209 recognize him by their appropriate garb. I’ve seen the respect with which they looked at a nun who continues to wear her habit, in spite of the trend to abandon their religious garb for the sake of comfort and alleged ease in apostolic work, prevailing until recently among the American consecrated women. Thus, it’s a small wonder that religious orders with strong structures, expressive charism, and the wearing of the religious garb have the most vocations in the United States, regardless of the crisis of religious life so often spoken of. Even though it’s silent, the religious garb gives a very strong and inspiring witness of life for Christ on the road of a concrete religious charism. Unfortunately, I must note here with sadness the latest drastic decrease of vocations to our religious family in many provinces of our Congregation. I think that Blessed Fr. Renovator’s great openness affords us this manner of thinking. In his Spiritual Diary, he noted on October 27, 1910: “May all our thoughts, desires, and longings be directed toward that one goal: to bring Christ everywhere, to restore all things in His Spirit, to glorify the name of the Catholic Church in every place. In order to achieve this, we should make use of any lawful and worthy means available to us: the cassock of the priest or the habit of the Religious or, if need be, the clothes of the layman; we can use every trade, profession, every fi eld of learning or labor–and even our own blood–everything that is good and created by God can be used, if need be, for the greater glory of God and for the good of the Church.” The world changes, so too the face of the modern Church changes, in spite of our likes or dislikes. I believe that, in order to remain faithful to the spirit of our Marian Renovator, we must continuously adjust our life and apostolate so that we may respond creatively to the changes that happen all around us. Paweł Naumowicz, MIC Poland, Warsaw-Stegny, Provincial Superior The beatifi cation… The majority of confreres from the Divine Providence Province wished to participate in the beatifi cation; and indeed the majority participated. Many joined in its preparations. The majority rejoiced in the very fact of the beatifi cation while the preceding preparations and works united us all even further. It seemed at fi rst, that the beatifi cation was the crowning of a long process. We were saying: “Finally, after 300 years…” However, later we begun to understand that the beatifi cation is not just the crowning of all of the prayers and endeavors, but also the beginning of a renewal. It is not a “return” but a starting point towards something new.
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