75 Years of Mission in Angola: Bishop Urges Catholic Sisters to Serve With Renewed Commitment

He emphasized that consecrated life is ultimately a grace received from God.

“More than being a gift that you give to God, it is God who gives you this grace,” he said, urging the Sisters to “embrace this new stage with availability to participate, collaborate, work and serve.”

Bishop Jaca also underscored the importance of fraternity in Religious life, saying that community relationships can become a powerful witness in a society marked by division.

“Brothers are not chosen; we choose friends, but we accept brothers as they are,” he said, explaining that the difficulties of living together can help consecrated women develop “patience, forgiveness, tolerance and acceptance of others.”

The Catholic Bishop urged the Sisters to make their community life a witness of communion amid differences.

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“You are called to be a fraternal community, welcoming differences that do not create division but sow harmony and fraternity,” he said, adding, “How good it is when brothers live in communion.”

He further appealed for sharing of goods and resources among Religious Communities, particularly in situations where some communities have greater needs than others.

“Everything means precisely everything: the ‘I’ disappears to make room for the ‘we’,” Bishop Jaca said, emphasizing that sharing should also include income and should serve the good of the entire community.

He said, “Sharing generates fraternity and solidarity. In religious life, no expression says ‘each one for himself and God for all’; it is ‘all for all.’” 

The Bishop also called on the faithful to recognize their responsibility to support Religious Communities and the wider mission of the Church.

“We, as a Christian community, need to become aware of this commitment,” he said, noting that “Priests, Religious Men and Religious Women are at the service of the people and need the collaboration of Christians to continue carrying out their mission.”

He encouraged the faithful to contribute according to their means to the support of clergy, Religious Communities and the formation of vocations.

“Help in whatever way you can,” Bishop Jaca appealed, announcing the preparation of a Pastoral Note on the self-sustainability of the Church in Benguela and calling for the generous collaboration of the Christian community.

The Bishop also linked the Jubilee to the missionary growth of the Catholic Church in Angola, noting that the country’s growing Church is increasingly able to share missionaries with other Churches.

“We are already a Church that is growing, becoming established, and already sharing what we have—our missionaries, men and women—with other Churches,” he said.

The Congregation was founded on September 9, 1951, in Kamulemba, at Kola Catholic Mission in Angola, by Fr. Roberto Harder, a Swiss Priest and Missionary of Our Lady of La Salette. 

He began the work with young women destined for missionary, catechetical, and formation service.

The Congregation subsequently grew in Angola and expanded its mission to other countries, later becoming a Congregation of Pontifical Right.

As the Sisters mark 75 years of their presence and mission in Angola, Bishop Jaca called them to place Christ at the centre of their renewed commitment and to trust in God’s providence.

“Seek the Kingdom of God, Jesus, Jesus, and everything else will be given to you by Christ, without fear,” he said.