CONCLUSION

31. The intention of this Instruction is to confirm the Church's high esteem for the wholly contemplative life of cloistered nuns, and to reaffirm her concern to safeguard its authentic nature, “that this world may never be without a ray of divine beauty to lighten the path of human existence”. (⁹⁴)

May the Holy Father Pope John Paul II's words of blessing be of support and encouragement to all cloistered contemplatives: “As the Apostles, gathered in prayer with Mary and the other women in the Upper Room, were filled with the Holy Spirit (cf. Acts 1:14), so the community of the faithful hopes today to be able to experience, thanks also to your prayer, a renewed Pentecost for a more effective Gospel testimony on the threshold of the Third Millennium. Dear Sisters, I entrust to Mary, faithful Virgin and House consecrated to God, your Communities and each one of you. May the Mother of the Lord grant that from your monasteries a ray of that light which enveloped the world when the Word was made flesh and came to live among us should shine forth again!”. (⁹⁵)

On 1 May 1999, the Holy Father approved this present document of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, and authorized its publication.

From the Vatican, 13 May 1999, the Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord.

Eduardo Card. Martínez Somalo
Prefect

Piergiorgio Silvano Nesti
Secretary