After almost a month of vacation and another of communitarian immersion, before the academic year starts towards the end of September, the young Augustinian recollect religious who are still in their stage of formation spend each year three weeks of study and assimilation of their own subject matter. In the formation centers of study they receive class in Sacred Scripture, theology and other ecclesiastical subjects. The weeks in this summer meeting was dedicated in reinforcing the knowledge on St. Augustine and the history and recollect spirituality.
In Salamanca
This year there were 32 and they started in August 30, to be able to finish three weeks after; particularly, the Friday of September 18. The chosen place was the monumental Salamanca; the old theologate house of St. Thomas of Villanova.
The first week was focused on St. Augustine. The speaker, as in other occasions, was Enrique Eguiarte, who continued with the thematic cycle which he developed through these years. This time he touched on the theological works par excellence: The City of God and The Trinity. For five days, Eguairte showed the circumstances and outline of each of the works, and a selection of the principal texts, which between themselves they read and commented.
Ángel Martínez Cuesta
The second block is normally set aside for the history of the Order. And this has also been this time, with the only exemption on the morning of Monday, in which the Dominican Ricardo Carballeda led a reflection on the The religious life and the contemporary society.
Towards the afternoon of that day, September 7, another took charge, the assiduous for these summer programs, the Augustinian recollect Angel Martinez Cuesta. This year was highly awaited with a special expectation, in having just published the second volume of the History of the Augustinian Recollects (Madrid, Avgvstinvs, 1098 pages). The book scrutinizes the history of the Order in the XIX century and is a product of a lifetime work of research.
No better than the author himself can indicate the key in reading and ways of interpreting a very complex text. For the entire Church as well as for the Order, the XIX century can be described as a disaster. The young religious gathered in Salamanca -the recollects of the XXI century- had the privilege of contrasting their life and convictions with figures and circumstance of the past which, thanks to the book that they just read, start to come to light.
Exercises
The remaining third week was dedicated as usual to the spiritual exercises. It could be said that this is the central part, for being a time of assimilation, of interiorization of what was just gathered from the previous weeks. It was even more than that, this time would like to expressly show and to make an update of the mechanisms of interiority and revitalization.
A very delicate job was given to a well-known specialist in spiritual theology, Fr. Saturnino Gamarra, professor of the Faculty of Theology in northern Spain, capital of Vitoria. And an atmosphere very fitting for this purpose was the Residence Villa Santa Monica, the house of spirituality that the Agustinas Misioneras have opened in Becerril de la Sierra (Madrid).