COLLECTIBLE #5 and MEA REGISTRATION
Collectible #5 with Rosa Beatriz
Collectible #5 – an interview with Affiliate Board Chair, Rosa Beatriz Castañeda de Larios below is followed by a link for the MEA Assembly Guide. The Guide contains detailed information about this upcoming Co12 Assembly: The Maryknoll Mystique and Encounter
Collectible #5
This fifth and last Collectible leading to the August 2026 Maryknoll Ecclesial Assembly (MEA), highlights the interview on May 21, 2026, with Rosa Beatriz Castaneda de Larios, new Chairperson of the Maryknoll Affiliate Board, by Committee of 12 members, John Sivalon and Ellen McDonald. Rosa Beatriz says her life with Maryknoll began at age 7, in her native Guatemala. She notes a difference between those who grow up knowing Maryknoll through Maryknoll ministries in schools and parishes with either the Sisters or Fathers and Brothers, and those who come to know and join Maryknoll later in life. In her home country she has visited all the MK missions and has had contact with many Maryknollers. Rosa Beatriz speaks clearly and with conviction about the four pillars of the Affiliate expression of the Maryknoll Charism: spirituality - a way of being in relationship with God, with others, and with creation, not just prayers or rituals, but developing themes like justice, interculturality, etc; community – we need to learn about each other and how to develop our countries and world better; global vision – know what is going on around the world and approach this together; and action – care about others, helping in different places with different options, depending on needs. We see how the Maryknoll charism works - with service, friendship, justice and solidarity.
After graduation as a teacher from Monte Maria, the Maryknoll Sisters’ school in Guatemala City, Rosa Beatriz worked with a Maryknoll Father as a volunteer for a year. Much later, after a career of teaching and even being Principal of Monte Maria, for the first time, she heard about the MK Affiliates from Sister Connie Pospisil from the Sisters’ small Contemplative Community presence in Guatemala at the time. Then Fr. Tom Goeckler, now deceased, who was working with at-risk youth in Guatemala City, visited her saying, “you have it! You need to be an Affiliate!” Rosa Beatriz and friends decided to become Affiliates. She says at present there are 52 Affiliates in Guatemala and more than 200 in all of Latin America. In the beginning and for two years, Rosa Beatriz translated the Affiliate newsletter, “Not So Far Afield,” to keep communication alive among the chapters. Gradually she recognized the need for a Spanish edition unique to the Latin America context and experience. The Spanish “No tan lejos del horizonte” now comes out four times a year, connecting the Latin American chapters. Rosa Beatriz envisions further growth of the Affiliates in Africa and Asia and hopes that the contexts of those areas can be incorporated much more into the Affiliate movement. She speaks of the need to be more intentionally international and intercultural, as well as intergenerational.
In regard to internal and external encounter in Maryknoll, Rosa Beatriz looks forward to the MEA and to meetings like the JML (Maryknoll’s “Joint Meeting of Leadership”) where Maryknollers look at the world and its needs together. She finds that in many ways things are still U.S.-centered and that can affect our external encounters. Also we have to learn to be Maryknoll, not just our particular expression. This is our opportunity in society to transform and be transformed. How do we encounter realities like why people are living longer, or that young people have a different experience of life that needs to be listened to? The Affiliates are part of the Maryknoll family and charism. Together we can model for the whole people of God what Pope Francis saw and Pope Leo encourages in the Synod Process: through baptism we are a co-responsible community of missionary disciples. Maryknoll is our medium for realizing that. Rosa Beatriz says her hope and intent is to work with the Affiliate Board as a team, with everyone taking responsibility, to move the Affiliate Expression of Maryknoll to also be international and intercultural.
MARYKNOLL COMMITTEE OF TWELVE (Co12): Ann Carr, Kylene Fremling, Fred Goddard, Joe Healey, Claudette LaVerdiere, Rich Lessard, Ellen McDonald, Len Montiel, Sami Scott, Bob Short, John Sivalon, Ken Thesing.
REGISTRATION LINK:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1r7kjyerAv9Oam-XnaHpS-kxAxycNAS08DW73X6GRETU/edit