Missionary Meditation December 2006

Sailing towards new shores

The Superiors General of male religious orders meet twice a year. This November was the first time that we shared part of our gathering with the Superiors General of female religious congregations. The theme chosen was: "Together for the Kingdom". The 150 gathered participants talked about working together. I had expected openness to the idea of collaboration but the energy with which the participants pleaded for doing things on an inter-congregational level, struck me.

It should not have surprised me too much. Recently, two common projects were presented to both unions of superiors general, women (UISG) and men (USG), and both met with a great deal of interest. The projects are:

• The mapping of all the activities of religious, caring for AIDS victims. This has been a work in progress for the whole of 2006 and is being pursued, in order to have a stronger voice among the different organizations involved with AIDS, especially the United Nations. The Catholic Church is the single most important player in helping people affected by AIDS but because we are not united, we have less access to resources and often just get bad press - to the detriment of the people whom we serve.
  
  
• The request, coming from the bishops conference of Southern Sudan, to help build up their country and their church, in particular founding a teachers' training college, a training hospital and giving other kinds of help. Among the congregations, a decision on concrete steps will be taken in 2007.

Both of these projects are larger than what any single congregation can afford, not even if it were among the strongest ones. Confronted with several of today's important mission needs, we realize that collaboration is called for. Certain things can only be done together; we must go beyond our own turf. Beyond the two projects above, there are a number of tasks that call for collaboration, and luckily, in some areas there is already a good tradition of working together. We need to collaborate, and are doing so to some extent, in academic teaching, in representation at the United Nations, in providing nursing care for infirm religious, in training formators and treasurers, as well as many other examples.

Of course, questions also arise. What about our identity, our charism? Who should offer the leadership? - everyone's project could easily become nobody's project if responsibility is not assigned. Which models of sharing aspects of our community life are appropriate? How is the important place of laity seen in this type of collaboration?

One of the deeper questions asked at the meeting was: do such big projects not just sound like business, like multinational corporations - with spirituality left out? This is a question which needs to be answered from the heart. I do not believe that those who challenged us to dare to succor those suffering of Aids, or build up the church and the society of post-war Southern Sudan, were "unspiritual" in their approach. Rather the voices sounded to me, as a call to part from a comfortable, limited vision of our life and to "go out onto the high sea". It sounded like Advent. In this present world, many people of good will are working to respond to the needs of today's poor, both physical and spiritual. Religious congregations can and must be part of it, but this is possible only if they learn to work in closer collaboration among themselves and with others.

Someone reminded us that in the Eastern Christian tradition, all the religious, were basically seen as one; only in the West have we spread out into so many different orders and congregations. It is time to remember our basic, common call to this special, vowed life of celibacy and community (these are the two elements that some see as essential). A new wind is blowing, let us set sail for new shores at the service of God's Kingdom that is to come.