We were born of a call that resounded with force after a General Assembly in the Provinces of Spain. It led us to go further, to other human and geographical frontiers, where people’s dignity is most threatened. From that listening, a concrete way of life gradually took shape: an interprovincial community that later evolved into an itinerant mission, with the desire to remain attentive to the movement of the Spirit and to the reality that challenged us wherever the poor were found.
The first stage of this journey began in Melilla, a borderland marked by migration, transit, and waiting. There, we learned to accompany with closeness, to share life with migrants—especially young people—and to respond to their most basic needs in a complex, changing, and deeply human context. The arrival of Sister Lupita, through Lumière, was also a gift to the community, enriching fraternal life and the mission throughout the entire journey with her presence, outlook, and availability.
In time, as reception conditions in Melilla improved and migration routes shifted, we discerned a new call requiring an urgent response: the mountain families affected by the 2023 Marrakech earthquake. The Community moved there and, for two years, in collaboration with Caritas Marrakech, we took part in reconstruction, empowerment, and development projects in the villages of the Moroccan Atlas. We were also awaited there, in the parish with the Franciscan Fathers, by the growing number of sub-Saharan migrant youth. We expanded the mission by offering them welcome, care, and accompaniment, listening to stories woven with suffering and hope.
As the earthquake project was coming to an end and the work with migrants was being continued by a team of volunteers, we once again questioned the call that had once resounded so strongly. We listened anew to the underlying question: where today does the frontier ask for our presence? We engaged in shared discernment together with the Visitatrices and the General Councillor. In that process, the significant increase in small-boat arrivals to the Balearic Islands and the shortage of reception resources pointed toward a new horizon. On 29 September, the Visitatrices communicated to us the sending of the community to Mallorca.
Today, our mission takes shape in direct work with migrants at the border, collaborating especially with the Red Cross, which allows us to be on the front line in welcoming small boats and integrating into services with Caritas. At each arrival, we seek to offer more than a material response: we strive to humanise every gesture, to safeguard dignity in every encounter, to offer real closeness, and to uphold hope amid fragility.
This journey—Melilla, Marrakech, Mallorca—is not a succession of destinations, but one single path woven of fidelity to the vocation received from God, in the today of the poor: to go out… to go toward… to meet those who ask to be welcomed and recognized in their dignity, and “may feel that Jesus’ words are meant for them: ‘I have loved you’” (Rev 3:9; Dilexi Te, no. 121).
