Year after year the Augustinian Recollects celebrate the feast of St. Joseph with great devotion being the protector of the Order, but this year the feast of the Holy Patriarch had something special. In the old monastery of Veruela, about 12 kilometers from Tarazona (Zaragoza, Spain), the Recollect Eusebio Hernandez Sola was ordained bishop, and the whole Augustinian Recollect family –present with their prayers– took part in it. The prior general of the Order, Miguel Miro, together with some members of his council, came to Veruela all the way from Rome. Three former priors general, namely, Javier Ruiz, Javier Pipaón y Javier Guerra, joined in the celebration. The four priors provincial with seats in Spain, together with Norberto Escobar, prior of the Augustinian Recollects in Colombia, graced the affair too. Sr. Miriam Neira, general superior of the Augustinian Recollect Missionaries, came as well. Religious from the different communities in Spain were also present, even some from Colombia and Italy. The universality of the Order was rather more highlighted by the presence of the fourteen Augustinian Recollect bishops coming from the United States, México, Costa Rica, Panamá, Colombia, Peru and Brasil. The formands of Las Rozas (Madrid) and the novices of Monteagudo (a town just six kilometers from Tarazona) and a good number of the members of the Augustinian Recollect Secular Fraternity came too.
Gratitude
The new bishop of Tarazona, in his first address, made the words of St. Augustine his own: “With you I am a Christian, for you I am a bishop. Being a Christian is for one’s own benefit; being a bishop is solely for you… I tremble at the thought of who I am for you but I get relief in being with you.” He capsulized the goal of his episcopate using the words of the late Pope John Paul II, when he defined the Church as “house and school of communion”. He emphasized the meaning of his episcopal motto: "Caritas in veritate", very Augustinian, where charity is the oven in which the human relations mature and where the truth of God is discerned.
Eusebio Hernández ended his message with a special mention of his Recollect brothers: “I would like to thank the Order of Augustinian Recollects. Thank you for everything that you have done to me. Thanks to the Order, now I am here as pastor of the beloved diocese of Tarazona."
Personalities
With the Cathedral of Tarazona still under renovation for years now, the great date was set to be in Veruela at 11 o’clock in the morning. Eusebio Hernández Sola was ordained in a solemn ceremony that brought together 45 bishops, 200 priests and over 1,200 faithful. It was presided by the consecrating prelate, Manuel Monteiro de Castro, secretary for the Congregation of Bishops and the co-consecrating prelates were Renzo Fratini, apostolic nuncio in Spain, and Manuel Ureña, archbishop of Zaragoza. Together with them was the former bishop of Tarazona, Demetrio Fernández, now bishop of Córdoba, and Cardinal Francisco Álvarez, who also served as bishop of the place in 1973–1976. Archbishop João Bras de Aviz, prefect of the Congregation for the Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life (CIVCSVA), where the new bishop worked for 35 years, came purposely all the way from Rome.