Jesus, the Good Shepherd, has called us to live in union with him and continue His redemptive mission in the Church. God has consecrated us for this purpose through the gift of His love poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit. Our consecration, which is deeply rooted in baptism, turns us to the father in love and gives us totally to Christ’s saving work. We live these inseparable realities of our vocation in community through prayer, sisterly love, the evangelical counsels and the vow of zeal.
The father, who is rich in mercy, sent His son to bring good news to the poor, to set free the oppressed, to heal the contrite of heart, to seek and to save what was lost. Through the church, Jesus continues to encompass with love all afflicted with human weakness. He looks for the lost one, brings back the strayed, tends the injured and makes the weak strong. He reveals God’s mercy through a love which overcomes all sin and infidelity.
The Church entrusts to us a share in her mission of reconciliation. This demands an awareness that we ourselves are always in need of conversion. In our unceasing return to our compassionate God, we discover the depth of our sinfulness and in openness to God’s initiative of love we find mercy. United with all people in their struggle with sin and in their need for reconciliation, we witness among them to the power of this mercy.
The continued experience of mercy in all aspects of our lives sends us to be a presence of Jesus, the Good Shepherd. We are envoys for Him; God is appealing through us and the appeal that we make in his name is: be reconciled to God.
Our relationship with those we meet should be for them a means of encounter with Jesus the Good Shepherd. We seek to approach them as he does. Each person is present to him in human uniqueness, and he calls each one friend. Our love should awaken in them a sense of their worth and dignity as children of God. At the same time, we are aware that we receive mercy from them and that we cannot separate our salvation from theirs.