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Letter Convoking the 3rd Provincial Chapter of the PASS Province, Philippines

February 25, 2009
Ash Wednesday

My dear brothers in Christ,

Our Legislation number 54 states that “The Provincial Chapter is to be held every four(4) years. The Chapter shall be convoked by the Provincial with the approval of the General Superior at least three(3) months in advance”

Let me quote three more points from our Legislations;

Number 55 “The ex-officio members of the Chapter shall be the following. The Superior General or his delegate who presides over the Chapter with the right to vote and to confirm the elections. The Provincial and his Consultors, the General Consultors, the General Consultor who is the liaison between the Generalate and the province who have a consultative voice only. If the General Consultor is a member of the Province, he has active and passive voice, according to the norms of the General Legislation.

Number 56 “all religious of the Province in Final vows are members of the Chapter. Active voice is enjoyed only by those present according to the norms of common law.

Number 57 “All religious of the Province in temporary commitment are granted the right to choose one of their members as a non-voting observer to the Chapter. There may be one observer for every five (5) members in temporary vows or major part thereof. The Province with the approval of the General or his delegate may invite other religious in temporary commitment to be present as non-voting observers.

It is meaningful that we will hold this 2009 3rd Provincial Chapter while our Congregation is in the process of taking a major project on Restructuring.

Here in our Province we felt the constant need for Restructuring for greater life and vitality. After years of evaluating our life in the Province, we found many elements on Community, Apostolate, Finance, Administration, Formation which are both life giving and life draining, hence potential factors to either break and make our local life in our respective local communities.

The 2005 Provincial Chapter gave the new Council a task to evaluate and eliminate elements in our way of life which impede growth and development and put all life giving and vital ones into a Manual form. The process then became a communal one rather than just the task of the Council. This endeavor took us four years. We have seen, we have judged things in our religious life and once approved by the 2009 Provincial Chapter, the task of the new Council is to put the elements in the Manual into action.

The Manual contains series of do’s and don’ts, policies and guidelines but we believe that what we have written there came from our years of religious lived-experience. In that case we believe that the Manual in general is an impetus for greater life and vitality in our local communities.

We have invited Fr. Clemente Barrón not just as our facilitator but also as our General Consultor in PASPAC. We have reserved one afternoon for him to share a conference on leadership.

With this, I convoke the Provincial Chapter to be held in Holy Cross spiritual Center, Calumpang, General Santos City, from 11th to the 15th of May in this year of grace 2009.

One with you in Christ Crucified,



Edwin S. Flor, C.P.
Provincial