RITE OF DIVESTITURE BEFORE TEMPORARY PROFESSION

Novitiate Director: My dear brothers, (name of novices), You have already

completed your novitiate formation. It is with great joy that
we thank God for journeying with you throughout the
novitiate year, helping you when you felt weak, guiding
you when you seemed to be lost, and finally bringing you
to this moment of being approved by the Minister
Provincial to make the temporary profession of vows.

We sincerely thank you for giving yourselves as our

brothers in the novitiate; we thank you for your patience
and forgiveness for our mistakes; and most of all we thank
you for trusting us your formators, as your guides and co-
journeyer.

Very soon you will make your steps towards making the
temporary profession of vows. Before you do, we ask you to
return to us the things that were given to you in the
novitiate to aid you in your formation.

Frist, we ask you to return to us the novitiate manual.

Novices: (Together) Dear brother (name of novitiate director), we

humbly return to you this novitiate manual, / which has
provided us direction and guidance / helping us to grow in
our vocation as novices. / With it we have become what we
are now, / with the help of God.

(The novices returned the novitiate manual to the director)

Novitiate Director: In about the one year ago, when the Minister
Provincial accepted you to the Novitiate formation, you
were given the habit and a cord of probation. Now that you
have finished the year of learning, testing and trying the
Franciscan life, we ask you to return toi us now the habit
of probation which you are still wearing.

Novices: (They take off their habits, fold them neatly and hold them
like an offering. Together they say…)

Dear brother (name of novitiate director), we have been

priviledged to wear this habit of probation / for the
 duration of our novitiate formation. / In it, / we
experienced the warm embrace of St. Francis of Assisi /
who inspired us to commit ourselves to God / through
living the life that he had begun.

(They give the habits to the novitiate director)

Novitiate Director: Thank you my dear brothers…

Now, you are no longer novices. And you are not yet friars,
although only for a short while. At this moment you have
returned to your state as lay persons who are in the world.
You are like the rich young man who was told by the Lord
Jesus to go back, to sell what you have and give to the
poor. And this is just exactly what you will now do. As a
sign of your honest intention to follow the Lord Jesus by
living the vows of obedience, chastity, and poverty we ask
you now to entrust your property, your possessions, your
treasures to the person of your own choosing.

(One by one the novices read and sign their affidavits.)

Novices: (Facing the altar, together they say:)

Now we can truly say / that we have nothing of our own, /

except the love of God who called us / to this way of life. /
Humbly we submit ourselves to him, / to his live / and to
his providence.

Director: Brothers, the Lord Jesus said: “Anyone who leaves home
or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or
fields for my sake and for the gospel, will receive much
more in this present age. He will receive a hundred times
more houses, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, children
and fields. And in the age to come he will receive eternal
life.

Go forward without turning back. The loving arms of the

Father are open wide to welcome you.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit.
All: AMEN.

(Everyone will give their approval by a round of applause.

An appropriate song may be sung.)