“A tree without roots cannot withstand the storm.“

It is a truth the SMA knows well. And some few days before the Plenary Council 2026, the Superior General, Fr François du PENHOAT and the Provincial Superior of Nigeria, Fr Emmanuel DIM, chose to go back to the roots, literally.

Before the meetings begin, before the agendas are set and the decisions are made, they travelled to Topo Island, where some of the early missionaries of the SMA and the OLA Sisters lie buried, men and women who gave everything to plant the Gospel on this soil. It was not a ceremonial detour. It was a deliberate act of remembrance, of gratitude, and of trust.

In many African traditions, no important undertaking begins without first turning to the ancestors, those who have walked the path before, whose lives have shaped the ground on which the living now stand. That is precisely what happened at Topo Island. Before a single participant takes their seat in the Council hall on Monday, the gathering was first entrusted to those who can no longer speak, but whose witness continues to say everything.

At the tombs, the Superior General spoke of entrustment. This Plenary Council, its deliberations, its decisions, its outcomes, was entrusted to the memory and example of those early missionaries.

The Provincial Superior of Nigeria echoed the same spirit, commending the meeting to them as one would commend a journey to a trusted elder : not out of superstition, but out of deep continuity with a living tradition.

The Superior General also paused to name what these graves represent: sacrifice. These were men who left their homelands, crossed oceans, and in many cases never returned. They gave their health, their comfort, their years, and ultimately their lives to a mission that was not yet finished, and still is not. Their tombs on Topo Island are not monuments to the past. They are reminders that mission has always carried a cost.

And that cost, the Superior General noted, does not belong only to another century. It belongs to this one as well. Mission, he reflected, has always been linked to sacrifice. The form of that sacrifice may change with time, but each generation is asked to give something of itself so that the mission may continue to grow and reach new people.

The faces around the Council table on Monday will be different. The languages, the challenges, the countries will be different. But the call remains the same: to give something of ourselves for a mission greater than ourselves. The sacrifice takes a different shape today, in the choices made, the priorities set, the generosity demanded of each Unit and each person, but it is no less real.

There is something quietly profound in the fact that, prior to the official opening of the 2026 Plenary Council, the Superior General and the Provincial Superior of Nigeria chose to gather at these tombs on Topo Island, not to deliver speeches or participate in formal sessions, but in silence and prayer.

It was a personal act, not a ceremony. And yet it sets a tone. It says that what is about to happen in that Council hall is not merely institutional. It is spiritual. It is historical. It is part of a long chain of men and women who chose, in their own time and in their own way, to give themselves to something that mattered.

The early missionaries now rest at Topo Island. But the mission they began continues, and on Monday, the Society gathers once again to decide how those roots will continue to grow.

Brice Ulrich AFFERI