Suchergebnisse

Over the review period covered by this report (2003-2012), the budget allocated to agriculture increased noticeably more than the sector's contribution to GDP. This reflects a notable effort by the Chad authorities to increase the budget to boost this sector's development in recent years. In this proactive context, Chad signed its CAADP compact in December 2013 to continue supporting agriculture's revival. The CAADP is being implemented in Chad even as the terms of the National Rural Sector Investment Program (PNISR, 2014-2020) are being finalized. Within the context of the CAADP, the Government of Chad (GOC) wished to undertake a review of public agriculture expenditures to learn from past budgetary implementation in this sector with a view to improving future program performance. Following a request by the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation (MoAI), the NEPAD planning and coordination agency gave Chad it's backing for this review. This process was undertaken by the Program for Strengthening National Comprehensive Agricultural Public Expenditure in Sub-Saharan Africa, co-financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the CAADP Multi-Donor Trust Fund. This program, implemented by the World Bank, aims to improve the impact of the still-limited public resources available to governments in Sub-Saharan Africa to foster agricultural development and reduce poverty in rural areas, where most of the poor in these countries, notably Chad, live. This study follows and builds upon a number of similar studies conducted in recent years on public expenditure management, in particular in Chad the Action Plan for the Modernization of Public Finances (PAMFIP). However, these studies have focused on budget management as a whole, and none to date has looked at the agricultural sector specifically.

Emerging market economies have been experiencing high credit growth and high delinquency rates amongst retail banking customers in recent years. However, collections practices have not always kept pace with this rapid growth; many collectors still rely on relatively unstructured processes and weak oversight frameworks. It is therefore important to consider how fair and ethical treatment of borrowers can be better promoted in these markets. To this end, International Finance Corporation (IFC) commissioned a study in 2009 to examine the question of what guiding principles should financial institutions follow to raise their responsible and ethical standards in collections. IFC has subsequently commissioned Oliver Wyman to study existing global retail debt collections practices and recommend tangible actions that lenders and collectors can take to promote responsible and ethical standards in the field. The conclusions of this study are based on field research conducted by IFC and Oliver Wyman, industry experts analysis and opinion, and a survey of institutions in 20 emerging markets.

Regulation and supervision of China's banking system has made impressive progress in the past few years, led by an activist, forward-looking regulator China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC), with a clear safety and soundness mandate that has been supported by banks and by the State. Less than fully compliant ratings in certain areas in this assessment generally reflect deficiencies in the legal framework, which can be amended, or that banks have yet to fully implement CBRC guidance. This assessment of the current state of the implementation of the Basel Core Principles for Effective Banking Supervision (BCP) in China has been completed as part of a Financial Sector Assessment Program (FSAP) undertaken jointly by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank between June 7 and June 25, 2010, and reflects the regulatory and supervisory framework in place as of the date of the completion of the assessment.

The Lao PDR has been a one-party, socialist state since the overthrow of the monarchy by the communist Pathet Lao in 1975, which was preceded by a long period of civil and regional strife. After a decade of relative isolation and close military cooperation with Vietnam, the new economic mechanism, introduced in 1986, ushered in an era of market-based reforms, which has continued to the present day. Lao PDR is one of the poorest countries in East Asia, with a 2006 per capita income of US$ 500. In 2004, 71 percent of its population of 5.7 million lived on less than US$ 2/day and 23 percent on less than US$ 1/day. However Lao PDR has grown rapidly since the inauguration of reforms two decades ago. During the 1990s growth averaged 6 percent per annum despite severe imbalances during the Asian crisis. Following successful stabilization, growth continued to average close to 6 percent during 2001-2004, accelerating in 2005-2007 to over 7 percent. Inflation remained well below 10 percent since 2005. Although Lao PDR qualifies for the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative, the Government has chosen to maintain normal creditor relations. The latest debt sustainability analysis confirms that, while risk of debt distress is high, medium term debt service is manageable, contingent on continued reform and prudent fiscal management. Foreign direct investment has almost quadrupled between 2004 and 2007, and exceeds US$ 800 million annually, mostly in hydropower and mining. Growth in Lao PDR has been pro-poor. Based on the national poverty line, the poverty headcount has fallen from almost half to one-third of the population during the decade ending in 2002-2003. The country's performance on other elements of poverty reduction as summarized in the millennium development goals is mixed.

España es líder Europea en la producción piscícola de rodaballo (Scophthalmus maximus) y, concretamente en Galicia supone una importante actividad económica y social, representando más del 60% de la producción de la Unión Europea. Debido a que uno de los mayores problemas en la acuicultura es el impacto negativo que tienen las enfermedades, en los últimos años se ha realizado un considerable esfuerzo en estudiar el sistema inmune de los peces cultivados, para poder desarrollar herramientas de lucha y prevención frente a estas. Incluso cuando enfermedades víricas, (como la causada por el virus de la septicemia hemorrágica viral (VHSV) (Tafalla et al., 1998)), bacterianas (como la causada por bacterias como Aeromonas sp (Toranzo et al., 1993)) o parasitarias (como la causada por Philasterides dicentrarchi (Iglesias et al., 2001)) han sido investigadas y se sabe que afectan a estos cultivos, poco se conoce sobre los mecanismos de defensa de estos animales contra los patógenos. Aunque se han llevado a cabo considerables esfuerzos para desarrollar vacunas convencionales o subunidades para muchos de estos patógenos de peces, su éxito ha sido muy limitado. Es conveniente que se introduzcan nuevos enfoques en la investigación concerniente a las vacunas, que proporcionen seguridad y eficacia frente a las enfermedades más importantes de los peces comerciales. Se conoce que en los peces el peso de la respuesta inmune no específica o innata es mayor que el que parece tener en mamíferos y por lo tanto, se confía más en su respuesta inmune innata que en la adaptativa para combatir las infecciones. Recientemente se ha descrito en vertebrados la existencia de mecanismos inmunes independientes de células B/T o "trained immunity" (TI), que previamente ya habían sido descritos en plantas e invertebrados. Sin embargo, la TI y su contribución a la protección frente agentes infecciosos en peces aún no ha sido explorada, aunque existen muchas evidencias que sugieren que es así. En este proyecto emplearemos dos especies de peces; el rodaballo (Scophthalmus maximus) y el pez cebra (Danio rerio), que emplearemos como herramienta de laboratorio para poder profundizar en el estudio de procesos básicos en los que sea difícil trabajar con especies comerciales. El pez cebra se ha empleado como modelo, tanto para el estudio de la respuesta inmune frente a enfermedades de los peces cultivados (Novoa et al., 2006; Rodríguez et al., 2008; Encinas et al., 2010; Novoa y Figueras, 2012), como para el estudio de procesos inflamatorios de gran interés para la salud humana, como el choque séptico y la tolerancia al lipopolisacárido bacteriano (LPS) (Novoa et al., 2009). Además, nos ha servido para estudiar la ontogenia del sistema inmune en peces (Dios et al., 2010; Varela et al., 2012 ). En este proyecto pretendemos profundizar en la modulación de la respuesta inflamatoria o innata frente a patógenos virales como el virus de la septicemia hemorrágica viral (VHSV), asociado con mortalidades de rodaballo o el SVCV, que se emplea como patógeno del pez cebra (Varela et al, 2014). - Dios S, Romero A, Chamorro R, Figueras A, Novoa B. 2010. Fish Shellfish Immunol, 29(6):1019-27. - Encinas P, Rodriguez-Milla MA, Novoa B, Estepa A, Figueras A, Coll J. 2010. BMC Genomics, 27;11:518. - Iglesias R, Paramá A, Alvarez MF, Leiro J, Fernández J, Sanmartín ML. 2001. Dis Aquat Organ, 22;46:47-55. - Novoa B, Romero A, Mulero V, Rodríguez I, Fernández I, Figueras A. 2006. Vaccine, 24 (31-32):5806-16. - Novoa B, Bowman TV, Zon L, Figueras A. 2009. Fish Shellfish Immunol, 26(2):326-31 - Novoa B. and Figueras A. 2012. Adv Exp Med Biol, 946:253-75 - Rodríguez I, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2008. Fish Shellfish Immunol; 25(3):239-49. - Tafalla, A. Figueras & Novoa, B. 1998. Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 62: 359-366. - Varela M, Dios S, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2012. Dev Comp Immunol, 37:97-106. - Varela M, Dios S, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2014. J.Virol, 88(20):12026-12040. ; España é líder Europea na produción piscícola de rodaballo (Scophthalmus maximus) e, concretamente en Galicia supón unha importante actividade económica e social, representando máis do 60% da produción da Unión Europea. Debido a que un dos maiores problemas na acuicultura é o impacto negativo que teñen as enfermidades, nos últimos anos realizouse un considerable esforzo en estudar o sistema inmune dos peixes cultivados, para poder desenvolver ferramentas de loita e prevención fronte a estas. Mesmo cando enfermidades víricas, (como a causada polo virus da septicemia hemorrágica viral (VHSV) (Tafalla et al., 1998)), bacterianas (como a causada por bacterias como Aeromonas sp (Toranzo et al., 1993)) ou parasitarias (como a causada por Philasterides dicentrarchi (Iglesias et al., 2001)) foron investigadas e sábese que afectan a estes cultivos, pouco coñécese sobre os mecanismos de defensa destes animais contra os patógenos. Aínda que se levaron a cabo considerables esforzos para desenvolver vacinas convencionais ou subunidades para moitos destes patógenos de peixes, o seu éxito foi moi limitado. É conveniente que se introduzan novos enfoques na investigación concernente ás vacinas, que proporcionen seguridade e eficacia fronte ás enfermidades máis importantes dos peixes comerciais. Coñécese que nos peixes o peso da resposta inmune non específica ou innata é maior que o que parece ter en mamíferos e por tanto, se confia máis na súa resposta inmune innata que na adaptativa para combater as infeccións. Recentemente describiuse en vertebrados a existencia de mecanismos inmunes independentes de células B/T ou "trained immunity" (TI), que previamente xa foran descritos en plantas e invertebrados. Con todo, a TI e a súa contribución á protección fronte axentes infecciosos en peces aínda non foi explorada, aínda que existen moitas evidencias que suxiren que é así. Neste proxecto empregaremos dúas especies de peces; o rodaballo (Scophthalmus maximus) e o peixe cebra (Danio rerio), que empregaremos como ferramenta de laboratorio para poder profundar no estudo de procesos básicos nos que sexa difícil traballar con especies comerciais. O peixe cebra empregouse como modelo, tanto para o estudo da resposta inmune fronte a enfermidades dos peixes cultivados (Novoa et al., 2006; Rodríguez et al., 2008;Encinas et al., 2010; Novoa e Figueras, 2012), como para o estudo de procesos inflamatorios de gran interese para a saúde humana, como o choque séptico e a tolerancia ao lipopolisacárido bacteriano (LPS) (Novoa et al., 2009). Ademais, serviunos para estudar a ontogenia do sistema inmune en peces (Dios et al., 2010; Varela et ao., 2012 ). Neste proxecto pretendemos profundar na modulación da resposta inflamatoria ou innata fronte a patógenos virales como o virus da septicemia hemorrágica viral (VHSV), asociado con mortalidades de rodaballo ou o SVCV, que se emprega como patógeno do peixe cebra (Varela et al, 2014). - Dios S, Romero A, Chamorro R, Figueras A, Novoa B. 2010. Fish Shellfish Immunol, 29(6):1019-27. - Encinas P, Rodriguez-Milla MA, Novoa B, Estepa A, Figueras A, Coll J. 2010. BMC Genomics, 27;11:518. - Iglesias R, Paramá A, Alvarez MF, Leiro J, Fernández J, Sanmartín ML. 2001. Dis Aquat Organ, 22;46:47-55. - Novoa B, Romero A, Mulero V, Rodríguez I, Fernández I, Figueras A. 2006. Vaccine, 24 (31-32):5806-16. - Novoa B, Bowman TV, Zon L, Figueras A. 2009. Fish Shellfish Immunol, 26(2):326-31 - Novoa B. and Figueras A. 2012. Adv Exp Med Biol, 946:253-75 - Rodríguez I, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2008. Fish Shellfish Immunol; 25(3):239-49. - Tafalla, A. Figueras & Novoa, B. 1998. Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 62: 359-366. - Varela M, Dios S, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2012. Dev Comp Immunol, 37:97-106. - Varela M, Dios S, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2014. J.Virol, 88(20):12026-12040. ; Spain is the European leader in the production of turbot (Scophthalmus maximus). This is an important economic and social activity in Galicia. The turbot production represents more than 60% of the production of the European Union. One of the major problems in aquaculture is the negative impact of disease. For this reason, considerable efforts have been made in recent years to study the immune system of cultured fish. The target is to develop prevention and control tools for aquaculture. Even when viral diseases (such as that caused by viral hemorrhagic septicemia virus (VHSV) (Tafalla et al., 1998)), or bacterial diseases (such as that caused by bacteria such as Aeromonas sp (Toranzo et al., 1993)), or parasitic diseases (such as that caused by Philasterides dicentrarchi (Iglesias et al., 2001)) have been investigated and are known to affect these crops, little is known about the defense mechanisms of these animals against pathogens. Although considerable efforts have been made to develop conventional vaccines or subunits for many of these fish pathogens, their success has been very limited. DNA vaccines are the only prophylactic means that have shown promising results as an effective strategy to fight viral diseases in fish. New approaches to vaccine research should be introduced to provide safety and efficacy against the major diseases of commercial fish. It is known that in fish the weight of the nonspecific or innate immune response is greater than to have in mammals. Because of this, it relies more on its innate immune response than on the adaptive one to combat infections. Recently there have been described in vertebrates the existence of independent immune mechanisms of B / T cells or "trained immunity" (TI). This was previously described in plants and invertebrates. However, TI and its contribution to protection against infectious agents in fish has not yet been explored. There is much evidence to suggest that this is so. In this project we will use two species of fish. The turbot (Scophthalmus maximus) of great commercial interest and cultivated mainly in Galicia, and the zebrafish (Danio rerio), which we will use as a laboratory tool. Zebrafish be able let us deepen into the study of basic processes in which it is difficult to work with commercial species. Zebrafish has been used as a model for the study of the immune response to diseases of cultured fish (Novoa et al., 2006, Novoa et Figueras, 2012), and for the study of inflammatory processes of great interest for human health (such as septic shock and tolerance to bacterial lipopolysaccharide (LPS) (Novoa et al., 2009)). In addition, it has served to study the ontogeny of the immune system in fish (Dios et al., 2010; Varela et al., 2012). In this project, we intend to deepen in the modulation of the inflammatory or innate response to viral pathogens such as viral haemorrhagic septicemia virus (VHSV), associated with mortality of turbot or SVCV, which is used as a zebrafish pathogen (Varela et al. Al, 2014). - Dios S, Romero A, Chamorro R, Figueras A, Novoa B. 2010. Fish Shellfish Immunol, 29(6):1019-27. - Encinas P, Rodriguez-Milla MA, Novoa B, Estepa A, Figueras A, Coll J. 2010. BMC Genomics, 27;11:518. - Iglesias R, Paramá A, Alvarez MF, Leiro J, Fernández J, Sanmartín ML. 2001. Dis Aquat Organ, 22;46:47-55. - Novoa B, Romero A, Mulero V, Rodríguez I, Fernández I, Figueras A. 2006. Vaccine, 24 (31-32):5806-16. - Novoa B, Bowman TV, Zon L, Figueras A. 2009. Fish Shellfish Immunol, 26(2):326-31 - Novoa B. and Figueras A. 2012. Adv Exp Med Biol, 946:253-75 - Rodríguez I, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2008. Fish Shellfish Immunol; 25(3):239-49. - Tafalla, A. Figueras & Novoa, B. 1998. Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 62: 359-366. - Varela M, Dios S, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2012. Dev Comp Immunol, 37:97-106. - Varela M, Dios S, Novoa B, Figueras A. 2014. J.Virol, 88(20):12026-12040.

The purpose of this doctoral dissertation is to contribute to the investigation of the regional organization of the system of settlements in the regions of the Eastern Ro-man Empire (ERE) during the Early Byzantine period (EBP). By EBP we mean the historical period comprising from the 4th to the end of the 6th century AD. By regional organization we mean the administrative system of rule of the ERE with its five hierarchical levels of organization: a) the Empire; b) its division into admin-istrative regions (dioceses); c) the division of these into smaller regional unities (provinces); d) cities (polis), and e) market towns villages (komes choria) within each province. This system includes 3,048 units of analysis, settlements belonging to all hierarchical levels, and it yields their distinguishing features, through geographic - spatial and historical -cultural criteria. The dissertations object of study is the regional organization of settlements of the EBP, with emphasis on the 6th century. Its goal was the cartographic representation of the regions of the ERE and creation of maps that are defined by the data of politi-cal geography and described by the data of physical and cultural geography. Through the creation of historical sections in the 4th, 5th, and 6th centuries, diachronic regional transformations in the EBP were examined. A further goal was to create a database of cultural and geographic information concerning the entirety of settle-ments, in which are recorded the period of founding, the diachronic presence of each, with historical alterations of its name, including also its modern name and the state to which it belongs today. The dissertation conveys the totality of regional sites in the ERE, contributes to making the regional organization of settlements in the EBP better known, and enriches the diachronic study of both the settlements and culture of the Eastern Mediterranean. The dissertation is composed of three parts: Part I. Introduction; Part II: The regional structure of the Empire; Part III: Conclusions. Part I: Chapter 1 offers a scholarly overview and defines the goals, objects of study, and purpose (A.1), contents (A.2), primary sources (A.3) and methodology (.4), with a description of the techniques of cartography, map-making (atlas-making) and table-making. Part I also includes the historical framework of the EBP (Chapter 2), with its main socio-economic and political parameters. Chapter 3 concerns the geo-morphology and organization of the Empire (administrative boundaries, production activities and spatial administrative hierarchy, both political and ecclesiastical). Part II: Chapter 4 deals with the regional structure of the Empire and is allocated to a study of the organization of the 64 provinces in each of the six dioceses. The level of internal description of each diocese and province refers to variables that concern administrative division, geomorphology, and settlements (three levels: capitals, cit-ies, and market towns villages). Two categories of variables were created: histori-cal-cultural data, and geographic-spatial data. The total of 3,048 settlements and the recording of variables along diachronic and synchronic axes, aided by the computer software SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences), allowed observations of a statistical nature as well as structural correlations between and among variables used for analysis. The data are complemented cartographically by 90 maps, done on the basis of the road network (3 variables: inter-regional, main, secondary) and their individual geomorphology. Part III: Chapter 5 describes the results of the analysis of the regional organization of the six dioceses, while Chapter 6 presents the results for the overall picture of the Empire (6.1), followed by the results for the articulation of the road network (6.2). These sub-sections are followed by the network of settlements (6.3), with conclud-ing observations of a statistical nature concerning the regional organization of set-tlements and the static/dynamic nature of the settlement system. The structure of the network of settlements is expressed through an attempt at modeling. In addition, basic statistical correlations and cross-tabulations concerning the hierarchy of set-tlements and their various parameters (period of founding, morphology of terrain, road network, transportation / communication features) are listed. The conclusions of this doctoral dissertation can be summarised as follows: During the Early Byzantine Period the Eastern Roman Empire, with its six large administra-tive dioceses and 64 provinces, occupied the regions around the Eastern Mediterra-nean, joining districts from three continents. The geomorphology and the landscapes of the region are varied and complex. Much of the land is mountainous though there are a few very important plains. There are eight types of vegetation varying from desert to beech forest. Olive cultivation accounted for an important percentage of the cultivatable land at that time.The primary sector was developed and there was self-sufficiency, which depended on cooperation between individual farmers as to what was grown. The secondary sector was also developed: there were government owned factories in many provin-cial capitals, as well as private artisan. There was also government owned mines and quarries for the excavation and the supply of raw materials.The network of settlements: their historical and cultural characteristics: 12,5% of the 3,048 settlements were founded in the Archaic period, 7.3% in the Classical, 17,8% in the Hellenistic, 42% in the Roman and 20,4% in the Early Byzantine pe-riod. Cross correlation between the number of settlements and their dates of founda-tion demonstrates that a much larger number of settlements arose after the Hellenis-tic period than were constructed before this period. It also shows that the Early Byz-antine provincial capitals were largely founded during the Hellenistic period. In ad-dition it shows that more than the 50% of the cities were founded in the Hellenistic and Roman period, while only about 12% were founded during the EBP. With re-gard to smaller settlements, we can observe that roughly 50% were founded in the Roman period, while only 25% were set up during the EBP. The fact that more than 80% of the total settlements in the Roman and EBP were minor settlements suggests a tendency towards agrarization of the society.The geographical - spatial characteristics and the morphology of the land: We ob-serve that 41% of the settlements were located between 0 300m, 12,5% were lo-cated between 300 600m and 43% were found higher in the mountains. From the cross-correlation of the timescale of the settlement with the geomorphology we see that 56% of the capitals and 50% of the cities are located in flat regions, while 47% of minor settlements are located in mountainous regions. 72% of settlements are close to water. 34% of the settlements are located on transregional road axes, 9% of these on main and the 14% on secondary roads, while 43% are not connected in this way. 14% of the settlements represent nodal points on the road system, 11% are ports, while nodes and ports constitute the 2%. The structure of the network of set-tlements ,using the capital city Constantinople as a point of reference, corresponds on the first level to a radial spatial model, the diffusion of which, extends as a spatial web into the three continents. On the second level there are individual linear spatial models that follow the seashores of the Mediterranean and the Euxeinos Pontos and follow passages to the hinterland, frequently through river valleys. The network of settlements and the road network are of course, closely linked.A substantial density of settlements, founded in the EBP, is found in Pontike Dioe-ceses, in the regions near Constantinople, as well as in the Anatolike Dioeceses, in the regions, that are related with the new religion, as the Palestine. There is a me-dium sized concentration of settlements in the Thrakike, Asiane and Aigyptiake Dioeceses, while there is a small concentration in the Dioeceses of Illyrikon. In gen-eral there is a large concentration of settlements in Greece; in the plateau of Asia Minor; in the southern parts of Syria and Palestine, (mainly in the coastal plateaus between Tyre and Gaza and following the banks of the Nile).In the Eastern Mediterranean the foundation of settlements began in the Archaic period and continued in the Classical period with the city state as its main model. Slowly, during Hellenistic period minor size settlements began to dominate. In the Roman and Early Byzantine period, 80% of the new foundations were minor size settlements. Of the five historical periods, the foundation of settlements was at its most intense during the Roman period. The EBP continued this trend, though the development of new settlements was only half that which had been carried out under the Roman rule. The amount of flat land was very limited, yet the spread of settle-ments in flat and mountainous lands was almost the same. In the Roman and EBP, the higher percentage of settlements was founded in mountainous regions and these settlements were, in the beginning, small.The administrative structure had a pyramid-like form with the emperor at the top and a tree-like structure down the whole length of the hierarchy. The administrative power predominated over the military and there was a strengthened bureaucracy and a state centralism. The network was able to function because it was supported by two connected infrastructures: The first was concerned with the organized use of human resources: the bureaucracy: the administrators of the regional political power, whose main job was the collection of taxes and resources, and the control and the management of the means of production. The second was the physical infrastructure which enabled the trade, manufacture and transport generated by the administrators to be carried out, as well as facilitating the exchange of ideas, to and from the capital city. The network of roads ensured good communications and thus enabled this effi-cient system of central control to be implemented throughout the empire. The hier-archical structure at all organizational levels constitutes one from the distinctive features of the early Byzantine mode of production. This structure runs through the spatial dimension of the regional organization, that was cartographically surveyed on three levels: 1. On the land-planning level, which deals with the whole Eastern Roman Empire. 2. On the regional level, which was concerned with the Dioeceses. 3. On the provincial level, which deals with the Prov-inces. 3,048 settlements were recorded, located, categorized and organised in a data-base, a number that represents the total number of settlements known from archaeo-logical studies to have been active during the period being studied.From the above statements it can be seen that in the Early Byzantine period the Eastern Roman Empire was wealthy in the sense that it was productive, that there was a growing network of roads and dense pattern of settlements. The fact that many small settlements were founded at this time shows that not only was there a trend towards agrarization, but also suggests that the role of the cities was changing in those places where the number of small settlements increased within the same re-gion. The investigation of the regional organisation in the EBP shows that both the settle-ments at all levels, and the infrastructures of the Eastern Roman Empire were in good shape. It presents a picture of an empire, where the number the of rural and urban settlements is increasing while being organized in a hierarchical structure throughout the region. The thesis has made an effort to create a holistic picture of the geographical and administrative form of the Eastern Roman Empire, which can easily be analyzed in smaller spatial parts and recomposed in bigger, showing on each level the cultural characteristics of the settlements network, through the loca-tion, mapping and categorisation of the network. The present research was designed to contribute to the overall study of the regional landscapes of the Eastern Roman Empire and it contributes by analyzing regional organization of settlements in the Early Byzantine period. In this way it enriches the diachronic study of settlements of the Eastern Mediterranean and her culture with quantitative and qualitative elements.

To analyse and compare the big powers' perspective on a Nordic country seems to require at least as much consideration for their economic as for the political interests. Whilst the British legation was predominantly concerned with Britain's economic interests the German legation focused on political issues. This does not mean that German-Finnish economic relations carried less weight but reflects a different organisation of the German foreign policy establishment and a different perception of mischief. Public opinion in Finland, culture and propaganda figure as secondary issues in both of the legations' sources. Whereas the British were apprehensive of German activity in the North the German conservative minister noted damage to the German image resulting from repugnant Nazi policy at home and abroad. Despite rising continental power German political influence in Finland suffered a substantial setback at the turn of 1936/1937. By the choice of Finnish voters a parliamentary majority on the left was established bringing to power a Centre-Left government and disposing a conservative president. The politics of the new foreign minister, Holsti, were disliked by the disposed Conservatives. The German minister in Finland, von Blücher, immediately adapted the Conservative's negative attitude. He also developed a strong personal aversion against Holsti perverting his reports continuously. Criticising Holsti's initiative to normalise strained relations with the Soviet Union Blücher aligned his position with that of Erkko – a right wing party fellow of Holsti. He had to acknowledge, however, the widely accepted political will to normalise eastern relations. The reports of the legations were characterised by opportunistic distortions. Whereas the British were quick to report a decline in German political influence, the German minister qualified the meaning of the political change in Finland by questioning the stability of the Centre-Left government and Holsti's position therein. The Germans readily acknowledged the weight of Finnish-British notably economic relations. Beyond that acknowledgement there was German frustration with the new Finnish foreign policy that did not always find its way into official reporting. In looking for the information opportune to their interests both legations had no difficulties finding influential Finns that provided the desired assessments of Finland's affairs. Central in the concern of the big powers about Finland was Finnish foreign policy. In spite of an official assertion of an unchanged foreign policy the Finnish prime minister speaking in private labelled the United Kingdom a 'protecting power'. Finns across the political spectrum, even Conservatives who traditionally stood for a close relationship with Germany, also desired a closer relationship with the UK. High-ranking political and weighty English business representatives descended in large numbers on Finland. Blücher, however, saw no sign of a formal political alignment and only acknowledged some concerns regarding future access to Finland's natural recourses. This relaxed attitude must not have been universal since the British legation perceived nervousness and distress among junior members of the German legation. According to indirect evidence the German leadership was disgruntled. The German-Finnish relationship had supporters in both countries including Göring and the grand old man of Finland, Mannerheim. While a rather forced visit of Holsti in Berlin did not solve political contradictions there were other unofficial high-level contacts that tried to alleviate stress in the relations. In observing closely and trying to influence by various means the opinion of ordinary Finns and the capital's elite a rivalry between German and British influence manifested itself. The reports about the official celebrations of the birthday of Finland's revered Mannerheim are an example of the diplomat's scrutiny. Their contrasting depictions and interpretations reveal conscious and unconscious whitewashing stemming sometimes from biased informants. Germany's perversion in the 1930s was initially perceived through the lenses of the inner-Finnish split between conservatives and social-democrats with the latter criticising fascism across Europe vigorously. As German policy became more radical – especially with the endangerment of peace in Europe during the Sudeten-Crisis, the pogroms of 1938 and the occupation of Prague – the conservative parts of the population and politicians were willing to criticise it and did so, though mostly in private. The German minister went as far as possible for a Reich's civil servant in outlining the negative repercussions for Germany's public and also more tangible interests in Finland in reporting to his foreign ministry. This is remarkable in light of previous whitewashing of reports. While there was ever more reason to criticise Germany the concurrent threat of war and entanglement which Finland wished to avoid at any price demanded a more radical interpretation of neutrality. Thus just when criticism of Nazi policy was spreading the government and the media consented to toning down their criticism of Germany in accordance with German diplomatic pressure to that end. Britain's role in the world of rising fascism enjoyed high respect in Finland. British foreign policy and the Finnish population shared the desire for maintaining peace in Europe. Absent from British official reports is how the UK's role in undermining the integrity of another small state – Czechoslovakia – in Munich marred its image temporarily. Germany went further than the UK in actually trying to shape her image in Finland. Propaganda was seen as a substitute for cooler political relations. Speedily transmitted German news items were placed in receptive Finnish conservative newspapers and used by the German minister as a basis for argumentation. Visits of outstanding speakers and the German radio's ordinary broadcasts had an effect limited to a German speaking elite which also proved ambivalent. To reach the general public the German legation promoted military visits. The German propaganda efforts attracted disproportionate attention in the British legation. Events including official German guests were carefully scrutinised and considerable room was devoted to evaluate the German propaganda's motive and effect. German propaganda was not seen as threatening but rather as futile, however. The German minister, on the other hand, was jealous at the strong interest in 'everything English' as compared to the modest efforts of Britain, whose British Council had only recently been founded. The success was disproportionate: promotion of English culture and the advent of Anglo-American cinema attracted a comparatively high degree of interest among the wider Finnish public. The establishment of an Anglo-American share in popular culture became discernible. The crises of 1938, especially the Sudeten crisis, brought about by German policy damaged the German moral reputation but served to increase her political clout also in the North. The League of Nations- and UK-orientated foreign policy of the despised Finnish foreign minister Holsti and came under attack by the still formidable conservative opposition. His position seemed increasingly unstable. A renewed commitment to western values by the Finnish Prime Minister in the run-up to the Sudeten crisis did not save him. The German minister seized upon the political constellation and helped to bring Holsti down. The minister's subsequent euphoria was understandable in light of his long-harboured aversion against Holsti and close relationship with Holsti's successor, Erkko. Such euphoria, however, proved not justifiable. Instead the German minister had to avoid inconsequential criticism of Erkko's anglophile policies as he was told frankly that English desire for increased exports was well founded. The British had no reason to worry. Erkko promised to defend the independence of the Finnish media against German pressure and put all his considerable clout behind supporting Finnish purchase of English goods. The gross predominance of economic issues in British reports is contrasted by the German ministers almost complete disinterest in the issue. British economic difficulties in the thirties made trade a contentious issue that received much more attention than politics. Most noted was the contribution of trade with Finland to the general trade-deficit which seemed enormous considering the size of the countries' respective markets. Meanwhile German-Finnish trade grew in volume while British-Finnish trade stagnated. British industrialists highlighted the unfair methods that Germany employed for steering trade. The possibility of their subsequent demands for protectionism and control of trade being adapted by British politicians frightened Finnish industry. Some British officials were willing to employ scare tactics but diplomats on the ground recognised that the competitive disadvantages were home-grown. However, they eagerly supported their exporters. Pressure was exercised to influence public spending whenever the legation learned about planned acquisitions. Finnish politicians tried to meet such demands although this often meant paying more than for comparable German goods. Diplomats reported correctly that interventions in the public sector worked due to the Finns' willing co-operation. Germany's efforts to secure rights of usage to a Finnish harbour in the polar sea were rejected. The most efficient contact person for economic interventions was the new and more powerful foreign minister to whose the Germans ironically had helped by bringing his predecessor down. Public spending was, however, too small a factor to revert the general trend in favour of German industry. A high frequency of mutual visits by traders and industrialists was a sign of willingness to widen economic relations. They resulted in declarations of good-will but were sometimes overshadowed by protectionist grumbling of English traders. Given a protectionist penchant in the Foreign Office and the difficulty of directing trade by mere declarations of good will the legation did a superb job in preventing conflict. The legation gave its reports a positive spin, alerted their superiors to the sensibilities of Finnish partners and sometimes meditated carefully between British and Finnish parties. A last high-level political visit of a Finnish cabinet minister in Finland passed smoothly in contrast to his visit in Sweden. By virtue of foreign minister Erkko, liked both with the German and the British ministers, Finland was well positioned to avoid being caught in the differences between Germany and the western powers. This ability to stay neutral was put on test in 1939 when Germany offered a non-aggression pact to serve its propaganda aims at a time when no country wanted to be closely associated with her, least of all neutrality-minded Finland. The Finns put Scandinavian unity over adherence to Germany's wishes by declining the offer. The legation could not avoid dissatisfaction at home. At the same time Finnish-British political relations began to suffer from talks on guaranteeing Finland in alliance with the Soviet Union. Finland's vehement opposition was a far more serious concern to the British than the symbolic German pact offer. In analogy to the pattern in dealing with economic relations it was the legation that defended Finnish interests whereas the London Foreign Office argued in favour of the Soviet alliance. Before the German minister could rejoice in the discontent the British created by negotiating with Moscow his own country signed Finland away in the Hitler-Stalin Pact without even informing him. From now on the threat of entanglement in a war forced Finland to heed German demands scrupulously. A purely political analysis is insufficient and economic relations are essential for a comprehensive and proper history of the big powers policy towards Finland in the time between the wars. On the purely political plane German influence grew relentlessly although orientation towards Germany was not desired by the Finnish government. The stronger Germany grew the more its demands for absolute political neutrality had to be heeded. On the other hand, a look at Finnish-British economic relations reveals a squarely pro-British orientation. Germany by contrast was denied access to the Finnish polar sea port of Petsamo. For the UK with its vast trade deficit increased exports to Finland were of paramount importance. Especially the reshaped Finnish government with Erkko as foreign minister directed public expenditure in favour of English industry wherever possible. Even Finnish conservatives who appreciated the value of retaining close ties with Germany were not opposed to expand Finnish-British relations. A comprehensive look at economics, politics and culture makes German pressure on Finland appear like a futile effort to prevent an outdated state of international relations by intimidation and control.

This series is produced by the Health, Nutrition, and Population family (HNP) of the World Bank's Human Development Network (HDN). The papers in this series aim to provide a vehicle for publishing preliminary and unpolished results on HNP topics to encourage discussion and debate. The cost of a health insurance program will largely be determined by the size and composition of the covered population, the benefit package, cost sharing arrangements, the current and future supply of health care providers and facilities, and the provider payment mechanisms used. This note summarizes in broad strokes the subset of the possible Universal Coverage (UC) transition scenarios and their related costs in Indonesia. These scenarios were selected based on initial discussions with key stakeholders, and further broad-based discussion with stakeholders will be needed to finalize the design, financing and transition options. This note shows how decisions regarding the transition steps, benefit package and the choice of eligible population affect public Health Insurance (HI) expenditures as Indonesia transitions to UC. This work follows closely the earlier World Bank report health financing in Indonesia; a road map for reform.

Latin America's historically low saving rates and sub-par growth performance raise the question of whether the region should save more to grow faster. Economists generally resist acknowledging a policy-exploitable causal connection going from saving to growth because domestic saving is perceived to be fully endogenous, optimally determined, or fully substitutable by foreign saving. However, to the extent that these three assumptions do not hold, three channels can be established through which higher domestic saving—by curbing persistent current account deficits—can promote medium-term growth. The channels are first, a real interest rate channel, whereby higher saving reduces the cost of capital and enhances macro sustainability; second, a real exchange rate channel, through which higher saving leads to a more competitive real exchange rate; and third, an endogenous saving channel, whereby saving follows growth and, hence, subsequently compounds the effect of the first two channels. Econometric evidence supports all three channels and suggests that the lower-saving countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, especially those with recurrently weak balance of payments and persistent domestic demand pressures on the non-tradable sector, would benefit the most from boosting their saving rates.

Kosovo is one of the poorest countries in Europe (World Bank 2010). In 2009, 35 percent of the population lived below the poverty line. This note was prepared primarily as a key input to the Kosovo country partnership strategy (FY2012 to FY2015) and aims to provide an overview of gender disparities in three major domains: human capital, labor market, and entrepreneurship. The note provides a broad picture of gender disparities in Kosovo in education, health, and access to economic opportunities. Lack of statistical data on Kosovo, and particularly of gender-disaggregated data, limits the depth and scope of this gender diagnostic. Men and women in Kosovo have lower education levels than men and women in the European Union (EU). Women comprise less than 10 percent of all entrepreneurs and 0.3 percent of top management positions. This note is organized as follows: section one highlights gender differences in human capital focusing on education and health outcomes; section two describes men's and women's relative employment patterns; section three focuses on gender disparities in entrepreneurship and career advancement in business and politics; and section four provides concluding observations.

Since the 2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak, health care in China has become a leading national concern. Often highlighted by the popular phrase, kan-bing-nan, kan-bing-gui (seeking care is difficult and expensive), healthcare costs can be devastating. Prior to 2007, there were two formal insurance programs: the Urban Employee Basic Medical Insurance (UEBMI) for the urban employed population, and the New Rural Cooperative Medical Insurance (NRCMI) for rural residents. A third major group-urban resident without formal employment-was essentially left out of the state health security system. In July 2007, the State Council initiated a pilot experiment in 79 cities-the Urban Resident Basic Medical Insurance (URBMI). The plan targeted urban residents without formal employment, especially the elderly and children (State Council 2007). The present health policy note provides an updated review of healthcare settings and policy reforms, focusing primarily on urban health financing. It discusses urban insurance in the context of universal coverage and how to harmonize insurance schemes across urban and rural areas. This discussion is placed in the context of global experience and emerging principles of best practices.

This report synthesizes data from surveillance, behavioral surveys and published and unpublished research to better understand emerging patterns and trends in the HIV epidemic in Bangladesh. Taking stock of 20 years of experience with HIV in Bangladesh, this report summarizes what is known about the coverage and impact of HIV prevention services, including knowledge on risk and protective behaviors. The report is divided into nine chapters. Chapter one provides a brief introduction and an overview of the methodology used for this exercise. Chapter two discusses the risks and vulnerabilities of the high risk groups including female sex workers, injecting drug users, male who have sex with male, hijra and overlapping populations, while chapter three discusses the trend of the infection amongst partners of high risk groups. Bangladesh continues to report low condom use, which is analyzed and discussed in chapter four. Structural factors including macro level and intermediate level factors that affect HIV interventions in Bangladesh are addressed in chapter five. The national HIV response is discussed in chapter six. The report concludes with a discussion of the main findings, with recommendations for the future in chapter seven, and chapter eight and nine are annexes and references.

The integration and inclusion of persons under international protection (i.e. persons granted asylum and refugees) into society proceeds through their contacts and interactions with institutions and residents in local communities where their reception and accommodation have been organised. In this process, the achievement of social, economic, cultural and all other dimensions of integration in local communities is facilitated by the activities of different national and local stakeholders in the integration system. Creating the conditions for Croatian citizens to familiarize themselves with refugees requires joint efforts by all system stakeholders and engagement to inform citizens and raise their awareness about the presence, rights and obligations of persons under protection, with a view to preventing and mitigating any negative manifestations of discrimination, exclusion and marginalisation, and to ensuring that persons under international protection become accepted and integrated members of local communities and society as a whole. With this in mind, this research has analysed capacities and challenges, and assessed the resources and needs of local and regional self-government units given their past or future experience with the reception and integration of persons under protection. Furthermore, this research has also identified the attitudes of Croatian citizens towards persons under protection and their readiness for the reception and integration of persons granted asylum in their local communities.The general purpose of the project is to support units of local (cities, towns and municipalities) and regional (counties) self-government in identifying the needs and challenges of integrating third-country nationals in need of international protection. To achieve the purpose of this research, both quantitative and qualitative research methodologies have been used. As a result, it was conducted as mixed-method research, that is, as two correlated studies. The quantitative segment of the research pertains to its first goal, which was to identify the attitudes of Croatian citizens and their readiness for the acceptance and integration of third-country nationals granted international protection in the Republic of Croatia, while its qualitative segment refers to the second research goal, to identify the needs of local and regional self-government units in the process of integrating third-country nationals granted international protection in the Republic of Croatia as well as the challenges they encounter or will encounter when it comes to the integration of persons granted asylum into Croatian society. The third research goal, to prepare checklists for assessment of needs and challenges of integration for local and regional self-government units and for persons granted international protection, has been achieved by synthesising the findings reached under the previous two goals and by preparing two checklists. One is intended for heads and staff of LSGUs and RGSUs so that they can assess the existing needs, resources and capacities of their communities in terms of planning and implementation of integration activities. The other is designed for persons granted asylum and serves for the self-assessment of their needs and the extent to which they are met. Accordingly, the starting point for tool selection and elaboration is the multidimensional concept of integration of aliens into the host society, which is focused on the processes and dimensions of integration of persons under international protection (either with full asylum or subsidiary protection status) into Croatian society as a whole, but also into individual local communities in Croatian regions covered by this research.Due to the specific character of the quantitative and qualitative methodological approaches, the report describes methodological aspects and results separately, first for the quantitative study conducted by a survey of citizen's attitudes towards the integration of persons under national protection, and then for the qualitative study of needs and challenges faced by local communities in the integration process. The target group of survey participants covered by the research was defined so as to include citizens living in selected counties (regional self-government units) and towns and municipalities (local self-government units). In order to form a sample of participants for the purposes of this research, Croatia was broken down into four regions: Eastern, Central and North-Western, Littoral and Istrian, and Dalmatian regions. In each region, the sample came to include between two and five counties (a total of 12) and between three and five towns (a total of 15). The Eastern Region encompassed the counties of Osijek-Baranja, Vukovar-Srijem and Požega-Slavonski Brod. The Central and North-Western Region included the City of Zagreb as well as the countries of Zagreb, Sisak-Moslavina, Bjelovar-Bilogora and Varaždin. The Littoral and Istrian Region covered Primorje-Gorski Kotar and Istria counties. The Region of Dalmatia consisted of Zadar and Split-Dalmatia counties.In the selected towns, the size of the sample was proportionate to the size of the town within its region, with the participants in each town selected by probability sampling. The sample of citizens aged 18 to 65 included 318 persons in each region, and probability sampling – together with the use of two levels of purposively selected clusters (region and town) – ensured that the sample structure, in terms of its socio-demographic profile, reflects the characteristics of the region's population, according to publicly available statistics. The sample formed in this manner and its size (N = 1,272) allowed inter-regional comparisons with regard to the relevant characteristics of the participants and measured constructs. Data were gathered using the CAPI (Computer Aided Personal Interviewing) method, in the period from 14 May to 10 June 2018. The response rate was 57%, which is quite high given the type of research in question.The survey questionnaire contained 67 items forming the following constructs and scales: (1) Attitude towards persons granted asylum; (2) Perception of realistic threat; (3) Perception of symbolic threat; (4) Support for the rights of persons granted asylum; (5) Perception of negative changes in the community; (6) Readiness to assist persons granted asylum; (7) Frequency of contacts with persons granted asylum; (8) Quality of contacts with persons granted asylum; (9) Sources of information about persons granted asylum; (10) Media portrayal of persons granted asylum; (11) Social proximity to persons granted asylum; (12) Attitude towards forms of acculturation; (13) Estimated number of persons granted asylum; (14) Change in the number of persons granted asylum; (15) Socio-demographic profile of participants. The scales used in this questionnaire show very good metric characteristics: a Cronbach's alpha internal reliability coefficient ranging from 0.77 to 0.93 and a clear construct validity and single-factor structure.The collected data were subject to a series of statistical analyses, including descriptive calculation of statistics (range, frequency, median measures, variability measures) at the levels of the aggregate sample and each region as well as inter-regional comparisons of the results derived from the measured constructs (variance analyses, t-tests, chi-squared tests). Also, by using regression analysis, a model was set to predict two forms of behavioural intentions among host populations: (1) readiness for social relations with asylum beneficiaries at different levels of proximity; and (2) readiness to help persons granted asylum in their integration. These two forms of behavioural intentions served as criterion variables, which were predicted on the basis of a set of predictors that included the participants' individual attributes (socio-demographic variables and regional affiliation), their religious and political orientation, their opinion about the number of asylum beneficiaries to be received by the country in future and about their social adjustment strategies (i.e. about acculturation strategies), their frequency of contacts with persons granted asylum and their perception of threats and expected changes in the community caused by the arrival of persons granted asylum (i.e. perceptions of realistic and symbolic threats, and expectations of negative changes in the community).The average results obtained on the aggregate sample show that, when it comes to attitudes towards persons granted asylum, the respondents express attitudes that are, on average, neutral. However, when assessing their perception of threat, they seem to feel a slight realistic threat, and a somewhat stronger symbolic threat. The participants also express what is, on average, a neutral attitude regarding the expected negative changes in the community. As for their readiness to help asylum beneficiaries personally, the participants are also neutral, stating they are not sure of their readiness in this regard, but showing a slight support for the rights of asylum beneficiaries. Concerning the frequency of contacts with persons granted asylum, slightly more than half of the participants (52.1%) reported that they had such contacts, describing them, on average, neutrally – as neither positive nor negative. Among those who reported such contacts, the majority stated that they were rare.The data collected clearly show that the mass media (print and online news outlets, television and radio) are the most common source of information for Croatian citizens – more than 90% of citizens receive information about persons granted asylum in this way. These are followed by social media, which are used as a source of information about asylum beneficiaries by nearly half of the participants (45.8%). It has been established that citizens deem the media portrayal of asylum beneficiaries slightly negative.As for social proximity, the participants are, on average, ready to accept persons granted asylum as their fellow workers or neighbours, where it is obvious that the citizens are, for the time being, not ready for the closest relations with asylum beneficiaries, although nearly 61% would be ready for friendly relations.The participants were also asked about acceptable acculturation strategies, that is, about how persons granted asylum should approach the Croatian culture and maintenance of their own culture. The majority of participants (70.7%) chose integration as the preferred acculturation strategy (both maintaining their own culture and accepting the culture of the host country). About one fifth of the participants champion assimilation as the preferred acculturation strategy; i.e. they expect persons granted asylum to relinquish their specific culture and accept only that of their host country. Separation, that it, the opinion that persons granted asylum should maintain only their own culture without accepting Croatian culture, is upheld by 3.7% of the participants. Looking at acculturation strategies as a continuum (from assimilation, through integration, to separation, or vice versa), the participants on average tend to support cultural integration of persons granted asylum.When it comes to estimating the number of persons granted asylum at the time of survey, only one fifth of the participants made a more or less accurate estimate. Somewhat more than a fourth of participants underestimated the actual number of asylum beneficiaries, whereas almost half of them overestimated the number of cases of granted asylum. These results are consistent with the replies regarding preferred projections of the number of asylum beneficiaries in the future. Specifically, the majority of participants (45.8%) feel that their number should remain the same, only slightly fewer are those who would reduce it (45.6%), while less than a tenth holds that the future number of asylum beneficiaries in Croatia should go up.The analysis of regional differences demonstrates that the least positive attitudes towards persons granted asylum, the highest perception of both realistic and symbolic threats, the lowest support for the rights of asylum beneficiaries, the highest expectations of negative changes, and the lowest readiness to assist are present among participants in the Dalmatian Region. It is followed by the Eastern Region, and then the Littoral and Central Regions, where these attitudes are more positive. The frequency of contacts with persons granted asylum is low in all the regions, with the lowest levels reported in the Eastern and Dalmatian regions. However, there are no regional differences in the quality of contacts, as it is everywhere seen as neutral. Readiness for close contacts is the lowest in Dalmatia, followed by the Eastern Region, with its highest levels reported in the Littoral and Central regions. The citizens of all regions choose integration as their preferred acculturation strategy, while participants in Dalmatia divided their preferences between assimilation and integration. The number of asylum beneficiaries is mistakenly estimated in all regions. Indeed, it is overestimated everywhere except the Eastern Region, where the figure is underestimated. Furthermore, while the citizens of the Central and Littoral regions would prefer to keep the future number of asylum beneficiaries at the same level, those in the Eastern and Dalmatian regions are keener to reduce it. When predicting the readiness for social proximity with asylum beneficiaries, the key predictors include the attitude towards the number of asylum beneficiaries in the future and acculturation strategies. The readiness for a higher level of proximity is demonstrated by those citizens who feel that the future number of asylum beneficiaries should be increased, as well as those who champion integration. The predictors of marginal importance include practising religion, where the participants who do not declare themselves as practicing believers tend to be ready for a higher level of proximity with persons granted asylum, as well as the perception of symbolic threat and the fear of negative changes in the community, where those who perceive a higher symbolic threat from asylum beneficiaries and expect more negative changes in the community due to the arrival of persons granted asylum tend to be ready for a lower level of proximity with them. These results generally apply to all of the four regions.When it comes to predicting the readiness to assist asylum beneficiaries personally, it can also be said that – allowing for minor regional particularities – the key factors include the participants' opinion that the number of asylum beneficiaries should increase in the future and, again, the perception of a higher symbolic and realistic threat. Those participants who feel that the future number of asylum beneficiaries should increase are readier to help, whereas those whose perception of threat from asylum beneficiaries is higher are also less prepared to assist them personally. Another highly significant predictor is the frequency of contacts with persons granted asylum. Those participants who reported more frequent contacts with asylum beneficiaries are also more prepared to assist them. Finally, the variables of marginal significance include gender and political orientation, where women and those on the left side of the political spectrum would be readier to help asylum beneficiaries.The conducted regression analyses show that the most frequent predictors for both criteria (social proximity and readiness for personal assistance) include the perception of symbolic and realistic threat, expectation of negative changes in the community due to the arrival of asylum beneficiaries, opinion that the future number of asylum beneficiaries in Croatia should be increased and the choice of integration as the preferred acculturation strategy. It follows that a more favourable attitude of Croatian citizens can be expected if they feel less threatened by persons granted asylum, that is, if they understand that their arrival does not pose a threat to the existing identity and culture nor jeopardise the resources of local communities, if they expect less negative changes in their communities due to the arrival of asylum beneficiaries, if they think that the number of asylum beneficiaries in Croatia needs to be increased in the future, and if they believe that integration is the acculturation strategy appropriate for Croatia.The second part of this research deals with the assessment of needs and challenges which are or will be encountered by LSGUs and RSGUs, and also of the capacities and resources required for integration with regard to the current or anticipated accommodation and stay of asylum beneficiaries in their local communities.This part of the research was conducted through a series of interviews and focus groups with different stakeholders in the integration system, which are in one way or another involved in or will in future be responsible for the processes of reception and integration of persons granted asylum. Stakeholders from LSGU and RSGU include representatives from county-level and town-level public authorities and various professional institutions, while the CSO stakeholders include representatives from the non-governmental sector, religious organisations and civic initiatives. The perspectives of integration processes were, whenever possible, complemented with those of asylum beneficiaries in the local communities in which they live. For sampling purposes, a list of 30 units (9 counties and 21 towns) was drawn up, taking into account the criteria of regional representation, town size, experience with the integration of asylum beneficiaries and available state-owned housing units. Along with the four regions, the City of Zagreb was taken separately as it considerably differs from other regions in terms of the number of integration stakeholders and capacities, as well as the number of asylum beneficiaries it hosts. The persons included in the sample had the attributes of schoolants based on their role and office they held, their experience and knowledge of the needs and challenges relating to the integration of asylum beneficiaries in local communities. In keeping with the principle of maximising the variability of key informants, a total of 168 interviews and four focus groups were conducted with 227 participants, including 26 interviews with persons granted asylum. Once all of the methodological requirements were met in the process of qualitative-data gathering, 158 transcripts obtained from 216 interviewees were subjected to analysis. The other transcripts did not contain any useful information because some interviewees were totally uninformed about the topic of the research. Of the total number of analysed transcripts, 143 contain data obtained from 191 representatives of municipalities, towns and counties, state-administration offices at the county-level, professional institutions and the civil sector, while 15 transcripts of interviews and focus groups contained information obtained from 26 asylum beneficiaries. The analysis made it possible to identify some specific features of statements made by representatives of the selected local communities about their needs, challenges, opportunities and expectations. A comparison has been made among the four regions and the City of Zagreb, and similarities and differences have been analysed among statements made by stakeholders from different sectors.The results for all regions (except the City of Zagreb) equally suggest that most of the integration-system stakeholders from LSGUs and RSGUs (towns, municipalities and counties) generally had no direct experience of contacts and work with persons granted asylum or, if they had, then they encountered asylum beneficiaries in rare, individual cases. On the other hand, interlocutors from Zagreb recounted and described experiences of direct and immediate encounters with persons granted asylum, mostly through participation in projects with SCOs and the OHRRNM, while CSOs in all the regions have very little direct experience with asylum beneficiaries. A large portion of LSGUs and RSGUs in each region state that they are not aware of the Action Plan for Integration, or are aware of it only partly, or since a short time ago. Stakeholders in various sectors and regions have not developed their own action plans and protocols for integration, independent of the Action Plan. Professional institutions do not have their own plans either, but many of them perform tasks relating to the integration of persons granted asylum as part of their daily work and remit, and some have their own internal prodecural protocols, most often based on their previous experience with marginalised groups or guidelines from relevant ministries. All stakeholders in all regions agree that the lack of funding poses a serious structural constraint and that allocations for integration activities should be increased. They stress that the entire budget is centralised and that they lack special resources earmarked for integration, noting, however, that budget allocations could be repurposed or activated if and when the need arises.When it comes to understanding the importance and indicators of successful integration, there are no major differences between either sectors or regions. As far as the key dimension of integration is concerned, all stakeholders across all regions highlight communication, that is, learning the Croatian language, as a crucial prerequisite for all other aspects of integration, especially for the inclusion of children in the education system, participation of adults in the labour market, addressing housing issues and, generally, enabling asylum beneficiaries to get along in local communities. In the Central Region, professional institutions claim that integration could also be facilitated by the community's experience with refugees during the Croatian War, and the history of coexistence with national minorities. In the Central Region, they feel that integration would be more successful if asylum beneficiaries were accommodated within the community rather than isolated, and if they were provided with appropriate care and inclusion in community life. All stakeholders across all regions voice some sort of concern because, when it comes to the accommodation of persons granted asylum, they expect negative reactions from the host population due to cultural and religious differences, especially in smaller communities, with the general opinion being that larger towns would be readier to accept asylum beneficiaries. Interlocutors in Zagreb are the most critical of the local community as a favourable environment for integration, with professional institutions stating that negative sentiments are the greatest problem, stemming primarily from fear of the unknown among the local population. Nonetheless, almost all of the interviewed asylum beneficiaries highlight the positive experiences they had with their acceptance in local communities, noting, however, that it took a while for them to feel accepted by their neighbours. Only three out of 26 interlocutors report having negative experiences upon their arrival in the community, consisting mainly of unpleasant verbal comments. Persons granted asylum generally do not see any major cultural barriers to their life in Croatia, but in their view the integration system is not well-organised and includes some contradictions.At the intraregional level alone, and particularly at the interregional level, the integration stakeholders from different local communities show considerable differences when estimating the integration capacity of their communities. The majority of LSGUs believe that organising language courses falls under the responsibility of the Ministry of Science and Education, expressing concerns about the duration of courses (too few lessons) and uncertainties about their funding, while RSGUs also stress their lack of human and logistic capacities to organise courses. Professional institutions shift the responsibility for organizing courses to administrative bodies – from the local, through the regional, to the national levels. Only representatives of Zagreb-based SCOs report more direct involvement in the organisation of courses – some of them offer them in a formalised manner, and others through voluntary engagement. As to the inclusion in the education system, most stakeholders stress the problem of slow-moving administration and emphasize the heavy teaching workload, suggesting that there is a need for additional teachers as well as the necessity to work additionally with asylee children. Further difficulties mentioned are related to the lack of personal documents and the issue of recognising diplomas and previously acquired qualifications. In the Littoral and Central regions, they also highlight a lack of interpreters and teaching assistants, over which they have no control, but depend on the relevant ministry.Most of stakeholders from LSGUs and RSGUs are actually unaware of the existing accommodation capacity because they do not own any housing units or have already allocated all they had to beneficiaries from certain social categories. They see a possible solution in the conversion of the existing vacant buildings or renting of private flats, where they report problems with landlords, i.e. the unwillingness of landlords to let out their flats to accommodate persons granted asylum and the high rents they impose. Persons granted asylum are mostly concerned about their initial accommodation in reception centres, with which they were partially (dis)satisfied and, in addition to prejudice by landlords, the interlocutors also stressed high prices. In their local communities, asylum beneficiaries have been recognised as a desirable workforce in sectors with labour shortfalls. The LSGU representatives stress the need for a skilled workforce in the construction and public works sectors and, in the Eastern Region, agriculture. In addition to feeling that employers should be informed of opportunities to hire asylum beneficiaries, LSGUs are somewhat keener to consider potential retraining and additional training schemes as well as efforts to overcome the language barrier, referring to professional services which should take over that task. Many see the opportunities to employ asylum beneficiaries primarily in low-skill and ancillary jobs, such as kitchen or warehouse assistants and so forth. While the asylum beneficiaries themselves are highly motivated to take part in the labour market, since they see employment as a key prerequisite to gaining independence, they are aware of the economic situation in Croatia and do not want to become a public charge, but rather an active and productive segment of the society.Almost all interlocutors attach great importance to public information and awareness-raising campaigns, and most of them also recognise the role of the media in this process and believe that it is extremely important to get the local population acquainted with good practices and examples of successful efforts to integrate asylum beneficiaries, and to inform them about their culture and customs. This would prevent the development of prejudice and discrimination, where the LSGU representatives often see their role in such efforts unlike RSGUs, among which only a few recognise it. Professional institutions also leave the role of awareness raising to the media and, for the time being, carry out awareness-raising activities in the form of workshops and cultural events mainly with support from CSOs in Zagreb. The training of staff members and professionals has also been stressed as extremely important, yet largely non-existent in most institutions, offices and organisations.Nearly all interviewees from all regions agree that asylum beneficiaries have been provided with adequate social welfare, just like all of its other beneficiaries. Some of the representatives of LSGUs and professional institutions from the Dalmatian and Eastern Regions noted that asylum beneficiaries were not supposed to be singled out, that is, afforded greater rights and priorities than domestic social-welfare beneficiaries. All local communities feel that asylum beneficiaries have been provided with adequate health-care, but the interviewees highlight a lack of physicians and the overload of the health system, as well as communications. When it comes to providing adequate social welfare and health care, a common problem stressed in all regions is the insufficient capacity of institutions, while other aggravating circumstances include slow systems, uninformed staff members, shortcomings in the monitoring of asylum beneficiaries, uncertainties about the financing of health-care services and lack of coordination between different stakeholders. The same issues are also reported by the asylum beneficiaries themselves.Professional institutions have, for the most part, already established cooperation with almost all stakeholders involved in the integration process. In this context, they most often point out line ministries, as well as significant cooperation with CSOs. Only the Central Region (including Zagreb) highlights the existing cooperation with LSGUs and the OHRRNM, or with international organisations. The LSGU and RSGU representatives are somewhat more likely to expect more significant engagement by and cooperation with CSOs, which they consider more capable of writing projects and mobilising funds for work with asylum beneficiaries or count on their human resources. Some professional institutions are also focused on inter-city and inter-county cooperation, for example, with other social-welfare centres, in order to compare their experiences and share good practices. The SCO stakeholders state national and local authorities make insufficient use of the capacity and experience of local SCOs.All stakeholders criticize administration primarily because of the lack of timely and transparent exchanges of information, given that they are perceived as responsible for the entire system. Stakeholders in local communities feel that they operate without specific guidelines and decisions, everything being left to improvisation. Professional institutions hold that the measures defined in the Action Plan are not applicable to the realities in the field, stressing that the system is not prepared to respond to current challenges and needs such as, for instance, securing accommodation and interpreters. There is also concern about the duplication of work by different institutions and organisations, and shifting responsibilities to CSOs. It has been stressed that a protocol in needed which would contain descriptions and guidelines for the implementation of steps in the integration of persons granted asylum, which should define the sequence of implementing integration measures, those in charge of their implementation, including their responsibilities, as well as the forms of their cooperation. Such a protocol and guidelines would enable LSGUs and RSGUs to rely on these documents in their work and to act in compliance therewith. All stakeholders emphasize the need to receive timely and reliable information about the number, structure and time of arrival of persons granted asylum in their areas because this information is crucial for them to be able to prepare themselves for different aspects of their integration. A distribution plan is a document cited by all self-government units as essential to launch preparations for the asylum beneficiaries, in accordance with the aforementioned protocol.All stakeholders highlight interpreters and cultural mediators as a very pressing need in all regions. It has been stressed that interpreters should be professionally trained, rather than semi-skilled individuals or family members, let alone children. All stakeholders realize that securing housing is a key prerequisite for the reception and integration of persons granted asylum, and that it falls within the remit of the central government, rather than the local community. The Eastern and Dalmatian Regions place special emphasis on the need to provide adequate accommodation for unaccompanied children under international protection. Also, all integration stakeholders feel that efforts are needed to speed up administrative procedures because there is a gap between what has been set forth in legislation and what can really be implemented due to technical barriers, including children's registration in school e-registers, medical records, access to Croatian language learning, and verification of previously acquired qualifications and job competencies which is a requirement for education or employment. To achieve all this, sound intersectorial cooperation is required.The integration stakeholders in all regions show a clear need to prepare, raise the awareness of and train the staff directly involved in the integration process for contacts with and providing services to persons granted asylum. Since professional institutions are places of direct and on-going contacts with asylum beneficiaries, there is a need for continuous training of their professional staff. The training of all integration stakeholders should include learning about the culture and customs of asylum beneficiaries and it should be based on the principles of intercultural communication. In some professional institutions whose staff are engaged in direct and intense work with families of asylum beneficiaries, such as counselling and psychosocial support, there is an increased need for continuous mental-health care and stress prevention among staff members through supervision and professional support.Given that they believe that the responsibility for integrating persons granted asylum rests primarily with the state, a number of LGSUs, professional institutions and some CSOs expect the state to bear the related costs. The LSGUs in the Central Region see the opportunity to secure funding by applying for EU projects and drawing money from EU funds. In the Dalmatian Region, the LSGUs expect the state to issue fewer instructions, and to focus more on direct care for asylum beneficiaries. At the LSGU level, help in meeting community needs in the integration process and their own efforts is expected from the Government of the RoC, primarily the OHRRNM as the central coordinating body. Some RSGUs believe that they will successfully carry out all tasks imposed by law and those received from the competent state authorities, and that they will tackle problems only once asylum beneficiaries arrive in their territory. LSGUs and RSGUs see their role in coordinating different integration process stakeholders, such as professional institutions and CSOs, at the town and county levels. Some LSGUs also see their role in supporting other stakeholders when they lack capacity in the integration process, and in networking with other institutions within the community. In this context, they stress their role in providing information to asylum beneficiaries and improving intersectorial cooperation because they "have a good overview of the activities of different services." Some LSGUs feel that a person should be assigned to each integration stakeholder as its key informant about how asylum beneficiaries can exercise their rights.The LSGUs see their key contribution to integration in their efforts to raise the awareness of and inform the public about the arrival of persons granted asylum and the process of their integration, being aware there resistance to their arrival in some communities. In the Eastern Region, they warn that greater resistance to the arrival of asylum beneficiaries may be expected in communities that are traditionally more closed and host a larger number of immigrants from Bosnia and Herzegovina, who were forced to leave their homes due to armed conflicts with the Muslims. In the Central and Littoral regions and the City of Zagreb, they believe that the experience they have with proven integration mechanisms for socially vulnerable groups, referring to members of the Roma national minority, will help them in the process of integrating asylum beneficiaries. The LSGUs feel they can also directly support integration efforts by providing initial financial assistance to asylum beneficiaries, helping in the process of their reception and accommodation, offering aid such as food and toiletries, facilitating children's inclusion in educational institutions, covering their kindergarten costs (Eastern and Littoral regions, Zagreb), as well as helping asylum beneficiaries to find employment. Professional institutions will address integration as part of their daily activities, by providing services for persons granted asylum as well as any other beneficiaries. The LSGUs, RSGUs and professional institutions see the important role of CSOs in complementing services provided to asylum beneficiaries by professional institutions. Most of the CSOs plan to expand their present activities to meet the specific needs of asylums beneficiaries, and represent a major integration potential for local communities, highlighting their networks of volunteers as a key asset in work with persons granted asylum. The CSOs feel that a coordination mechanism should be put in place at the LSGU level so as to bring together all the stakeholders, including the civil sector, and ensure transparent financing of services for asylum beneficiaries.Croatia has few communities with any reception and integration experience and most of the local communities covered by this research have not considered or prepared themselves for this challenge. Yet, the integration stakeholders in all units included in this research stress that they crucially need timely and reliable information about the plans for the arrival and distribution of persons granted asylum, and that information from the relevant ministries, particularly from the OHRRNM, will enable them to launch preparations for integration activities and possible reception of asylum beneficiaries. Finally, the recommendations derived from this research will facilitate improvements in policies and practices for the integration of persons under international protection, making it easier and less painful to achieve the objectives stemming from Croatia's commitments as an EU member state, as well as its legislation and action plans of the Government of the RoC.

AMÉRICA LATINALópez Obrador acusa al PRI de comprar cinco millones de votos.Para más información: http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/10/content_15565230.htm http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/07/world/americas/mexico-elections/index.html http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/09/actualidad/1341854235_769141.html http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/latinoamerica/lpez-obrador-pedir-la-nulidad-de-las-elecciones-en-mxico_12013582-4 http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/05/12570126-mexicos-president-elect-shrugs-off-claims-of-vast-vote-buying-coercion-in-election?lite http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/09/world/americas/mexico-election/index.html?hpt=wo_c2 Masiva marcha en México para condenar el triunfo del PRI.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488821-masiva-marcha-en-mexico-para-condenar-el-triunfo-del-pri http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/08/12622028-tens-of-thousands-protest-in-mexico-against-president-elect-alleging-vote-fraud?lite http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/06/world/americas/mexico-elections/index.html http://www.lemonde.fr/ameriques/article/2012/07/09/mexique-les-manifestations-hostiles-au-nouveau-president-continuent_1731173_3222.html http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/08/actualidad/1341710466_799097.html Legislativas mexicanas: PRI tendrá poco margen de maniobra. Para más información: http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/internacional/noticias/B0D5AED1-A987-48D9-8D05-5C606ADE78C2.htm?id={B0D5AED1-A987-48D9-8D05-5C606ADE78C2} Hallan 43 muertos en distintas partes de México, 7 de ellos policías.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/latinoamerica/muertos-en-mxico_12016401-4 http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/onze-pessoas-morrem-em-emboscada-no-norte-do-mexico-5434512#ixzz20DVo0c4yHuracán Emilia se acerca con fuerza a costas mexicanas. Para más información: http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/10/12660912-emilia-becomes-powerful-category-4-hurricane-off-mexico?lite http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/10/world/americas/pacific-hurricanes/index.html Argentina condena a 50 años de cárcel al dictador Videla por el robo de bebés. Para más información: http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/06/12592712-wasnt-just-one-or-two-children-ex-argentine-dictators-jailed-for-baby-thefts?lite http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/05/actualidad/1341478049_436607.html http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/05/world/americas/argentina-baby-theft-trial/index.html Sin apoyo externo, el paraguayo Franco afronta ahora el aislamiento interno.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488915-sin-apoyo-externo-franco-afronta-ahora-el-aislamiento-interno http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489390-los-colorados-preparan-su-regreso#comentar http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/latinoamerica/paraguay-es-un-pas-en-soledad_12010505-4 Descarta la OEA suspender a Paraguay y critica al Mercosur.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489389-descarta-la-oea-suspender-a-paraguay-y-critica-al-mercosur#comentar http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/latinoamerica/insulza-rechaza-suspender-a-paraguay-de-la-oea_12017170-4 http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/internacional/noticias/5FFD5269-B04F-4517-A7C3-746DC07E0CE4.htm?id={5FFD5269-B04F-4517-A7C3-746DC07E0CE4} Mercosur hace frente a la doctrina de Hugo Chávez.Para más información: http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/mercosul-testa-doutrina-de-hugo-chavez-5433450 Caracas cede cada vez más el control de su industria petrolera a China.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489118-caracas-cede-cada-vez-mas-el-control-de-su-industria- Lula a Chávez: "Tu victoria será nuestra victoria".Para más información: http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/07/actualidad/1341623066_440627.html http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488742-fuerte-respaldo-de-lula-a-chavezChávez dice que se encuentra "totalmente libre" del cáncer.Para más información: http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/chavez-diz-que-esta-totalmente-livre-do-cancer-voltou-correr-5431942#ixzz20DVaaC8w http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48127346/ns/world_news-americas/#.T_1cD5HMqw5 http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489116-chavez-dice-que-se-encuentra-totalmente-libre-del-cancer#comentarCierran una radio opositora en Ecuador. Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488743-cierran-una-radio-opositora-en-ecuador Nicaragua busca tener canal interoceánico. Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/latinoamerica/nicaragua-busca-tener-canal-interocenico_12012306-4 Dilma alienta el consumo de productos nacionales.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488945-dilma-alienta-el-consumo-de-productos-nacionales Preocupación en Cuba por un nuevo brote de cólera.Para más información: http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/10/12656866-cholera-kills-at-least-3-in-cuba-bad-water-wells-blamed?lite http://america-latina.blog.lemonde.fr/2012/07/09/cuba-retour-sur-laffaire-padilla/ http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489344-preocupacion-en-cuba-por-un-nuevo-brote-de-colera#comentar Ejército abandona las favelas que fueron bastión de los narcos en Río de Janeiro.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489115-el-ejercito-abandona-las-favelas-que-fueron-bastion-de-los-narcos-en-rio-de-janeiro#comentar http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/latinoamerica/la-singular-estrategia-de-paz-en-las-favelas-de-ro_12010831-4 http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/internacional/noticias/AC562F1F-46DC-40DE-A2FF-7BE82BDAA16C.htm?id={AC562F1F-46DC-40DE-A2FF-7BE82BDAA16C} Bolivia estatizará concesión de plata.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/latinoamerica/bolivia-estatizar-concesin-de-plata_12016287-4 http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/09/actualidad/1341821141_720801.html Ascenso de los evangélicos en Brasil, el país más católico del mundo.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/latinoamerica/ascenso-de-los-evanglicos-en-brasil-el-pas-ms-catlico-del-mundo_12013663-4 Argentina: se concreta fractura de central obrera. Para más información: http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/internacional/noticias/F9138ADB-53CD-4D1C-B393-5251B78854B1.htm?id={F9138ADB-53CD-4D1C-B393-5251B78854B1} Indígenas colombianos se enfrentan al ejército. Para más información: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-18791301ESTADOS UNIDOS / CANADÁ Obama estancado en un empate con Mitt Romney. Para más información: http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/_portada/noticias/CC8294A8-6DEC-4BB7-B791-EA60DE261C19.htm?id={CC8294A8-6DEC-4BB7-B791-EA60DE261C19} http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/no-mes-em-que-mais-arrecadou-obama-segue-atras-de-opositor-5432399#ixzz20DVzysuaObama va por extensión de reducción de impuestos.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/estados-unidos/obama-pide-terminar-con-rebajas-fiscales-a-ricos_12013882-4 http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/estados-unidos/barack-obama-propone-que-los-ms-adinerados-se-metan-la-mano-al-bolsillo_12016285-4 http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489101-obama-pide-que-la-clase-media-pague-menos-impuestos#comentar http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/obama-insiste-em-imposto-maior-para-ricos-5433578 http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/11/content_15567815.htm Obama mantiene la ventaja en doce estados clave de cara a las elecciones.Para más información: http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/09/actualidad/1341852907_521683.html http://elpais.com/tag/elecciones_eeuu_2012/a/ Romney lidera en la recaudación de fondos.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489102-romney-lidera-en-la-recaudacion-de-fondos#comentar Hillary Clinton visita Laos . Para más información: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-18792282Peor incendio en la historia del estado de Colorado, casi bajo control.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/estados-unidos/peor-incendio-en-la-historia-de-estado-de-colorado_12011204-4Congresista estadounidense homosexual contrae matrimonio.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/estados-unidos/congresista-estadounidense-homosexual-contrae-matrimonio_12015133-4EUROPAItalia no descarta pedir un rescate a la Unión Europea. Para más información: http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/11/content_15568009.htm http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489387-tambien-italia-abrio-las-puertas-a-un-rescate#comentar http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489497-italia-no-descarta-pedir-un-rescate-a-la-ue#comentarRajoy lanza nuevos recortes para combatir el déficit. Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/europa/ayuda-del-eurogrupo-a-espaa-hasta-100000-millones-de-euros_12017462-4 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-18792427 http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489110-presionada-por-la-ue-espana-ajusta-mas#comentar A cambio del rescate Madrid debe renunciar al control de sus bancos. Para más información: http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/858086.html http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489421-la-ue-avanza-sobre-espana-y-le-recorta-soberania#comentar Diversos medios hacen referencia a la crisis económica europea.Para más información: http://www.economist.com/node/21558257 http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489112-bajo-la-lupa-los-lideres-tambien-se-aprietan-el-cinturon#comentar http://www.lemonde.fr/economie/article/2012/07/09/le-mes-un-fmi-a-l-europeenne-qui-doit-encore-trouver-sa-place_1731118_3234.html Grecia continúa haciendo frente a medidas de austeridad. Para más información: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-greece-resignation-20120710,0,1715490.storyParís y Berlín quieren refundar Unión Europea. Para más información: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/world/europe/germany-and-france-celebrate-their-bond.html?ref=world&gwh=F31516EB7E884932259193FE0B5E9652 http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/08/actualidad/1341743167_271675.html 54 migrantes africanos mueren en intento por cruzar a Italia. Para más información: http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/11/content_15567645.htm http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-18794548 Más de 140 personas mueren por causa de fuertes lluvias en Rusia.Para más información: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/09/world/europe/russia-floods/index.html?hpt=wo_c2 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/world/europe/putin-tours-flood-stricken-black-sea-region.html?ref=world&gwh=6533565A0D4BC183840BD4138B5015EB http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/mais-de-140-pessoas-morrem-por-causa-de-chuvas-no-sul-da-russia-5417115#ixzz20DYdU1OE http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/08/actualidad/1341741179_622677.html La UE alerta que Al Qaeda tiene misiles para derribar aviones en el Sahel.Para más información: http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/07/actualidad/1341696955_789895.htmlEta mantiene renuncia a las armas, pero cuestiona que no haya diálogo.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/europa/estrasburgo-se-opone-a-la-doctrina-parot-y-pide-excarcelar-a-una-etarra_12016481-4 http://www.lemonde.fr/europe/article/2012/07/09/eta-accuse-paris-et-madrid-de-bloquer-le-dialogue_1731169_3214.html http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/europa/eta-mantiene-renuncia-a-las-armas-y-dice-que-madrid-y-pars-no-avanzan-hacia-el-dilogo_12012484-4 Rusia hace ejercicios con buques de guerra en el Mar Negro. Para más información: http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/11/content_15567096.htmReinician juicio contra Mladic en La Haya.Para más información: http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/internacional/78575.html http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48144578/ns/world_news-europe/#.T_1b1ZHMqw5 http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/06/19/actualidad/1340065013_444531.html http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/testemunha-descreve-massacre-em-julgamento-de-ratko-mladic-5427938#ixzz20DYvURT2 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-18795203Alemania reformará los servicios secretos tras el escándalo de grupo neonazi.Para más información: http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/08/actualidad/1341739420_437202.html Gran Bretaña vota una histórica reforma de la Cámara de los Lores.Para más información: http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/09/12637862-london-bomber-widow-samantha-lewthwaite-recruiting-female-terror-squads-in-somalia?lite http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-britain-lords-20120711,0,2351369.story http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489216-gran-bretana-vota-una-historica-reforma-de-la-camara-de-los-lores#comentar http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-russia-floods-20120708,0,3779381.storyLondres se prepara para las Olimpíadas. Para más información: http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/internacional/noticias/C66745FA-E3AF-4BBB-B255-BDBE47981E4E.htm?id={C66745FA-E3AF-4BBB-B255-BDBE47981E4E} http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/05/world/europe/uk-security-incident/index.html?hpt=wo_bn9 Los mineros españoles protestan contra los recortes con una "marcha negra" por Madrid.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489403-los-mineros-espanoles-protestan-contra-los-recortes-con-una-marcha-negra-por-madrid#comentar Los bosques radiactivos de Chernobyl, una bomba dormida. Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489052-los-bosques-radiactivos-de-chernobyl-una-bomba-dormida#comentar Según autoridades rusas dejarían de vender armas a Siria. Para más información: http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/russia-vai-suspender-venda-de-armas-para-siria-diz-autoridade-5426247#ixzz20DYau3Lt Hollande lanza una cumbre social para reformar el modelo francés.Para más información: http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/09/actualidad/1341840770_252931.html ASIA- PACÍFICO/ MEDIO ORIENTEKofi Annan asegura que acordó un nuevo plan de paz con régimen sirio.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/medio-oriente/siria-acuerdan-nuevo-plan-de-paz-con-bashar-al-asad_12012983-4 http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/11/content_15567761.htm http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/internacional/78574.html http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/world/middleeast/bashar-al-assad-meets-with-kofi-annan.html?ref=world&gwh=24DB32B019FC2DE1935A2D140E746CBF Assad afirma que no va a terminar como Gadafi o Mubarak. Para más información: http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/assad-diz-nao-temer-destino-de-kadafi-ou-mubarak-5430021#ixzz20DZ4cIsS Annan busca apoyo de Irán e Irak frente a crisis siria. Para más información: http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/internacional/noticias/FE35F23F-BA99-40AE-890B-B7178FA2CA68.htm?id={FE35F23F-BA99-40AE-890B-B7178FA2CA68} http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/09/actualidad/1341816579_934773.html Repudio internacional por ejecución pública de joven afgana acusada de adulterio.Para más información: http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/09/12639235-unspeakable-cruelty-outrage-grows-after-afghan-womans-execution-caught-on-video?lite http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/08/12627795-us-afghan-officials-condemn-public-execution-of-afghan-woman?lite http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489214-conmocion-por-el-brutal-asesinato-en-publico-de-una-mujer-en-afganistan#comentar http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/afeganistao-video-mostra-mulher-sendo-executada-por-adulterio-5422494#ixzz20DYyNkmQ http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/08/world/asia/afghanistan-public-execution/index.html?hpt=wo_c2 Irán prueba misiles.Para más información: http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/11/content_15567884.htm http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/01/world/meast/iran-missiles/index.html?hpt=wo_bn11 China desafía al mundo e invierte 20.000 millones de dólares en Irán.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1489014-china-iran-inversiones#comentar China advierte freno en economía.Para más información: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-china-slowdown-20120710,0,3626338.story http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488944-china-advierte-que-se-frena-su-economia#comentar http://www.economist.com/node/21558307Japón y China en disputa por una isla. Para más información: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-18792556 http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-afghan-roadside-bombing-20120709,0,7742430.story Ataque en Afganistán mata a 6 militares estadounidenses.Para más información: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/world/asia/gunmen-in-pakistan-kill-6-soldiers-and-a-policeman.html?ref=world&gwh=883D5C77A6960B664276A9D77BEB75D2 http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-china-slowdown-20120710,0,3626338.story http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/08/12627789-6-us-soldiers-killed-in-roadside-bomb-attack-in-eastern-afghanistan?lite Los aliados darán a Afganistán 13.000 millones de ayuda en tres años.Para más información: http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/08/actualidad/1341757800_037533.html http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/world/asia/afghanistan-is-pledged-16-billion-for-civilian-needs.html?ref=world&gwh=716276436265F935ACD6ADED912FE74D Sacerdote preso por desafiar al gobierno chino. Para más información: http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/internacional/noticias/A946EE57-B9C4-4F25-8083-B5F0028742AB.htm?id={A946EE57-B9C4-4F25-8083-B5F0028742AB} El 'tercer sexo' será oficializado por medio de una ley en Nepal.Para más información: http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/asia/ley-oficializara-el-tercer-sexo-en-nepal-_12016981-4 Aung San Suu Kyi mantiene su asiento en parlamento de Myanmar.Para más información: http://photoblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/09/12638373-aung-san-suu-kyi-takes-her-seat-in-myanmar-parliament?lite Trabajadores de medios surcoreanos en huelga por independencia de medios de comunicación.Para más información: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-korea-media-strike-20120711,0,5422254.story"CNN" analiza qué pueden aprender los líderes japoneses de la crisis nuclear en Fukushima.Para más información: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/06/opinion/takeshita-fukushima-management/index.html?hpt=wo_bn7ÁFRICAEl Constitucional egipcio censura al presidente por restablecer el Parlamento.Para más información: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/world/middleeast/egypt-tension-after-order-to-reconvene-parliament.html?_r=1&ref=world&gwh=9D2DE4022C04A357E903195CA2BC3A53 http://www.economist.com/blogs/newsbook/2012/07/libyas-electionhttp://www.economist.com/blogs/newsbook/2012/07/egypts-politics http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/10/12659862-future-constitution-at-heart-of-egypt-power-struggle?lite http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-egypt-parliament-20120711,0,7892069.story http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/09/world/meast/egypt-politics/index.html?hpt=wo_c2 Desafío de Morsi a los militares egipcios.Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488914-desafio-de-morsi-a-los-militares-egipcios http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/06/23/world/middleeast/The-Leaders-of-The-Egyptian-Military-Council.html?ref=world&gwh=4BFBFEBC95E1F52E7DA308015B315475 http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/11/content_15568011.htm http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/08/actualidad/1341760888_873837.html Se aleja en Libia el fantasma islamista: ganan los liberales. Para más información: http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2012-07/11/content_15568011.htm http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-18799065 http://www.economist.com/blogs/newsbook/2012/07/libyas-election http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488910-se-aleja-en-libia-el-fantasma-islamista-ganan-los-liberales http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48111019/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/#.T_1btpHMqw5 http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/09/world/africa/libya-election/index.html?hpt=wo_c2 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/world/africa/libya-election-latest-results.html?ref=world&gwh=5D6E6EFEE759B5007C364EE0B568B654 http://internacional.elpais.com/internacional/2012/07/09/actualidad/1341843623_669452.html "MSNBC" analiza: 120 doctores para 8 millones de personas en Sudán del Sur.Para más información: http://photoblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/10/12658825-120-doctors-for-8-million-people-south-sudans-health-care-gap?liteCorte Penal Internacional condena a 14 años a líder rebelde congoleño.Para más información: http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/internacional/noticias/C11C434B-39A6-4F8C-979C-A797628DB0B7.htm?id={C11C434B-39A6-4F8C-979C-A797628DB0B7} http://diario.elmercurio.com/2012/07/11/internacional/_portada/noticias/8745E475-BD7D-4163-9597-EB71364AE508.htm?id={8745E475-BD7D-4163-9597-EB71364AE508}OTRASEl FMI advirtió que la desaceleración de Brasil, China y la India frenarán aún más elcrecimiento este año, que será inferior al esperado. Para más información: http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1488508-duro-pronostico-para-la-economia-global"The Economist" presenta su informe semanal: "Business this week". Para más información: http://www.economist.com/node/21558323

Issue 21.4 of the Review for Religious, 1962. ; ALOYSIUS J. MEHR, O.S.C. Community Exercises in Religious Life Introduction: The Religious Community in Perspec-tive The religious communityx exists within two wider communities from which it draws its own unique vitality and significance. These two communities--forming one kingdom of God--are the Church and the total human world. Both are immeasurably deep and charged with dynamism; and we cannot arrive at an adequate grasp of the significance of community exercises in religious life unless we see the posture of our own particular commu-nity within these two great communities which are great covenants, the covenant of creation and the cove-nant of Christ. The religious community, however, is not related to the Church and the world only extrinsically as though these formed some kind of background or framework out-side of the community. Kather, the religious community exists at the point of encounter between two great lines of force and destiny which are the Church and the world. Its being calls out to the total human Community from which it arises and in whose service it acts; and its being is a response, deep and creative, to the call of the Word of God. The religious community sums up, symbolizes, and is an eikon of the human community and of the Church. The religious community, therefore, arises from the depths of creation, from the depths of life, lost in the eons of the life's growth itself.2 We carry on the work of crea- 2 This paper was written for and delivered at the international convention on Crosier spirituality held at Maaseik, Belgium, July 24-26, 1961. It has been revised so as to make it applicable to re-ligious communities in genera!. 2 Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man, translated by. Bernard Wall (New york: Harper, 1959); The Divine Milieu, trans-lated by Bernard Wall (New York: Harper, 1960). Hans Urs yon 4. 4. Aloysius J. Mehr, O.S.C., is on the faculty of Crosier House of Studies, Route 1, Wallen Road, Fort Wayne 8, Indiana. VOLUME 21, 1962 30! 4" Aloysius Mehr, O.~.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS tion, converging, as Teilhard sees it, to a kind of world unity in which all things are synthesized into community,a The direction of the history of life has moved through phases of biology ("biogenesis") into the world of incar-nate spirits ("noogenesis"); and in the New Covenant this force is caught up in the moment of the Resurrection, present among us as a pledge of the final entry into the glory of the Lord (kabod Yahweh). Our community-being, our being-together (Mitsein in Heidegger's termi-nology) is thus wrapped up in the forces and destinies of life, surging on in space-time towards its fullness, the seed of which it carries in itself at the present. Moreover, our community-being is also wrapped up in the fulfillment of creation, the new creation in Christ who draws all to the parousial and paschal destiny of all creation--a destiny that is already sacramentally present in a community called together in the Eucharistic sacrificial meal. These are undoubtedly far-reaching and difficult themes the full significance of which will always remain inaccessible to us, lost behind the veil of the future and the inscrutable destinies of man in the divine plan. We must expect, then, that any discussion of the religious community must, in its ultimate significance, shadow off into mystery. We shall not be able to lay out the forces in us as problems which can be solved, here and now, once and for all times. Community-being is essentially dynamic: we, as men and as religious, are homines vi-atores. Our fellowship in God is an eikon--an image, a sign, a symbol--of the Church localized in our areas of concern, but the Church which is the people of God on the march (in via), creating (in/ieri) what we most deeply are unto fullness in Christ who fulfills all in all (Eph 1:23; Jas 1:18). From this viewpoint we are able to see, or rather to begin to see, the profound significance of community exercises. Community exercises are the historical and temporal incarnations of our being-together (Mitsein). There is a deep and vast need, truly an ontological need, a need arising from our being-together, for authentic community activity that emanates from the inexhaust-ible fullness of our being.4 What we are demands suc-cessive real-ization; our being overflows into our life. Activity, operatio, exercise--these are not on some pe-riphery of the real, bu~ rather incarnations in the fabric of the real world. Man is embodied soul and besouled body. His existence is incarnate existence, caught up in Balthasar, Science, Religion, and Christianity, translated by Hilda Graef (London: Bums and Oates0 1958). s Teilhard develops this theme in The Phenomenon of Man: ~ Gabriel Marcel, Homo Fiator, translated by Emma Crawford (Chicago: Regnery0 1955), p. 26. solidarity with the corporeal universe but transcending it as spirit.5 Human being demands expression; as in-carnate, it is essentially temporal, basically historical, realizing itself further and more fully in successive and authentic encounters with the real--in the mysteries of birth, death, conversion, sickness, and above all, love.~ This paper is, first of all, a re-investigation of certain societal universals--relationships of persons which are the anthropological, sociological, and theological binding forces which help to produce a healthy and fruitful com-munity. The term "relationship" will be used more fre-quently than "community exercises" or "community ac-tivities." This, however, should not confuse the reader. An activity has social implications and social value if it is a relationship to others. The fact, therefore, that we will not group our material under the usual headings like "prayer life" or "recreations" or "the apostolate" should not tempt the reader to conclude that we are not speaking of things usually thought of as "community ex-ercises." We will speak primarily about the unifying forces, the community-building potential of community exercises, whether these be a simple conversation, a rec-reation, the Mass, superior-subject relationships, pro-fessional relationships of instructors with students, or even the exercise of talent in a "private" way within the community. It would be wrong to see as binding forces only those activities in which all of us perform the same movements or say the same words. On the other hand, community and society can hardly exist where there is no mutual a.ctivity, no common involvement of all the members in some fruitful, meaningful task. Finally, this analysis of communal activities precisely in their unifying value views the religious community in its objective, intersubjective, and Christian dimension. Part I: Community in Social Patterns To an anthropologist7 a very significant characteristic of the monastic community is that it is a celibate, reli-giously oriented institution'. This is without precedent or parallel in primitive or preliterate culture. In general, as the society becomes progressively complex,, certain indi-a Von Balthasar .develops this theme in his book Science, Religion, and Christianity. e Gabriel Marcel, The Philosophy O] Existence, translated by 4. Manya Harari (New York: Philosophical Library, 1949)', p. 6. 7The Reverend Alphonse Sowada, OiS.C., received his master's degree in anthropology from the Catholic University of America, Community Washington, D.C., in the spring o[ 1961. In an interview with the Exercises Reverend Ronald Kidd, O.S.C., he initiated in outline form the following analysis of the monastic community based, on anthropo-logical procedure. Father Sowada is'presently working in the New Guinea Mission, VOLUME 21, 1962 3O3 ÷ ÷ ÷ Aloysius Mehr, O$.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 3O4 viduals are set aside solely for religious activity. Hence the phenomenon even of the Israelitic priestly office, given to the tribe of Levi, suggests a somewhat highly developed social complexus. Furthermore, sexual prac-tices become restricted for religious specialists only in civilized, cultured society. The religious community, com-bining both factors, arises only late in the development of a people. This unique development suggests various problems: a separation from the elemental and primitive social binding forces, perhaps a tendency towards over-com-plexity and hyper-specialization, in general, a danger of an ever greater artificiality. Man-to-Nature Relationships The ecological system comprises the sum total of the man-to-nature relationships in a given social organiza-tion. It comprises all the activities by which these people make a living--how they satisfy their elemental needs from nature. Thus, the supplying of food, the manufac-ture of clothing, the realm of technology, and attendant organizations and belief are .elements in an ecological system. In primitive societies, these are the concern of everyone; social organizations and belief patterns (treated in the following sections of this paper) arise from this common involvement in wresting an existence from na-ture. The ecological system forms the foundation for the actual social forms of the people. In the religious community, participation in this basic, elemental social activity is often frustrated. The general pattern is the specialization of ecological functions; they are more often than not entrusted to a few--the prior,,;, procurators, and other superiors. As a result, the remain-ing members of the community lack this elemental bind-ing force with one another and with the community as a whole. This can easily lead to frustration, complacency, and eventually create parasites within the community, In this connection it should be noted that the work of those religious who are engaged in manual labor almost exclusively is much more in line with the needs expressed in an ecological system, provided that they are truly a part of the community in which and for which they work. In order to utilize this natural, social binding force, these religious must feel themselves solidly within the whole community. They should experience the same satisfaction that the son or daughter enjoys when they begin to co-operate with their parents in providing a livelihood for the family. The social bindings formed by the ecological system are intense and deep. For the clerical and teaching members of a community, there is also a need for an acceptable way either to fulfill this function or to find an adequate substitute. The apostolate might seem like a perfect substitute. But in the apostolate the results are apt to be too far distant for the immediate kind of satisfaction caused by common involvement in providing the basic necessities of life. In fact, where superiors or subjects try to make' apostolic work an "acceptable" sublimation, the very 'remoteness of results can tend precisely to create further frustration and complacency. '~ In general, any project in which personal initiative is called into play within and for the community and in which a sense of fulfillment can be forthcoming ~can be used as a substitute. Such projects are of great value in binding together the religious,community. Stress should be placed°especially on the matter of results; for example, graduation, profession, and ordination days should be planned wisely to be days of community joy in accom-plishment rather than of relief in being through with tedious work. Although effective substitutes depend on both subjects and superiors, it is the superiors, above all, who must see the absolute need for them. Individual ~religious may have the initiative to make valuable .suggestions, but :the only person who can integrate these suggested projects into the community and give them their full social force is ,the superior. Without due attention, the community moves towards increasingly artificial social forms, lacking and attempting to substitute for, the basic level of social solidarity. In order to have a healthy community, we must find effective and meaningful substitutes. Man-to-Man Relationships Next, we deal with interpersonal relationships, en-compassing social ability and practice, questions of status and hierarchy in the communal organization, questions of law regulating interpersonal behavior, family orienta-tion, pressure groups, informal and formal groupings. This is the area of personal response and personal: activ-ity~ phenomena that vary with,each individual. Consid-eration of the interpersonal relationships are of 'utmost importance in analyzing the social structure of a com-munity; they form the operative and dynamic structure of society. Perhaps the most evident charact~eristic of interpersonal relations within the religious community is its thorough structure ot control. First of all, everyone knows every-one else and every individual can control his response thereby. Moreover, the social control within our unique form of community is almost familial or patriarchal. This is a good basis for developed social organization. In a healthy community a person is a part of things, 4. + + Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 305 ÷ Aloysim OM.e~h.Cr., REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS he knows what is expected of him, he is not bewildered or lost within the crowd. He is at home, he knows how to approach everyone else, he knows how to regulate topics of conversation, to account for individual differ-ences, to accept the particular interests of the other mem-bers of the religious society. He enjoys that ecce quam bonum feeling which is a natural result of being [ul_ly ac-cepted by the group. He belongs to them, uncondition-ally; they are happy to have him and would be distressed at losing him. As. a further consequence, he feels shel-tered, contented, and can gradually abandon all his poor little defensive mechhnisms as well as the defects of. char-acter which necessitate them. All his potential gifts can flower, he can. give himself up confidently to his most generous aspirations. Such. :are the blessings which accrue to an individual who lives in a healthy group definitely ready to accept him.s There are, however, definite dangers in our communal make-up. The first and perhaps most serious danger is that of artificiality--artificially controlled responses. To the extent that responses become too automatic, too pat, too set, too taken-for-granted, the very situation which ought to promote solidarity could conceivably destroy it. Responses must be genuine; meaningless responses are detrimental to community. The artificiality of community llfe can be much re-lieved by warm parental and fraternal relationships be-tween superiors and subjects, instructors and students, and, above all, between equals. This fosters the character formation that ordinarily occurs within the family. Con-sequently, everyone must take his role in community seriously; he must be open, understanding, sympathetic, and avoid meaningless responses and inflexibility policy in the name of functional efficiency. Professors ought to be aware of the fact that attitudes built up by personal relationships with students are as important as the material being taught. On the other hand, students must realize that they have much to learn and that their attitude towards their instructors is extremely important. Entering. into dialogue is always a two way street. Within the community deep and authentic friendships should be fostered, for personality grows in proportion as it is opened to others. Fear of friendship shatters munity and leaves only a group of isolated introverts living in the same building. Mistaken notions of partic, ular friendship have forced many a religious to lead an unnecessarily lonely life. Authentic friendship means that I am genuinely con-e Communal Lile, translated by a Religious of the Sacred Heart (Westminster: Newman, 1957), p. 267. cerned with my neighbor as a person. When interest is only pretended, people instinctively feel that they are be-ing treated, not as human beings, but as a case, an object, an It. Make-believe interest, pharisaical interest does more harm than good. Every Christian, and certainly every religious, should be conscious of the manyreasons why he should be deeply and genuinely interested in his neighbor in all places and at all times. Another danger in our communal make-up presents it-self where subjects refuse to cooperate with their supe-rior, or where incapable men are invested with status-power. In primitive tribes, subjects who refuse to work with their superior are simply eliminated. Moreover, a leader who blunders in personal relations or in tribal projects, for example, failing to bring off a hunting raid successfully, loses prestige ipso facto. But in our com-munity, the social status of the members is not easily changed. This has its advantages and disadvantages. More permanent social relationships can be formed so as to .give the individuals a greater security and to give the social order a basic stability. On the other hand, where poor relat!onships are formed, this situation too tends to perpetuate itself. Overspecialization is another factor which endangers solidarity in a community. Anthropologists distinguish between diversification, which can lead to mutual de-pendence and promote solidarity, and specialization, in which a member withdraws himself from the community in order to devote his time and energies to some partlc-ular field. In primitive societies, specialists share perforce a vast number of tribal interests: the medicine man is interested in the buffalo hunt and thereby enjoys a social binding to the hunters; he is involved in wars and raids since his status to some extent depends on a perpetuation of the present social organization. In general, in primitive cul-tures, bindings between religious functions and the re-mainder of tribal functions are very strong. But when society develops, it tends to free itself more and more from nature (the ecological system); and it does so only to become more and more dependent upon man and man-to-man relations. This dependence must serve as a constructive and not a destructive force. In order to prevent diversification--which is absolutely necessary in a complex society--from becoming special-ization, we must manifest and recognize on a community level our mutual dependence; for example, the very real dependence of one teacher upon all the others. Here we see the importance of faculty meetings in which the par-ticular field of competence of one person is seen as com-plementing that of another. There are many ways of Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 196Z ÷ ÷ ÷ Aloysius Mehr~ O.S.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS keeping different interests and fields of competence from becoming divisive. Perhaps greater stress should be placed on the apostolate as a community apostolate, a common effort, accomplished in different ways by each individual, but without thereby becoming any less communal in in-spiration, motivation, and reality. An awareness of our mutual dependence is absolutely necessary for the proper integration of personal activity towards our social goals. Interpersonal relationships in the religious community include not only individual-to-individual relations but also those of groups.-A formal grouping is one which is established de [acto and is recognized by the society as exercising a certain control of the whole. Chapters, councils, a faculty, special committees for accreditation, and so forth are all formal groupings. Informal groupings are not officially set up or estab-lished. We see examples of informal groupings during common recreation periods or when some religious work together informally as a group. Informal groupings can at times exercise more influence than the formal group-ings; that is especially true if the formal groupings are inoperative or if the i.nterrelationships between formal groupings is neglected. It is in the informal groupings that public opinion is formed and in many cases social innovation begins. The informal groupings should pro-vide much of the initiative and dynamism necessary for any society to be alive, to grow and develop, and to keep in touch with the members and their real needs and as-pirations. While informal groupings are very important, formal groupings are even more important in a religious com-munity; ours is by its nature a hierarchical society, and one strongly so. Therefore the effective functioning of our formal groupings is especially important for the vi-tality of the entire community. Inoperative formal group-ings, or artificiality in formal ,groupings, invites seg-mentation of the society, then disintegration, and finally demoralization. The history of the American Indian is an extreme case of precisely this. Factors leading to inoperative formal groupings are many. Among them are age differences, lack of precise definitions of ideals, and immaturity. For a well-function-ing community, superiors-,must be willing to present straightforward proposals to their councils or others' whose advice they are to seek. This means the full pres-entation of real cases that involve discussion and choice, not simply decisions for'ratification.9 In short, he must seek to collaborate. Also, he must have the humility and wisdom to consider minority positions; seeking support Ibid., pp. 270-273. only in numbers infallibly excites mistrust, resentment, opposition, or utter indit~erence. "The prudent and most efficient thing for the superior to do is to make the group share, from the beginning, in the common task.''1° Cooperation between formal and informal groupings is of the essence in achieving a healthy, vital c0mmufiity. This means that we must understand the roles which these groups are to play within, the community. More-over, since the religious community is so strongly hier-archical and the superior tO a large extent controls the interrelationships between formal and informal group-ings, he should be doubly alert, astute, and comprehend-ing in regard to the ideas generated in the informal groupings.Suspicion on the part of a superior is harmful to the vitality of the community, kills personal initiative, and tends again to artificial substitutions and the seg-mentation of the community fabric. But beyond this a superior must have the ability to select appropriate ideas from the informal groupingsmthose ideas which will prove beneficial to the community. It is difficult to re-spect a superior who accepts every suggestion that is of-fered to him or proves that he does not have the ability to choose well. In a primitive society he would in that eventuality lose status. Man-to-Ideals Relationships Under this heading we find community purpose and sense of purpose. In primitive society religion ferments the whole society. And certainly community goals, re-ligious ideals, can and should be important unifying fac-tors in a religious community. It is worthy of note here that in primitive ~ociety where the satisfying of the basic needs has such a prominent role, the upper echelons tend to have the same ideals as those of lower status, the .young as the old, the specialists as those engaged in community projects. When the eco-logical needs become less urgent and the man=to-man relationships more important, it becomes more difficult for all to have the same ideals. But the religious commun-ity should be able to realize this unity of ideals in a way that other communities in contemporary life cannot. In a religious community we-ness will tend to be established by living according to a unique set of ideals--provided the ideals are well defined. Our fellowship, as we will see later, is a unique fellowship in Godl For social vitality and solidarity, it is better to define ideals clearly and energetically and then, as the need arises, to modify them than not to define them at all or to define .them haphazardly or casually. Searching for Ibid., p. 270. 4" 4" CEoxm~misuensity VOLUME 21, 1962 309 4. 4. dloysius OM.Se.hCr,., REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ideals has little social result. Without well-defined, known, and accepted objectives, ideals will be fashioned individually and in groups; this leads directly to com-munity segmentation. In this situation, the very factors which in a healthy social organization cause solidarity and vitality have the el~ect instead of segmenting the community. Ideals must and will be formed. If the proper formal grouping will not define them, it is inevitable that informal groupings will attempt to fill this lack. Community goals and ideals, however, cannot be al-lowed to stagnate. Once they have been defined, they must be re-defined as social changes and new needs make themselves felt. In this sense, it is only by innovation that society can maintain its health and well-being. For these reasons, our ideals require constant modification and elaboration to insure their continued adequacy for the very real and growing society which they both reflect and form. Furthermore, wise inter-group relationships constitutd community dynamisms and insure that the social structures of the community are truly alive and' changing--that the incarnations of the community ideals are true responses to the appeals of the era and the per~ sons, that the community continues to be constituted through history in its response to the Word, that its voca-tion continues to be authentic. It is in this context that tradition possesses real meaning. One group, which is n.aturally the most capable of really fruitful effort in this direction, is the meetings oE the various spiritual directors on a regional or inter-national basis. Undoubtedly much good could be ac-complished by regular and well-prepared meetings of these spiritual leaders in each order or congregation. Each meeting should consist oE a series of scholarly papers followed by serious discussion. Here again, we should point out the grave responsibit-ity of superiors. Upon their shoulders must rest a good portion of the burden of keeping goals alive and develop-ing with the community itself. But this responsibility can-not be placed solely upon the superiors. For a society to develop, all should participate in the re-discovery of old ideals and the formation of new. Community is a "we"; its responsibilities are no less communal than the end which they serve. If a religious suffers from abnormal loneliness, an anthropologist would immediately look for some need which is neither being fulfilled nor et~ectively substituted for. Where such a condition exists, the man is not livit~g a whole life; and attempting to live a half life tends to-wards increasing frustration. The only effective remedy in such a case, according to anthropologists, is the real-istic integration of our activities by directing them mean- ingfully towards the specific and ,well-defined goals of our community. Any notable incidence of real loneliness will probably reveal upon careful .investigation some rupture in the social structure of the whole community-- whether ecological, man-to-man, or man-to-ideals, More-, over, from the fact that our society is in 'itself artificial to a certain extent (lacking almost necessarily the deep and elemental bindings of an ecological involvement), we must be doubly aware of the other unifying forces within our community. Part H: Community and Personal Creativity ~ Patterns of social organization are vital, without the slightest doubt. Much. of our actual failure to realize deeply and meaningfully fellowship with one another in a brother-to-brother relationship stems from the neglect or mismanagement of the social structure of our com-munity. Yet the religious community---even considered only as a deep community of men--is not simply cre-ated by experts. The expert manipulates, controls, studies problems, and finds solutions; but his union with his tools and the particular determined purposes of his craft is extrinsic. We can think in" this connection of the over-organiza-tion of working communes as they sprang upsince the last world war. Here, everything is functionalized--all the activities are planned out, with time alloted on the schedule for religion, recreation, and so forth, which are considered as necessary means for overhauling the ma-chine periodically. When people begin to see their lives coincide with the routines planned for them, when they see themselves and their own importance diminish to the level of cogs in a machine, their spirits harden, atrophy, and wither. Life becomes less than free in the sense that activities are not flowing from the deepest levels of being. They become re.ore and more a number in a filing system. This is no doubt an extreme case. But we must reso-lutely resist the temptation to reduce man simply to an aggregate of psychic functions and forget that he is a living soul. In my relations with the men in my com-munity, I am involved. My actions should not tend to build a wall of separation between the me I know myself to be and others. Given the thorough system of social con-trols characteristic of religious life, given too a life that is frequently arranged by my superiors, the most common temptation is to avoid reaching out in true personal ap-peal to the other in all his unique personality, but to see both him and myself as [unctions--a teacher, student, cook, carpenter, Mass-sayer (a cog in a machi'ne can never pray), a procurator, or sflperior. The conclusion we have been working towards is this: ÷ ÷ Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 dloysius Meh~, O.S.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS community is not established by merely legislating laws, setting up a hierarchy of superiors.and subjects, or giving a dozen human beings a common residence. Nor can it be produced by a system' of techniques. Community must grow out of its members, for it is a highly personal gift of oneself to the other person in all the richness of his individuality. While techniques cannot produce community, they are nevertheless valuable in eliminating those things which could prevent community from happening; for example, enclosure within myself, being trapped, as it were, in a system of concentric circles which stand between me and my life. Furthermore, techniques are undoubtedly neces-sary for the effective accomplishment of particular, goals; for example, organizing a sports program requires some manipulating of people. But teamwork still remains a union based on something outside of the being of the other person;, while it may be a true degree of community, it is still not the fullness of human community, let alone: of fellowship in the word and love of God. "Community," Martin Buber .writes, '"is where com-munity happens.TM There is something in genuine meet-ing which extends beyond calculations, plans, and proj-ects. Just as my being is not definitely exhausted in any one particulai'ity of my life but overflows into promise and possibility,12 rooted in my existence and its destiny, so also the community is never definitely established, en-tirely a "given" factor, a.status; Community, the genuine union of beings, is created out of the depths of promise of my bei~ng. It is not pro-duced. Community is meeting; and that meeting which calls to the other from all that I am is essentially creative: something new happens, I become something that I was only potentially before, and in this connection I must think in terms of gilt or grace. I can remain open to re-ceive this gift of the other as long as I am not artificially isolated from my own being in a world of function; but somehow we are here in a realm in which the notions of cause and effect no longer apply with their full import--. I do not cause dialogue. Even more, in a very real sense, I am given to myself fully only in dialogue, in the gift of another self calling out to me, joining our lives in com-mon destiny and hope. "All real life :is meeting.''13 The energies of life become fully real only in community: [ am the possibility, even more, the promise of community in my most elemental reality as incarnate spirit. r~Between Man and Man, translated by Ronald Gregor Smith (Boston: Beacon, 1955), p. 31. '~ Marcel, Homo Viator, p. 26. ~ Martin Bub~r, I and Thou, translated by Ronald Gregor Smith (New York: Scribner's, 1958), p. 11. Hence community--and in a unique way, the religious community--fulfills a basic demand (exigence in French) of human being. The ability to say We, the possibility of genuine encounter presupposes beings who can love and give themselves to others, beings who are incarnati.ons of the spirit which man i~, a spirit embodied iia'spake.and time, in solidarity with the cosmos and the covenant of creation. The human spirit can be stifled for just so long--a time and a time and half a time of the Scrip-tures-- within the abstractions and reductions of a func-tionalized world which, we repeat, is a real danger in a religious community due to the artificiality and conven-tionalisms so easily developed in such a life. But in the well-chosen words of Gabriel Marcel, it seems, at least as far as man is concerned, tha~ even if life is weakened and in a way degraded, it must still retain a certain character of sacredness . We must accordingly realize, I think, that here we are faced with a~ certain absolute, and that this absolute must be assisted, however strong the temptation to resist it?' Man's spirit seeks the fullness of being, the fulfillment of its destiny.15 Even in the midst of degradation or open rebellion, the voice of his spirit calls out for authentic living. Rebellion is a call to another to answer my appeal, to respond, knowing that even if I fail, at least my call will go on being heard. Although many unfavorable things can be said about rebellion, yet we must admit that it is still authentic living. As Camus has written, "I rebel--therefore we are,''x~ In modern religious life, the danger is not primarily open rebellion. With us, frustration more frequently takes the place of rebellion. We begin with high ideals, but, after encountering many difficulties and meeting with many failures, it is easy for us to lose courage, to be-come despondent and frustrated. The principal cause of this frustration is the lack of understanding one's own abilities, strength, and weakness, Being frustrated, religious enclose themsdves within a shell of their own creation; they try to circumvent the full meaning of their vocation. Frustration is a flight from authentic living, and that is the reason why frus-trated religious try to escape and lose themselves in rou-tine or a ceaseless merry-go-round of activities. Here we see, or begin to see, the ontological.significance of frus-tration, despondency, and defense mechanisms--the psy- ~ The Mystery ol Being, translated by G. S. Fraser (Chicago: Regnery, 1950), v. 2, pp. 182-188. x~ Marcel, The Philosophy ol Existence, p. 4 a0Albert Camus, The Rebel, translated by Anthony Bower (New York: Vintage Books, 1959), p. 22. ÷ ÷ ÷ Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 Aloydm 0M.$eh.~r., REV~EWFOR RELIG;OUS chological and sociological ruptures which prevent com-munity from happening. It is in this context that we propose to re-investigate the three relationships already viewed on the anthro-pological level: my relationship to things, to other peo-ple, and to ideals. Creative Community and Things 1. Art. In our mechanized world, things are considered more and' more as means, even pure means (bona utilia), apart from myself, only accidentally and, ontologically speaking, haphazz'rdly coming into contact with me. Their own values are, for me, simply utilitarian. I fail to see in them the mystery of creation in which I also am essentially involved. Art, beauty--these are simply esoteric tinsel, luxuries for the functional man. In a way this man is only half a man, and hence only half himself, begrudging those energies of life with which his created and corporeal being is essentially in communion.,x7 It would be almost meaningless to tell such a man that his activities are incarnations of his being, for he has denied any essential involvement in this universe of space and time.xs When I live out of harmony with myself and the deep community of creation in which I am, which 'is my world, my environment, my ontological context, how can I truly give myself to another? Furthermore, how can a com-munity that is out of harmony with creation be worthy of being presented to Yahweh in the Eucharistic assembly as the sign of His pleroma? The famous American painter, Ben Shahn, writes: I have always believed that the character of a society is largely shaped and unified by its great creative works, that a society is molded upon its epics, and that it imagines in terms of its cre-' ated things--its cathedrals, its works of art, its musical treas-ures, its literary and philosophic works. One might say that a public may be so unified because the highly personal experi-ence (of the artist) is held in common by the many individual members of the public. The great moment at which Oedipus in his remorse tears out his eyes is a private moment--one of deepest inward emotion. And yet that emotion, produced by art, and many other such private and profound emotions, ex-periences, and images bound together the Greek people into a great civilization, and bound others all .over the earth to them for all time to come.1D Art brings into play the unifying forces of creation but' at a deeper, more subjective, and thoroughly personal~ a~ Von Balthasar, Science, Religion, and Christianity, p. 45. a~Bernard Haring, C.SS.R., The Law o] Christ, translated by Edwin G. Kaiser, C.PP.S, (Westminster: Newman, 1961), v. 1, p. 87. ag Ben Shahn, Shape o] Content (New York: Vintage Books, 1960), pp. 45-46. level. Lacking a developed and fully shared ecological sys-tem, the religious-community unity depends on other re-lations to our world, activities of creativeness, ingenuity, activities which produce "results," or better, activities in which my being sees fruition in the corporeal world in which I am. The point is that we should not i~eglect the unifying force of art, the union of persons in the beauti-ful, in the shared experience of meaningful incarnation. But the attitude of encounter with the beautiful is not limited to what we call the fine arts. If I pick up a chisel, it is simply a tool which I use to perform some task. Con-sider, however, the difference when a highly skilled artist or carpenter picks up a chisel. His work expresses him-self, gives himself to the community. Here we return to the general theme of these 'pages: df community is to happ.en, I must give mysel[, and not simply offer the other some service which I perform. In art--from garden-ing to the liturgical setting--I give myself, I entrust to the community that deep and personal experience of creativ-ity. In accepting another's art, we "welcome" him. To welcome is active, personal, embracing. I go out of my-self to meet the other, to invite him to feel at home with me. We cannot merely accept the other's art, whatever it may be, as we accept the result of an assembly line. To accept his art, I must reach out and take his work into my own life; and by doing so I take him, too, into my life. And here again we glimpse a moment when com-munity happens. If a community does not accept the beautiful, it neglects an important binding force--a neglect which will tend to re-appear in personal encounters. Without the proper at-titude toward art, even the deep significance of liturgical symbolism and expression will lose some of the vitality which it was meant to have. The community chapel, above all, should be a masterpiece of art, expressing community, proclaiming the fellowship in God which we are. 2. Play. Finally, we should consider more deeply the meaning of play. Perhaps play is not the deepest of the arts, but it is a true creative expression of man.2° Play is of its nature public. "Through play we find ourselves no longer imprisoned and isolated in our own individual-ity.'' 21 Play "is act in its spontaneity, acting in its very activity, the living impulse.''~ As a vital phenomenon or manifestation of human being, play--to be genuine-- demands a man in contact with reality; "only the vital Eugene Fink, "The Ontology of Pla}'," Philosophy Today, v. 4 (1960), pp. 95-109. Ibid., p. 96. Ibid., p. 97. ÷ + ÷ Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 315 4. 4" 4- A~oysius Meh~, 0.$.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS being., can die, work, struggle, love, and play. Only such a being is in touch With surrounding reality and the total environment--the world.''u3 Humanplay . is a creation through the medium of pleasure of a world of imaginary acuv~ty . Play ~s always character, ized by an element of representation (something like the real world and its rules, but never degrading into routine). This element determines its meaning. It then effects a transfigura-tion: life becomes peaceful.~' In our own world, play is apt to be a highly organized, commercial project; and here again its mea'ning tends to become more and more functionalized---I play, not for delight, but in order to preserve physical and psychic health. If we would look for a moment at the primitive world, we would find far more significant contours: In the primitive times, play was not practiced so much as an act in its pleasure-giving aspect as is the case for those isolated individuals or groups who periodically detach themselves from the social group to inhabit their own little isle of passing hap-piness. Originally, play was the strongest unifying force. It founded a community quite different, it is true, from that of the living and the dead, the governing and the governed, and even from that based on the family. The community of play of primitive man included all the forms and structures of com-mon life., and it called forth a reliving of all the elements of life. This reached its high point in the community festival. The ancient feast., was a liturgical spectacle where man ex-perienced the proximity of the gods, heroes, the dead, and where he found himself in the presence of all the beneficent and dreadful powers of the universe . What was represented was nothing less than the whole universe.= Genuine play is extremely important in a religiou:; community. We will develop this point further in Part III where we will see that community recreation should serve as a catechesis of the proper celeb'ration of the~ Eucharistic festival--the Mass. Inter-personal Creativity: Intersub]ectivity Community exercises are significant only in as far as they involve an encounier with the Thou. This is the point, above all others, which we must remember. This is the heart of the matter. Divorced from all genuine en-counter with the Thou, community exercises are mean-ingless. In our very proximity, it is easy for me--because of routine, fatigue, and so forth---to consider my confrere less and less as a person (a Thou) and more and more ;ts an object (an It). An object is contained within itself, something which I can possess and manipulate. A person Ibid. Ibid., pp. 104-105. Ibid., pp. 105-106. is a being to whom I can call out, whom I can invoke, who is able to return my call, and in our response to each other create community. I can say "We." But to approach the other in his own unique being and destiny, in all that makes him himself, I myself must be a presence to him. Self-consciousness atrophies,, encloses me in .myself; we may be with one another physically and temporarily, but we have not yet realized Mitsein, that full union in love and welcome where deep calls out to deep. Without doubt, our lives and our encounters with one another tend to form stereotyped patterns. In accordance with our rule and constitutions,~l meet others at certain determined places and at set times. We are joined to-gether for specific purposes: prayer, recreation, work, in short, every conceivable type of community exercise. In a way there is constant community. I am very little in real solitude whether before God or before men. The students whom I teach in the classroom, the community for whom I cook or for whom I build cabinets, the confreres with whom I watch television--these are certainly beings with whom I exist; and even though I cannot speak of the re-ligious life as being entirely or ~even properly speaking functionalized, yet frequently there is something in the other which I am neglecting. P~r~haps 1 am polite and courteous: I smile at the other and laugh at his jokes; I try to understand his problems and offer him sympathy-- and still; perhaps, we stand more in juxtaposition than in community. But there are moments when this half-face to the 'world breaks down, hours of.grace (kairos.in St. John) in which the possibility of far deeper community is suddenly revealed. It is then that we see individuals in an entirely new perspective and their presence becomes more mean-ingful to us. A time of community crisis can draw us to-gether in this way, and we learn to depend on a confrere as he is, and not just in what he does---or better, what he does incarnates what he is. The world from which our candidates come has been well described as a broken world.20 This factor must be kept in mind while considering, the present-day prob-lems of religigus life. Older forms of unity have been gradually breaking down--the family, for instance, has been to a great extent replaced by the peer group, the gang, the more casual associations. Political and techno-logical unions have become strong~ r, suggesting a growth 'in world unity. But frequently, ~he new unions which have sprung up are on the impersonal plane; technol-ogy, for. example, unites the worlO" because cultural dif- ~ Marcel, The Mystery o! Being, v. 1; pp. 22-47. The title used for this chapter is "A Broken World." ~ 4. 4. 4. Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 317 + Aloysius Mehr, O.S.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 318 ferences do not prevent a person from working a machine; in principle any one at all can learn this operation. But "any one at all," l'on,.das Man, does not exist. What exists are real people, individual, free beings, irreplace-able in the solitude of their liberty. In those moments of human existence in which I some-how transcend the world of mechanisms, I sense another dimension which I know to be more basic, and more real. I sense that there is something in myself and in the self of the other which is immanently private and which does not lend itself to concepts or superficial unifying or binding forces; this is unique subjectivity, the deepest level of per-sonal existence, that which constitutes me as I, the irreduc-ible core of personality, the shrine of what is most serious and authentic in me, the theatre of my eternal commit-ments. It is this dimension of mystery which constitutes the great distinction between persons themselves. Regardless of how close two persons may unite with one another, something of the other's.subjectivity will always evade the other: he may become a Thou for me, we may even speak with full force and meaning the word "We," but the other is always profoundly other than me. The We is precisely for this reason a miracle or the grace that it is. We can never be like two drops of water coming together to form a single drop. I may give myself deeply in love and hope to another, but he will always remain absent from me in some way and this hbsen~e is what makes him uniquely himself. But it is of the essence to note that the other is dis-closed to me in his full contingency only in those situ-ations in which we are genuinely open to one another. I can hardly speak of the mystery of subjectivity--the revelation of the other--without speaking of the mystery of intersubjectivity--the mutual revelation of both ofu~, which includes the gift of the other person to me. Here; we can speak more justly and fully of presence: presencel reveals a human dimension beyond that of proximity or even of sharing an experience, and this is the dimension of full encounter, coesse, of co-presence.~7 Presence is in its deepest reality co-presence. The structure of this situation is one of appeal and response. To meet another', I must call out to him, or welcome his appeal to myself by responding with my whole being, and not simply with a stereotyped, pre-determined response. When I speak to another, the area of mutual concern may be a purely business proposition; but if I welcome him into my life, if there springs up deep sympathy in the basic meaning of that word, we Roger Troisfontaines, S.J., De L'Existence a l'Elre (Louvain: E. Nauwelaerts, 1953), v. 2, p. 21. are to another something more than a billboard which announces the time of a community exercise or an IBM machine that reels off information. The question he asks me implies his faith in my ability to answer--my ability to stand, as it were, in his place and understand his question "from the inside.''2s" ~'The question, anyway, operates as an appeal, a signal that may or may not be received.''29 The appeal reaches me in my freedom. I may respond by being, for all practical purposes, some sort of information machine; yet in t~he course of our conver-sation, he becomes something more than a "somebody." "That is, he participates more a~d more in the absolute which is unrelatedness and we cease more and more to be 'somebody' and 'somebody e!se.' We become simply 'US.' "30 This is not merely a psychol~gical interpretation of emotional experience, for realistically speaking, "I cannot really invoke 'anybody'; I can only 'pretend~ to do so. In other words, it appears as if inv'ocation can only be ef-ficacious where there is communiiy.''al Truly, I can speak the word Thou to another only Where community is re-vealed, and we speak the word We.m This deep dimension of human reality reveals me to m~self; in my.deepest and freest being, I find the mystery Of intersubjectivity, the mystery of our solidarity in the destinies of the human phenomenon and the covenant of'creation. Although the sharpest mani[esthtion of this ontological community of men tends to be the somewhat dramatic events--birth, death, love, and go forth--which break in on our course of existence?3 still intersubjectivity runs in a scale from, for example, the chance smile of a stranger from whom I happened to ask directions in a city I am not familiar with to the union with one another in Ghrist in the Eucharistic assembly. Thi(. is important for com-munity life; by holding myself open to the other, by mak-ing myself available, by my. willingness to welcome him, entirely mechanical situations like asking a routine per-mission from my superior can be illuminated with a bit of the radiance of the truly significant. The deepest moments of intersubjectivity can act perhaps as beacons, reflecting that, unit most clearly and fully. As I enter the religious liie and make my pro-fession, the community kiss of peace manifests beautifully the community which has been created in me. This mo- ~ Gabriel Marcel, Metaphysical Journal, translated by Bernard Wall (London: Rockliff, 1952), p. 21. "Ibid., p. 143. ~ ~a I bIbidid.,, pp. 114761. ~ Ibid., p. 303. a Marcel, The Philosophy o] Existence, pp. 3-4. ÷ ÷ ÷ Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 319 4. Aioysius Mehr, 0.$.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ment, though past, can be kept alive, can remain a presence to me--a moment of deep community to which I bear witness in the day-to-day encounters. I know, deeply within myself, that these encounters, for all their routine, flow forth from the community which we are, the com-munity which must be ever renewed through the passing years in creative fidelity to the situations in which. I am given to myself as one whose life, in the religious com-munity, is a being-with. From this point of view, we can look more closely at the full meaning of the opportunities of our religious com-munity: The closeness in which we live with one another is dangerous if reduced to the level of the functional, but it can just as truly point out to us the heights and depths of intersubjectivity. Social bindings open out into onto-logical community. Religious community life is rooted in social organizations and patterns, but it exists on the level of the human person in his freedom. In conclusion, the activities of our religious life must reflect the deep fact of our community-being, of our being-with one another, sharing a common destiny, united in the bonds of true love in Christ, For the structure of intersubjectivity is in its fullness, the structure of love. But we must be willing to see the levels and the manifestatiom of this love dim from time to time, just as in marriage the union in love has its ups and downs. Nevertheless, I must be aware of my deep responsibility to make my-self what Louis Lavelle calls "accessible" and Gabriel Marcel "disponible" or "availabie" to the other. Marcel equates this accessibility with charity, and quite rightly so.34 This is the fundamental posture or attitude for any fruitful communication between men, a communication which means opening myself to the presence and in-fluence of the other, desiring this presence, and being will-ing to go out into something that is quite different from myself. The self-centered egoist finds it impossible to be accessible and available. He is incapable of sympathiz~ ing with other people or imagining their situation. "He remains shut up in himself, in the petty circle of his private experience, which forms a kind of hard shell round him that he is incapable of breaking through.''3G Handy rules for making encounter possible, while help-ful, cannot be used without the danger of taking up a position outside the encounter itself in order to manipulate both the other and myself.3e I can perhaps ~' Ibid., p. 15. ~ Marcel, The Mystery o/Being, v. 10 p. 201. a Dale Carnegie gives.many of these handy rules in his famous book How to Win Friends and Influence.People (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1936). The value of some of these rules is questionable because of their pharisaical tendencies. be more aware of what I cannot do--in summary, tO treat him as an object, as a somebody, as anyone at all, as a function (whether teacher., farpenter, or any o[ the categories that can substitute for the person). In dis-agreements, I must respect the gift, for the other gives himself to me in his ideas and intdrpretations; in com- ¯ munity we can seek not a Procru~stean compromise but a kind of common expectation so that together we can go on seeking the light of truth. Th~ very things which tear us apart from one another~differences in age, in taste, in talent, in personal history-~zan unite us, not in a collectivity where differences are ignored or frowned upon, but in a community of mu[ual understanding. Creativity and Community Ideals High ideals attract men; the. higher the ideals the greater the attraction. Ideals fire, men with enthusiasm. But ideals cannot be handed physically to me as, for in-stance, a book or the constitutions.' Ideals can be described on paper, but they cannot exist oh paper. They are real-ized only in free creativity at the ~ery depths of being. More particularly, the ideals of. a gommunity must be ideaIs for particular men. They must be possible of fulfill-ment in their unique life and in the unique situation which invites their loyalty andS,, faithfulness to them. Every religious must create, again and again, the tra, di-tions and ideals of his order or congregation .by incarnat-ing them anew in his own life. The passage of ideals to incarnate human life, to act and incarnation in space and time is truly creative, for it ~nvolves a full and personal gift of myself creating meaning. Bu~t this does not happen in a void, but rather in an encounter, or 'a revelation of what I am (in the community that we are) that calls forth my witness and fidelity. An e, ncounter means a call and a response; a gift and a pre~ence of another who confronts me in my uniqueness; a re'alization of the destiny which lies at the heart o[ myselL "In action," writes Teilhard, "I cleave to the creatlve~ power of God; I co-incide with it; I become not only its instrument but its living prolongation.''~7 In the words of Gabriel Marcel: We have to realize that there are modes o[ creation which do not belong to the aesthetic order, and which are within the reach of everybody and it is in so far as he is a creator, at how-ever humble a level, that any man at all can recognize his own freedom.~ In our context, this means that in my freedom I must ~ Teilhard de Chardm, The D:vtne Md~eu, pp. 26-27. m Gabriel Marcel, Man Against Mass Society, translated by G. Fraser (Chicago: Regnery, 1952), p. 16. 4. 4. 4. Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 4. 4. 4. Alo~$ius OM~e.Ch~r., REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS respond to the unique religious vocation, which I have received from God, and that response is the truly creative assumption of the ideals, traditions, customs, and rules of my community. If I am to be a religious, and not merely act like one, I must enter into the living tradition of my community, see clearly the deep relationship be-tween law and reality (law in its deepest meaning in Christianity is the living out of our incorporation in Christ), and sense within myself the dynamism within the community, the promise of the future held in the hands of the present moment, the hour of trlal and grace. By translating the traditional ideals of my particular community into my life, I reach back into the very an. rials of history and, at the same time, proclaim that which is yet to come. I enter into living communion with the past and the future, with all who have professed, or will in the future profess, these ideals. Ideals seen in their' existent,_'al fullness are moments of consecration, joininl~ us with the ever-continuing history of our community. As Hiiring points out, History is to be viewed from the standpoint of the "now" in relation to beginning and end. The historic present reaches out into past and future. The past has its heritage which may be compared to the warp and woof of a rich fabric constantly redesigned into marvelously new and alluring shapes and formsi The treasure.is a summons or invitation, and a challenge as well, to the free will of man in the historic moment of the present.~ My response to this challenge wiaps up the rich her-itage of my order in the dynamism of my unique, per-sonal life, and.hands it as a sacred trust to the community, enriched, for future generations. By thus entering deeply into the We, and sharing together, feeling together in our deepest being the subtle movements and aspirations which translate possibility into act and thus tradition into life, and being into incarnations, I realize existentially arid not only notionally or rationally both the being which I am called to be and the significance of the union of men who have joined their own destinies together in respond-ing to the same ~hallenge. But just as we cannot understand man until we see his marvelous destiny, so we cannot begin to see the beauty and mystery of our community until we view it in its promise, in its dynamic growth and activity towards fullness. The religious community, as we pointed out in the introductory pages of this paper, exists within two wider communities--the community of life and t'J~e community of grace--from which it draws its own vital- The Law o] Christ, v. 1, p. 87. ity and life-thrust. In either Community, our destiny is not encompassed by the immediate projects, particular ends, or temporary goals. Our being plunges back into the dynamisms of created being itself; and in us the world achieves a certain completion of its own dest!ny. We are then a kind of particular and contingent, though nonetheless real, summation or symbol or eikon, image, of the community of all being. But the deepest values of our activity do not only capitulate in us the mystery of creation and the dy-namisms of life. As Teilhard would phrase it, ontogenesis has passed on into Christogenesis. Creation has been caught up, in its deepest dynamisms, into the new cre-ation, which is fulfillment, not destruction (Eph 2:15). As a community within the Church, and indeed its true eihon, its incarnation, we continue the forces of creation through the Incarnation and the New Adam into the promise and pledge of the Parousia (1 Cor 15:24). In this perspective, or better in this divine milieu, lies the true significance of our activities; we are bound together under a common cause which is as wide and deep as the community of men and as transcendent in its promise as the parousial presence in which life and temporality shall be consummated in the supreme en-counter of love. Seen in this light, we must modify our earlier thesi~ about the artificiality of the religious community. Adapt-ing Teilhard's terminology and the vision of St. Paul, we can rightly say that the religious community is an anticipation of a later and final stage of evolution, the unity of all men in Christ, the Omega point of historical being. This higher unity of mankind, which we an-ticipate, involves a center of gravity, a focal point, an axis above and beyond the ecological and physical. And what is this axis of religious community life? It is charity. The religious community must be founded on love of God and neighbor. This new level of mankind, as any leap in evolution, involves a definitive departure, a break from the lower stages even though it is their continuation, ful-fillment, and transformation.4° And yet, as an anticipation we are beginning to create the new within the old; this combination of the old and the new must involve sacrifice and tension--the death of the type as we pass into the era of the antitype, the dis-sipation of shadow as we strive to realize the light. There is tension and strain. Creation groans and is "in the pangs of childbirth" (Rom 8:22). Life is born through death. In our very community, creation is being re-capitulated in Christ. Christ is being born! The Divine Milieu, p. 86. ÷ ÷ ÷ Community Exegcises VOLUME 21, 1962 323 dloysius Mehr, 0~.~. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS Part HI: Community in the Word The deepest significance of religious community exer-cises is not found in mere human encou.nter, but in the encounter with men in God. Religious life .is a charism, a localized outpouring of the Spirit of God, who fills the whole .Church, in such an intense and concentrated way as to bear witness to a particular reality which in varying degrees permeates the whole Church. Keligious life is not radically different from Christian life; rather it is the living image, the eikon, the type and inauguration of perfect Christian life. The perfection to which all Christians are called and in which all shall share when the Day of the Lord dawns is incarnately realized in the Church today by the religious life, which can be called the "sacrament" of Christian perfection. The flourishing of religious life in the Church stands an apocalyptical pledge that the things to come will truly come because they have already been realized living type; religious life bears encouraging witness to each generation of Christians that the life of the Gospel can truly be lived to the full now, into the fullness that is to come. Such a witness can only be the fruit of the Spirit outpoured in charismatic plenitude. Once the religious life is seen as charismatic, its sacra-mental and ecclesiological dimensions become apparent and important. Since the religious life is the image of perfect Christian life, the basic structure of religious life must be seen in relation to the strhctural pattern of the Church's life. The possible points of reference here are numerous; we will limit the discussion to two features of Christian life which seem to be most fundamental. First, the Church is a community formed by the word of God. Secondly, the Church is a community of sacramental worship. Community in Covenant The Church of the New Testament, seen in the con-tinuity of sacred history as recorded in the. Scriptures, is the fulfillment of that people of God which was in continual formation down through Old Testament times by the gradually unfolding revelation of the Word of God. After the fall, God's Word appears on the human scene as a call; God called Abraham to leave his people and his father's house for a land of promise in which his descendants would multiply until they became as numer-ous as the sands of the sea (Gen 12:1). When Abraham responded to the initial promptings of God's Word, God spoke again to Abraham to make a covenant with him for a mutual sharing of destiny down through Abraham's posterity, which would come into being as a result of God's Covenant-Word. Abraham's family came into being as the family of God (Gen 15). As the history of the family of God folds back upon it-self, the same pattern emerges in the formation of the Israelite people from the family of Abraham. The Israel-ites were called out of Egypt to hear the Word of God proclaimed on Mount Sinai'(Ex 3:16--17). Another cov-enant resulted from this new proclamation, a covenant which was again creative of the community with whom it was made (Ex 24:8). The Israelites became a spiritual community in becoming the people of God in the Mosaic covefiant. The pattern recurs again as each successive wave of revelation leaves in its wake a fuller, more spiritualized community to whom God's Word is addressed as a call and a covenant. There can be no doubt from the annals of sacred history that when God speaks to man He speaks to man in community. In the dialogue between God and man, God is the I who speaks the creative Thou to the community. In the light of the fall of Adam, this dialogue appears as a healing dialogue. The community of the'human race disintegrated in sin. It appears to be God's plan to build it back up again meticulously in time, .through the gradual revelation of his creative Word in a gradually more perfect community, until these last times in which He speaks to us by a Son (Heb 1:2). He is the perfect Word uttered in the community which in the new Adam already exists but which is still being perfegted. (created) and realized (actualized) in all the members of the new human race by the continued call and proclamation of the new covenant in every life and time. In the realm of salvation, man does not walk alone and he is not free to do whatever he chooses. He is saved in community by the healing Word of God which is spoken to and in the community which it itself creates. The inner structure and dynamism of the Church is to be and to become this community of the Word of God. Let us now look more closely into the religious life in terms of what has already been said. If the religious life is to be the type and the eschatalogical pledge of the life of the Church, it ought to be the flesh-and-blood realiza-tion par excellence of the community of the Word of God. It is here that the progress of sacred history toward the fulfillment of God's plan of perfect community ought to be moving forward to the last day when the perfect community of the cosmos will be reheaded in Christ and God will be all in all (I Cor 15:28). The implications of this reach deeply into the basic attitudes incarnate in the concrete circumstances of re- Eoxme~mc~uen$lty VOLUME 21, 1962 325 Alo~situ Mehr, O.S.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ligious life. If the religious community is to be at all, the breath--the spirit-~of. God's Word must be free to move through and in us. Through baptism and confirmation we received the Spirit unto the building up of the com-munity to the full stature of Christ.4x The religious com-munity must be the community of the Word of God, true to the pattern of sacred history outlined above: call, proclamation of the Word, covenant. 1. (Tall. We are accustomed to the idea of a vocation to the religious life. We must draw this out to its concrete conclusions. First, when God calls man He calls him to community. A vocation to the religious life .is a call to community. Secondly, when God calls man to a religious community, He calls him to be initiated into a particular religious community. This means that the candidate must undergo a true initiation into the concrete life of that community and that he must successfully complete the initiation: he has to prove himself ready and able to renounce anything and everything which stands between him and the ideals of his vocation, to accept deeply in his incarnate being the two-edged sword of the Spirit. The religious pre-novitiate and novitiate training ought to be for the religious community what the catechu-menate was for the primitive Church. It ought to test the authenticity of the call. The community, but also the candidate, must ask the question: Is the Word of God truly at work here? God speaks toman in human language, not in weight-less abstractions. Hence the family background of the candidate must be looked into to see if God's Word came to him through parents genuinely in touch with God by their lives of faith. I[ the indications here are strongly negative, the.stronger influence of less natural channels of God's Word must be evident. Because of the psychology involved in such a situation, the candidate's response to this call must be tested for its supernatural authenticity by a convergence of other factors indicating the working and direction of Providence with adverse circumstances. The following questions must be answered: first, hits the candidate attained at least the minimum strength of character, mental health, and social ability required for successful community life; for the monastery or convent cannot function as a rehabilitation center without in-justice to its other members. Secondly, does the candidate at least show promising signs of being able to respond to maturing influences that will be able to help him to ~ Eph 4:13; see La Saihte Bible de Jerusalem (Paris: Cerf, 1956), p. 1546, note n: "Non pas simplement le chrfitien arriv~ h l'~tat de 'parfait,' mais l'Homme parfait en un sens collectif: soit le Christ lui-m~me., soit mieux encore le Christ total, T~.te. et mere- grow to a greater measure of personal authenticity? If the latter is the case, one must investigate whether or not these maturing influences so much needed are actually present in the community which the candidate wishes to join and whether they will be accessible to him. ~This is only another way of asking whether this person,~who does seem to be called by God, is being called to thig particular community. 2. Proclamation. This has led us to our next point. The community has been called together to hear the Word of God; hence that Word must be. authentically proclaimed in the community. In the Church there are official proclaimers, messengers (kerukes), for this task: the priestly hierarchy. In the religious community, this responsibility rests primarily with the superiors. They must be men of God's Word. The Bible must be familiar ground to them. They ought to be able to breathe the Scriptures. God's Word cannot be spoken with authority except by men who themselves hear the Word of God and keep it. St. Paul's timely words to Timothy, the head of the Ephesus community, point out this obligation: Attend to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching., to teaching. Do not neglect the gift you have, which was g~ven you by prbphetic utterance when the elders laid their hands upon you. Practice these duties, devote yourself to them, so that all may see your progress. Take heed to yourself and your teaching; hold to that, for by so doing you will save both your-self and your hearers (1 Tim 4:15--16; see also Col 3:16). The central time and place for the proclamation of God's Word to the community is the liturgy. Everything within the range of possibility should be done to make this proclamation authentic. The laws of liturgical psy-chology must be understood and incorporated into actual liturgical practice. Also it should be understood that proclaiming God's Word in the liturgy is not confined to the scriptural readings but extends to the homily or sermon delivered in the assembly. It is a mistake to think that because religious do a great deal of spiritual reading they do not need to hear sermons. Faith comes from hearing (Rom 10:17). The Scriptures must be au-thoritatively interpreted in relation to concrete con-temporary events. Here the jurisdictional power of su-periors can be seen to be more than a matter of legality. Theirs is the charism to preach authoritatively and to recognize the authentic prophetic spirit in those whom they delegate to preach. In general, there ought to be within the community a real atmosphere of reverence to the Bible. This is mani-fested, for instance, in the handling of the sacred books. Dilapidated Missals ought not be found on the altar. Out-side of the liturgical assembly, the Missal should not be ÷ ÷ Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 AIoysi~s Mehr, O&C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS carelessly thrown in the corner of the sacristry but re-served in a place of honor, like the Blessed Sacrament and the Holy Oils. The same can be said for the Bible used for community reading during the meal, and to a lesser extent for the copy of the Bible kept by individuals in their rooms. Private Bible reading ought to be en. couraged within the spiritual reading program; but this entails some instruction in how to read the Bible, es-pecially for those who do not have the benefit of an in-tensive Scripture course. All these things are only ex. amples, but they indicate a direction .of attitude which must be fostered if the seed of God's Word is to find good ground to grow into a community. 3. Covenant. The proclamation of the Word of God in the community climaxes in covenant, an intimate I. Thou relationship of God with the community. Itshall be a continual burnt offering throughout your genera-tions at the door of the tent of meeting before the Lord; where I will meet with you, to speak there with you . And I will dwell among the people of Israeli and will be their God. And they shall know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them lorth out o] the land oI Egypt that I might dwell among them: I am the Lord their God (Ex 29:42-46). The intimacy of the covenant is best expressed in the Scriptures by the idea of a sacred meal with God at the time of the covenant. "Then Moses and Aaron and Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel went up and they saw the God of Israel . they beheld God and ate and drank" (Ex 24:9-11). The sacred meal will be discussed later. What is of moment here is that God addresses the community as Thou. He covenants with the community. He shares the destiny of the community, and in this way alone does the community become God's people, heir to the promises. "I will be your God and you will be my people" (Jet 32:38)~ The community has in fact been established by the progressive call of God through both Testaments. Or, to put it more critically, the concrete possibility has been established for the authentically Christian community to become to be, to grow in creative fidelity into being fully what it already is in the reality of infallible promise. Nor is the creative, call merely the point of origin; the call is repeated through and in the community of the Church to each generation for the divinization of every era. We are in fact inserted into this order of the Spirit; and by this very reality bear the serious responsibility of. hastening the Parousia (2 Pet 3:12) by a total effort to build community, to respond to the creative call ad- dressed to us, to assure that there will be in us a Thou for the moment when God speaks his "I." There must be real communion of persons who have an authentic, conscious, un-egocentric participation in the human nature and creatureliness they share in their com-mon flesh from the loins of Adam. There must be com-munity in which Christ is progressively becoming in-carnated and given being-in-the-world, caught up, as it were, by the Spirit and created time and time again in authentic response (possible only in community) to the liturgical Word. proclaimed now, as in times past, in liturgical community. Then the great Passover of Jesus from the Cross into the glory of His Resurrection~ Ascen-sion, and Enthronement can take root- in the world and create from our community authentic and supernatural Christian community, the Body of the Lord. For a man to enter the We :of the community, certain things must happen to him. For one thing~ he must have experienced encounter with other persons in the com-munity. This occurs on various interpenetrating levels. On the sacramental level, the encounter begins with his initiation into the Church through baptism and confirma-tion which are an encounter with the concrete Church community. In the religious life a further sacramental encounter is the act of religious profession. Think of the handclasp, the Amen of the community, and the kiss of peace. , Through baptism, confirmation, and profession, the religious has already met the members ofthe community on the sacramental level, the. authenticity of which meet-ing will depend on the authenticity of the ritual. This also means that he is ontologically structured for and pledged to this encounter in all its dimensions. Other levels of encounter which are basic to the we experience are the father-son relationship between su-perior and subject, the brother relationship between con-freres, the teacher-student relationship, and the more in-timate encounter of true religious friendship. A parish community is as strong as the basic I-Thou relationship between the husband and wife in the families of the pa.rish, since marriage is the effective sign of the Church. similarly a promotion of genuine I-Thou relationships within the community builds up the great We of the I. Thou relationship with God, as the.se experiences open the personalities of the religious to that common human nature and creatureliness which would otherwise be hoarded up individualistically by each selbcenter. The human nature and creatureliness which we share is a concrete human nature and creatureliness incarnate in the human beings around us, and it is there where it must ÷ Community VOLUME 21, 1962 32g ÷ ÷ REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS be met. Here we have the sensible, real basis, the sign, of the Body of Christ which is realized in sacrament. Another experience which conditions for and builds up the great We is the common sharing of a rich ex-perience, a going through something together, a com-mon passover. God made his covenant with Israel after the Exodus experience, after the people had passed through the Red Sea together. This experience involves the elements of crisis, judgment, and victorious issue. Once again, on the sacramental level, this is accomplished through the catechumenate and initiation sacraments of baptism and confirmation in which the candidate shares the Christian community's experience of the Exodus, of the Passover from the Egypt of sin through the Red Sea of baptism to the new life of the people of God. In the religious life a further sacramental or ritual sharing of crisis-victory is embodied in profession, the passover into the state of perfection. But this sacramental ontology of community on the basis of shared experience becomes incarnate in and is the fulfillment of numerous experiences undergone on other levels of life. Religious life can provide many ex-cellent experiences of solidarity through crises and vic-tories. As examples can be mentioned: working out phil-osophical and theological problems; a difficult community project such as the continued and successful support of a mission; a common experience of joy such as might be expected at ordinations and professions; the death of a member of the community; in short, any event which deeply affects the community. This solidarity in experience is not limited to events. What may be more important is the common experience of the presence of great persons. Just as the Israelite community was somehow bound up in the persons of Moses, Josue, and Aaron, and just as the Church is bound up in the persons of Christ, the Apostles, and the Virgin Mary, so the religious community is bound up in the per-sons of its superiors and leading figures. The superior must be a deep, spiritually mature person who is in personal contact with his community so that the members of the community actually have a chance to experience him and feel a solidarity in this experience. As fdr the other leading figures in the community, the more deep personalities God has given to a community, so much richer will that community life be as the solidarity in this experience broadens the horizons of the com-munlty. It is a corruption of a precious gift for a com-munity to consider its outstanding members as divisive forces or to make them feel like isolated individualists. Sharing the experience of encounter with a great man is one of the strongest bonds of unity there is between man and man. We have discussed some factors in the formation of the community We which becomes the Thou whom God addresses in his covenant dialogue. There is one other element of covenant that should be mentioned, and it is the sharing of destiny. God becomes involved in the community's destiny and the community is caught up into God's great mystery of salvation, the secret hidden from the ages and revealed fully in his Son, the movement of salvation history (Col 1:26-27). There is a movement toward fulfillment, toward Pleroma. Christ has already been established as the Head of new order in heaven, but his Body is still undergoing construction upon earth. The completion of Christ's Body is being realized little by little. It is a steady growth until the full measure of the perfect Man is attained. This fullness, Pleroma, means that in Christ harmony has been established among all things, that the universe is "filled b~ the creative presence of God."42 When this day shall arrive, the Church will contain Christ in his fullness. The Church will reach the stature of the perfect man (Eph 1:23), The movement .of salvation history, however, is not inevitable. God is faithful and will accomplish His pur-pose, but His people do not always respond with like fidelity, and He will not use force. If the Day of the Lord is to come, it is the Christian community, we, who must hasten it (2 Pet 3:12), we who must move ahead; and we are free to contribute to this forward movement or to hold it it check. If we should choose the latter, we would become like the Thessalonians who sat around and waited for the Parousia and who were upbraided for their pre-sumption (2 Th). The religious community ought to be an advance guard unit in this forward march, for it is by definition a place of perfection and fulfillment. This again points up the necessity for the proclamation of the Word of God in the community. The history of salvation is contained in the Scriptures. God's plan is there, and only those who are familiar with its patterns are capable of reliable frontier work on the boundaries of sacred history. Ful-fillment does not mean reckless lunging out in any direc-tion. Yet neither i~ it all mapped out in detail. Here the living tradition of the Scriptures assumes its rightful im-portance. The leaders of the community must be men who walk in the way of the Lord and meditate on His law. If we may say so, they must have a scriptural instinct, a Pierre Benoit, O.P., "Corps, t~te et pl~r6me darts les Rpitres de lacaptivit~," Revue Biblique, v. 63 (1956), pp. 5-44. ÷ ÷ ÷ Community VOLUME 21, 1962 .331 ÷ Aloysius OM.Se.hCr., REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS a feel for the way God does things, and a contact with the currents of life in the Church. They must be attentive to the voice of higher authority and at the same time be aware of the prophetic movements within their own com-munity. They literally have to know which way the Wind --the Holy Spirit--is blowing. Community in Worship At this point lines of thought begin to converge: the Word of God, community, covenant, sacred history; and their point of convergence is worship. We may say that the community called into being by the Word of God in the context of sacred history through the intimacy of the covenant is primarily a worshiping community. What happens in Christian sacramental rituals? The Word of God, spoken once definitively in Jesus Christ, is spoken now in the Church community which is the Body of Christ, the real, glorified soma tou Christou, which is building up to completion. Ritual makes possible.through its pneumatic bodiliness, its symbolic or sacramental na-ture, the entrance by the commUnity here and now into the great sacramental moment, the primordial time, Christ's great Resurrection Passover, which stands at a particular moment of history yet transcends it, catches up within itself the vitality of all history, its direction and its completion. Here the Christian community whose task it is to move sacred history ahead, to build up the Body of Christ, is in contact with the vital source of the upward thrust of sacred history: the leap of the crucified Jesus up into the life of the Christos-pneuma. Covenant intimacy with God becomes possible in ritual: the I-Thou rela-tionship between the Father and the community comes into being in the spoken word and the meal ritual (or other symbolic act), in both of which, taken together, the risen Christ in whom we meet the Father is present through the working of the Spirit. By hearing the ef-fective Word together and eating the sacred meal to-gether (or doing the ritual action of the other sacraments), the members of the community pass together through the greatest of all experiences: the Passover of Christ, the primordial passage of non-being into being, of what is away from God to what is in God, of what is dead: sarx, to what is alive: pneuma. 1. Mass. In this context, the Mass, as the supreme Passover ritual, becomes for the Church and the religious community the supreme moment of covenant communion with the Father and with one another. The place of meet-ing with God is the place of.assembly and formation of the people of God. The people of God were formed to the Qehal Yahweh by communication with God himself. The community entered a covenant with God, and the effec- tive token of this covenant was the paschal meal. This reaches its fulfillment in the Eucharist where we become one people of God by sitting at table with God. For the community, the Mass is not just one of the de-votional exercises of the day, nor merely one of the "means" used by a group 0f3ndividuals for accumulating personal merits. It is first of all a gathering, an assembly of Christians, those who are of Christ. Secondly, it is not an hour of community meditation, but an hour of com-munity action, an event, a celebration. The act of cele-bration is important, for the event is Christ's event (here we have the true meaning of ex opere operato), and the community enters into the mystery of Christ by their ritual transposition of the action of Christ. The event is the Resurrection Passover of Christ which He Himself rit-ually transposed in the sacramental moment of the Last Supper and ordered to be clone in commemoration of Him. Let us examine these two interrelat'ed realities: com-munity and event. The worshiping community is not a priori, not an automatically given thing with which to work out the problem of celebrating Mass. Nor can the community be improvised haphazardly. It must be .built up by active and intelligent effort; it demand~ active con-cern and reverence for the laws of human acting. In fact, if the sacramental reality is to be accomplished, if com-munity is to be created on the supernatural level, the sacramental signs must be authentic. As St. Thomas has told us: the sacraments signify what they cause and cause only insofar as they signify,aa This highlights the necessity for catechesis: instruction, explanation, acclimatization--initiation into the reality of the community and the event. Catechesis is a psy-chological necessity because words and actions must be significant. The Bible and the ritual must be understood by the community. Cathechesis is accomplished both by systematic instruc-tion and by the actual celebration authentically done. We have already spoken of some things that can be done out-side the celebration regarding the catechesis of the Bible. A suggestion or two concerning the cathechesis of the ritual outside the celebration may slip into what fol-lows by an occasional convenient parenthesis, but what we are primarily interested in here is .the ca-thechesis that occurs within the celebration of Mass itself. No matter how much formal instruction we have about the Mass, we can come to learn the Mass only by doing the Mass. Actions must be learned from within, by doing. No matter how many books we read about how Summa Theologiae, 3, q. 62, a. 1, ad I. + + + ommunit~ Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 ÷ ÷ ÷ Aloysius Meh¢, O.S.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ,334 to study or how to play tennis, we will never really have learned these activities until we have entered into them. Catechesis must adapt the celebration of the Mass to the psychological climate of the assembly. This, of course, must be done within the limit of the laws of the Church. We do not, for instafice, simply "adapt" our celebration into the vernacular, despite the fact that this might be an excellent cathechetical move, one to be hoped, prayed and worked for through legitimate channels. But there is much to be done within the limits of the present rubrical framework. Let us begin with the community itseff. We can talk the idea of community to people until the Parousia, and it will not create community. A Christian community has to be built up by the celebration of Mass itself. The daily conventual Mass is a summons to enter deeply into com-munity. The community must experience community. Community is indeed where community happens. In the primitive Church there were at first no Catholic schools to teach the idea of community. Community was built up through worship, a worship that took into account the concrete conditions of the lives of the faithful. One of these basic concrete conditions is the bodiliness of men. Body is intrinsic to human personality. Man not only has a body, but also is a body. As we have already seen, man is a spirit incarnate in a body which is its epiphany, its revelation, its sign. And to come to the point here, it is through his body that man is part of the community of the race of Adam 'and through his body that he enters into conscious contact with the community. It is the role of good catechesis to create a sensible at-mosphere of community. It is especially when brethren gather around the altar that they ought to get that ecce quara bonum feeling. What can be done toward this? First of all, there have to be people there. And they ought to be there for the Mass. If I sit down to eat a meal with someone and he insists on reading the paper, I do not feel that he is really with me. Likewise, if the man next to me at Mass is "getting his meditation in" or "getting through his Office," the sense of community i~ being broken down. This does not mean that everyone at Mass has to be doing the same thing, for there are many liturgies or works to be done at the one great liturgy: the celebrant, the choir, the schola, the altar ministers, the organist, the choir director--all have their own work to contribute to th~ whole. But there must be that sense of the whole to which all are contributing. All present must feel that "we came here to do the Mass." The importance of this, I think, is felt instinctively even by those who close themselves up in a meditation book at Mass: they stand, sit, and kneel with the community. This at least is better than nothing, but it is for from the ideal. Akin to this is the practice of having "a Mass going on" in church when the community has come there to do something else. One picks up the habit of not becoming distracted by the Mass. Not only does this dull ofie's abil-ity to participate at other times when he is supposed to, but such a psychologically unsound practice of not doing what you are doing, on the basic religious level, has a disintegrating effect on the total personality and shows up in other activities. The desire to "get in an extra Mass" may proceed from sincere devotion, but it some-what misses the point. Whenever the Mass is used as a background or as something that is secondary, its signifi-cance (which is of prime importance in the sacramental realm) is greatly lessened (I do not say completely ab-sent); this lessening of significance breaks down the au-then. ticity of the ritual, hence its effectiveness. But in the Mass-and-something-else situation, it is not only the Mass that suffers. When two community exercises which de-mand full attention are combined, neither is able to have any depth. The sense of community at Mass is also built up by the alertness and freshness of the presence of the participants. This means that those who plan to attend Mass in the morning ought io feel it their responsibility to get enough sleep the night before to enable them to be attentive to one another and to the sacred actions. It also means that Mass should not be scheduled to be done after a marathon of spiritual exercises has just about exhausted the normal capabilities of a man to do the intensive work which good praying demands. Another important contribution to the sense of com-munity is the very structure of the church building. People at Mass ought to be able to see the altar and to see each other. They must be able to feel close to one another and not to feel oppressed by one another. Their place in church ought to be related to their role at the Mass. They ought to be able to feel together in the pres-ence of God. These problems have to be worked out on the architectural level by those competent in the field. The furnishings of a church must be such as not to distract from the main purpose of the building. The com-munity ought not to be pulled in all directions by a penny arcade of devotional concession stands. This does not mean elimination of statues from the church, but it does mean an integration of all furnishings into the main-stream of attention. This must be done by the planning of skillful designers, not by a mere process of accumula-tion. ÷ ÷ ommunlty Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 335 4. ÷ 4. Aloy~ius Mehr, 0.$.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 336 The celebrant, too, has his role to play in creating a sense of community. He must realize his role as the leader of the community, as one who acts in their name, and must by his very actions sweep up the community .into participation with him. Hemust understandthat not all parts of thd Mass are equally important, and he must learn how to emphasize the important parts with the proper gestures and tone of voice, and not to monopolize the attention of the community when what he is doing is not the main thing going on, especially when the choir is singing. His gestures must be authentic. When he greets the people, there should be contact, and he should wait for their response. When he proclaims the Word of God, he should do so loudly, clearly, and expressively. During the great presidential, prayer, the anaphora, from the pre-face to the doxology, he should invite the silent attention of the community to what he is doing by his own sense of presence, by his poise and serenity. His whole bodily attitude must be expressive of praise and thanksgiving, His priestly vestments ought to mark him as a man of dis-tinction. In short, he must look and sound like a leader, and to do this he has to feel like one. He is not to be esoteric or insert idiosyncracies into the celebration, yet his action must be personal action flowing expressively from his total personality which on the deepest level is priestly. Finally, the two .very important factors in building up the sense of community are music and movement. People experience real togetherness by mutual singing and mu-tual movement. Every conventual Mass should be a com-munity sing. But again this does not mean that everyone has to sing everything. Some of the prescribed chants are too difficult to be enjoyable for those who are not trained to sing them. The obvious answer is to let the trained schola sing those parts, while the rest of the community listens attentively--at that moment their liturgy is med-itative listening together. Beyond this, there is need for the composition of good music which is singable by the real communities that actuall~ exist. °The ability to sing must be built up, but we have to start where people are and help them experience their own way into better things. The most familiar mutual movements at Mass are the changes of posture: standing, sitting, kneeling, and bow-ing. These movements ought to be expressive and forma-tive of community. This means that all should rise, bow, and so forth, together because community actions are not fully authentic unless every member makes his contribn-tion to the communal movement. These movements, as well as all the ceremonies during any liturgical function, should be expressive of two things: first, the gravity of what is being done, and secondly, the anirna una et cor unum of the community. Beyond the familiar change~ of posture, there are three great movements of the .people of God at Mass--the En-trance Procession, the Offertory Procession, and the Com-munion Procession~during which the community is sing-ing together. There are practical difficulties in restoring the movement features of the first two processions which have been reduced to the singing of the Introit and Of-fertory Antiphons. The difficulties are not insurmount-able, but they are more formidable than the difficulty it would entail to reintroduce the singing feature of the Commun, ion Procession. There are few experiences of community which can match walking in a group of your confreres in joyful song on the way to and fron~ the table of the Lord where you share the .one Bread. Let Us now make a few observations about the cat-echesis of the Mass as an event. The Mass is not an ordi-nary dialogue, nor an ordinary meal. It is a festive speak-ing of God and a festive eating with God. It involves a longing for happiness and salvation, for every feast" has the atmosphere of expectation and liberation from rou-tine. This is the eschatological dimension of the Mass. The early Christian found it easier to feel the festivity of the Mass because he found it easier to see the Mass as a cel-ebration of the coming of the risen Lord, a pledge of His final coming. For the early Christian Christ was present in the Church, especially in the actual liturgical assembly gathered together in His name: as the community cam~ together, Christ came among them. When those who love come together the tone is one of festivity. The Mass must, then, become a real celebration, as its interpenetrating rhythm of dialogue and meal indicate it is meant to be. At a celebration people talk and sing and move around. There is real, free communication. Mass is a dialogue between God and His people through the mediatorship of the priest. The priest talks to God in the name of the people and to the people in the name of God. When people really come together in a festival setting to talk with one another, they bring their interests, their work, their experiences, and their whole personality which transcends these experiences. Here one can see the role that community recreation and community meals can play as a catechesis of the proper celebration of Mass. It is not stretching a point to see community recreation as the extension and fruit of the festive dialogue of the Mass; in itself it has something of the nature of a ritual and might indeed be considered a sacramental for community. Play is sacred. When the Bible says the people rose up ÷ ÷ + Community Exercises VOLUME 21o 1962 337 ÷ ÷ Aloysius Mehr, O.~.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 338 to play while Moses was conversing with God on Mount Sinai, it speaks condemningly of the event, including its sexual misbehavior, precisely because it was an act of false worship (Ex 32:1-6). Later in Israelite history we know that David leapt and danced before the Ark of the Covenant (2 S 6:14). Play is an expression of joy and freedom--like the Sabbath day of rest. The idea of worship and the free-dom from the drudgery of work belong together. The need to break routine is rooted in man's desire for the freedom of salvation. Play is free dialogue, whether it be in the form of relaxed conversation, or a contest in which make-believe competition is manufactured, or the sharing of some unroutinized activity just "for the fun of it." Play keeps a man from b~ecoming a slave to his work; it keeps him from confining himself to the world of I-It. We take a game seriously to a point. We must take it that far, for playing is literally "making fun" of work. The religious significance of this is deep. One can take his life's work seriously only to a point; from there he must "make fun" of it in the sight of God and man as David made fun before the Ark and the people. Other-wise he will become proud and self-sufficient. The world of I-It is not to be despised, but it must lead up to the world of I-Thou, of dialogue between man and man and between man and God. Community recreation ought to be fun, but it must never be dissipation or aesthetically squalid, or the whole meaning of it is destroyed. It is the bringing of the real necessity of one's work to the level of free personal dialogue with God and man. A person-alized celebration of community recreation is a great help to a personalized celebration of Mass. The festivities of" the Mass reach their climax in the meal celebration. Food and drink are an essential part of a celebration. The Mass is a holy eating together, a sacred banquet in which we are filled with the bread of life and drink of the cup of gladness. The symbolism of wine especially provides the atmosphere of festivity. The feeling tone of the Mass is that of a celebration of people who are spiritually well fed and well drunk, who feel the spiritual fullness from the rich bread and the spiritual freedom from the intoxicating wine. Here we might note that the regular community meals can be a real catechesis of the Mass, since they are in fact a sacramental extension of the meal aspect of the Mass through the ritual prayers surrounding them. Human eating is of its nature a sacred and communal act. It is not a mere refueling for another round of work. God is present at every meal in his gifts of food and drink and in the fellowship around the table. The prayers before and after meals set the tone of the meal. They are mos~tly i, excerpts from the Psalms, breathing the spirit of the anawim, the spirit of joy, thanksgiving, appreciation, de-pendence on God, praise, awareness of God's presence, simplicity. The meals themselves should reflect all this. The food should be simple fare, b,ut good. It ought, t.o be eaten in an atmosphere of calm enjoyment, not of frantic dumping from platter to plate to palate. There ought to be a real spirit of fellowship at the table. But besides fellowship at table, we should also be aware of how community meals tie in with the Mass. Father Godfrey Van Lit, O.S.C., describes the intimate relation-ship between the refectory and the ~ chapel, community meals and the Mass.4. The Christian dining room table is a symbol of the Eucharistic table, the altar, and hence the refectory used to be decorated with a large, artistic painting of the Last Supper. As we have silence of place in the chapel, so we also observe silence of place in the refectory, And as in the community Mass the leader pro-claims to us the Good News, so also during our commu-nity meals a lector acquaints us with the consequences of the Gospel narrative. Both at Mass and at table, we are reminded that "not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that comes forth from. the mouth of God" (Mr 4:4). Both the Mass and the community meals ought to par-take of the spirit of the Passover and Chaburah meals of the Old Testament. The pervading tone here is that of a family meal. The community superior presides in the place of honor at the table as the father of the family who provides the good gifts. In so doing he is the epiphany of our heavenly Father who provides us with all good things, and the assurance of His presence among us. "He who has seen me has seen the Father" (Jn 14:9). The hebclomadarius who leads the community both at Mass and at the meal prayers must be seen as the delegate of the father of the community, just as every priest stands at the altar as the delegate of the bishop. So simple a thing as the custom of not starting the prayers until the superior "knocks of[" in chapel or rings the bell in the refectory helps to keep this family awareness. At the com-munity table one ought not to feel that he is just one nameless stop along the long line of the gravy train, but that he is among the little group of his brothers with whom he is at home. We are one "b~cause the bread is one" (1 Cor 10:17). The event aspect of the Mass also demands that the ritual transposition of the sacramental moment should be ~ Lucerna Splendens super Candelabrum Sanctum, Id Est, Solida ac Dilucida Explanatio Constitutionum Sairi ac Canoni¢i Ordinis Fratium Sanctae Crucis (Coloniae Agrippinae: apud Antonii Boet-zeri Heredes, 1632), pp. 45-58; 87. ÷ ÷ ÷ ECxo~mrmcisuensity VOLUME 21, transparent; the celebration must be a revelation of the event itself. The main event is the Easter Passover, but there are other sacramental moments in sacred history which unfold in the course of the Church year as incip-ient or concluding stages of the Passover, from the In-carnation to the Mission of the Spirit. The sacramental moments are themselves revelations, openings into the Passover mystery, which pervades the whole Church in her sacramental ritual. A final note on the Mass concerns the apostolate. Cult is formative of missionaries. Worship is the school of the very Christian experience which the apostle seeks to com-municate to others. Here we must remember that there is no. effective activity without sanctity; there is no sanc-tity which does not radiate in the Church; there is no grace which does not come from the Head, and there is none which does not flow from the member back over the entire Body.~ + + lloysim Mehr, O.S.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 34O A religious who neglects his personal sanctity in order to intensify his activity, paralyzes it. The gift of the Spirit is the sacramental basis for com-munity in work. When a man works to bring forth the fruits of the earth as a Christian, he brings these temporal things into the sphere of the Spirit by doing the very best job he can to make his farming or his teaching, and so forth, as perfect as possible within the total context of human life, of community. He is working with the crea-tive force of the Spirit who hovered over the waters and brought order, harmony, and completion out of chao:; and who is now at work in the community. He brings; creation into his Passover experience. He is using the totality of his mind and energies and spirit, which totality exists only within the community, 'to bring creatures to perfection, to fill up the glory ofGod which will come in its fullness at the Parousia. 2. Penance. We are not accustomed to thinking of the sacrament of penance in terms of the community, and in this we have missed much of its meaning. The weekly confession of devotion can easily become for religious a routinized ticking off of peccadillos which one "gets rid' of" by inserting his penitential coins in the laundromat at the back of Church. The sacrament of penance is a re-penetration of our ex-istence into Christ's healing death and Resurrection. Re-penetration implies that something preceded. Through baptism man is ontologically structured into the commu-nity of the holy--holy persons and holy things which they share. Sin 'is something abnormal for man in Christ Jesus '~Jules Lebreton, S.J., The Spiritual Teaching o! the New Testament (Westminster: Newman, 1960), p. 375. (Rom 6:2). By sin man withdraws from the Body of Christ and sides with the world. The sacrament of penance is reconciliation with the Church. It is the Church that listens to his confession, prays for him, and gives him absolution. Here we see the Body of Christ, wounded by'sih, festoring itself t~0 health. For us, a return to God is always, first of all, a return to the Church. Forgiveness is not so much something which the Church brings us, but rather a belonging to the Church outside of which there is no salvation. The importance of the local Church community must be emphasized here. When a sinner is forgiven, he is for-given through the forgiveness of the local community. This was more evident in the earlier forms of the sacra-ment of penance when the sinner was received publicly back into the assembly. He was assured of God's forgive-ness by the concrete forgiving spirit manifested to' him by the community. The power to absolve is vested in those with hierarchical authority, but they absolve in the name of the community of the faithful; hence the?e is a more fruitful and creative spiritual power at work in the con-fessional of a community'where there is a strong spiri't of mutual forbearancb and forgiveness, where the '~'as we forgive those who trespass against us" is prayed with awareness and sincerity, where the offensive person is ac-cepted in patience, understanding, and ultimate trust in what in him lies beyond his offences: his Christian per-sonality. The sacrament of penance can also be made more fruit-ful if the sacramentals of penance in the community life are appreciated. Two important ones. come to mind: Compline confession of sins and the chapter of faults. Let it be remembered that by the institution of the Church these rites are sacramentals, and if approached in a spirit of contrition they accomplish forgiveness of sin. The Compline confession of sin is the best catechesis for the sacrament of penance for it clearly embodies .its essential elements: contrition, confession of sin in the community and to the community, including the whole community of saints in heaven as well as those present; absolution is given by the presiding priest; and everybody prays together for the effectiveness of the forgiveness. The chapter of faults is also well constructed to pro-mote the communal atmosphere of penance, but it needs to be approached in a genuine spirit of sorrow. The pub-lic confession of our faults in the presence of the com-munity helps to make us realize that by our transgres-sions, by our indifference, lack of interest, fulfillment of purely personal inclinations, and non-participation in the community as such, we cut ourselves off, in fact we deny, the ontological status or nature of our very calling. ÷ ÷ ÷ F~oxmermcisuens ity 4. .4. Aloysius Mehr, REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS Worse yet, we hold back the community, we retard its growth. This seems to be the point of the chapter of faults: we confess that we have not been completely faith-ful to the ideals to which we vowed creative fidelity. 3. Holy Orders. In clerical religious communities, the whole idea of community life is intimately bound up in the sacrament of holy orders. Some observations on the place of the priesthood in the Church are necessary to clear the ground. It has often been said recently that the Church is not the clergy, despite the impression that has long been given to the contrary. The community is the first inten-tion. The priesthood exists for and in and fromthe com-munity through the apostolic succession. The priesthood is a charism, a mode of being in the Church, for the com-munity, not for itself. It expresses and makes possible and matures the general priesthood of the faithful in its three-fold dimension of worship, kingship, and prophethood. These are the Messianic goods, and they have been placed within the community in the gift of the Holy Spirit. In this context the Church itself is the Ur-Sat~rament con-taining the fullness of the Spirit, which is worked out through many diverse gifts. The priesthood is a charism for the building up of the Church (Eph 4:11-14). Ordination is the,gift of the Holy Spirit by the laying on of hands in the Church for the community. The priest is filled personally by the Holy Spirit to be his minister. No man takes the office to him-self-- or for himself. The fullness of the priesthood is only in the bishop. He is the sign of the full presence of Christ on earth, the organ of unity within the local Church community. He is one with Christ and one with his people. His faith is the norm for the faith of his flock. St. Cyprian defines the . Church as the people united to its priest, the flock stick-ing with its shepherd. The 'bishop is the nucleus of the community because he is the link with Christ through the imposition of hands through which the continuum of the soma tou Christou is maintained. The presbyterate is only a share in the bishop's priest-hood, a subsidiary priesthood under the bishop. As the ordination rite explicitly states, the presbyter is a "sec-ond- rate" priest: secundi meriti. In this light, every priest is a diocesan priest, and, exempt or not, when he works as a priest in a diocese, he works there as the helper of the bishop. By his ordination he is ontologically struc-tured for this work. He is called from the depths of his being to be a helper to the bishop of the diocese in which he lives. Here one can see what a deordination it is for religious priests not to be on good terms with the local ordinary. These good relations should also exist with the rest of the local clergy since the presbyterate is not merely an in-dividualistic but a collegiate institution. The architecture of early churches and the episcopal liturgy indicate this by placing the corona presbyterorum on the bema round the bishop. We still put the clergy together in the sanc-tuary. When a presbyter is ordained he joins the ordo foresbyterovum. This is eloquently obvious in the ordina-tion rite when the "college of presbyters" encircles the ordinands and joins the bishop in the imposition of hands. Priestly fellowship is rooted in the sacramental re-ality, and this sacramental reality is also what makes com-munity life a natural thing for priests. The unity in an order of canons draws its essential vitality from the sacra-ment of holy orders. In this context, the naturally prominent position of the Divine Office and liturgical exercises in many of the cler-ica. I religious communities becomes evident. The Divine Office is, as defined by Pope Pius XII, ~he perennial prayer of the Church, offered to God in the name and on behalf of all Christians, by those who have been deputed for this. It is the hymn of the Divine Word who has united to Him-self the entire human race, and the hymn which He sings is the hymn of praise which is sung in heaven continu-ously. St. Augustine is correct in saying that in the Divine Office "Christ prays for us. as our Priest; he prays in us as our Head; we pray to him as our God . We recognize Our voice in him and his voice in us.''4~ It is the Church praying. But we should go one step further. When a community of canons regular is called into existence by the Holy Spirit and officially approved by the Church, it is by its very nature entrusted with the solemn and communal celebration of the sacred liturgy, especially the Divine Office and the conventual Mass. If any religious body has the right to say that the liturgical life is its ideal, it is the canons regular.47 They above all should lead the way in the liturgical revival of Christian life. The proper chanting of the Divine Office in common is formative of community. But, in order to be formative of community, it presupposes first of all that the community understands the dignity of the Church's prayer, secondly, that the choir members are able to read the text of the prayer intelligently, and, finally, that they adopt as their own the sentiments expressed in these prayers. ,e Mediator Dei, nn. 142-144. ,TDom Germain Morin, O.S.B., The Ideal o] the Monastic Life Found in the Apostolic Age (Westminster: Newman, 1950), p. 105: "If any Order has the right to boast of this it is the Canons Regular, rather than ourselves." See also the article "Canons Regular and the Breviary" by Roger Capel, Orate Frates, v. 23 (1948-49), pp. 246-251. ÷ ÷ + ECxoemrdmsuesnity VOLUME 21. 1962 343 ÷ ÷ ÷ Aloysius Mehr, O$.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS It is not merely a question of recitatk;n or of singing which, however perfect according to the norms of music and sacred rites, onl)t reaches the ear, but it is especially a question of the ascent ot the mind and heart to God' so that, united with Christ, we may completely dedicate ourselves and all our ac-tions to him.'s Whenever the Divine Office is chanted "worthily, with attention and devotion," it is prayer in the fullest sense of the term, and every genuine prayer cements together the members of a community. "Our deepest contacts with one another can be made only through God.''49 It is only in the depths of prayer that, in the fullest sense of the term, deep calls out to deep, and the soul gives itself to God. In this sense, every genuine prayer is a renewal of religious profession, the leaving of all things and following He-who- is. If the religious community is to blossom forth into a true community of worship and love, it must be able, at all times, to call upon this interior gift to God.5° The central portion of the Divine Office is the Psalter: the Word of God. The best way for men to pray together is to speak with God in God's own words, for the Word of God is formative and expressive of the community. The common chanting of the Psalter is, by and large, a meditar tive re-experiencing together of the great events of sacred history--again a community-forming factor.5x The Psalter is redolent with man's proper responses to God and his works: the spirit of the anawira, the poor in spirit, God's lowly ones through whom sacred history is accomplished. By a continual singing of these prayers day after day for many .years, these attitudes of heart sink into those who give themselves to this prayer with their minds and hearts and bodies. Through the ritual action, the attitudes and events are effectively experienced by the total personality in community; by all the rules of psychology such prayer is extremely capable of transforming one's life as an aLt-thentic individual in the community. A final note on the Divine Office concerns the non-choir members and every other member of the community who has been assigned work incompatible with regular attend-ance at choir. Here it is important to remember that the choir is a community obligation'. In a living community there are many members "just as in one body we have many members, yet all the members have not the same function" (Rom 12:4). Some are sent out as missionaries, others do the cooking, others are engaged in social work--- ~s Mediator Dei, n. 145. ~9 R. W. Gleason, S.J., To Live is Christ (New York: Sheed anti Ward, 1961), p. 11. ~ T. de Ruiter, O.F.M., Her Mysterie van de Kloostergemeenschap (Mechelen: St. Franciskusdrukkerij, 1958), p. 131. ~ Mediator Dei, n. 148. each according to the grace that has been given to him (Rom 12:6). And then there are also those who are not excused and who have the responsibility to be in choir. In each case it is the community at work or at prayer. Whether we are in the choir or legitimately excused, we are all working together in the name of the omhaunity, fulfilling our role in the completion of the cosmic task. 4. Extreme Unction. The communal dimension of ex-treme unction must be viewed from the Christian stand-point on death. The creation of Adam in flesh is the man-ifestation of the mystery of contingency which attends the existence of all things outside of God. Only God is in Himself and by Himself. All other beings tend to fuller being, which implies nonbeing. Death is the natural con-sequence of man's fleshy nature. Since the human race is a community in flesh it is also a community in death. Adam, however, did not accept his contingency. He failed to project beyond the dissolution of flesh to fuller life. He revolted against being the creature who dies, and death became a punishment for this sin. since the human race is a community in sin, it is a community in the pun-ishment of death (Rom 5:12). Christ, the New Adam, humbled himself: took on con-tingency. He submitted, as the suffering Servant, to be the creature who dies, and death became a redemption, a passage into the eternal life for which Adam revolted in vain (Rom 5:15-19; 1 Cot 15:21). Since the Church is a community in redemption, it is a community in triumph over death. Through the Church's sacraments of death and disso-lution, Viaticum and extreme unction, all human suffer-ing. and death is taken into the redemptive sufferings of Christ. The falling apart involved in suffering and death becomes the creative mustering of forces for the upward thrust to a higher level of life. The death of the Christian is his final experience of the Passover of Christ. Without Christ, death is complete loneliness. One leaves the community of his loved ones to go alone into nothing-ness. Christian death conquers this ultimate loneliness. The highpoint of the ritual for the dying is the admin-istration of Holy Viaticum. The Christian does not go alone into death: the Lord comes to take his faithful serv-ant up into his triumphant Passover. The Lord is able to come in Viaticum because the community has celebrated the Eucharistic Passover. Much of the loneliness of death comes from the effect of sin, by which man cuts himself off from the community. In the prayers and anointing for sickness unto death, the healing Lord approaches in the person of the priest to cure the wounds of severance from the community, to re-store the peace of mind that can come only from c6mplete + + + Community Exercises VOLUME 21, 1962 345 4. 4. 4. Aloysius Mehr, O$.C. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 346 reconciliation with the Church. Again, the priest is acting in the name of the community. The death of a Christian is a deep experience for the community in which it occurs. When at all possible, the religious community should be present at the administra-tion of the last sacraments to the dying members of the community, and they should pa.rticipate in the expressive prayers of the ritual. Such a death is a witness to the reality of the triumph of Christ, a real martyrdom. The joyful and peaceful suffering and death of one with whom we live in intimacy is a striking pledge of the reality of Christ's Resurrection and the certainty of the Parousia. Here we have the reason for a quite joyful celebration of a funeral. What is said of death extends also to the sufferings of illness, disease, and serious injury, as well as of old age. Here there is the same factor of dissolution and contin-gency which is at work in death. Illness and death are times of crisis that naturally draw the community together to struggle against the loneliness which has set into our flesh as a result of sin. The serious sufferings of a member of the community are a community experience and ought to be entered into by the community. This involves a patient care and con-cern for the aged and the sick and keeping the community informed of their condition. It means visiting the sick. It would also be good to make use of the magnificent ritual for the visitation of the sick: let the community gather occasionally in the sick room to join in these moving and consoling prayers led by the superior. In the communal carrying out of this sacramental, the healing Lord will be present, and the patient endurance of suffering in the true Christian spirit will again be a witness to the community of the reality of Christ's presence and the certainty of his coming. Epilogue: The Dynamism of the Sacramental Com-munity There is an inherent tension in the very being of a sac-ramental dispensation or system: the tension, inherent in the nature of a sign, toward the fullness of that reality which is less than fully present in the sign. This underlies the call, covenant, and passover aspect of the sacraments and gives them their "obligatory" dimension, their ex-istential imperative. In Christian life this tension is the cosmic covenant: the Christian community's responsibil-ity for the entire cosmos which needs redemption and building up. This means authentic community work. Religious life is Christian response lived to the full in the working out of salvation history. It is charged with the building up of the Church unto the Pleroma, with the hastening of the day of the coming of the Lord (Ac 3:20; 2 Pt 3:11-12