EUROPE/ITALY - Padre Steckling re-elected Superior general of the Oblate Missionaries of Mary Immaculate for another six years - “He sent me to evangelise the poor” the motto Saint Eugenio de Mazenod chose for his missionaries

Rome (Fides Service) - The Oblate Missionaries of Mary Immaculate have re-elected Father. Guglielmo Steckling Superior General for another six year term. On 15 September the General Chapter meeting in Rome, confirmed Father Steckling with 86 votes out of 97. Father Steckling is 57 . He was born in 1947 at Verl, in the diocese of Paderborn, Germany and he first encountered the Oblates when they came to give a parish mission in his town. Ordained a priest in 1974, in the same year he was sent to Paraguay, in what was then the Vice-province of the Oblates in Pilcomayo, where he worked in a parish and in the field of formation of Oblates. Twice he was elected provincial in Pilcomayo. In 1992 the general chapter elected him second assistant to the Superior General, Father Marcello Zago, whom he succeeded in 1998, when Father Zago was appointed Secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples.
The 34th general chapter of the Oblate Missionaries of Mary Immaculate is reflecting on the theme "Witnesses of hope: a call, our mission", opened on 30 August. Some 97 Oblates are taking part. Founded by St Eugenio de Mazenod, today there are 4,500 OMI missionaries working in 70 different countries, involved in mission in various fields: first evangelisation, new evangelisation, interreligious dialogue, national reconciliation justice and peace... Recently the congregations was recognised as NGO by the United Nations. (S.L.) (Agenzia Fides 16/9/2004; Righe 17; Parole 220)