(Mumbai) Another big day for the Redemptoristine nuns at Dublin on Saturday 11th December as Sr. Shital made her First Profession as a Redemptoristine Nun. Sr. Shital is the first Indian Nun in the cloistered order. The ceremony took place on 11 December and was presided over by Archbishop Dermot Farrell.
Shital Gonsalves is the first Indian to take solemn vows among the Redemptoristines, a contemplative religious family founded in 1731 by Maria Celesta Crostarosa together with St Alphonsus Maria de Liguori. Two other young Indian women are completing their training in the Redemptoristine convent in Dublin. “We hope and pray that these three young Redemptoristines will come to open the first-ever Redemptoristine Monastery in Mumbai, India,” said Fr Ivel Mendanha, provincial superior of the Redemptorists, the Redemptoristines’ male counterpart, already present in the Indian metropolis.
Shital Gonsalves comes from Pali. Together with two brothers and three sisters, she grew up at Our Lady of Lourdes parish. She got a Bachelor of Arts and decided to embrace the religious life. “I never thought of becoming a Redemptoristine,” she told AsiaNews. “I wanted to consecrate myself to God in religious life, but in an active congregation.”
However, ‘while reflecting on this, I heard an inner voice telling me: ‘I call you to be an instrument through prayer’. During my discernment, I realized that the Lord had other plans for me and I answered him with a yes.” Her training in Dublin lasted three years. “Unfortunately, my parents were unable to participate in my first profession, but they were in spirit with me,” she said.
(A warm welcome to the newest postulant Nilima)
“I feel that I have undertaken an incredibly brave choice. As a Redemptoristine, together with my sisters, I want to be a living memory of Christ the Redeemer for everyone. And this is an experience that is changing me day after day.”
(Courtesy: AsiaNews)
