For Vincent de Paul, community life enabled the Congregation to follow Jesus’s example, both in the work of evangelization and in the development of Christlike virtues that supported the work. To be effective missionaries—to travel and to share the life of the poor while evangelizing them—confreres were to embrace poverty. They also were to model Christian behavior for others by demonstrating it among themselves; this was accomplished through the virtues of uniformity, patience, and fraternal charity. Uniformity meant that the confreres were to have the same judgments and practice. Patience called for the tolerance of each other’s faults and the awareness of one’s own faults. Fraternal charity was the most important virtue. Confreres had to show each other Christian love to spread that love through missions. The order of the day is described to show how virtues were to be cultivated. The regimentation of community life and the ways it contributed to the apostolate are also explained
