After recently attending the Bicentennial celebrations, the Communications Office interviews Sister Rosa Vanessa, from the Province of Peru, about her vocation, her community life, and her hopes for the future.
How was your first experience of the call to embrace your vocation as a contemplative sister of the Good Shepherd? What led you to respond to that call?
I discovered this path with God through an evolving journey, rooted in a personal and intimate relationship with him. It was born from a deep need for inner peace and from the desire to give myself and serve in a different way, through prayer for our most vulnerable sisters and brothers, with whom our congregation and the entire Church work. Many of them need that encounter with the merciful God who surprises us each day with the great heart of a Father and a Mother.
I was deeply touched by the charism centered on mercy and compassion, which seeks justice and human dignity and reveals the tender love of God. I was also drawn by the two expressions of life: apostolic action and prayerful action, which mutually sustain one another in continuing the heritage of our holy foundress, Saint Mary Euphrasia Pelletier. In founding us, she entrusted us with being like the Good Shepherd who goes in search of the l'autre.
For those who are not familiar with contemplative life, how would you describe your daily rhythm?
Contemplative life, oriented toward depth and lived in the simplicity of being, is beautiful. Our own life, when complemented by the liturgy, speaks to us of the beauty of God and invites us to cultivate it in our daily activity and in who we are. We follow a balanced rhythm in which silence, prayer, and spiritual reading are given priority; this also includes periods of Bible study and other tasks we may need to learn, helping us enter more deeply into the spirit before we carry out external activities.
We have moments of work which we carry out faithfully, without losing the spirit of contemplation that shapes our way of life, and we also share in fraternal community life. Our cultures, gifts, and creativity make it possible to laugh together and to enjoy what life gives us: friendship and the love of God.
At the same time, contemplative life is not isolated from the world; it is a prayerful presence that sustains the apostolic mission. This prayerful impulse accompanies the work of our mission. God is so generous when one speaks to his great heart, and from this encounter merciful love flows forth. Our life, though seemingly hidden, becomes visible through the depth of our relationship with God, allowing us to accompany others spiritually and, when necessary, through direct presence—opening our communities to embrace the realities of the world which seek closer accompaniment. As contemplatives, faithful to the charism, we remain attentive and ready to respond with concrete action when needed. “The Good Shepherd goes in search of the lost sheep”: we carry out a silent apostolate of prayer that is transformed into concrete action.
How have the prayer and presence of contemplative sisters quietly sustained the mission of the Good Shepherd and strengthened those who serve on the front lines of the apostolate?
By integrating apostolic action and contemplative action, our shared search for the face of God—through prayer, silence, and daily work, centered on the mission—makes us aware that we are instruments of God’s reconciliation and mercy. Through the vow of zeal and our constitutional cloistered way of life, we participate deeply in the projects carried out by our congregation and the Church, inserted into the reality of human suffering.
Through the works of the congregation, contemplative life is fulfilled in a prayer that is fruitful and incarnate, in hospitality, and in deep listening to many sisters and brothers.
In a world that values visibility and speed, what does contemplative life teach us about love, freedom, and what truly endures?
Contemplative life, in its silence, reveals the sacredness of oneself—not as something self-consuming, but as a human being who is loved, and created to continue giving love. Only by loving can we reach the freedom our being longs for: a freedom that connects desires and actions, that allows us to co-create and to continue giving life even amid our vulnerabilities and fragilities. When we enter into them, we can observe the strength of the soul that is consumed in the mystery of the unimaginable, where grace alone is sufficient for liberation.
What did the Bicentennial celebrations mean to you personally? How did they affect you?
They were truly an experience of deep gratitude in my heart and soul; it was like building a poem made up of verses dedicated to each stage and each theme, where God surprised me in every moment of listening—heart and mind—unlearning and learning anew, in a celebratory way, the gift of my contemplative vocation and the constant call that I continue to receive in the context in which I live. A renewing breath remained, encouraging me to keep walking, sharing life and hope. I say “remained,” yet this experience, this moment, continues to make history, woven into the great heart of God and of the universe.
Looking back on my religious life and on the 200 years of the contemplative branch, I feel deeply grateful for God’s fidelity throughout all this time, for being part of this great Good Shepherd family, for the memory of belonging to a sacred history of love—suffered, discerned, and lived in God’s sight—and for the richness of being an international congregation. I am grateful because God called me to this specific vocation, accomplishing his work in me.
Along its journey, contemplative life leaves a mark of God’s gratuitous love, becoming the sign that sustains the mission of the congregation and upon which the world rests, accompanying with tenderness and hospitality all who are in need. Looking toward the future, I believe that the contemplative dimension will fully develop with a grateful, fruitful, and transformed heart, becoming present in this changing reality as a witness of life and self-giving. The hope that sustains me is the heart of the mission. Living a life centered on God and on the search for what is essential sets us free in the dignity of being daughters and sons of God.
