Life of Study
“For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world: to bear witness to the truth.”
— John 18:37
In keeping with the Tradition of the Church, the brothers give philosophical and theological work a primary importance. Because of the great poverty of our world, which is first and foremost a poverty with regard to truth, the vocation of the brothers implies a human and philosophical formation. This formation enables them to prepare themselves in the best possible way for the reception, in faith, of the Revelation of the Person of Christ in all its light. Without this light, the world remains in darkness: “I am the light of the world,” declares Jesus (Jn 8:12).
The fraternal life of the brothers of Verbum Spei is the privileged place for the exercise of their hope. This exercise of hope is nourished by the Word of God, which the brothers seek to receive by the personal and communitarian study of Sacred Scripture and Lectio Divina.
Sensitive to the urgency of announcing the joy of the Gospel to all those who have lost Hope and do not know Christ, the brothers want to be witnesses of Jesus, who died and rose again for all people, and to bring them the Good News of salvation with a profound respect for each person and their dignity, their situation, and their culture.
Through their various missions, and especially through their preaching, the brothers endeavor to bring to light the Word of God. They strive to share the thirst for truth that animates their faith, their charity, and their hope, in a world that no longer seeks God and yet thirsts for Him.
“Within the consecrated life itself there is a need for a renewed and loving commitment to the intellectual life, for dedication to study as a means of integral formation and as a path of asceticism which is extraordinarily timely, in the face of present-day cultural diversity.”
— John Paul II, Vita Consecrata, §98