108 of forfeiting God’s blessing, and in order to honor our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ’s thirst on the cross.”19 Those and other forms of mortifi cation were noted in The Rule of Life20 and his other writings. Today, we probably won’t return to fl agellation, many additional fasts or wooden sandals. It is certain, however, that we must accept both individually and communally some forms of mortifi cation that would help us to clear our minds and calm down senses. Maybe, instead of holding complete silence during meals, it would be worthwhile to accept the practice of not bringing our cell phones to meals, communal recreations or rooms. Maybe, instead of an absolute ban on bringing women into our monasteries, we ought to institute a moderate silence in all of the confreres’ rooms starting from a certain hour and involving the disconnection of telephones, e-mail, Internet, etc. For the building up and the deepening of our Marian identity, (the suffering and crucifi ed Christ; the Immaculate Conception of the BVM; praying for the dead and staying at the side of the dying; vows; community…), the Constitutions and Directory of the Congregation of Marian Fathers already provide many tools. They are: regular confession, the Eucharist, reading and sharing of the Word of God, devotions and forms of piety, communal retreats and renewals, etc. Clearly, some of them must be brought back into life, others—rejuvenated. I’m thinking here about quarterly interviews with the house superior; house meetings and conventions where, aside from organizational matters, we could discuss an appropriate topic, or share life experiences and our relations with God, with the Congregation, and with the house community. Very disquieting is the fact that we experience our deepening of faith far more frequently through personal quests or participation in retreats and communities outside of our Congregation than within it. The Marians of tomorrow (should they continue to exist and develop) are those who will more precisely defi ne their identity, who will better uncover their uniqueness planted by the Holy Spirit in the person of our Father Founder. They are the ones who will discern the charism and development of our Congregation, achieved by Divine grace throughout the centuries, by recognizing and responding to the signs of the times. We are not “masters of all trades.” Having learned God’s plan for our Congregation, its identity and its specifi city, we repudiate everything unrelated that adhered to us throughout the centuries; we undertake new challenges that God and the modern world present to us; we give specifi c nuance to all causes that we carry out today or will in the future. There is no sense to reform our apostolic works, if we don’t fi rst reform ourselves. 19 Bł. Stanisław Papczyński, Rozporządzenia dla Pustelni Korabiewskiej 5, in: Ibid., Pisma zebrane, p. 1507. Cf. Ibid.,, p. 3-9. 20 Cf. NV, IV.
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