Suchergebnisse

Issue 40.6 of the Review for Religious, November/December 1981. ; Volume 40 Number 6 Nov./Dec., 198;I REvtEw I:OR REto~(;~OUS (ISSN 0034-639X), published every two months, is edited in collaboration with the faculty members of the Department of Theological Studies of St. Louis University. The editorial offices are located at Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108. REVIEW Rt.'t.lcaous is owned by the Missouri Province Educational Institute of the Society of Jesus, St. Louis, MO. © 1981 by REvtEw ~:OR REI.IGIOUS. Composed, printed and manufactured in U.S.A. Second class postage paid at St. Louis, MO. Single copies: $2.50. Subscription U.S.A.: $9.00 a year; $17.00 for two years. Other countries: $10.00 a year; $19.00 for two years. I:or subscription orders or change of address, wrile: REVIEW I-'OR REt.~(;~OUS; P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, MN 55802. Daniel F. X. Meenan, S.J. Dolores Greeley, R.S.M. Daniel T. Costello, S.J. Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. Jean Read Editor Associate Editor Book Editor Questions and Answers Editor Assistant Editor Nov./Dec., 1981 Vo/ume 40 Number 6 Manuscripts, books for review and correspondence wilh the editor should be sent to REVIEW FOR Rt:t.tG~OUS; Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd,; St. Louis, MO 63108. Questions for answering should be sent to Joseph F. Gallen, S.J.; Jesuit Community; St. Joseph's University; City Avenue at 54th St.; Philadelphia, PA 19131. Back issues and reprinls should be ordered from RI-:VIEW I-'OR RELIGIOUS; Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108. "Out of print" issues and articles n;~t published as reprints are available from University Microfilms International; 300 N. Zeeb Rd.; Ann Arbor, MI 48106. Development of a Constitution Mary Kevin Hollow, S.C.L. Sister Mary Kevin, Community Director of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, details here the process of their community's work of revision of their Constitution, which was submitted to the Sacred Congregation for Religious in May, 1981. Sister resides in the motherhouse: Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth; Leavenworth; KS 66048. The Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, a pontifical institute, originated in the Diocese of Nashville in 1851. The religious community was formed by a group of Sisters Of Charity of Nazareth at the request of Bishop Richard Pius Miles. In God's Providence, many of these same sisters, with the encourage-menLof Reverend Pierre-Jean DeSmet, S.J., accepted the invitation of Right Reverend Bishop Miege, S.J., to come to Leavenworth (Kansas) in the Indian Territory. When asked by the bishop what the requirements of the community would be, Mother Xavier Ross, the foundress, asked that the sisters be .allowed to carry out "to the letter the Rules and Constitutions of St. Vincent de Paul.''~ On November I I., 1858, five,professed sisters, two postulants and one orphan girl reached Leavenworth by steamer late in the evening. In that frontier city, the sisters soon opened an academy (1860), an orphanage (I 863) and a hospital (1864).Christian education of youth, care of the sick, the poor and,orphaned continue to be the "works" of the sisters to this day. As new members joined the original small band, the Sisters of Charity of Leaven-worth set out from the Mother House for dioceses in California, Colorado, "Illinois, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Wyoming and 'to Peru and Bolivia. Some 1700 women have joined the community since 1858; the community now numbers over 600. Rule From the beginning, the sisters intended to pattern their lives after the manner and ,thought of the Apostle of Charity, St. Vincent de Paul. An 111~2 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 undated note in Mother Xavier's handwriting says that she petitioned Pope Plus IX "to approve and sanction our practicing the Rules and Constitutions of St. Vincent de Paul (for the Daughters of Charity in France under the title of 'Sisters of Charity').''2 After the usual procedures, the congregation received definitive papal appr.obation in 1922. In 1958 and 1963, some modifi-cations of the Constitution, approved by Chapter Enactments, were submitted to Rome, but the Constitution.remained substantially the same. After Vatican II The Church summoned religious throughout the world to "renew and adapt." Communities were given permission, by way of experimentation, to alter temporarily certain prescriptions of their constitutions, provided that the nature, purpose and character of the institutes were safeguarded. Religious began the study of the documents of Vatican II, especially the decree Perfectae caritatis and the constitution Li~men gentium (chapters 5 and 6 especially), the motu proprio Ecclesiae sanctae and, later, the exhortation Evangelica testificatio. The Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, women of the Church, cooperated with the new direction set by the Church. The Mother General and her council involved all the sisters in a community develo.pment of a set of schemata devoted to the major facets of the religious life as this pertains to our congregation,s Research of primary sources in the community archives and other centers draws attention to the importance of understanding our original spirit.4 Sis-ters were asked to articulate responses to the question, "Who are we as Sisters ~ Histoo' of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth. Kansas. 1898. p. 45. 2Addenda Regarding the Code of Life for Religious. Special Commission on the Constitution and Customs, SCL Community Studies. 1967-68. JSisters of Charity of Leavenworth, Community Study 1967-1968: "The Sisters in the Church," "Life of the Counsels," "The Apostolate." "The Person in Community," "Government." "Spiritu-ality," and "Community." 4Our Vincentian Heritage: a study based on archival materials immediately connected with Mother Xavier Ross and on an analysis of the Letters of St. Vincent de Paul. Study of the Spirit of the Community. as shown in circular letters of the major superiors prior to 1950. The Spirituality of Mother Mao' Berchmans Carman, S. C. L. by Sister Rose Dominic Gabisch, S.C.L. Instructions to the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, given at the Mother House by Mother Xavier Ross. Archival material at the Mother House: several notebooks, written in Mother Xavier Ross's almost illegible handwriting, and a typed copy of the contents by Mother Leo Frances Ryan. S.C.L. and Sister Rose Dominic Gabisch. S.C.L. Comparative Study of the Constitutions, from the "Old Rule" through the Constitutions of 1915. 1922. 1958 and 1963. Parallels, a study of scriptural and theological foundations for the religious life following our present 1963 Constitutions. Development of a Constitution / 1103 of Charity of Leavenworth in the Church in the world?''s Special Chapter The Special General Chapter (1968-69) was the community's direct and formal response to Pope Paul Vl's mandate in Ecclesiae sanctae to implement the conciliar decrees. This Special Chapter, like Vatican Council I1, had for its program of action aggiornamento: "a stimulias to preserve the perennial vital-ity of the Church, its continual awareness and ability of studying the signs of the times, and its constantly youthful agility in 'thinking before an~,thing is done and holding on to what is good.'''6 The resultant interim documents, A Life of Charity and Living in Charity,7 represent "the results of the serious attempts of the community to respond to the challenge of th~ times and to the current needs of the Church.''8 The first book embodied the key themes and principles enunciated by the Special Chapter. The second .book showed how these principles and themes were to be carried out. Its revised edition9 was derived from the directives of the Eleventh General Chapter of the congregation (1973-74). 1974-19110 Elected in July, 1974, the Community Director and her Community Council, as the congregation's major superior and council are now known, were aware that the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council had said that the "prudent experiments" begun during the Special Renewal Chapters could be continued until the next ordinary general chapter. That ordinary chapter would be empowered to grant a further prolongation of prudent experimenta-tion, but not beyond the date of the subsequent chapter. The Community Director and Community Council knew that religious communities were expected to be working toward the text of their revised constitution for pres-entation for approval to the Sacred Congregation for Religious and Secular Institutes. This meant, for the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, that the Twelfth Community Chapter of 1980 would be the second ordinary chapter beyond its "Renewal Chapter" of 1968-69. The Community Director and ~he Community Council, during their 5Statements on Nature and Purpos~ of the Sisters of Charit'y of Leavenworth by Members of the Community, "Resource for Schema on the Code of Life for Religious, a Self-Study." 6Ecclesiam Suam, n. 50. 7See A Life of Charity and Living in Charity, Directives of the Special Chapter of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth. 1968-69. 8Mother Leo Frances Ryan, S.C.L., ~'Circular Letter to the Community," Feast of the Resurrec-tion, 1970. 9See Living in Charity, Revised Edition. Directives of the Eleventh General Chapter of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, 1973-74. I~Ol~ / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 annual planning days, came to key decisions: the community needed a clear statement of its mission in the Church in today's world, an "'agreed upon" articulation of its charism, and a definite expression of the community's manner of observing the three evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience. The director and council thought it time to mind Mother Xavier Ross's words: "It is wisdom to pause, to look back and see by what straight or twisting ways we have arrived at the place we find ourselves." Serious ques-tions needed probing. How deep is our spiritual renewal? Which of the "pru-dent experiments" produced the "good fruit"?. The sisters of the congregation needed to reflect prayerfully about these questions and to share their thoughts about their renewal experience with each other. The council sought a comprehensive plan that would involve all of the sisters, as well as each of the "standing committees" of the community--the Sisters' Forum, the Personnel Board, and the Spirituality Commission. The goal of this community involvement was to move soundly toward a written description of our basic identity and mission. If a set of obligations and responsibilities commensurate with that identity and mission could then be enunciated, a new Constitution would finally be developed. Strategy for Community Participation That comprehensive plan and its implementation are detailed in the fol-lowing pages covering the period 1978-1980. Special liturgical celebrations initiated all of the community occasions from the opening SCL Community Reflection on Ministry/Mission at the Sisters'Forum (March, 1978) to the concluding session of the Twelfth General Chapter (November, 1980). Too, the Spirituality Commission called all the sisters to a Year of Prayer and Penance for the 1980 chapter in June, 1979. Constitution Consultors The Constitution Consultors were a key group of sisters in the activities related to the development of the Constitution. These sisters, selected by the Community Director with the consent of the Community Council, were to be a resource group designed to facilitate the work of the community and, at the appropriate time, the work of the Community Chapter in its proper role of determining the final text of the Constitution. Each consultor was selected because of her special familiarity with the history of the community and its charism, her background in theology and Scripture, her ability to listen/facilitate, her ability to write clear English, her knowledge about psychological/human development or her experiential background in current social, trends~ All were Sisters of Charity of Leaven-worth for at least ten years. They were responsible to engage in a study aimed at acquiring expertise in the development of "the new law and the new consti-tutions," and then provide further service to the community for assimilating Development of a Constitution / 1105 "the new law and the new constitutions" for our times. A videotaped presenta-tion was succes.sfully, used in our communities throughout the country and in South America. The assistance of the Constitution Consultors proved invalu-able as the community moved through the various phases of developing the constitution. Reflection on Ministry/Mission The Community Director' presented the first formal introduction for what was to be a Reflection on Mission to the members of the Sisters' Forum on February ! i, 1978. Sister then set forth the time frame for the various activi-ties. The essential mission/ministry questions were addressed, and a bibliog-raphy distributed. Regional, local and area reflections were next in order. Personnel Board representatives scheduled meetings for sisters involved in each of the major "works" of the community. A common paper entitled "Mission and Ministry in John's Gospel and in Religious Life" was delivered at each such apostolate session. The Constitution Consultors circulated their tentative draft of the mission statement that incorporated, input from all these events. The sisters were invited to send responses and suggestions to the consuitors who revised their statement in light of these replies. They presented this revised Statement of the SCL Mission to the delegates of the chapter, and to its Commission on Mission/Ministry in particular. The commission further revised the state-ment, and the chapter approved this final form of the mission statement. It is in the new Constitution. This entire sequence of events surrounding the articulation of the mission statement was very valuable to the community and to the cohesiveness of the chapter in its work of development. Reflection on SCL Charism A workshop in the summer of 1979 prepared designated sisters to be group leaders for the charism reflection that was to take place throughout the com-munity. Sister Dominique Long, S.C.L., assisted by Sister Janice Futrell, O.S.B., from the Ministry Training Service in Denver, met with these sisters for an intense prep~aratiori. The sisters then successfully conducted "charism sessions" throughout the community. Again, the Constitution Consultors wrote a letter to the community explaining that they had reviewed the statements that resulted from these local meetings and extracted the key concepts common to most of the statements. They asked the sisters for a further response as the next step in the charism study. The conclusion was that the charism of the Sisters of Charity of Leaven-worth was already adequately expressed in the interim documents, and that the community seemed to favor threading the expression of our charism through those documents rather than attempting to formulate a specific 111)6 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 statement of charism. This information was made available to the chapter delegates. Study of the Vows In a circular letter reviewing community participation in the various phases of the Chapter Preparation, the Community Director next announced workshops on the vows at various regional centers. The Spirituality Commis-sion wrote all the sisters outlining the various materials available for the study of the vows. They enclosed a booklet, Focus on Vows, an annotated bibliog-raphy on the vows, and an article, "How to Live the Vows Today," by J.M.R. Tillard, O.P., together with some suggestions for a special celebration of the feast of Vincent de Paul. Ma'terial from the area reflections were sent by the Spirituality Commission to the Constitution Consultors for analysis. The material in summary form was then given to the Commission on Formation/ Spirituality of the Twelfth Community Chapter. Study of Interim Documents Next, the Constitution Consultors guided the community through an in-depth study of the interim documents, Life of Charity and Living in Charity. They offered a formal procedure by which each sister would prayerfully con-sider her personal experience of renewal in light of the interim documents" expression of the Gospel, the spirit of Mother Xavier "Ross, and the commun-ity response to the signs of the times. Several hours were required to finish the study (many sisters using more than one session of two hours). For example, they examined each page, section or norm in the document to evaluate its degree of importance in their lives. The over-all response was heartening. The vast majority of sisters returned a completed survey. The Constitution Con-sultors' analyses of the various sections of these responses were of invaluable assistance to the chapter delegates and to each commission of the chapter. The exercise not only renewed an appreciation of the community documents, it proved helpful to the writers of the Constitution as well. Proximate Preparation for Chapter The election of chapter delegates was scheduled early enough for all dele-gates to be available for a chapter-preparation workshop in December, 1979. The delegates established commissions (Spirituality]Formation, Mission/ Ministry, Community/Government and expressed their preference for joining one or the other. A panel of Constitution Consultors briefed the delegates on the work of the consultation, and distributed materials to each commission. At the preliminary meetings each commission explored what was to be the scope of its work, the manner of drafting proposals, and the function of the Chapter Central Committee. David Fleming, S.M., and Sister Mary Kevin Ford, C.S.J., spoke to the delegates on the chapter as an ecclesial/community event. The Personnel Board, a group of sisters representing each of the commu- Development of a Constitution nity's apostolates and ministries, drafted a pre-chapter questionnaire. The questionnaire surveyed each sister's thinking about community living, govern-ment, spirituality, formation, the vows, and apostolic service. Some questions required the sister to assess the entire decade of renewal. This survey, com-pleted by about 550 of the community's 630 sisters, enabled the respondent to .express her thoughts anonymously. Each sister sent the completed question-naire directly to Liguori Publications, a Missouri Religious Life Service Department, where the responses were tabulated by computer and the ques-tionnaires destroyed. Printouts in the categories of chronological age, time since first vows, and apostola.te were sent to each community. Data revealing the sisters' assessment of the renewal years came from answers to questions such as: "Which best expresses your opinion on the changes in our religious life? . When I reflect on my own personal experience of the decade of renew-al, 1 think that of all the areas of my life, the most positively affected aspect was: community living, ministry/apostolate, spirituality (prayer, liturgy, etc.), way of governance, observation of the vows." These computerized evaluation reports were sent to the chapter delegates. In February, 1979, the sisters received copies of the format for submitting proposals for the 1980 chapter with a "flow chart" that depicted the route of the proposal from the sender to the chapter delegates. A second and third mailing drew attention again to the procedure by which any sister or group of sisters could make a proposal for the delegates to consider in chapter. By the deadline (May !, 1980), 113 proposals had been forwardi:d to the respective commission chairperson. The Community/Government Commission received 45 proposals, the Spirituality/Formation, 35, and Mission/Ministry, 33. The Chapter Analysis of the Period of Renewal The Church, as early as 1950, encouraged religious to adapt themselves to the changing times, and to join the new and old in harmonious union. Our community response to that mandate touched every aspect of our religious life--our way of living, praying, working and governance. The varying ways of measuring the impact on our community of over a decade of intensive renewal and adaptation had been alluded to in, several of the previous sec-tions. It remained for each commission to bring together all of the informa-tion from the various community chapter-preparation activities, to sift it all carefully, and to present the commission's own assessment to the chapter. This was done early in the chapter sessions. Development of Proposals Six months after the delegates' pre-chapter workshop, all chapter commis-sions had to have the first draft of their proposals in the hands of all the delegates (May, 1980). All proposal's [rom the various community groups and individual sisters had, of course, been received earlier. At this time, the chair- III)11 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 persons of the three commissions, who themselves formed part of the Central Committee, estimated the number of proposals their respective commission would actually present to the assembly. From this information, the Central Committee drafted a tentative agenda which the delegates approved for the assembly sessions. The work of the chapter now entered a crucial phase, as the proposals were being honed for chapter action. In all, thirty of the proposals of the Spiritu-ality/ Formation Commission were enacted by the chapter, about half of these relating to vows and spirituality, the other half to formation. The Mission/ Ministry Commission's ten proposals were favorably acted upon by the dele-gates. And the chapter delegates passed twenty-nine proposals of the Com-mission on Community]Government, all but seven of them relating to governance. The chapter then recessed so that the Writing Committee, selected from among the Constitution Consultors, could commence its work. First Draft This committee set about the task of writing a draft of the Constitution which was to be presented to the chapter delegates for approval. The content of the draft was, of course, the material already approved by the Community Chapter. At the same time, the Writing Committee attempted to preserve the literary form of the interim documents. In general, they followed the principle that doctrinal, theological, inspirational and juridical.elements should be blended throughout the Constitution. The writers asked that each delegate and each sister read the circulated first draft, using for their criteria in reading clarity, simplicity, accuracy, brevity of language, and the conformity of the text with the enactments of the Community Chapter and the general law of the Church. The writers also had sent the draft to Father Thomas Clarke, S.J., and Father~ Francis Morrisey, O.M.I., for a critical reading of the text from a theological and canonical perspective respectively. Revised Draft After considering the recommendations of the chapter delegates, the other sisters in the community, and those of Father David O'Connor, a canonist (Father Morrisey had not returned from Rome in time to read the material), the Writing Committee prepared a revised draft of the Constitution. A copy of this revised draft was then sent to each local house. Each delegate also received a copy to study prior to the chapter meeting. In a covering letter, the writers explained that they had eliminated or revised some articles. In some instances, an article was removed because it merely repeated a canon that need not be repeated. In other instances, the writers acted on the advice to state only the substance of the chapter action in the Constitution, putting the other details into a book of chapter enactments. They explained that this would not change the nature of the chapter action, Development of a Constitution / 809 nor diminish the importance of its implementation. In any event, the letter stated, the delegates would meet to review and approve or not approve these decisions of the committee. Final Draft The Twelfth Community Chapter of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth met for its final session to receive the report of the Constitution Consultors. The Constitution Consultors reported the changes incorporated by the writers by reason of the critique of the first draft made by the delegates themselves, as well as by the other sisters and experts consulted. Book I of the first draft, for example, had bee~n re-written in the first person. Sisters who had reviewed the earlier draft of the book, written in the second person, objected to this change. Delegates were asked to make additional editorial changes, reflecting the latest revisions, to conform with style and content suggestions. The president of the Chapter asked the delegates to consider both Book I and Book I1, section by section. Following this, the chairperson of the Consti-tution Consult'ors, herself a delegate to the Chapter, moved the acceptance of the Constitution as circulatetl, presented, discussed and amended by the Twelfth Community Chapter. The motion passed unanimously. The last action of the Chapter was to mandate that the Community Director and the Chairperson of the Constitution Consultors personally take the Constitution to Rome for presentation. And there the matter rests, a task completed and a future begun. The "Active-Contemplative" Problem in Religious Life by David M. Knight Price: $.75 per copy, plus postage. Address: Review for Religious Rm 428 3601 Lindell Blvd. St. Louis, Missouri 63108 Let All God's Glory Through Donald Macdonald, S.M.M. Father Macdonald, whose last article, "To Experience God," appeared in the issue of March, 1981. has returned to England for a period of study. His present address is: Montfort Mission-aries: 18 Donaldson Rd.; London NW6 6N6; England. ~ remember once chatting with a young couple engaged to be married. When it was suggested that we have a cup of tea, the girl got up to put on the kettle. Seconds after she moved, the young man stood up, vaulted the settee on which he had been sitting, crossed the floor of the room and held the door open for the girl. Because possibly few religious have ever felt that way about anyone, or have ever received such attention in their adult lives, many find it hard to believe that this is the way God feels about them: "the Son of God. loved me and gave himself for me" (Ga 2:20) or, as a later age put it, "we are his [Jesus'] bliss, in us he delights without end."l Lacking such experience, our faith finds it hard to "take off." Nowhere, I think, is this more evident than in our attitude to our Lady. Many of us religious find it hard to credit that she is so loved by God, and, therefore, such a marvelously attractive person in her own right. We then tend to subject her to the slow death of a thousand qualifications. We are ill at ease with her, not because of anything she has done to us, but because we never' quite know how to "place" her. Our first introduction to her was, for many of us, in the company of our parents when we were children. They saw to it that we met someone they knew well on good days and bad. We entered religious congregations, only to find that our founders, too, shared a common devotion to her. The present Ho!y Father is evidently devoted to her, and this is seen by. more than the letter M on his coat-of-arms? Our Lady is part of the wider air ~Julian of Norwich. Revelations of Divine Love. Ch. 23, N.Y. 1977. 810 Let All God's Glory Through / 811 we breathe as Catholics. But, when we try to be more specific, we are uneasy. Have her anywhere near the center, and she seems to usurp the role of the Holy Spirit. This, of course, could never be acceptable--not least at the present time. Yet is she on the periphery of our relationship with God? It might be worthwhile looking again at Mary in the light of the Church and the Gospel. The Church has reminded us of the "various attitudes that bind her to Mary.: profound veneration., burning love., trusting invocation. loving service., zealous imitation., profound wonder., attentive study.''3 Clearly these are sparks from a fire, not a catalogue from a library. What of the person who so attracts, and who .forges such links? For the Church to speak of anyone like that could only be because the Chu.rch is in love with her. We are the Church. Do these words speak for us? Is that how we see her? Mary is part of the Church. To what extent is she part of us? Full of Grace St. Luke's two-volume work, Gospel and Acts, is particularly strong on personality and persons, including some of the most loved in the Christian world. Our Lady is among them. The account of the birth of Christ in which she first appears is written in a deliberately "old-world" style, in part, that is characteristic of the Old Testament. Yet it is light and beautiful and inspiring. As literature it is superb. What if its content is true? God is coming on earth. No wonder the account is alive with puzzlement, astonishment and joy. Who could find words to convey adequately such a message? Yet Luke, in pausing to introduce his gospel, leaves us in no doubt that "having followed all things closely for some time past" he has been careful to check "that you may know the truth" (Lk 1:3-4). His head is not being ruled by his heart. The old order, he writes, is changing. A son is to be born to an old man Zachary and his wife Elizabeth. This is "good news., joy and gladness. many will rejoice at his birth . . . to make ready for the Lord a people prepared"(Lk l: 13, 14, 17, 19). Expectancy, possibility and fulfillment almost beyond imagining is the good news from God--and this only in regard to the birth of the future John the Baptist. It is against this background that we first meet our Lady. She is greeted in a way familiar from the Old Testament: "Hail O favored one, the Lord is with you"(Lk i:28). As Luke uses these words they imply that Mary has been loved and graced by God for a long time. Now, ~is it were, God's love reaches such a 2"'If 1 may be permitted to speak here of my own experience, I will say., that in writing to you I am referring especially to my own personal experience . [A]t the beginning of my ministry I entrust all of you to the Mother of Christ. entrust., your priesthood to her in a special way. Allow me to do it myself, entrusting to the Mother of Christ each one of you" (John Paul Letter to Priests, 419179). 3Paul VI, Marialis Cultus, n. 22 (CTS. 1974). 1112 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 pitch that it comes cascading into her life. God wants her to do something for him as an expression of his love for her and for all people. Here is "good news of a great joy which will come to all the people" (Lk 2:!0). Clearly, if God wishes Mary to do something for him, he must give her the means to do it. This is why she is addressed as "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you." In the light of the Old T~stament, the greeting recalls the time when Gideon, the farmer's son, was approached by God with the greeting: ."the Lord is with you, valiant warrior!" (Jg 6:12). Understandably he protests that there must be some mistake. He is a farmer not a fighter, and could not possibly undertake the role of freedom-fighter, leader of the people. But God promises to be with him. Gideon therefore has a new identity: "valiant war-rior." He was a farmer. He is a fighter. The power of God will see to this. So when Mary is addressed "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you," she, too, is given an identity and a role. This is not empty compliment. It is a statement of who she is as she allows God's love full scope in her life. Her personality becomes fully alive as an expression of God's will. As love from a friend can deepen and enrich life so too with God and our Lady. Such is the love given and received that Mary is to give birth to a son, and "the child to be born will be called holy, the son of God"(Lk 1:35). The word holy attempts to say who God is. Holiness is the "is-ness" of God: "Whatever it is you are wanting to say about God you will find it all summed up and contained in this little word is. Mention every one of [the attributes of God] and you have said nothing extra; say nothing at all and you do not diminish him.TM Who God is, as the Old Testament understands it, is summed up in the word holy. God is then holy, essentially other, quite beyond our categories of understandii~g. To come into contact with God in any way one has to become holy, become like God as far as this can be: "Come no nearer, ~take off your shoes. This is holy ground" (Ex 3:5). God's presence on Sinai and later in the Jerusalem Temple made these places charged with the holiness of God himself (See Ex 19:12; Is 6:1-7). Invitation, purification, awe and worship are required before anyone dare venture near the presence of God. To understand, then, what St. Luke is saying of our Lady, one needs some such feeling for the word holy. So intimately present is God to her that the child to'be born of her "will be called holy, the Son of God." Only then can we see the genesis of the "profound veneration . . . profound wonder" in the Church's contemplation of our Lady. Open to the Spirit Like Gideon and Zachary, Mary, too, is greatly troubled: "How can this be since I know not man?" (Lk 1:34). The answer is so familiar: "The Holy 4"The Epistle of Privy Counsel," Ch. 4, in the Cloud of Unknowing and Other l~orks (Penguin Books, 1978). Let All God's Glory Through / 1113 Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you" (Lk 1:35). Again a wonderful world opens up, illuminating further the person and role of Mary. To describe the Spirit coming upon her, Luke uses the same verb he will later use to describe the Spirit of God coming upon and calling into life the early Church at Pentecost (see Acts !:8). Her receptivity to God's loving creative spirit, allowing his will free rein in her regard, opens up again the possibility that the face of the earth will be renewed. The wider background is perhaps not without echoes of the opening of Genesis. There, the Spirit of God hovered like a bird over .the formless void. The presence of God's creative spirit produced a universe of pattern, purpose and mystery. "The darkness over the deep" (Gen: 1:2) was no more. With the coming of the Spirit upon our Lady so powerfully and joyfully, there, too, issues a new creation (see 2 Co 5:17). Mankind will never be the same again in its intimacy with God. The universe is now to be illumined by a new divine light (see Lk 2:32). While the main emphasis is self-ex;idently on the child to be born, inevitably this reflects on the person of our Lady. It seems scarcely credible that God could use her merely as a passive, if willing, tool. The birth of a child to a woman is an aberration if it is not wholly personal. God's loving, creative Spirit is not programming a computer. Genuine love heightens personality. Light Wherewith to See "How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of one who brings good news, who heralds peace, proclaims salvation, brings happiness" (ls 52:7). If this is true of the message and the messenger, what of its transforming effect on the0one for whom it is meant? "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior" (Lk 1:46-47). The overshadowing of Mary'by the Spirit of God, invited to love .her without any reserve--"l :am the handmaid of the Lord, let it be to me according to ~,our word" (Lk 1:38)--is not the offering of something but, insofar as a creature can receive, rather the loving, personal gift of God's presence. God's love has been poured into her heart through the Holy Spirit which has been given her (see Rm 5:5). Here, above a:ll, we see "Give and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed .down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap" (Lk 6:38). "For the spirit reaches the depths of everything, even the depths of God" ('! Co 2:i0). The core of the sun or the accumulated energy of the greatest stars is but created-- though unimaginably great to us. How begin to plumb the depths of God-- the uncreated one? We do not have the capacity. Yet, such is our faith, that through the giftof God "now we have received., the Spirit .that comes from God, to teach us to understand the gifts that he has given us" ( ! Co 2:12).5 Cot ad cot loquitur. If this is true of Paul, of his people, and of us, what of our Lady? The depths of her being were touched by the depths of God. As Augus-tine said of the spoken word, it can go from his heart and be possessed by his 1114 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 hearers, yet never leave him. So when the Spirit overshadows our Lady she becomes God's temple, and God's Spirit is particularly with her (see I Co 3:16). God is ever with her. She is always with God. She thus glorifies God in her body (! Co 6:20). The result of such experience must be illumination, albeit lived in faith. For the God who said "let light shine out of darkness" has shone in her heart to radiate the light of the knowledge of God's glory, the glory on the face of Christ (see 2 Co 4:6). The Spirit's gift to her of a son--and such a son--is as the creation of light in the life of Mary. Her whole personality, body and spirit, would reflect her son. Thus, in time, she would be turned into the image of Christ which she reflected. She is the Mother of God. This, of course, is the work of the Lord who is Spirit (see 2 Co 3:17-18). Her eyesight would not see, but her insight (faith) would assimilate life lived in the light of her son. The effect on others of her spirit-filled personality taught her much (see Lk 1:42-43, 45; 2:19). So power-ful a presence has she with her child in her arms that she ~would enter the Temple with him and the place would never be the same again. In her son she brings "a light of revelation to the Gentiles and . . . glory to . . . Israel" (Lk 2:32). So said an old man, Simeon, "and the Holy Spirit was upon him" (Lk 2:25). So he too could "see." "Inspired by the Spirit he came into the temple'" (Lk 2:27) and with our Lady's child in his arms, could say from his heart that now he could die in peace "for my eyes have seen., salvation., a light. glory . . ." (Lk 2:29-32). This is the work of the Spirit. She visits her cousin Elizabeth, and again, such is the effect of her presence that at the very sound of her voice greeting her cousin "the babe leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit" (Lk 1:42). She radiates the Spirit from a personality at one with the will of God. Her being was attuned to the will of God as no creature's has ever been. She is a reflective person who "kept all these things in her heart" (Lk 2:51)--a heart ever open to the illuminating Spirit of God. In a sacramental world, she above all would see God in Christ. It is the "pure of heart" who see God (see Mt 5:8). Open to Her Spirit This realization of the presence of the Spirit in our Lady can help us see why the Church is so attracted to her. One would like to think that today few would confuse insight and perception with formal education. They are not ~"His [the Holy Spirit's] approach is. to enlighten the mind, first of the man who receives him, then, through him, the minds of others also . As a man previously in darkness suddenly seeing the sun receives his sight and sees clearly what he did not see before, so the man deemed worthy of the Holy Spirit is enlighteng,d in soul and sees beyond the power of human sight what he did not know before" (Cyril of Jerusalem: To Catechumens, 16. See Office of Readings: Eastertide, Week 7, Monday). Let All God's Glory Through necessarily linked. Some things in life are never understood until they are loved. The biblical tradition and centuries of the Church would seem to corroborate this as far as understanding anything of God is concerned. "He may well be loved but not thought. By love he can be caught and held, but by thinking never.''6 This is not a fundamentalist anti-intellectual polemic. Faith, love and worship alone know who God is. Kathleen Raine's illuminating comment in another context can perhaps summarize this: "To those who rule out life, an acorn is a poor kind of pebble. The difference is not of degree but of kind.''7 To view any Christian, especially our Lady, without at the same time allowing for the mysteriously lavish action of the Holy Spirit, is indeed to view the acorn as a poor kind of pebble. Religious, therefore, wishing to live wholly for her son in the Spirit would do well to open themselves to whatever love and influence our Lady can bring to bear on them. Time in the company of our Lady is time in the presence of God. Our faith is incarnational, and she is one of the loveliest expressions of the love of God. There are no steps to the guru here. She is so approachable, so uncomplicated. Moses' contact with the holiness of God was such that tradition says his face had to be veiled, as people feared the light reflected there. Not so our Lady. Nondescript shepherds can approach her child and wonder. An old man can take her child from her arms. Her cousin Elizabeth saw her come to her own home, and how pleased she was to see her. Our Lady centers the delight and welcome where they properly belong: "He who is mighty has done great things for me"(Lk 1:49). It remains true that our Lady is blessed among women, and blessed, too, is the fruit of her womb. She is the mother of our Lord, blessed because she believed. "He (Jesus) wills that it be known that all those who delight in him should delight in her, and in the delight he takes in her and she in him.''s Generations in the Church have known and done just that. ~The Cloud of Unknowing, Ch. 6 (Penguin Books, 1975). 7Defending Ancient Springs (Oxford University Press, 1967). 8Julian of Norwich. Revelations of Divine Love, Ch. 25, N.Y. 1977. The Rite of Religious Profession and the Ignatian Tradition Gerald K O'Connor, S.J. Father O'Connor teaches at St. Joseph's Preparatory School and resides at the Ferdinand Farmer Residence; 4520 Chester Ave.; Philadelphia. PA 19143. Many religious communities, especially those following the tradition of the Society of Jesus, have traditionally pronounced their vows before the Sacra-ment at the communion of the Mass of Profession. The new Rite of Religious Profession (RRP), in #15 of its Praenotandao advises that this tradition of professio super hostiam be dropped in favor of profession following the hom-ily of the Mass as a response to the Word of God. A.number of communities have already elected to follow the Roman directive, substituting the ceremony in RRPfor their original lgnatian practice. I believe, though, that it is possible to abide by the directives of RRP while still retaining the core of the Ignatian tradition. In an article which appeared in the Archivum Historicum Sbcietatis lesu in 1940,t I.A. Zeiger discussed the possible origins of profession before the Sacrament in the Society of Jesus. Zeiger's conclusion was that the early Jesuits had borrowed a long-standing medieval tradition of solemnizing an oath through, a ritual "ordeal." The person swearing the oath or vow placed his hand on some sacred object to show the seriousness of his oath and to invoke God as a witness to the truth and honesty of what he was swearing. The "ordeal" of such a ritual obviously lay in the understanding of all parties that a false oath or vow would be punished by the deity represented by the ~I.A. Zeiger. "Pr0fessio Super Hostiam: Ursprung und Sinngehalt der Professform in der Gesell-schaft- Jesu." Archivum Historicum Societatis lesu, vol. 9. pp. 172-188. 816 Rite of Religious Profession and Ignatian Tradition / 1117 sacred object. The Blessed Sacrament was the most sacred thing upon which an oath could possibly be sworn, and Zeiger cites a number of instances of oaths taken with the hand on the Sacrament. When it became unacceptable for non-priests to touch the Sacrament, the ceremony was adapted so that the oath was sworn while the priest held the Host aloft. The reception of communion after the oath was the final seal on the swearer's act. This ceremony fits perfectly into the description of the vows taken by Ignatius and his first companions at Montmartre and later in Rome. Father William Bangert describes the simple ceremony which Ignatius and his first companions celebrated at Montmartre in 1534.2 Pierre Favre, the only priest in the group, celebrated Mass. At communion he turned to face his companions while holding up the Host. One by one, they vowed poverty, chastity, and a journey to the Holy Land. If it were not possible to travel to Jerusalem within the following year, they would place themselves at the ser-vice of the pope. These first vows were not the vows of religion strictly speaking since there was as yet no superior, no real Society established. Still, the ceremony at Montmartre must have been an important step for Ignatius, for years later he prescribed the same ceremony for pronouncing vows in the newly approved Society of Jesus.3 With the acceptance of the Constitutions by the Holy See, this essentially private ceremony of vows before the Blessed Sacrament became a formal ceremony of religious profession. It is the ceremony of profession as described in the Constitutions that was later borrowed by many religious communities and incorporated into their rituals as the professio super hostiam. Now the heart of the ceremony, as we have seen, is the ritual touching of some sacred object while reciting the vow formula or oath. The question can therefore be asked whether or not this central action can be adapted in some way that would accord with the proposed outline of religious profession in RRP. I believe it can be adapted. The elevated Host is sacred precisely as an outward sign or sacramentum of God's presence in the midst of the community. However, the Host is not the only such sign present in the celebration of the liturgy. The Decree on the Sacred Liturgy of the Second Vatican Council teaches us that the Lord is also present in His Word and in the people.4 It is the presence of the Lord in his Word that has become the center of attention in RRP. 1 suggest that it would be in keeping with the core of the lgnatian tradition for those pronouncing vows to do so while holding or touching the Book of 2William Bangert, A History of the Society of Jesus (Institute of Jesuit Sources, St. Louis, 1972), p. 16. Hgnatius of Loyola, Constitutions of the Society of Jesus, (Institute of Jesuit Sources, St. Louis, 1970), George E. Ganss (trans.), n. 525. 4See no. 7. 11111 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 the Gospels. The central ritual action would remain the same: the ordeal of swearing on some sacred object which signifies the presence of God in our midst. What would be changed is the particular symbol chosen to r~present the presence of the Lord. Numbers 12 and 14 of the Praenotanda to RRP require that the ceremonies outlined in the rite be adapted to the spirituality and traditions of each religious family. The adapation I have proposed is just such an adaptation to the traditions of Ignatius and the Society of Jesus. There is nothing in RRP which would prohibit the one pronouncing vows from touching or holding some sacred object during the reading of the vow formula. There are also some positive reasons in favor of the ceremony l have suggested, As we have seen the emphasis in RRP is on the vows as a response to the Word of God. Pronouncing the vows while touching the Book of the Gospels from which God's Word has just been proclaimed in the assembly would further emphasize the intrinsic connection between God's call and the response of the one making vows. Since Vatican II Catholics have begun to recapture the primitive symbol-ism of God's presence in his Word. While an older generation of Catholics was raised on various devotions to the Blessed Sacrament, the younger generation is more likely to have been raised on Scripture services and Bible vigils. The Word of God is as important and vital a symbol of the Lord's presence in the Church today as was the lamp before the tabernacle in the recent past. Neither symbol is complete in itself, neither is better than its complement, but either symbol may speak more clearlyoto a particular generation. RRP has called on all religious communities to adapt their profession ceremonies in light of the new ritual. But the emphasis is on adaptation, not on simple adoption of the new rite. It is possible for those communities which have inherited their traditions of religious profession from Ignatius Loyola to accept the insights of the new rite, while remaining true to the essential core of the lgnatian tradition. In preparing for the adaptations invited by RRP we must enter more deeply into the essential elements of our profession rites. Both individually and as communities we have the opportunity to grow in our understanding of our traditions as we work to adapt them to the new rite. The suggestion made here is one attempt to seize such opportunities. Ongoing Conversion and Religious Life Miriam Louise Gramlich, L H.M. A frequent contributor to these pages, Sister Miriam Louise continues to live and work at St. Mary Convent: 610 WestElm Ave.: Monroe. MI 48161. At a time when a number of religious congregations are preparing to update their constitutions for canonical approval, many communities are engaged once again in a new study of their documents. Although the work of revision is generally entrusted to a special Documents Committee, individual members are often encouraged to take an active part in such a study by submitting their insights and recommendations to the committee. In such preparation, many individuals engage in study groups or small-group discussions on the essence of religious life, earnestly considering such questions as: "At this point in time, how do we see ourselves? What do we believe are the most important elements of religious life? What identifies us as religious?" and the like. Such study and discussion furnished a springboard for this writer to research and reflect on ongoing conversion as one essential component of any truly spiritual life. It was exciting to discover that many reputable contemporary theologians also hold this view. Bernard Lonergan maintains that conversion is fundamental to religious living. He says it is not a topic studied in traditional theology since it is too dynamic to remain with the abstract or the static. It occurs in the lives of individuals not merely as a change, or even a development, but more often as a "radical transformation," a complete about-face in one's relations to others and to God. He further believes that reflection on the ongoing process of conversion may uncover the real foundation of theological renewal, its aggiornamento. * Many religious regard their response to their vocation, their religious profession, as a deep conversion experience. They may question whether a 819 1~20 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 radical, new conversion is possible after one has sincerely committed one's whole life to God. Yet most of us can remember occasions in our lives--times of crisis or quiet times of retreat--when we did experience a deepening and intensifying of our original consecration to Christ. After the initial surrender, our lives are meant to express an ever deeper self-realization, a continual act of self-giving and abandonment to God, a continual conversion. This has to be done throughout our lives. More growth in our surrender is always pos-sible. Depending upon each new situation, we are capable of further growth and maturity in love. Scripture gives us a good example in St. Peter, who although he had faithfully responded to his vocation of following Christ, found further conversions in his life necessary. Before Peter's denial at the time of the Passion, Jesus foretells his apostle's conversion: "I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail, and once you have been converted, you in turn must strengthen your brothers" (Lk 22:31). Conversion, then, is necessarily ongoing,, for religious life calls for con-tinual growth and development. On earth all of us remain pilgrims on the way, and although we may be just, at the same time we realize that we are sinful and in need of overcoming sin through grace and love. Nature of Conversion The word conversion signifies a "turning around" in an opposite direction, making a countermovement. A person has turned in a wrong direction and must retrace his way. For the psychologist William James, conversion is the process, gradual or sudden, in which the divided self becomes unified (p. 123). It means a change in what he calls "the habitual center of personal energy"-- the group of ideas and values to which a person devotes himself. "To say that a man is 'converted' means that religious ideas previously peripheral., now take a central place, and that religious aims form the habitual center of his energy" (p. 125). The converted person now finds new values and meanings in his life; he thinks differently and relates differently. In short, for him life is transformed. In religious conversion, God takes the initiative in calling back the one who has strayed from him. No human being is self-sufficient; no one is able to return to the Father through his own resources. Conversion is possible only through God's grace. Through his merciful love, the Father has sent Jesus Christ, his beloved Son, to live and die for us. Jesus dwelt on earth to reveal the merciful and forgiving love of his Father and to show us the way back to him. His sufferings and death have won for us the grace that is the sole source of all conversion. *Bernard Lonergan. "Theology In Its New Context" from Conversion. Ed. by Walter E. Corm, Ph.D. New York: Alba House, 1978, pp. 12-20. References to other theologians and writers are taken from this book and the pages are indicated in the body of the article. Ongoing Conversion and Religious Life Dom Marc-Fran~;ois Lacan defines religious conversion as "a grace of light which reveals both the ingratitude of man in sinning and the goodness and mercy of God toward him." This grace is received when there is humble admission of sin, an opening up with confidence to the goodness and love of God who desires to forgive. It involves a change of heart in which "the converted one acknowledges his need, humbly accepts God's pardon, opens himself to the grace which renews his heart, and asks confidently for the grace of his transformation." Furthermore, Dom Lacan holds that it is through a necessary and ongoing conversion and renewal that man succeeds in respond-ing to God's call, to his vocation and mission (pp. 75, 79). For Karl Barth, conversion means waking up, ,rising from the sleep of death," or more correctly, a "being awakened," since awakening and rising are possible only "in the power of the mystery and miracle of God" (p. 35). Karl Rahner sees conversion as "fundamental decision"--a basic choice intended to turn a person's entire life to God; likewise, it is response to a call from God made possible through grace. "This call of God is both Jesus Christ himself as the presence of the kingdom of God in person., and his Spirit as the. presence which as God's self-communication, offers freedom and forgive-ness to overcome the narrow limitations and sinfulness of man" (p. 204). Rahner explains that insofar as conversion is concrete concern and obedience to God's call, it is faith; as a turning from the past and abandoning one's own securities, "trusting oneself to the uncharted way into the open and incalcu-lable future in which God comes," conversion is hope; and insofar as it con-sists in unselfish love of God, neighbor and self, conversion is charity (p. 206). Bernard Haring also regards conversion as "radical decision," a humble, grateful and joyous acceptance of the kingdom of God in Christ (p. 216). For Charles Curran, conversion is believing in the "Good News" and turning to the Father. It is heeding the message of Jesus: "The time has come ¯ . . and the reign of God is at hand. Be converted and believe in the Good News" (Mk 1:15). He emphasizes its joyful aspect: "Conversion is a joyfu.l proclamation of God's love, calling for a change of heart." The prodigal son's return to his father was a joyful experience (p. 225). Perhaps Bernard Lonergan's description of conversion best sums up the foregoing ideas: "Religious conversion., is other-worldly falling in love. It is a total and permanent self-surrender without conditions, qualifications or reservations . For Christians, it is God's love flooding our hearts through the Holy Spirit given to us. It is the gift of grace . . ." (p. 18). From all these definitions, it is clear that conversion involves both initiative on the part of God and response on the part of man. In this return to the Father through the Son in the grace of the Spirit, the self is both objective and subjective, both active and passive. Patterns and Dimensions of Conversion Although every conversion, like every person, is unique, certain patterns 1t22 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 and dimensions can be discerned. As already mentioned, some conversions are sudden while others are gradual. Even in those that appear sudden, such as St. Paul's and St. Augustine's, there could well have been a longer time of preparation than we know. Some psychologists and counselors call attention to the frequency of con-versions at the time of adolescence, yet they frankly admit that these can often be the result of suggestion rather than of real growth or maturity in the person's spiritual life, and tend to be transitory. A large number of great religious personalities, such as Paul, Augustine, and Teresa of Avila, experi-enced deep conversion later in life. The one unanimous opinion of theologians and psychologists is in favor of ongoing conversion. Not only in adolescence is a person brought into a new life of maturity and personal insight, but conversion or renewal takes place all through life. Since we live from moment to moment, day to day, year to year, we can never accomplish total spiritual maturity in this life. We can only move toward it. Ongoing conversion in religious life may well be a movement from a merely external and conventional practice of "regular observance," of rules and regulations, to one in which a true interior commitment and surrender to the will of God is paramount. Sometimes external observances, even external worship, can be obstacles to conversion when they become the sole criteria of dove and justice. The hypocrisy of the Pharisees consisted basically in reducing the interior worship of God to mere externals. Although a sound formation is an important element in religious life, if it is over-emphasized it could hinder conversion and the transformation that is the result of conversion. Rosemary Haughton, who considers the importance of both formation and transformation, feels that a good formation is neces-sary for a person to form correct judgments and make right decisions, but it may become a hindrance to true renewal and transformation. She writes: This is the dilemma. A good formation, according to a sound customary and moral law, is necessary if a person is to be able to respond to the demand for the decision to love. Yet if this formation is really good and really thorough, it may. just because it is good, prevent the person from being aware of the need for repentance and decision. No need for repentance will appear, therefore no change of heart, no transformation, will be possible (p. 26). Some religious may find their days characterized by hyperactivity, clut-tered with needless trivia. Often sincere, devout religious become dissatisfied and yearn for something more than their present religious life is giving them. They may feel the need of more time for prayer and reflection. Always it is necessary to stay spiritually awake, to be aware of new calls from God, lest we become like the foolish virgins who let their lamps go out, like the apostles who slept in Gethsemane during Christ's agony. And when these calls come, we must answer them promptly. There is an insistent quality about them. If we do not respond at once, the same opportunity may not come again. The time Ongoing Conversion and Religious Life is always now. "Now is the acceptable time." Now is the time to wake up from sleep and seek the Lord, as Isaiah reminds us: Seek Yahweh while he is to be found. call him while he is still near (55:6). Finally, it is necessary to note that a deep, sincere conversion has always had not only a personal, individual dimension but a communal, social one as well. However, the latter dimension has been given more importance in our time. The emphasis in years past may have been more on striving for God's glory through individual perfection and salvation. Today it manifests itself in seeking God's glory through greater cosmic love and compassion, a conver-sion which leads to more determination to spread Christ's kingdom through selfless service of the world's poor and suffering. In fact, for anyone aiming at wholeness and self-fulfillment, conversion cannot be purely a private matter, an individual concern. As Karl Barth puts it: "The man who wants to be converted only for his own sake and for himself rather than to God the Lord and to entry into the service of His cause on earth and as His witness in the cosmos, is not the whole man" (p. 39). Since by becoming incarnate, Jesus took this world and everything human so seriously, the converted person, in imitation of his model, takes a positive view of the "here and now." He sees his relationship to all his neighbors as immensely important, because he perceives Christ in each one of them: "1 was hungry and you gave me food" (Mt 25:35). He will be involved, in the first place, with his own immediate religious community, viewing it as his spiritual family, and realizing that those have first claim on his love and concern who have opted to live and labor intimately with him for the spread of the kingdom. At the same time, the truly converted religious, open to the Spirit, will be aware of the social sin present in so many institutions and structures of our society today, and will earnestly pray and work to eradicate the social injustices that oppress and exploit so many people. These unjust structures can be changed only through a deliberate commitment on the part of many correctly informed persons to participate coni:retely and realistically in the day-to-day struggle to liberate the poor and oppressed. Through new minis-tries and new means of involvement, today's converted religious is becoming more effective in this mission of liberation. We are in a better position now to recognize'the lineaments and to draw ¯ the portrait of the converted person, the man or woman wholly turned towards God, completely "for God." Although a new creature in Christ, such a person realizes that the rem-nants of the old self still cling to him. He cannot always do the good he wants to do and must constantly struggle against a downward pull, an inveterate tendency towards selfishness and self-will. St. Paul describes this inward con-flict so well. He writes: "The Law is spiritual but 1 am unspiritual . I cannot 1~211 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 understand my own behavior. 1 fail to carry out the things I want to do and I find myself doing the very things 1 hate., though the will to do what is good is in me, the performance is not," and he concludes: "What a wretched man 1 am! Who will rescue me from this body doomed to death?" His answer is that this can come only "through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Rm 7:14-25). It is in Christ then that the converted person comes to recognize and accept what he is in himself, but also to realize the self as God's gift. Through grace, he sees himself as a lovable person because he is loved by God and others in spite of everything he knows about his own weaknesses, failures and even sinfulness. Through constant, ongoing conversion, Love has gradually become his raison d'etre. With each new surrender to God's will and provi-dence, his life is becoming transformed. He is the same person and yet the change is producing a "new person." As St. Paul expresses it: "If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away; behold the new has come" (2 Co 5:!7). Conversion gives birth to a new life, hidden in Christ, which produces in the person childlike humility and a deep sense of joy, as well as increased freedom and maturity. In the awareness of his own salvation--the great things the Lord has done for him--the converted one is ready to become a witness to the reign of Christ's kingdom and to help others experience the peace and joy he has found in converting his whole heart to God. He echoes David's words: "I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you" (Ps 50:13). Thus ongoing conversion becomes the way in which the kingdom of God is estab-lished anew and the Spirit renews the face of the earth. It is wise to remember that even though there may be exceptions, the renewed spiritual life described in this portrait of the converted person takes a lifetime to become fully developed, even as a seed that is planted in the soil takes time to push up from the ground and develop into the full flower and fruit. Father Bernard Haring says: "Usually only the final yes to the loving will of God in death brings final maturity" (p. 219). Every human experience in life can be a new call of God's love, and every grateful response on the part of a religious can be an intensifying of the divine life within. Each successive conversion is only a new beginning, meant to be ongoing and to deepen the union with the soul's loving Bridegroom. In considering the essentials of religious life, would it not be wise, then, to include "ongoing conversion" as an important element of religious living? Does not the very fact that we must be constantly evaluating our lives and periodically updating and renewing the principles and constitutions we live by prove that such dynamic conversion and renewal are indeed of the essence of our vocation? Communal Discernment George. Schemel, S.J., and Sister Judith Roemer Father Schemel and Sister Judith are on the staff of the Jesuit Center for Spiritual Growth; Church Road; Wernersville, PA 19565. With today's new awareness of group process, it is not surprising that there has been a renewed interest in communal discernment. Although for a long time historians and theologians have talked about communal discernment, it is ohly recently that groups have returned to a more formal use of this prac-tice. We have personally witnessed and facilitated several of these sessions each year for the past nine years. Although communal discernment is ancient in the church, the historical precedent for the articulated form to which we refer in this writing is the experience of St. Ignatius Loyola and his first companions in their delibera-tions about the founding of the Jesuit order. As a group they worked through questions of community, the need for a vow of obedience, the procedures for sending each other into apostolic works. Out of that experience, written ina little paper known as the Deliberation of the First Fathers, has come a procedure for communal discernment, along with some characteristics that distinguish it from other forms of decision-making. Perhaps most characteristic of this procedure is the insistence on separating the pro and con sides of a qu.estion at issue, requiring that each person prayerfully consider and speak to both. There is, however, more to communal discernment than this. Actually, communal discernment might have many forms. Once some important- elements are acknowledged and considered, many varieties of procedures become possible. Essentially, there are seven elements in com-munal discernment. In the paragraphs that follow, we are going to talk about each one. The seven essential elements of communal discernment are: 825 1126 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 1) An explicit attitude and atmosphere of faith 2) Prayer: before, during, after; for light, for purification 3) Interior freedom: poised spiritual liberty 4) Information: disseminated, assimilated 5) Separation into con and pro reasons 6) Attempt at consensus 7) Confirmation (congruence) a) Internal: joy and peace in the Holy Spirit b) How does the decision work out over a period of time? How is the decision accepted by legitimate authority? The first three elements should be habitual modes of mind and heart. They ought to be part of the group's life rather than something it quickly does on the morning of a decision. The next three elements belong to the more formal part of the discernment process. The last element, confirmation and congru-ence, is monitored in the group over weeks, months, a year, as the new decision is worked out and tested. 1. An Explicit Attitude and Atmosphere of Faith At the base of each communal discernment is a belief and growing aware-ness of our "name of grace," the unique way in which God calls to me indi-vidually and to us corporately. Discernment itself rests on the theological belief that God d~als personally and individually with each of us. Over the years, as this relationship has grown and been nourished, we have often become aware of those patterns and characteristics, those unique notes which characterize one's own personal relationship with God. This "first name of grace"--the unique way in which God deals with me--may seem a new idea at first; but at second glance we recognize that we have come to take it for granted in distinguishing some of our favorite saints: St. Therese of Lisieux and her "Little Way," or St. Francis of Assisi, "God's Little Poor Man," are readily distinguished from St. Robert Bellarmine, "the Church has not his like in learning," or St. Teresa of Avila, the first v~oman Doctor of the Church. in each of these persons, God was known in a unique set of circumstances. Their sanctity developed through this uniqueness. In working out their identity, vocation and mission, what was appropriate for one could not have been appropriate for another. For instance, Francis may well have begged and walked barefoot among the Umbrian hills,.forbidding his followers to ride horseback because it was a sign of nobility and ~wealth. Robert Bellarmine, on the other hand, had ser-vants, a coach and four, and a castle as a part of his being a cardinal. The choices of Francis would not have been appropriate for Robert, nor vice versa. Similarly Teresa of Avila dedicated herself to God in Carmel almost twenty years before she began "to get serious about her contemplation. Again in her case, the timings, the graces, the circumstances were simply different. Yet each was faithful to his or her inspirations. Each became a saint in his Communal Discernment own right. Just as it is important that an individual be aware of his "first name of grace," it is likewise vitally important that groups pay attention to their own unique calling as a group, their "last name of grace." Much was said after Vatican I1 about rediscovering the original grace or charism of the founder. Groups were encouraged to look at their own graces, patterns of call and apostolic works. Any group, be it family, diocese, reli-gious community, parish organization, has its own charism, its own "last name of grace." There is some common identity that focuses the energies of that group. It is much like a family with several children. For example, the distinction among Bob, Mary, Peter and Sharon is certainly observable; yet the fact that they all belong to the Parker family is also immediately apparent. This example highlights the distinction between first and last name of grace. In any communal discernment it is very important that the persons within a group be aware of their faith-reality, their first and last name of grace. The last name of grace, that special uniqueness that we share with each other as members of this particular community, is of especial importance during the iime of discernment. It is necessary that decisions which involve this group of people flow from their awareness of their own group's unique relationship with God. These awarenesses should be heightened at the time of decision so that all are in touch with this reality during the whole process of discernment. Notice, too, that we have said "in an atmosphere of faith." Communal discernment is not another group method along with Robert's rules, management by objec-tives, paternal or maternal guidance, or any other such possibilities. Discern-ment demands that we ask the further question: "What is God asking of me and my group in this concrete situation?" This is an important, feature of communal discernment because, in discernment, we are weighing and decid-ing among goods rather than choosing between good and evil. We are not asking how much money can we save, how much profit can we accumulate, where can we sacrifice now in order to get ahead later, we are asking quite simply: ."What does God want?" The word explicit is also important. There may have been a time when it was not as important as it is today to make faith explicit. "In the good, old days," when the community was close or the group came out of a well-knit parochial setting, there may have been a more common understanding of faith beliefs. In a religious community the way of dress, the customs, the order of the day all said something to everyone about what people believed. There was a time in the lives of many of us when we got out of bed at 5:20 a.m. because "the voice of God is in the sound of the bell"; we kissed the floor before saying the office because we were unworthy to proclaim God's praise; and we said our prayers in Latin so that we could be united with the universal Church. Today, though, I still will listen to God's voice; I am continually unworthy to offer his praise; and 1 am united to the universal Church. But I look different ~!211 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 and my life-style has changed. Unless I am more explicit about my faith values, most people will not know of the faith-drama that is going on within me. For that reason groups must voice for themselves their beliefs, and dis-tinctions they make between faith-absolutes and cultural relatives. Obviously, it is not possible to have this faith-awareness automatically no matter how knowledgeable a group might be nor how group-sensitized it has become. Granted one needs information and group-sensitivity, but the special kind of information and sensitivity needed here is brought about forcefully by the second element of communal discernment. 2. Prayer: Before, During, and After, for Light and Purification Discernment rests on the belief that the human organism is made rightly, and that God actually works perceptibly in one's affective consciousness. It also rests on the belief that evil is a reality. If the deciding body is to sort through and weigh its consolation (those things which bring about an increase of faith, hope, and love--thus urging one close to God) and its desolation (those things which foster a lack of faith, hope, and love--thus urging one away from God), it must do this searching fortified by prayer. No group is without its intimacy questions, its hostilities, its life-style inconsistencies, its power plays and territorial (physical or psychological) disputes. The group must sort out its anger, fear, resentment, ambition, stubbornness, insecurity-- all the negative sinfulness that plagues most of us twenty-four hours a day. The necessity of being in touch with God through all of this confrontation with sin and sinfulness is paramount. The authentic who-l-am--my first and last name of grace--owning its reality of sinfulness, must come before God to listen. If, for instance, on the day my two housekeepers.quit, and 1 am misunderstood by a department head, and the keys to the car are missing when I want to run away, I go before God and say, "Dear Father,,please bless your child and increase my love and devotion to you," I am more probably not being entirely authentic before God. It would likely be better for me to say, "Dear God, I amso angry. I hate my job. I hate housekeeping. It's your fault that l'm in this stupid situation. 1 know I'm being selfish and stubborn and I don't want to change. I am in great need of your help, so please will you heal me?" It is only in that attitude of dependence and honesty that 1 am ready to begin to listen. It is difficult to believe that a matter proposed for communal discernment would be so clear as not to provoke a number of positive and negative thoughts and feelings in a group. There is hardly a topic today that can be introduced for group consideration that does not evoke a host of rational and irrational, controlled and spontaneous reactions and responses. Without prayer, thee third element of discernment is also impossible. 3. Interior Freedom--Poised Spiritual Liberty In the Exercises, Ignatius spends a considerable amount of space on the topic of"indifference"---that attitude of mind which says, "Please God, I want Communal Discernment what you want. 1 will receive honor or scorn, richness or poverty, fame or hiddenness--whatever is for your honor and glory, whatever you want in my life, in whatever measure you want it." That attitude is not easy for an indi-vidual personally; much less is it easy for a group that is involved in a particu-lar work or prejudiced in a particular direction. If, for instance, 1 have just spent two years of my blood, sweat and tears establishing an individualized reading program in grades one to four, I will hardly be spontaneously indifferent or spiritually free for a discernment pro-cess aimed at deciding whether or not to close the primary grades in our school. Similarly, if I have just spent six years getting a B.A. and an M.A. in Latin, it will be very hard for me to be indifferent to a discernment process about dropping the classics from the curriculum. In any such circumstances, we have to be aware of these reluctances, prejudices and fears, prayerfully asking to be freed from their hold on us, at least during the time of discernment. As I mentioned before, these first three elements, faith-prayer-freedom, are ongoing attitudes that need to grow in individuals as well as in the group before decision-making can begin to share the qualities of authentic discern-ment. In one group, my partner and I animated a decision-making group and their husbands or wives over a four month period precisely on these first three elements. We set up a series of structured spiritual conversations in which the group participated in looking at its history together, articulating its gifts and liabilities, reinforcing its individual and qiturgical prayer commitments, and sharing all these with each other in preparation for a decision about its parish finances. At the end of that period of preparation, the group expediti.ously continued into the process and made decisions about a $ i,000,000 inheritance. Along with these habitual modes of living, such as prayer, faith and free-dom, but' before coming to the actual decision, there is a period of research and fact-finding. This leads us into our fourth element. 4. Information: Disseminated and Assimilated There are few, if any, direct pipelines from heaven; and thus there is no substitute for study, research, evaluation, and an awareness of the concrete facts about the subject up for decision. Included in such a list of facts are the feelings and values in the group which are associated with the situation. If, for example, I am on a studies committee that is trying to decide whether or not to send three persons off to get doctorates, we cannot just meet, expecting God to send us an answer. As a deciding group, we need to know the candidates' talents, their grades, their GREs, the requirements of the particular university, the attraction or repulsion each person feels for graduate studies, the finances involved, the transportation and housing available, the related job opportunities present in our system, the relevance of this type of education for our overall work, the spiritual needs of the persons involved, their mental and physical stamina and on and on. Not only must the data be 1131~ / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 accumulated, but all the members of the group must have studied the facts. It would be outrageous for me to arrive some place the night before a meeting and be expected to decide whether a novitiate should be moved to a new location if I am unfamiliar with the topic and have not had time to study the briefs. In that case 1 simply would have no human information to use as a reality check on my discernment. Once information has been gathered and studied, it is necessary to formu-late subject at issue in a simple statement. It is best not to try to address a multifacet6d issue all at once, or attempt to deal with a complicated formula. In other words, keep the issue simple. As a rule, the statement should be a simple, declarative sentence articulating the issue in a manner opposite to the status quo. For instance, if we are presently trying to concentrate our person-nel in a few hospitals (this is our status quo), then the statement of our issue might be, We would have g~reater apostolic effectiveness by scattering our per-sonnel in as many health services as possible. Or, in another example, if our present practice is to elect a president of the board every second year (status quo), our sentence might read, There will'be an election of the president of the board every fourth year. Our pra.ctice of writing the proposition in this way, opposite to the status quo, arose out of experience. Groups seem to be better able to look at their situation from a new perspective when the proposition is presented to them from the opposite situation. One of the big temptations in formulating a working simple sentence is to include too many issues at one time. A statement such as: Five generalate councilors should form an equal-power team in spiri-tuality, apostolate, temporalities, formation, and community life. is just too complex. That proposition contains too many items of concern: I. How many councilors are needed? 2. Should there be team government? 3. Do all the members have equal power? 4. Where does the authority reside? 5. What are the needed areas of responsibility? In such a case it would be better to work at the many issues one at a time~. Part of learning to live with communal discernment is learning to live with process. In other words, the group needs time and patience to work with its own real agenda and to be satisfied with the sometimes small, but clear truths that belong to it. In discernment it is necess~iry to work with clarities and to move as a group from one point to another without jumping ahead of the graces actually present. Once the issue is formulated in a simple, declarative statement we move on Communal Discernment to the fifth element. 5. Separation into Con and Pro Reasons The separation of the issue into the con and pro reasons is necessary so that each and all take a fair look at both sides of the question, and so that at no time-does the discernment become merely a discussion or a debate. In this procedure, where each is asked to address both sides of the issue, the timid are given an opportunity to speak; while the loquacious are challenged to be more focused. This procedure allows the many sides of the issue to be explored and articulated. When a group knows that everyone will be giving the cons and everyone will be giving the pros, there is less chance that any one person will be singled out and made to stand alone. In this way, the defensiveness of the group is reduced to a minimum. Debate is also precluded. Obviously, one does not go into a discernment knowing an answer and pressuring the other side into compliance. Rather, in communal discernment the group members are looked upon as partners in seeking the truth. In fact, should one be convinced of an answer before discernment, it would be foolish for that person to proceed through the process. The purpose of discernment: finding God's will, is already present. It doesn't make much sense to discern about something when one already knows what God wants. To go through those motions would merely mean to play games. When the group finally meets for the more formal part of the discernment, a simple procedure can be helpful. After a period of prayer, each person in a group of possibly six or eight persons is asked to state the reasons he or she sees against the proposition. At this point the person does not say that he or she is personally against the proposition, but only that he sees good reasons against it. Those reasons that he names are real reasons for him. He does not speak for anyone else, nor does he manufacture reasons. The group listens to all the reasons against, each one giving only one reason each time, until each person has given his entire list. There may be a need to go around in the circle of the group several times before this is accomplished. It is helpful for all of the members to write down the various reasons stated so that all have an accurate account of these reasons later on in the consensus effort. The group is then asked to begin a second period of prayer over the reasons for the proposition. At the end of this time, the group meets again and each is asked to state reasons for the proposition. The procedure is exactly the same as the first time. Each one gives one reason, and all stay until everyone has had a chance to give his entire list. They may have gone around the circle several times to accomplish this. Again, the reasons are written by each. For the sake of fairness, it is good to give equal time to con and pro even if this means sitting in silence together. The quiet time can be an opportunity to consider the new information learned from the group. The discipline in these first two sessions of giving con and pro is quite 1132 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 strict. Although one may certainly ask a question about a word that she has not heard or a phrase that was not clear, there is, on the other hand, no discussion or amplification. The assumption here is that the time for discus-sion and challenge has taken place in the weeks before communal discern-ment. At our present point .in the procedure, the emphasis is on listening and sorting out the facts and feelings without further dialogue. Sometimes people ask why.we look at the cons first. Historically~ that is what Ignatius and his friends did. Psychologically, there is n~uch evidence to support the fact that negative reasons are hard to hold in and quite naturally come to the forefront~ It seems best to lay them on the table early. I have, in fact, experimented with a group's giving pro reasons first. On one occasion two of us did a communal discernment with two hundred and fifty persons. We divided the large group into twenty-five small groups. Although all used the same issue, half the small groups worked on positive first, then negative. All groups came to the same general conclusion, but those doing positive reasons first experienced some stress in holding on to their negatives until last. At present, I consistently do the negative or con reasons at the beginning. After the group has looked carefully at con and pro reasons, there is a third period of prayer. At this time each person looks carefully at his or her own reasons and the additional reasons both against and for voiced in the group. He then comes up with his own personal decision about the matter. At a third group session all meet to state their decision and attempt to work towards consensus, the sixth element. 6. Consensus Seldom does it happen that all persons in a group are of one mind right away. It is a good idea at the beginning of this third session to make a quick poll of the group to see its initial stand. Lit us say that a group is discerning whether or not to close a retirement home. Seven say "yes" and three say "no" at the beginning of the first round. Perhaps the three who say "no" have certain legitimate fears about the closing: "Well, I can't agree unless all the residents are carefully placed in other homes." "I could agree if we find some other way of Christian witness in this same .neighborhood." "I can agree provided we wait two years until the new city home is finished next year." It may be, in listening carefully to these provided's,,:if's unless's, maybe's, that we.can seek areas of agreement. Here the dialogue with the group.is much freer. All are listening to hear what is really being said by the entire group. Sometimes, at this point, the original proposition needs to be restated or changed to include the new areas of agreement. Often there is a greater facility in reaching consensus once people are assured that their very real concern can be taken care of in some way that they did not previously imagine. One.of the biggest temptations at this point in the communal discernment is to try to "form consensus" instead of reading the one that is "actually in the group. At one time I saw a .group come to a standstill over whether three or Communal Discernment seven persons would be sent on an African project. On the surface, they thought there was no consensus, and continued to argue over "three" or "seven." However, in this case there definitely was a consensus: both sides agreed to three persons. That is clear. It's just that some wanted four more to go. On another occasion I participated in a group that was locked over the time of liturgy: 6:15 a.m. or 4:30 p.m. We went round and round giving very convincing reasons for both options. Again there appeared to be no consen-sus. Yet there was. All the group agreed the liturgy was a very important part of their life together. All wanted the liturgy at the prime time of day. The disagreement focused around what time was "prime." Once that detail was realized, and the group acknowledged its common faith convictions, the ten-sion was released and the detail compromised and brought to consensus. There are times, however, when consensus in the sense of "we all feel, think, believe together" cannot be reached. When there is no complete consen-sus, a group may have to be content with a vote or having the resident authority declare the practical steps to be followed in the group's life on this question. This is particularly true when time runs out or the urgency of the matter demands~decision. Ideally, one should take the unresolved consensus back to prayer and continue the process. However, there are times when this is just not feasible, and the group has to resort to the expediency of voting or having the consensus declared. Once the decision has been made and the consensus is reached, it is neces-sary to take that decision back to prayer and ask for confirmation. 7. Confirmation: Exterior and Interior Interiorly, when a good decision has been made, the group should expe-rience a peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. There is a rightness in its sense of being, a congruence with the first and last name of grace. This definition of discernment sums up the interior confirmation. "Discernment is an experien-tial knowledge of self in the congruence of the object of choice and one's fundamental religious orientation." If a good decision has been made, the persons within the group will experience these qualities during the following months and there will be a new graced energy to carry out the decision. Sometimes, a group experiences a "sigh of relief: that at last a decision has been made. 'Let's go home!'" That is hardly interior confirmation. Rather confirmation is a growing awareness over time about the rightness of the decision. The decision fits well with who I am personally and communally. It urges me to a greater service of God. Finally, I can return to my habitual form of prayer and find that 1 am not continuing to go around in circles or to debate about the issue, but rather 1 am growing in peace and joy before the Lord. This interior confirmation must be checked with exterior confirmation as well. Is this decision accepted by legitimate authority? Does time confirm the rightness of the decision? ~!~14 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 I once discerned that I should become a regular blood donor so that I could participate in some physical way in the human race. 1 appeared eagerly one morning at the bloodmobile only to be told that unfortunately no one under one hundred ten pounds was allowed to give blood. Another time 1 discerned with a group about going to a particular university. I had all the required finances, housing, and approval on my side of things, and then had the application rejected by the admittance board. In both cases 1 lacked the acceptance of legitimate authority. Sometimes it happens that a group conscientiously submits the results of a genuine discernment to legitimate authority which says, "no." The discern-ment lacks exterior confirmation. For the time being the group can be assured that it is not called to proceed in precisely the way it has decided. This does not mean the group was wrong, or the authority right. It just means they temporarily have no confirmation, and they need to plan carefully for the next step. Ideally, the legitimate authority in a given situation has been a part of the discerning group. It is also important for the group to be clear about whether the discernment it is undertaking is consultative (the group acting as advisor) or deliberative (the group actually being the deciding body). Such distinctions made before the time and energy of the group has been devoted to the process will eliminate strain and misunderstanding later on. Lastly, the practicalities of life add their own kind of confirmation by answering the question, "How does it work over a period of time?" A group may have discerned to take on extra sick calls or catechetical duties, only to find later on that their regular work is being neglected, there is less time for prayer, or they are becoming unduly tired and crabby. All these signs of disharmony suggest that they take another look at their decision. If we set up a soup kitchen, and six months later not too many come for soup, we can rightly assume that the apostolic venture needs to be reevaluated; the apos-tolic possibility we once saw doesn't seem relevant any longer. Summary In summary then, before coming to discernment, a group needs three viable attitudes: !) faith --an awareness of God's acting in my life --an awareness of my own name of grace --an awareness of the group's name of grace 2) prayer --an abiding sensitivity to the movements of.consolation and desolation --a realization of personal and corporate sinfulness --a willingness to face our hang-ups honestly 3) freedom--a willingness to be responsive to whatever God is asking --an indifference towards the options of good that are placed Communal Discernment before us --a desire to move in the fullness of our reality With these attitudes and awarenesses at one's fingertips, we then move into the more formal aspect of communal discernment. 4) Studying the issue: formulating the question in a simple manner. 5) Separating the reasons into cons and pros and being willing to look carefully at both sides of the issue. 6) Attempting consensus and seeking areas of agreement. Finally, as we come to our decision and begin to carry it out, we monitor ourselves for the next weeks, months, year. 7) Experiencing confirmation both interiorly in peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, in congruence, and appropriate indifference; and exteriorly through the reality check of time and acceptance by legitimate authority. With these seven elements it is hoped that a group can come to a decision that represents God's will for it. Certainly if the group has been faithful to the various elements, not only will its decision be well-grounded but also the lives .together of its members as part of the Christian community will have deep-ened. Within the process they will have experienced trust, faith, sinfulness and forgiveness. In a very real way they have participated in the life, death, and resurrection of the Lord by sharing the work of seeking the truth, facing their sinfulness, and participating in the forgiveness and love necessary to come to consensus. Certainly, this method of proceeding is consistent with who they are~ More importantly, they have allowed the means of their decision-making to enter into their purpose for being together. Just as we assume that the end does not justify the means, in discernment spirituality we go one step further to say that the means enters into the end. All parts of the process are important and must be consistent with the truth and love which a discerning group is called to seek. Communal discernment provides that opportunity more than other decision-making methods. There is no one way of conducting a communal discernment. As long as the seven elements are observed, the variations can be many. A group might prepare and study an issue for several months and then come together for a day, allowing forty-five minutes for each part of the prayer, cons and pros, while leaving the rest of the day for consensus. Or, if time is short, a group may look at cons during one meeting, pros at a second, and consensus at a third. Less complicated situations or smaller groups might use a shorter time. Sometimes people ask how a group knows what issues to use for discern-ment. Usually, as any group stays together, there are any number of issues that arise and need to be settled. Communal discernment is best used on those issues which touch the common vocation. Lesser issues can be handled admin-istratively. They do not need the amount of time and effort that is required of an entire group in communal discernment. 1~36 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 In conclusion, in our own day we have come to realize more and more that it takes the entire community to hear the infinitely rich word of God. No one person has ears big enough to do this on his own. Most of us also accept committee meetings, team efforts, total staff participation, and second opin-ions as a normal part of life. The age of the loner or even of the enlightened amateur is waning. As our awareness of life's richness and complexities increases, we are encouraged to look beyond our personal wisdom to a wider group of conscientious people who will be with us in our decision-making. No one wants the burden of closing a school, opening a new department, with-drawing a subsidy, initiating a new field of research completely alone. More and more we are relying on a gathering of friends, experts, or colleagues to decide corporately what is the best way to go. Most of us, too, have experienced a certain frustration with groups and meetings. Projections and power struggles, contracts and silences that we may have learned to handle and work with on a more individual, personal level, often become very complex in a group. Our current skills do not always seem to work. The group becomes a hindrance rather than a help for our endeavors. On the brighter side, most of us learn quite early that "none of us is as smart as all of us." In our labored ignorance in seeking for truth we welcome as much help as we can get. Theologically, we may have been alerted to the awesome interchange that takes place between God and humankind. The Lord has visited his creatures, and we are a part of that magnificent inter-change. Communal discernment offers us a way of participating in this mystery. At the close of the Deliberations, the author has the following remarks that might well be our goal as well as our prayer during communal discernment. By the feast of St. John, all our business was pleasantly concluded in the spirit of perfect harmony. But it was only by first engaging in prolonged vigils and prayers, with much expenditure of physical and mental energy that we resolved these problems and brought them to this happy conclusion. A Note on Small Beginnings in The Spiritual Exercises Nancy M. Malone, O.S.U. Sister Nancy has been enjoying a "spiritual sabbatical" after a period of service as director of a retreat center and a regional director of the National Institute for Campus Ministries (NICM). She is residing at the Ursuline Convent of St. Angela; 265 East 162nd St.: Bronx, NY 10451. Talking about one's Thirty Day Retreat can, I suppose, be like talking about one's operation, and probably for the same reasons. It is all so intensely meaningful and interesting to the person who has undergone it as to be endlessly fascinating--to her. This article is not about my retreat in the sense of recounting those profound and personal things that happened to me during it. It is about several devices embedded in the text of The Spiritual Exercises which I believe contain one of Ignatius' much-praised psychological insights. The insight is displayed in the various and canny ways that Ignatius has. us use to bring ourselves from "a distance" to "closer," or from "outside" to "inside" in respect tothe scene or person(s) we are contemplating, or, in sohae cases, from "outside" to "inside" ourselves. Underlying the devices is what might be called the "vestibule principle," the need, recognized by Ignatius, among others, that scattered and externalized human beings have to go through an "anteroom" before entering into the "Holy of Holies." Put another way; Ignatius' insight has to do with ways of our becoming "present." I came upon this insight in the course of my Thirty Day Retreat at Loyola House in Guelph, Canada. I used the text of The Exercises itself as translated by Elder Muilan, S.J. Having been warned about Ignatius' less than elegant style and less than contemporary theology and imagery, I nonetheless approached the text on the assumption that the man had chosen his words very carefully and for a purpose. This assumption of intentional precision paid off. 837 11311 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 Take, for instance, the "second prelude" (the composition of place) in all of the exemplary contemplations that Ignatius lays out in the Second and Third Weeks. On the Incarnation: "Here it will be to see the great capacity and circuit of the world, in which are so many and such different people; then likewise, in particular, the house and rooms of Our Lady in the city of Naza-reth, in the Province of Galilee." On the Nativity: "It will be here to see with the sight of the imagination the road from Nazareth to Bethlehem; consid-ering the length and the breadth .'.; likewise looking at the place or cave of the Nativity, how large, how small . " On the Passion: "It will be here to consider the road from Bethany to Jerusalem, whether broad, whether narrow .; likewise the place of the Supper, whether large, whether small . "And again on the Passion: "It will be here to consider the road from Mount Sion to the Valley of Josaphat, and likewise the Garden, whether wide, whether large. . . ." (Notice, by the way, that following his own advice to directors in the "second annotation," Ignatius doesn't paint the picture for us; he simply lays out categories for our imaginations to play with.) Wh'y all this attention to "circuits" and "roads"?. Much has been made in preached retreats I've attended of the difficulties that Mary and Joseph expe-rienced in the journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Now if such is the point of so composing that place, it doesn't apply to the other composition mentioned here. But I don't think it is the point. 1 think the point is not content but process. Ignatius knew that something happens inside us when we not only imaginatively put ourselves in a place, but actually imagine ourselves getting there. We are, somehow, more there than if we had begun simply by imagining ourselves there in the first place. In the process of coming, we become present. Ignatius follows a similar process in the three points that he gives us for the contemplations of the Second and Third Weeks: "to see the persons . " "to hear what they are talking about., . to look at what they are doing . " Most people I have asked assume that Ignatius simply wants us to see, hear and understand what is going on in every scene, that it was only the exigencies of getting this down on paper that dictated his separating the three operations into "three points." If you think about it for a minute, though, he could have found an easier way of doing this, if he wanted to. But perhaps he didn't.I Perhaps Ignatius was again bringing us "closer from a distance," this time from outer to inner space. There is a certain kind of knowledge that we acquire simply by observing people across the proverbial crowded room. It ~The separation of the three operations" is particularly marked in the contemplation on the Incarnation where one might have expected Ignatius to direct us to see, hear and look at the persons.on the face of the earth, and then the Three Divine Persons, and then our Lady. Instead, he so constructs the points that he groups the persons together under the separate operations. On the other hand, as an indication that you can't push this thesis too far. he, for some reason not clear to me, changes to the wording of the Second Point in the contemplation on the Nativity from his usual "to hear" to "look, mark and contemplate what they are saying." ¯ Small Beginnings / 839 may be that we gaze more intently when it is only through that one sense that we receive data. It may be that there is in all of us a tendency towards a certain voyeurism, the unobserved observer looking at those who reveal themselves precisely because they don't know that they are being observed. At any rate, when we move close enough also to hear what is being said, we are also moving closer to inner space. We learn something more and different about people than what we learn by merely watching them. It is not only the words that we listen to; it is the quality and tone of voice, inflection, and phrasing. And all of these things are revelatory of the self within; all of them deal "out that being indoors each one dwells," as Hopkins says. But it is in the third point that we arrive at the heart of the matter, as it were. Ignatius tells us to "look at what they are doing," and the way he explicates that in every case makes it clear that what he is after is not another act of imaginative seeing, but an understanding, an entering into the inten-tions, the affections--the hearts--of those we are contemplating: "the Divine Persons . . . working out the most Holy Incarnation . . .; Our Lady . . . humbling herself and giving thanks to the Divine Majesty . . ."; Our Lord being born, "that He may die on the Cross; and all this for me." We have been led, if we have followed the process, from sense knowledge to heart knowl-edge, from outer distance to inner closeness. Consider again Ignatius' meditation on Hell, which can and does present formidable difficulties to present-day directors and retreatants. Many think it more effective to meditate on Hell by considering interior states such as alienation, despair, loneliness and hatred, rather than "great fires, wailings, howlings, smoke, sulphur, dregs, etc." Well, in the first place, I think that lgnatius is on sounder ground, theologically and anthropologically, in not passing over the part played by our body in reaping the bitter fruits of sin that it has helped to sow. And though he doesn't psychologize our suffering too much--too soon, he does bring us inside ourselves in an astute way, and he does this through our bodies. We are directed, it is true, to see the fire, to hear the cries and blasphemies, to smell the putrid things. But when it comes to the sense of taste, we are told to taste, not rotten food or rancid drink, but ourselves: "bitter things, like tears, sadness, and the worm of conscience." In this case, we move from outer to inner through that sense which is, in a way, most inside us. Finally, there is that intriguing little device that we are counseled to use by the Third Addition. "A step or two before the place where I have to con-template or meditate, l will put myself standing for the space of an Our Father . " So often we no more plunk ourselves into our prayer chair than we plunk ourselves also into the cave at Bethlehem, or into the heart of the Trinity. No, at the very outset of prayer, Ignatius has us bring ourselves, physically and spiritually, through a tiny vestibule, no bigger than "a step or two away" or "the space of an Our Father." Now, what does all of this have to say, apart from the fact that, in my 1141~ / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 experience, these devices work? Having said it all, I want to emend one of my original statements. Ignatius' insight is profound, but it is not strictly and merely "psychological." The insight underlying all of these devices has to do not just with the workings of our psyches, but more precisely with the work-ings of body and soul on each other, more precisely, with the organic unity of the human person. On another level, presuming that I am right about what is going on in these instances, that Ignatius is directing us to follow a carefully constructed process, these reflections also say something about the value of using his text as it is. And they suggest that, when The Exercises are accommodated, some explicit attention ought to be given to constructing a process designed to achieve the same results. The Charism of Poverty Robert Faricy, S.J. Father Faricy also wrote "By His Wounds," which appeared in the issue of May, 1979, as well as other articles. He continues to teach at the Gregorian University; Piazza della Pilotta. 4; 00187 Roma, Italy. Poverty can be considered as a vow, as an interior psychological state, or as a gift. Religious poverty, at the most profound level, is a charism; it is a special gift from the Lord before it can be a response to the Lord's love--because it is precisely the gift, the charism, of poverty that empowers me to respond to the Lord's love by living my commitment to him and to be poor for him. Poor With Jesus Poor The gospel text about the rich young man refers to the counsel of poverty and stands as the classically cited passage concerning the vow of poverty. "Jesus said to him: 'If ~,ou would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me'" (Mt 19:21). This fits with Jesus~ general teaching on poverty as a Christian value: "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven . For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also" (Mt 6:19-20). "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven" (Mt 19:24). "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field which someone has found; he hides it, and goes off happy, and sells everything he owns and buys that field" (Mt ! 3:44). The most important words in Jesus' invitation to the rich young man are, "Come, follow me," and they should be understood in the context of Jesus' 841 1142 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 teaching on discipleship: "If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross and follow me. For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it" (Mr 16:24-25). The Christian virtue of poverty, then, consists of renouncing self, taking up the cross, and following Jesus. But there is, beyond the general call to a certain poverty, at least interior, and to the cross, a further call, a call to go further and to give more. This call Jesus addressed to the rich young man. Like all Jesus' invitations, it calls, and it empowers to respond. The power to answer the call to a radical poverty, to a special following of Jesus on the way of the cross, is the charism of poverty. Not all Christians are called to this kind of poverty, to this radical way of being poor with Jesus poor. But some are. And the power to live out the answer to that call is the charism of poverty. As a charism, poverty enables me to serve the Lord with a special freedom. I am free to serve him in an apostolate that earns a good salary, or a small one, or that earns nothing at all. Money and material advantages do not determine my choices in serving the Lord. And so the charism of poverty "builds up the body of Christ" i:n that it frees me more for service. And, further, it relates me in a particular way to Jesus, making me his disciple in chosen radical poverty, in the poverty of the cross. When Jesus dies on Calvary, he has nothing. Not only does he die without any material possessions at all, but he dies stripped of all honor, of all dignity, of all respect. He dies, not like a common criminal, but more shamefully, like an uncommon criminal; he dies, not just rejected by his own people, but outside the framework of civilized society, on a hill outside the gate~ outside the city, cut off from human society. Subjected to extensive and horribly severe torture, both physical and psy-chological, he finally dies without composure, without a vestige 'of human dignity, feeling utterly abandoned even by God and crying out to God, "Why have you abandoned me?" The gospel accounts of Jesus' death are strikingly laconic. The Church had no crucifixes for hundreds of years, until the shock could be assimilated; the shock of the terribleness of Jesus' death. So too, the charism of poverty takes one beyond just material poverty freely chosen, lived out voluntarily. The charism of poverty associates one intimately with Jestis in his passion and death, crucifying one to the world and the world to him (see Ga 6:14). "1 have been crucified with Christ" (Ga 2:19). It frees me from ambition for honors, for applause, for attention from others. The charism of poverty acts as an antidote for that malady thai has beset professionally religious people since the scribes and the pharisees and before: the need for na'rcissistic feedback. ~ The charism of poverty empowers me to be poor with Jesus poor, poor materially and poor interiorly, stripped of everything, for love of Jesus who calls me. Religious poverty is not, then, some kind of stoical pragmatism, a streamlining for service. It does free me for service. But beyond that, and more The Charism of Poverty / 1143 importantly, it relates me in love to Jesus who laid down his life for me. Poverty and Liberation , One of the fruitful insights of the Latin American theology of liberation is that religious poverty frees me to become one with those who live in oppres-sive poverty; it enables me to enter into solidarity with the downtrodden, the suffering, the poor, the marginal people who, with Jesus, are "outside the city," outside respectable human society. 1 can see Jesus in them, the least of his brothers and sisters. And, united intimately in love with Jesus, I enter into a fraternal solidarity with the most oppressed, the poorest, the most marginal of his brothers and sisters. I find Jesus most clearly and distinctly in the most needy--in the retarded, in prisoners, in the .very ill--whether physically or mentally or both, in the outcasts and the severely troubled and poorest of the poor. Not that entering into solidarity with those who have nothing is my motive for living poverty. The motive is love. The motive is Jesus, who calls me in love to respond to his love for me. This loving response, made in the power of his Spirit, leads me to live out religious poverty; and it leads me to a preference for the poor. The gospel preference for the poor stands at the hea'rt of Jesus' teaching; it runs through the Acts of the Apostles and Paul's letters; and it holds the thematic center of the letter of James. In his public life Jesus goes to the oppressed, eats with whores and publicans, heals the sick, raises up those who are brought low. This gospel preference for the poor is, always, an apostolic priority. To be poor with Jesus mear~s to be poor with the least of his brothers and sisters so as to participate in Jesus' mission of redemption, a mission he always understood as applying to this life as well as to the next. "He has sent me to bring the good news to the poor, to proclaim freedom to captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set free the downtrodden . " (Lk 4:18). The charism of poverty empowers me to go to Jesus in the poor and~the needy and the oppressed, because I can give up everything for him,. because lam free to love him and' to serve him in the downtrodden, the outcasts, the marginal people. This freedom that the charism of poverty gives me is, firsi of all and above all, an interior freedom. It takes the form of a radical and thoroughgoing dependence on God, a dependence that looks to the Lord for salvation, for liberation from present difficulties both for myself and for those whom the Lord has called me to serve. The theology of liberation has not always recognized the primacy of pov-erty of spirit, of that interior freedom that has the shape of a total dependence on the Lord. God does save his people, bring them out of bondage, i'edeem them. But this deliverance and this redemption begin, on the part of the people, with crying out to the Lord, with a desperate recourse to the only one who can truly save. The Old Testament event of the Exodus dominates Israel's theology as a 8411 / Review for Religious, Nov.-Dec., 1981 category of salvation. God frees his people, now and always, just as he did then. Deliverance from Egyptian bondage begins, not with political commit-ment, nor with education, nor with the solidarity of the oppressed, but with the interior poverty that cries out to the Lord. The Bible's oldest passage, directions and a prayer for the temple offering of the first fruits of the harvest, goes like this: The priest shall take the basket from your hand, and set it down before the altar of the Lord your God. And you shall make response before the Lord your God, saying, "A wandering Aramean was my father: and he went down into Egypt and sojourned the~e, few in number: and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and populous. And the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, and laid upon us harsh bondage. "Th~n we cried out to the Lord the God of our fathers, and the Lord heard our voice, and saw our afflictior~, our toil, our oppression. And the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror, with signs and wonders; and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. And behold, now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground which you, O Lord, have given me" (Dr 26:4-1 I). The New Testament event-category that is analogous to the Exodus, and is its fulfillment, is the death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus' deliverance from the powers of darkness is his passage from death to risen life. This passage has its beginning in his crying out to the Father, "My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?'~ (Mt 27:46). Jesus uses the opening line of Psalm Twenty-two. as a prayer to express his feeling of being abandoned by the Father, as a prayer of lamentation, an expression of profound poverty, of radical depen-dence on the Father. As a lament, Jesus' prayer expresses not only his own feeling of being abandoned, but also--implicitly--his abandonment into the hands of the Father. Jesus' prayer of crying out to the Lord leads directly to his death--Matthew's words are carefully chosen, Jesus "yielded up his spirit" to the Father, and in Luke's account Jesus cries in a loud voice, "Father, into your hands 1 commend my spirit." This abandonment into the Father's hands is the essence of interior pov-erty. The charism of religious poverty gives me the power to surrender to God, to say "yes" to the Father with Jesus, and in and through him. Jesus' whole life finds its summation and meaning in his death on the cross, because his death, like his life, was a surrender, a "yes" to the Father. "Jesus Christ . . . was not Yes and No; in him it is always Yes. For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why we say the Amen through him, to the glory of God" (2 Co i:19-20). Prayer for an Increase, of the Charism of Poverty We can pray for a new outpouring of the charism of religious poverty: Lord Jesus, I ask you for a new fullness of the charism of poverty. I ask you to reveal to me now my inordinate attachments, my holding on to things or to persons, my .~'richness" that keeps me from saying a more comp'lete Yes The Charism of Poverty to you. I surrender to you my excessive search for material comforts, and what-ever material goods I have that I do not really need to serve you. I surrender to you my excessive need for attention, for acclaim and applause, for narcissistic feedback from others; I surrender all my selfish ambitions, my search for honors, my vainglory and my pride. I surrender to you my possessiveness of those whom I love; teach me to love (mention the names of any person or persons that you tend to be attached to in a selfish or possessive way)freely, leaving others free; teach me to love with an open hand. I renounce the possessiveness in my love for others; teach me to love more and better. And l ask you now for new graces, for new power to live for you, for a new outpouring of the charism of religious poverty. Give me the interior poverty that depends on you and not on the world's acceptance. You say to me now, "lf the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you; if you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I spoke to you: a servant is not greater than his master" (Jn 15:18-20). Teach me, Lord, to enter by the narrow gate that leads to life (Mr 7:13-14). You are that gate, Lord; let me follow you, taking up my cross. For ybu alone, Lord, are my portion. I have no inheritance, for you are my inheritance; I want no possessions, for you are my possession (Ezk 44:28). Amen. The Forgiving What has been burned is burned, but ashes stir to unseen winds and whirlpool into life raised higher than the flames that birthed them to seed the clouds that grow the tender rains. Sister Linda Karas, RSM Mercy Consultation Center P.O. Box 370 Dallas, PA 18612 The Other Side of Humility: Its Clarity and Strength Frederick G. McLeod, S.J. Father McLeod is an associate professor of the Department of Theological Studies at St. Louis University. He resides at 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis. MO 63108. Christian tradition,] particula, rly in its Scriptures and spiritual writings, has set humility on a prominent pedestal. In fact, it extols humility as the foremost of all the moral virtues, even on a par with charity. It proclaims humility as the weapon with which to parry and fend off the deadly enemy of humanity-- pride. It also trumpets humility as the way that those who are on the last rung of life can mount to the top. Yet, it is a virtue whose meaning and importance are still widely misunderstood. If queried, few today, I suspect, would be able to state accurately what it is, and why it is so central to the Christian message and life. Current Views Humility is not a popular'virtue among our contemporaries. For some, it still evokes unease, if not profoundly negative feelings. In the past, when pride was targeted as the number-one enemy, writers and preachers exhorted us to take up the club of humility to beat down our pride. Unfortunately, in the process many also clubbed down healthy self-love--an experience that still rankles in some. ~This tradition is amply documented in the articles on Humility in the Dictionnaire de Spiritual-itb. Vll, 1136-87. and in The New Catholic Encyclopedia, Vll. 234-36. For a popular but some-what dated book on this subject, see Nivard Kinsella. O.C.S.O. Unprofitable Servants (Westminster: Newman Press. 1960). 846 The Other Side of Humility / 1147 Then, too, pithy statements and striking examples from the lives of such spiritual giants as Saints Paul,2 Benedict3 and Francis of Assisi4 were hailed-- often out of context--as offering the ideal attitude that ought to govern our relationships with others. We were urged to consider ourselves as the worst of all sinners and everyone else better than ourselves. To live thus--according to this advice--is to be humble! While respecting the sincerity of the saints and reluctant to question their spiritual wisdom, many today simply confess their Confusion. They do not see how one, especially a saint of the magnitude of Paul or Benedict or Francis, can truthfully claim to be the worst of all sinners. Moreover, to affirm that all others are better than ourselves in all circumstances is patent nonsense. But what is worse, some who have tried in the past to live out such humility are still,~struggling with lingering feelings of an inferiority complex, ls this the lowliness that humility seeks to instill and achieve? in the past, too, humility was the favorite virtue extolled by authority. Though Christ's remarks on humility seem to have been. directed mainly to those with power and authority, hu

Issue 62.4 of the Review for Religious, 2003. ; Church Dii~ection D evo tion a 1 Life Religious Life Pers 3ectives QUARTERLY 62.4 2003 Review for Religious (ISSN 0034-639X) is published bimonthly at Saint Louis University by the Jesuits of the Missouri Province. Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393 Telephone: 314-977-7363 ¯ Fax: 314-977-7362 E-Mail: review@slu.edu ¯ V~Zeb site: www.reviewforreligious.org Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor: Review for Religious ¯ 3601 Lindell Boulevard ° St. Louis, MO 63108-3393 Correspondence about the Canonical Counsel department: Elizabeth McDonough OP Mount St. Mary's Seminary; Emmitsburg, Maryland 21727 POSTMASTER Send address changes to Review for Religious ¯ P.O. Box 6070 ¯ Duluth, MN 55806. Periodical postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri, and additional mailing offices. See inside back cover for information on subscription rates. ©2003 Review for Religious Permission is herewith granted to copy any material (articles, poems, reviews) contained in this issue of Review for Religious for personal or internal use, or for th~ personal or internal use of specific library clients within the limits outlined in Sections 107 and/or 108 of the United States Copyright Law. MI copies made under this permission must bear notice of the source, date, and copyright owner on the first page. This permission is NOT extended to copying for commercial distribu-tion, advertising, institutional promotion, or for the crehtion of new collective works or anthologies. Such permission will only be considered on written application to the Editor, Review for Religious. fo r religious LIVING OUR CATHOLIC LEGACIES Editor ¯ Associate Editors Canonical Counsel Editor Editorial Staff Advisory Board David L. Fleming sJ Clare Boehmer ASC Philip C. Fischer SJ Elizabeth McDonough OP Mary Ann Foppe Tracy Gramm Judy Sharp Sr. Raymond Marie Gerard FSP Eugene Hensell OSB Ernest E. Larkin OCarm Louis and Angela Menard Bishop Carlos A. Sevilla SJ Miriam D. Ukeritis CSJ QUARTERLY 62.4 2003 contents 340 church direction Alphonsus's Perspective in the Post-Vatican II Church Nihal Abeyasingha CSSR highlights the God-given perspective of St. Alphonsus Liguori and suggests that such a perspective can be pgeserved even though the content of the Christian message has new dimensions after Vatican II. 354 Belief, Augustine, and the New Religiosity Paul Graham OSA enters us into a reflection on the shape of our faith, as opposed to its content, in contemporary Western society. devotional life 363 Rediscovering the Rosary Dennis J. Billy CSSR reviews the pope's apostolic letter on the rosary as a venerable form of prayer that will help Christians "to contemplate with Mary the ffice of Christ." 37O Mirroring Jesus: The Luminous Mysteries and Religious Life Mary Joseph Schultz SCC reflects on the luminous mysteries of the rosary not only as a new graced opportunity to deepen our faith by bringing the public life of Jesus into the rosary, but also as a special gift to vowed religious to reflect on essential elements of consecrated life. Review for Religious 379 reOi ious perspectives Why Newly Professed Religious Leave Peter Cantwell OFM reflects not only on what younger people are disillusioned by in religious life but also on what current members might provide as helps in a mutual effort to live the charism. 402 Ignatian Insights into Evangelical Poverty Donald C. Maldari SJ explores the richness and relevance of evangelical poverty and its relationship to theological hope in the spirituality of St. Ignatius Loyola. departments 338 Prisms 423 Canonical Counsel: Papal Enclosure 431 Book Reviews 440 Indexes L33-7-- 62.4 2003 Te naturalized British writer Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953) came to the United States for the first time with hope of winning a young lady's hand. He had met her and her mother earlier, when they were visiting England. Sometime during his unexpectedly 16ng and difficult land trip west to California to propose to her, Belloc was stimulated to write the following light verse: Kings live in palaces, pigs in sties, youth in expectation. Youth is wise. Despite Belloc's idealistic inspiration, we might hesitate to agree that such youthful expectation is wise. When our hopes, our expectations, are not realized, we can become disillusioned or bitter and angry or, perhaps, if we have a certain psychological makeup, resilient. As it happened, Belloc's marriage proposal was rejected by the young lady's mother, but he returned to England with his expectations intact. A year or so later, he took another trip to the United States with the same purpose in view, and this time he was successful. He married the young lady. Undoubtedly he felt that he had made his own the truth he had expressed in his verse. Our Catholic faith seems to agree with youth, even finding that living in expectation is a divine way of living. Jesus, after all, taught us to Review for Religious pray daily "Thy kingdom come." Certain times of the year, like Advent, and holy days like All Saints, All Souls, and Christmas highlight for us the virtue of hope or expectation. God has such divine expectations of each one of us that there is no limit to how often he forgives our wrongdoing. Likewise there are no restrictions on the graces of God's intimacy with his sons and daughters in Christ. Scripture would have us believe that God expects to delight in us. Expectation, then, considered in a Christian light, is not just for the young, but it is the graced quality of those who are called to be young in heart by their Christian baptism. Living in expectation, we look forward to growing in holiness. We have expectations about ourselves as saints, just as God does. Living in expectation, we look for the ways that God shines forth in the world he created and leads us towards God's reign. Entering into St. Paul's heart, we have expectations that God keeps working at the century-by-century fulfillment of his creation in Christ. We as members of Christ's Body expect to play our own part, with God, in bringing about this fullness of redemption. Of course, we all have our natural fear of dying, especially faced with its unknown pain and circumstances. But we as Christians can at the same time look towards death with expectation, welcoming our further identity with Christ in receiving death as one more gift of the Father so that we can rejoice in resurrected life forever. As we say in our Creed, we expect the res-urrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Yes, to live in expectation is a profound Christian calling. Such living is rooted, not in youthfulness, but in God, and is sustained by God. We the baptized are meant to live in expectation. We devoutly pray for God's presence gracing us in this way. Then we are youthfully wise. David L. Fleming SJ 62.4 2003 church NIHAL ABEYASINGHA Alphonsus's Perspective in. the Post-Vatican I! Church direction Redemptorists were for a considerable period of their history called "hellfire preachers." And so indeed they were. At the time of Alphonsus Liguori, the founder of the Redemptorists, the preaching was accompanied by "audiovisuals" that would be considered macabre today--the exhibition of a skull, an imaginary dialogue with a damned soul, and thepreachers going around the town in the dark crying out "Save your soul!" Obviously, these procedures cannot and should not be duplicated today. But, if what he did represented a God-given perspective, I think it would be a pity to lose the perspective even today. In this article I intend to highligh,t Alphonsus's perspective and suggest tentatively that it can be preserved even though the content--or the awareness of the content--of the Christian message has new dimensions after Vatican Council II. Nihal Abeyasingha CSSR lives at 454/9 Piachaud Gardens; Peradeniya Road; Kandy, Sri Lanka. Review for Reli~ous Background of the Ministry of Alphonsus The Council of Tren.lt (1545-1563) met to counter the effect that Luther's andI other Reformation perspectives were having on the church. The perspectives were primarily doctrinal. They had serious implications, however, for the institutional and disciplinary structure of the church. There was pblarization: Scripture alone versus Scripture and Tradition;'I faith as commitment alone (tides fiducialis) versus faith ificluding content; only God and grace versus God in Christ acting through human ministry and grace being mediate.d through the church. When the council met in 1545, the attendance was poor, some forty bishops, most of the~m Italian. They began with disagreement, but by 1546 they decided to deal simulta-neously with both doctrifial and disciplinary issues. . The shadow of thel Reformation cast a permanent shadow on the council's deliberations. The result was an emphasis on 'what the Reformers had gotten wrong by Catholic criteria, ignorin, g altogether what they got right. (In the words of G.K. Chesterton, every heresy is the revenge of a forgotten ~r_~-uth.) Among other things, Trent stressed the veneration iof the saints, devotion to Mary, the Mass as sacrifice, th~ importance of suffrages for the dead, and other matters! against the Reformers, Spin-offs of these lines of thought in Catholic culture included stress on Euchanstac ad.orataon, a deemphasls of the role of the laity, and undu~e emphasis on the role of the . ordained minister who c.onfects the Eucharist. In the Catholic trad, ition the theology that followed was highly systematized, the disciplinary structure rigid and centrahzed. But the, ology also reflected attempts to find places of accord with Luther. For example, Michel de Bay of Louvain (+1589) thought of original sin as depriving human beingi of what constitutes the human condition--another vergion of Luther's understanding of humanity's "radical corruption." Bay's position was 62.4 2003 Abeyasingba ¯ Alpbonsus's Perspective Alphonsus's ministry was "popular," directed to the masses who lacked competent pastoral care. defended by Cornelius Jansen (+1638). Even though views such as these were repudiated by the church, they had effects on requirements for receiving the sacraments. I suggest that Alphonsus used the "last things" (death, judgment, heaven, and hell), which had a major impact on Luther, as a call to conversion for those in sin. The response of conversion that he sought was oriented towards the sacraments of recon-ciliation and the Eucharist, the ecclesial communion that is based on the true faith and true sacraments. Alphonsus's ministry was "popular," directed to the masses who lacked competent pastoral care. These people were steeped in superstition and magic, and lived in fear of frightful evils such as the devil coming into their lives. That is where Alphonsus started; he addressed their emotion of fear by proclaiming the last things. Beginning his preaching of the Christian message here, he le~l individuals to the sacraments. He wanted to make it as easy as possible for sinners to confess to a priest (in contrast to the Reformers' idea of confessing directly to God). He advocated a gentle manner with those who committed sins by almost unconscious habit and with those who fell again and again into the same sin (consuetudinarii and recidivt). In his time the laxist view allowed absolution as often as penitents confessed, while the rigorist view demanded thorough amendment of life before they could receive absolution. Mphonsus proposed a middle path of sound common sense. He said that absolution should be refused to consuetudinarii and recidivi unless there were clear signs of repentance, which he listed: tears, weeping, a lessening of the number of sins, notable efforts at amendment such Review for Reli~ous as fasting or almsgiviOg, evidence of a search for new means of improvement, spontaneous confession, special motivation such as the fear of some impending disaster, confession of sins previously and culpably omitted, prior restitution, new awardness, of guilt. He advocated that absolution be deferred only when the confessor was morally certain of the penitent's wrong disposition; that is, .for deferral he needed to make a prudent probable judgment about ,tpheen'i te"n t s' fundamental lack of sorrow. He said, too, ~at absolution is not to be deferred if there is danger of more harm than good being done.1 Through reconciliation followed by the Eucharist (the emphasis more on Holy Communion than on the Mass), people were weaned ,away from sin. What was taking place is pictured on thd cover Alphonsus designed for his book Selva: The Digni~ and Duties of the Priest. The priest is hearing confession .'in front of a large crucifix. Rays from the crucified Lo,"rd stream towards the penitent. Alphonsus's pastoral r~alism saw God's action in Christ reaching penitents thro.'ugh the sacramental mediation of the church. The perspelctive is close to that of Irenaeus of Lyon (+202): "God is~ man's glory, but it is man who receives the effect of Gbd's activity, who is the recipient of all God's wisdom and power. Just as a doctor proves himself in his patients, ~o God reveals himself in men." 2 Alphonsus facilitated reconciliation with a bias in favor of penitents because of his own trust in the power of God's grace. He-k~ew that generally the habitual sinners would fear death, judgment, hell, and the loss of heaven and so would approach sacramental recon-ciliation. He knew thht fear as a motive does not last long. He knew that "~erfect love casts out fear" (1 Jn 4:18). So, to lead therfi beyond fear and enable them to remain converted, to p'ersevere, he offered the motive of love and a support structure of prayer and fellowship, namely, confraternities. 62.4 2003 Abeyasingba * Alpbonsus'sPer~ective To sustain people's effort and stir up love in them, he presented considerations that would naturally lead to love. Look how much God loved you, sending his Son in human .form; that Son died for you amid unspeakable suffering; that intense love continues in his abiding presence, especially in the Eucharist. Will you not return love for love? In such works as The Practice oft be Love of Jesus Christ, he would go further into the qualities that true love for Jesus entails. He knew, of course, the sinner's obvious objection: I am too weak to respond with any degree of intensity of love. He forestalled that objection by his teaching on prayer. Christ has said, "Ask and you shall receive." Ask God--that is prayer. Because God has said it, you will receive. Everyone and anyone can do this much. He bolstered this position by citing respected authors and by telling stories of how sinners who did not stop praying " received a final chance to repent and be saved. Even daough many of the stories would be laughed at today, in those days they made his point effectively. Parish missions were considered finished only when all had had an opportunity for confession. After the mission Alphonsus established some ongoing programs: regular mental prayer in the church and confraternities where people supported one another with fellowship, prayer, and regular instruction to stay on the path of their conversion. There is a clear overall perspective in these programs. Today one can object that in this model popular piety and liturgy merely coexist and that the former can even take precedence over the latter.3 It is likely that Alphonsus knew of Ludovico Antonio Muratori, a 17th-century writer who in Della Regolata Devozione dei Cristiani (Norms for Christian Devotion) proposed a religiosity that drew from the liturgy and the Scriptures to offset superstition and magic, and that he also knew of Benedict XIV's important initiative of permitting the use of the Review for Religious Bible in the vernacular. But Alphonsus did not bring these perspectives into his work for the pastorally most abandoned, chiefly uneducated people inclined to superstition. It would make little sense. They might give a symbolic assent to the matter presented and engage in a symbolic act of conversion, but their lives would not be much changed. Alphonsus said that the test of a good sermon is when the people leave the church striking their breast and not talking about the preacher. A New Context As the church in mid-20th-century Europe was facing something of a crisis of neglect and indifference, some new theological perspectives and initiatives in Scripture, catechesis, and liturgy were appearing. Without intend!ng to imply that Redemptorists were in the forefront of the pre-Vatican II theological scene--in fact, they were not--I venture to suggest that two Redemptorists made a significant contribution to this evolving theology. They did this by examining the existing perspectives in the light of Alphonsus's call-response perspective (fear as initial stimulus leading to love in the long term). This was obvious in the German Bernard H~iring.4 EX. Durrwell, from France, highlighted the grandeur of the resurrection in God's redemptive plan so that believers could more attractively show those who were ignoring the Christian message the way to conversion and growth.5 After all, the motto of the Redemptorist congregation is "With him is plentiful redemption." Paul Hitz CSSR, of Switzerland, even though he did not receive much international notice, contributed to catechetics, which too is a call to grow as believers. Vatican II bro,ught into focus several aspects of theology for which 'Isome theologians had been disciplined. It rediscove~'ed the paschal mystery and, with that, found a new view df the ¯church: its being sacrament, I 62.4 2003 Abeyasingha ¯ Alphonsus's Perspective the common priesthood of all Christ's faithful (and some consequences of this), and a renewed liturgy.6 Alphonsus's Perspective in a Post-Vatican II Context Can Mphonsus's perspective fit in this post-Vatican II context? I do not know whether this question has been posed in this way. It is claimed that Alphonsus's perspective is embodied in a story that is loved, remembered, and lived by Redemptorists. Without assessing that claim, perhaps articulating some contemporary dimensions may not be out of place. In his Confessions Augustine (+430) made this prayerful observation: "Since the time I first learned of You, there is nothing of You I have discovered that I have not discovered by remembering." And what he discovered in responding to the Manichees, Donatists, and Pelagians of his time has influence even in our day. Perhaps one may suggest that a hint of a Vatican II perspective was already present in Alphonsus. In his Duetto (Dialogue with the Soul) he imagines a soul meeting Christ going to his death. The soul asks: "Where ¯ are you going?" Jesus replies: "I am going to die." The soul wants to follow him. Jesus asks the soul to give him his heart and then go and live, always remembering his (Jesus') love." In practice, one emotion seems dominant in the Redemptorist recognition of, and conversion from, sin, and that is joy, thankfulness that one is forgiven. "Father, you show your almighty power chiefly in your mercy and forgiveness" (opening prayer, 26th Sunday, Ordinary Time). Put this grateful joy felt by Redemptorists into the picture of alertness for clear signs of repentance--fear as a starting point of conversion, tears, fewer sins, fasting or almsgiving, seeking new ways to improve, and so forth--and perhaps you have something that at least resonates with the perspective of the Exsultet of the Easter Vigil, stemming from well Review for Religious before Vatican II: 'iWhat good would life have been for us had Christ not come as our Redeemer? Father, how wonderful your care for us! How boundless your merciful love! To ransom a slave you gave away your Son. O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam, which gained for us so great a Redeemer!" Does this Redemptorist picture from before Vatican II fit in with post-Vatican II theological reflection? I think it does. After being careful to identify those who are in the greatest pastoral need, we must remember a few basic principles. First, it is important to touch people where they are. Where Muratori proposed drawing popular piety from Scripture and the liturgy, Alphonsus's program was to meet people where they were and then lead them beyond it. Second, a clear distinction needs to be made between stimulating conversion in the short term (Alphonsus used fear for this) and maintaining conversion in the long term. (For the latter, Alphonsus had only one prescription: love.) Third, how does one propose love? The short answer is: as a call that evokes a response, or an offer that invites acceptance. It is important to keep God's initiative in mind, as in the picture of rays from the crucified Jesus shining on the penitent. Alphonsus's call to love focuses on Jesus' passion: "Greater love than this.no one has, than that a person lay down his life for his friends." But this emphasis should include the following: "Therefore does the Father love me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again" On 10:17-18). Death and resurrection are inseparable. Psychologically, selfless suffering unto death is deeply evocative of response, but it is not complete by itself.7 Rather than being isolated from the resurrection, Jesus' passion should be presented as a step on the journey to fullness of life. "The glory of God is man fully alive, and the life of man is the vision of God," says Irenaeus of 62.4 2003 Ab~yasingha ¯ Alphonsus'sPerspective Lyon. Incorporation into Christ's deat[h and resurrection in baptism should be the basic paradigm for preaching about death and resurrection. For there to be resurrection, there must be passion (suffering) and death; one chooses this journey because of the hope of resurrection. "Christ has passed beyond our sight, not to abandon us, but to be our hopE. Christ is the beginning, the head of the church; where he has gone, we hope to follow" (Preface 1, Ascension). The grandeur of that goal makes the call to conversion attractive today: "With him is plentiful redemption." It is well to remember that even on Good Friday, when the liturgy focuses on the suffering and death of Christ, it is not separated from the resurrection. (The Via Lucis, Stations of the Resurrection, may be one way to maintain the link between death and resurrection.) Note, too, that the apparitions of the risen Lord involved some renunciation (of previous expectations) and often a call to mission as a condition for recognizing the "stranger" as the very Jesus whom the disciples had known. This is the version of the resurrection as call to death and call to love that needs to be worked out in popular idiom for people today. The resurrection is contingent upon the Son's having taken human flesh. If the incarnation had not taken place, no death-cum-resurrection would be possible. This mystery highlights the incarnation as an emptying (Ph 2:6-11), the rich one becoming poor for our sakes (2 Co 8:9). Jesus' life in the flesh meant sharing our condition and emotions. But, because it was not a life limited to the flesh, he was raised to life in the Spirit (Rrn 1:1-4). In the liturgy we pray, "May this sacrament [Eucharist] restrain our earthly desires and enable us to grow in love of the things of heaven" (After Communion, Tuesday, First Week of Lent). The child Jesus shared in the development that every child goes through--from the first stages, whei'e self- Review for Religious reference is the norm, to the point of total unselfishness in love ("He loved them to the end" Jn 13:1). The incarnation is the call to grow. Here one does well to keep in mind that excellent training in a particular discipline (medicine, accountancy, or whatever) does not automatically mean that one is an adult in regard to one's religious growth (the commitment based on content that Catholic faith requires). Many adults remain at the level of children (often the faith content they had at confirmation) and think that a vague "feel good / do some good" religion is growth. God's invitation is to deeper growth, an incar-national growth guided by the Spirit. The journey from the Father to this world and back to the Father is the program for all Christians. It is eriacted (as a "today") in the Eucharist. There is a continuing call to recommitment, to baptism's death and resurrection themes. The Eucharist is a third focus of Alphonsus. For him, Jesus is the prisoner in the tabernacle, awaiting, calling, and welcoming those who come to visit him. But the Jesus of the tabernacle is first the Jesus who was born, lived, died, and rose again, who celebrated that Passover with his disciples and continues to do so in the community of believers. And this is perhaps the high point of the call: to recognize that we are betrayers who are called by the one betrayed (Jesus) to share a meal with him. For this he accepts what we offer (bread and wine, products of the earth and of human hands) and returns them to us transformed (his risen body and blood, the new creation). One can add some glosses to the Eucharistic narrative to highlight this perspective: "On the night he The journey from the Father to this world and back to the Father is the program for all Christians. 62.4 2003 Abeyasingba ¯ Alpbonsus's Perspective was betrayed [by his disciples, with whom we are all complicit], Jesus took bread [that supports life---he was not seeking revenge] and gave thanks [for everything, including the betrayal, life and its support, death, because this is the prelude to resurrection and glory] and shared it with his disciples [betrayers become .companions, "bread fellows"], saying [not only in word but in deed]: 'This is my body, which is broken for you' [the principle enunciated in the Gospels: 'Unless .the grain of wheat dies' and 'Take upyour cross']. Do this in memory of me [the call addressed to all his followers, sinner and saint alike, a call to 'do this' not only in word but also in deed].''8 Finally, for continuing the journey of conversion over the long haul, Alphonsus proposed a program of prayer. He emphasized, not the amount of prayer, but fidelity to it. A short prayer every day is better than a long period of prayer occasionally. Prayer means recognizing one's limitations, acknowledging one's need for God. Beginners in mental prayer need some method, but, as they grow, they should not let the method become a hindrance to prayer. When difficulties arise, they can fall back on the method. This advice of Alphonsus remains valid and relevant in our day, but support groups are needed too. For the community as a whole, Alphonsus proposed confraternities, which were support groups. Today's psychological research has identified the roots of various problems. Lay people should be encouraged to use .their skills to help others in various difficulties, even if it means merely lending an ear to one other person. When people feel that they havebeen heard and understood, they are often able to work their way through their own problems. Such support is very much in the competence of laypersons, and those devoted to pastoral care would do well to keep encouraging them to fulfill their special role in the world. Review for Religious Charisms as Life-Giving Roots The present article indicates the need for religious institutes not to take their agendas from current theology. Theology has its place, but institutes have their own particular orientations and perspectives. It is in rediscovering and living according to their foundational perspectives that religious institutes can make their authentic contributions. These solidly rooted agendas are indeed their very reason for existence. When Cyprian (+258) became bishop of Carthage, he made it a rule to do nothing on his private opinion without the counsel (consilium) of the presbyterate and the agreement (consensus) of the people. The two Latin words are significant. As the one who presided over the presbyterate, Cyprian needed their counsel. Often it would be far more "advanced"--aware of many more theological perspectives, one could say--than the laity. But he also wanted to have the consensus of the people, a fellow feeling of where they were. I suggest that Alphonsus started with the consensus of the laity and, as preacher of repentance, led them to commit their lives in love to Jesus, supporting one another along the journey. The challenge is to be "popular," to meet people where they are, but also to lead them beyond, in terms of call and response, invitation and acceptance. There will be changes in the content and style of post-Vatican II proclamation and ways of celebrating the sacraments, but the apostolic perspectives of Alphonsus and other founders can, I am convinced, well remain unchanged. Notes ' See Raphael Gallagher, "The Fate of the Moral Manual since Saint Alphonsus," in Histo,3v and Conscience: Studies in Honour of Father Sean O'Riordan CSSR, ed. Raphael Gallagher and Brendan McConvery (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 1989), pp. 212-239. 2 Irenaeus, Adversus haereses, 3.20.2. 62.4 2003 Abeyasingba * Alpbonsus's Perspective 3 See Directory on Popular Piety and the Litu'rgy: Principles and Guidelines (Vatican, 9 April 2002), §41: "The 'popular missions' emerged at this time and contributed greatly to the spread of the pious exercises. Liturgy and popular piety coexist in these exercises, even if somewhat imbalanced at times. The parochial missions set out to encourage the faithful to approach the sacrament of penance and to receive Holy Communion. They regarded pious exercises as a means of inducing conversion and of assuring popular participation in an act of worship." 4 See Bernard H~iring CSSR, The Law of Christ, 3 vols. (Westminster, Maryland: Newman Press, 1961o1966), and his later work, which is more diffuse and wide-ranging, Free and Faithful in Christ, 3 vols. (New York: Century, 1979). 5 EX. Durrwell CSSR, The Resurrection (London: Sheed and Ward, 1960). 6 See Directory, §§48-49: "History shows, first of all, that the correct relationship between the Liturgy and popular piety begins to be distorted with the attenuation among the faithful of certain values. essential to the Liturgy itself. The following may be numbered among the causes giving rise to this: ¯ a weakened awareness or indeed a diminished sense of the" paschal mystery and of its centrality for the history of salvation, of which the Liturgy is an actualization. Such inevitably occurs when the piety of the faithful, unconscious of the 'hierarchy of truths,' imperceptibly turns towards other salvific mysteries in the life of Christ, of the Blessed Virgin Mary, or indeed of the angels and saints; ¯ a weakening of a sense of the universal priesthood, in virtue of which the faithful offer 'spiritual sacrifices pleasing to God, through Jesus Christ' (1 Pt 2:5, Rm 12:1), and, according to their condition, participate fully in the church's worship. This is often accompanied by the phenomenon of a Liturgy dominated by clerics who also perform the functions not reserved to them and which, in turn, causes the faithful to have recourse to pious exercises through which they feel a sense of becoming active participants; ¯ unfamiliarity with the 'language' of the Liturgy--that is, its language, signs, symbols, and ritual gestures---causing much of the meaning of the celebration to elude the faithful. This unfamiliarity can even make them feel like outsiders to the liturgical action, and so they are quick to manifest their preference for pious exercises whose 'language' is closer to their own cultural development, or Review for Religious else for private devotions more in keeping with the details and demands of their daily life. "Each of these factors, and both in certain cases, not infrequently produce imbalances in the relationship between the Liturgy and popular piety, to the former's detriment and the latter's impoverishment. These should therefore be corrected through careful and persistent catechetical and pastoral work. "Conversely, the liturgical renewal and the heightened liturgical sense of the faithful have often recontex~ualized popular piety in its relationship with the Liturgy. Such should be regarded as a positive development and in conformity with the most profound orientation of Christian piety." 7 See Sean O'Riordan, "The Human Psychology of Repentance," Studia Moralia 21 (1983): 79-102, and "The Nature and Function of Pastoral Psychology," Studia Moralia 1 (1963): 348-387. 8 Karl Rahner, "The Episcopate and the Primacy," in Karl Rahner and Joseph Ratzinger, The Episcopate and the Primacy (New York: Herder and Herder, 1961), p. 25: "Essentially the church is the historically continuing presence in the world of the incarnate Word of God. She is the historical tangibility of the salvific will of God as revealed in Christ. Therefore the church is most tangibly and intensively an 'event' where (through the words of consecration) Christ himself is present in his own congregation as the crucified and resurrected Savior, the fount of salvation; where the redemption makes itself felt in the congregation by becoming sacramentally visible; where the 'New and Eternal Testament' which he founded on the cross is most palpably and actually present in the holy remembrance of its first institution. Therefore the celebration of the Eucharist is the most intensive event of the church." I would add that the consequence is that every word in the church must be understood in connection with the memorial dimension of the Eucharist (see I Co 11:26). It is like the prism which separates light intoits constituent colors and also refocuses the different colors into a unity. 62.4 2003 PAUL GRAHAM Belief, Augustine, and the New Religiosity ~/ nd what remains when disbelief has gone?" That striking line from Philip Larkin's poem "Church Going" poses a question that is characteristic of the times we live in. The problem today is not so much disbelief or unbelief, but belief. The onus is now on those who claim they do not believe in God. According to the European Values Study for 1999/2000, 77.4 percent of the sample surveyed believe in God. Even in secular Sweden, which has the lowest number of believers in God in Western Europe, the number is 53.4 percent. Clearly, unbelievers are in the minority. The agnostics, according to this scenario, are not those who are unsure about their belief in God, but those who are not sure they disbelieve. The line from Philip La~'kin's poem cap-tures beautifully the anxiety of the unbeliever who has a nagging suspicion that perhaps there is a God after all. The present-day anxiety, the anxiety of a post-Christian society, is in the possibility that there is a God. Paul Graham OSA is provincial of the English-Scottish province of the Augustinians. His address is Provincial Office; 15 Dorville Crescent; London W6 0HH; United Kingdom. Review fbr Religious In these circumstances, those of us who through our faith have been freed from the burden of unbelief--and it is a burden--have a corresponding responsibility not to take our belief for granted. Belief is something that grows and deepens; it is not static. In the famous words of St. Augustine: "Make progress, my brothers and sis-ters, examine yourselves honestly again and again. Put yourselves to the test. Do not be content with what you are, if you want to become what you are not yet . Always add something more, keep moving forward, always make progress" (Sermon 169). An important part of reflection on faith is its social context. The shape of our belief, as opposed to its con-tent, is influenced by the world around us. If we lived in 13th-century Italy, for instance, unbe-lief would not have been a problem; even the gross sinner would be expected to believe in God. Faith was characterize~l by an intense devotion to the person of Christ in his passion and in the Eucharist. Belief had a tangible feel about it then, and peo-ple were not afraid to express it publicly. In Poland during the Communist times, faith was shaped by the need to take a firm stand against state-controlled atheism. Belief in God was caught up in nationalism: to be Polish was to be Catholic, as being Irish in Ireland was until recently. The object of faith in these differenttimes and places remains the same: God in Jesus Christ. This leaves us with the question: In contemporary Western society, what is the shape of our faith? It is now fashionable to have a "spirituality" in these 2 l st-century "postsecular" times. The problem is not so much religious belief as what to believe in. People today have become spiritually gullible. G.K. Chesterton noted perceptively that, when people stop believing in the true People today have become spiritually gullible. 62.4 2003 Graham ¯ Belief, Augustine, and the New Religiosity God, they start believing in anything. One of the charac-teristics of this new religiosity is its individualism. People now pick and choose the bits of religion they want to believe in and reject the distasteful parts. It has become a lifestyle choice: a bit of Zen here, a bit of Feng Shui there, a touch of white magic perhaps, and even some aspects of Christianity--the nice bits. This is nondemanding, non-threatening religion, a pick-and-mix spirituality. It has become fashionable to make a distinction between "religion" and "spirituality." By "religion" is meant institutional religion, the church; by "spirituality" is meant the "good" things about religion without the awkward bits like the hierarchy and the church's teach-ings. One can now have a spirituality, even if it means rejecting or sitting loose to the institutional form of the church. The problem is, once you detach spirituality from religion, it can quickly become self-seeking and inward-looking. Belonging to the church prevents that from happening. The Latin word religio implies "ties," ."obligations." We are bound to one another and to God, in the church. Jonathan Sacks, the chief rabbi of Great Britain, has an interesting observation to make here (see Credo in The Times, 24 August 2002). He challenges those who claim to have a "spirituality" but reject organized reli-gion. Spirituality, he says, marks the beginning of a search for God, leading on to religion, to belonging to a community of believers; otherwise it tends to be escapist and self-indulgent. He illustrates this by referring to Robert Putnam, the Harvard sociologist, whose recent book Bowling Alone (2000) is about the breakdown of community in the United States as a result of growing individualism. The metaphor for this breakdown is to be found in ten-pin bowling. In the 1950s bowlers belonged to leagues and clubs and went bowling together, as teams. Today those leagues are no longer so Review for Religious popular, and people prefer to go bowling on their own. Sacks therefore declares, "Spirituality is what happens to religion when it goes 'Bowling Alone.'" Britain faces a similar problem of individualism. A recent sociological study (Changing Britain, Changing Lives, (London: Institute of Education, 2003), involving three birth-cohort studies of people born in 1946, 1958, and 1970, found that in the last fifty years there has been a marked decline in social cohesiveness and awareness, evidenced in the universal decline in voting, community activity, and church activity. The political philosopher Eric Hobsbawm is quoted in this study as saying, "Prosperity and privatization broke up what poverty and collectivity in the public place welded together" (p. 9). This individualizing tendency in society as a whole, I suggest, is influencing deeply the way we believe. St. Augustine understood this very well. Father Tom Martin OSA, in Our Restless Heart: The Augustinian Tradition (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2003), takes up this issue: "Does Augustinian spirituality lead to a privatized spirituality? While it is clear that Augustine privileges the heart and the journey within, he would be the first to decry any reading of him that would turn the Christian life into a solitary journey. It is always a shared pilgrimage, a community of fellow believers on a journey of faith to God" (p. 47). In another passage, speaking of the need to "return to one's heart," he says: "Yet for all this talk of 'heart,' this empl~asis on interiority, its inten-tion is never meant to lead to an introverted spirituality. What is fundamentally interior to me is, for Augustine, the point where I am also closest to my brothers and sis-ters in the human family. From the heart I come to Christian faith, become a member of the church, the Body of Christ . [Augustine's] insistence upon the heart is thus not a self-serving escape from responsibil-ity into interior religion and privatized faith" (p. 43). 62.4 2003 I believe this to be one of the greatest challenges to Christian faith today, the challenge posed by the privatization of belief. I have labored this point because I believe this to be one of the greatest challenges to Christian faith today, the challenge posed by th4 .privatization of belief. As Cardinal Hume once said, "faith is always personal but never private." Augustinian spirituality is one of the greatest safeguards we have. However, because of its emphasis on interiority and the need to find God within, it can very easily be hijacked by the "privatizers" of faith. Martin makes it quite clear that such an interpretation of Augustine is a distortion of his spirituality, which is at all times ecclesial, rooted in community, rooted in the church. "To remove or isolate or separate God or self or community within the thought of Augustine," he says, "would only result in a profound distortion of his spiri-tual vision" (p. 49). So, as we struggle with belief ina society that wants to reduce everything--whether fast food or spirituality-- to individual choice, Augustine provides us with a nec-essary corrective to the "McDonaldization" of religion, as a Scottish theologian calls it (John Drane, The McDonaldization of the Church, London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2000). Return to your hearts by all means, but not to stay there, rather to encounter the God who opens up our hearts to those around us. Augustine himself was only too aware of the temptations of interiority. His first experiment in community life was with like-minded friends near Milan just after his bap-tism. He established a community apart from the hustle and bustle of life in order to spend time in contemplation and reflection: otium sanctum, "holy leisure." He brought Review for Religious this idealized form of Christian community back to North Africa, to Thagaste, where he established a lay community, but he had a.rude awakening. Visiting a church in Hippo one day to look for a candidate for his community, he was grabbed by the congregation and presented to the aging Bishop Valerius for ordination to the priesthood--and he wept. Augustine knew that from then on his life would no longer be his own. Gone for the rest of his life was any notion of otium sanctum. The life of contemplation would lead him now to share that contemplation with others. It is a paradox of his life, and indeed of the Christian life in general, that the journey within becomes at a certain point a journey outwards, to God and to others. Hence his famous observation in the City of God: "For no one ought to be so leisured as to take no thought in that leisure for the interest of his neighbor, nor so active as to feel no need for the contemplation of God" (xIx. 19). The current resurgence of interest in religion and spirituality is evidenced in the number of books in the "Mind, Body, and Spirit" sections in most bookstores. Often the Christian section is quite small in relation to other religions. Clearly, many are hungry for a spiritual view of life. It has become obvious that people cannot survive for long on unbelief and on a purely secular view of the world, in spite of the predictions of the proponents of the "theory of secularization," who are now eating humble pie. Harvey Cox has said: "Today it is secularity, not spirituality, that may be headed for extinction" (Fire from Heaven, London: Cassell, 1996, p. xv). People yearn for enchantment. Secularity does not feed the human spirit, which is made for God. The Vatican has responded to this phenomenon by publishing Jesus Christ, the Bearer of the Water of Life: A Christian Reflection on the "New Age" (Pontifical Councils for Culture and Interreligious Dialogue, 2003). It 62.4 2003 Graham ¯ Belie, Augustine, and the New Religiosity This new religiosity is largely non-Christian. acknowledges that this renewed interest in spirituality and religion in general is evidence of a spiritual hunger in the contemporary world. There is in people a deep desire for the transcendent. "Our hearts are restless," says Augustine, restless for the true God (Confessions, I. 1). The document sees in this new religiosity "a genuine yearning for a deeper spiritu-ality, for something that will touch their hearts, and for a way of making sense of a con-fusing and often alienating world" (1.5). It also notes many positive aspects of this religiosity: its criticism of materialism, its sense of the sacredness of life, and its concern for the environment. But there is a difficulty. This new religiosity is largely non-Christian. As the document says, "it is on the wh61e difficult to reconcile it with Christian doctrine and spir-ituality" (2). It is important to remember that we are all subject to these influences in society at large. One has only to mention the example of Cherie Blair, the wife of the British prime minister, who has publicly declared her allegiance both to the Catholic Church and to forms of New Ageism, such as the use of crystals. I have no wish to judge an individual case, merely to cite her as a very public example of what I believe to be a common misapprehension: that you can mix Christianity with alternative spiritualities and think there is nothing amiss. Some of it may be harmless, but one needs to be dis-criminating. The current tendency towards the privatization of faith and spiritual individualism is also picked up by the Vatican document, which refers to "spiritual narcissism" and the "private world of ego-fulfillment," quoting a well-known commentator On New Age (3.2). It also cautions against looking for religious experiences "engen- Review for Religious dered by turning in on oneself." This leads on to the fundamental point that "Christian prayer is not an exer-cise in self, contemplation, stillness, and self-emptying, but a dialogue of love" (3.4). Certain kinds of religion can easily become an ego trip, and this document is not afraid to say so. Augustine's search for God, expressed in his Confessions, appears on one level to be the classic "journey within," and indeed he gave succeeding generations the spiritual vocabulary for that necessary journey. But he is at pains to point out that, unbeknownst to himself, God was with him at all times on that journey. It was not so much a search for self as a search for the Truth outside of self. In a sense, it was God who went in search of Augustine, not the other way round. It was grace that prompted him to seek God in the first place: "You were within me, and I was in the world outside myself . You called me, you cried aloud to me, you broke the bar-rier of my deafness" (X.2 7). As Jesus says in John's Gospel, "you did not choose me; no, I chose you" (Jn 15:16). It is important to mention this, as Eastern forms of prayer and meditation are very popular. While there are many rich insights to be gained from these traditions, like the need for stillness and proper bodily posture, one has to remember that these are not Christian forms of prayer. They are mainly exercises to bring about an expe-rience of peace and enlightenment. But Christian prayer is not fundamentally about such experiences, unless they come as a grace from God. It is a relationship more than an individual experience of heightened consciousness or awareness. As the Vatican document points out, "life in Christ is not something so personal and private that it is restricted to the realm of consciousness. Nor is it merely a new level of awareness" (3.5). To quote a contemporary theologian speaking about Augustinian interiority, Christian prayer is not a "diving expedition into the soul" 62.4 2003 Graham ¯ Belief, Augustine, and the New Religiosity (John Milbank, Theology and Social Theory, London: Blackwell, 1990, p. 291), but an encounter with the living God in the person of Jesus Christ, the bearer of the water of life. Dry Rain It is as if a great party is under way: with every wind falling leaves, multicolored, natural confetti, gigantic golden snowflakes fr6m a sycamore. Autumnal dry rain in its festive, roundabout fashion waters next spring's growth, rots its way to fruitfulness, an ordinary embodiment of mercy, another promise of life from death, another reason to hope. Bonnie Thurston Review for Religious DENNIS J. BILLY Rediscovering the Rosary On 16 October 2002 Pope John Paul ~I promul-gated an apostolic letter on the rosary titled Rosarium Virginis Mariae. The purpose of the letter is to help Christians rediscover the rosary as a venerable form of prayer that will lead them "to contemplate with Mary the face of Christ" (§3). Addressed to the church's bishops, clergy, and faithful, the letter is continuous with the pope's earlier reflections in his apostolic letter on the new millennium, Novo millennio ineunte, where he insists on the importance of developing "schools of prayer" for helping the members of Christ's body to "set out in deep waters" (duc in altum) and experience the fullness of the gospel message. "With the rosary," the pope says, "the Christian people sits at the school of Mary and is led to contemplate th6 beauty on the face of Christ and to experience the depths Of his love" (~1). In order to help this process of reclaiming along, he has officially proclaimed a "Year of the devotional life Dennis J. Billy CSSR writes again from Collegio Sant'Alfonso; C.P. 2458; Roma 00100; Italy. 62.4 2003 Billy * Rediscovering the Rosary Rosary" spanning from October 2002 to October 2003 (§3). A Path of Contemplation In this letter the pope reiterates a statement he made in his letter on the new millennium: "What is needed is a Christian life distinguished above all in the art of prayer." He presents the rosary as a "path of contemplation" that developed in the West and represents a counterpart to Eastern Christianity's "prayer of the heart" or "Jesus Prayer." It numbers "among the finest and most praiseworthy traditions of Christian contemplation" (§5). !n order to reclaim its full meaning, however, the rosary must be prayed meditatively against a backdrop of solitude. It sustains rather than conflicts with the liturgy. If properly revitalized, the prayer will be in touch with its Christological center and will aid rather than impede ecumenical efforts (§4). The rosary, moreover, is proposed as a preeminent prayer for peace and as a way of helping families cope with the forces of disintegration that threaten them on both the ideological and practical levels (§6). Mary is presented in the letter as the model of Christian contemplation par excellence: "No one has ever devoted himself to the contemplation of the face of Christ as faithfully as Mary." Mary's gaze would at times be % questioning look," as when she found Jesus in the temple (see Lk 2:48). It would also be % penetrating gaze" capable of understanding Jesus and possibly even anticipating his decisions, as at the wedding at Cana (see Jn 2:5). It could also be % look of sorrow," as when she stood beneath the cross (see Jn 19:26-27) or % gaze radiant with the joy of the resurrection," as on Easter morning, or "a gaze afire with the outpouring of the Spirit" (§10), as on the day of Pentecost (see Ac 1:14). Re'levy for Religious Because the rosary starts with Mary's experience, the pope describes it as "an exquisitely contemplative prayer." Without this contemplative dimension, it would lose its meaning and risk becoming nothing more than "a mechanical repetition of formulas" (§12). When prayed with reverence and a reflective heart, the rosary enables believers to remember Christ with Mary, to learn Chris~ with Mary, and to be conformed to Christ with Mary, to pray to Christ with Mary, and to proclaim Christ with Mary (§§13-17). A Compendium of the Gospel "The rosary," for John Paul, "is one of the traditional paths of Christian prayer directed to the contemplation of the face of Christ" (§18). It is sometimes referred to as "a compendium of the gospel." To further emphasize its Christological depth, the pope has proposed five new mysteries, from Jesus' public life. In addition to the traditional joyful, sorrowful, and glorious mysteries, these "mysteries of light" are "(1) Jesus' baptism in the Jordan, (2) his self-manifestation at the wedding of Cana, (3)' his proclamation of the king-dom of God, with his call to conversion, (4) his transfiguration, and (5) his institution of the Eucharist, as the sacramental expression of the paschal mystery" (§21). These mysteries span Jesus' public ministry. The first is traditionally understood as the first action of his public ministry. The second and third present him respectively as a miracle worker and as preaching and teaching with The five mysteries lead us from the beginning to the end of Jesus' public ministry and focus on the key elements of his message. 62.4 2003 Billy * Rediscovering the Rosary authority. The fourth foreshadows the resurrection and presents Jesus as the culmination of the Law and the Prophets. The fifth is traditionally considered the last action of his public ministry. The five mysteries lead us from the beginning to the end of Jesus' public ministxy and focus on the key elements of his message. As prophetic actions that effect what they signify, Jesus' baptism and his institution of the Eucharist encapsulate the whole of his ministry and serve as fitting bookends for all that comes between. Although the pope leaves people free to follow the traditional format (§19), he is quick to point out that these five new mysteries round out the contemplative focus of the rosary by adding Jesus' .public life to the profound mysteries of the incarnation, the passion, and the resurreEtion that the other three series highlight. In doing so, he roots the rosary even deeper in the Gospel narratives and encourages the faithful to see the intimate unity of the whole of Jesus' redemptive mission. Because the mystery of Christ also reveals something "about the mystery of man, the pope goes on to point out the important anthropological significance of the rosary for believers: "Contemplating Christ's birth, they learn of the sanctity of life; seeing the household of Nazareth, they learn the original truth of the family according to God's plan; listening to the Master in the mysteries of his public ministry, they find the light which leads them to enter the kingdom of God; and, following him on the way to Calvary, they learn the meaning of salvific suffering. Finally, contemplating Christ and his Blessed Mother in glory, they see the goal toward which each of us is called, if we allow ourselves to be healed and transformed by the Holy Spirit" (§25). When reflected upon with care, each of the mysteries of the rosary says something significant about the mystery of human existence. Review for Religious Assimilating the Mystery The.pope also devotes considerable space to how believers should pray the rosary. He highlights the constituent elements of this method of contemplation, one rooted in "the inner logic of the incarnation," namely, that in Jesus God wanted to take on human features. It is well to announce each mystery, perhaps with a suitable icon that will open up the biblical scenario for those praying. The announcement is meant to lead the imagination to focus on a particular moment in the life of Christ (§29). A reading from Scripture, long or short depending on the circumstances, can follow, and then a brief period of silence (§§30 and 31). After these preparatory exercises, those praying lift their minds to the Father with the words of the Our Father. Then come ten Hail Marys followed by the Trinitarian doxology (and sometimes a short prayer) to conclude the decade (§§32-35). Beginning and finishing the rosary as a whole is done in a variety of ways. Some people begin with a verse of Psalm 70: "O God, come to my aid; O Lord make haste to help me." Others begin with the Creed, an Our Father, and three Hail Marys (§37). Some people habitually pray all twenty decades of the rosary in a single day. For those who say five decades a day, the pope suggests the following format: the joyful mysteries on Monday and Saturday, the sorrowful mysteries on Tuesday and Friday, the mysteries of light on Thursday, and the glorious mysteries on Wednesday and The rosary invites believers to open their hearts with Mary to the Word of God seeking to be born within them. 62.4 2003 Billy ¯ Rediscovering the Rosary Sunday (§38). The beads themselves are more than a mere counting device. Flowing from and converging upon the crucifix, they remind believers that their lives must be centered on Christ, and can be seen as "a chain which links us to God," a symbol of "the bond of communion and fraternity which unites us all in Christ" (§36). The pope makes one point very clear: "Although the repeated Hail Mary is addressed direcdy to Mary, it is to Jesus that the act of love is ultimately directed, with her and through her." The repetition suggests our ongoing desire "to be conformed ever more completely to Christ, the true program of the Christian life" (§26). As a "method of contemplation," the rosary invites believers to open their hearts with Mary to the Word of God seeking to be born within them. Like the liturgy, it is a prayer which engages "the whole person in all his complex psychological, physical, and relational reality" (§27). Ten Purposes The pope's apostolic letter serves ten basic purposes: (1) it provides a fitting Marian complement to Novo millennio ineunte, his earlier apostolic letter on the new millennium; (2) it emphasizes the contemplative dimension of the rosary and encourages believers to use it "to contemplate with Mary the face of Christ"; (3) it reviews the method typically used when praying it and shows how it corresponds to the inner logic of the incarnation; (4) it draws out the Christological basis of the rosary and asserts that, when used appropriately, it will further rather than hinder ecumenism; (5) it highlights the anthropological dimensions revealed in the various mysteries and shows how the rosary can lead to a deeper understanding of human, existence; (6) it affirms that the rosary sustains the liturgy rather than being in conflict with it; (7) it breathes new life into the rosary by adding new mysteries that will root it even more deeply Review for Religious in the Scripture; (8) it shows parents that the rosary can help hold their family together in the faith and can foster their children's spiritual growth and development; (9) it presents the rosary as a prayer that by its very nature can advance peace in the world; and (10) it designates the year October 2002-October 2003 as a special time for rediscovering the power and beauty of this ancient and venerable form of prayer. The goal in all of this is to help the faithful recognize the grea( gift they have in the rosary and use it in new and creative ways as they face the challenges ahead of them. In his conclusion, the pope asserts that the rosary is "a treasure to be rediscovered." It has something to offer to everyone: bishops, priests, deacons, religious, and laypersons. He asks all members of the church to take this old and venerable form of prayer once again to heart: "I look to all of you, brothers and sisters of every state of life, to you, Christian families, to you, the sick and elderly, and to you, young people: confidently take up the rosary once again. Rediscover the rosary in the light of Scripture, in harmony with the liturgy, and in the context of your daily lives" (§43). soundings for one of the sisters in the infirmary little does she know she teaches me how to eclipse her deafness. i am brief, no, spare in my attempts. at eighty, she is the poem: words are few mixing with her grief which ebbs like the tides at twilight Lou Ella Hickman IWBS 62.4 2003 MARY JOSEPH SCHULTZ Mirroring Jesus: The Luminous Mysteries and Religious Life TRhosea rHy-o-lOyc Ftoabtheer r2'0s0 n2a tmo iOncgt oobfe trh 2e0 Y03e-a-cr aomf et,he certainly not coincidentally, during a time of profound unrest, conflict, and anxiety. Our world and our church are in labor, struggling for a birth, a release, new life, The feelings of fear, hopelessness, and anxiety that have invaded the lives of all of us call for healing and a new vision. The luminous mysteries of the rosary offer all Christians a new perspective, a new graced opportunity to deepen our understanding and love of our faith, namely, by bringing the public life of Jesus into the rosary. Here we can find refreshment for our souls in these complicated and strife-filled days. We can also find here an additional special gift as vowed religious. I would like to examine the new mysteries in relation to ~onsecrated Mary Joseph Schultz SCC is president of Assumption College for Sisters, the only rerfiaining sister-formation college in the United States. Her address there is 350 Bernardsville Road; Mendham, New Jersey 07945. Revie-w for Religious life, reflecting on how each one can be linked to an essential element of it. The Baptism of Jesus--"You are my beloved Son. On you my fax;or rests" (Mk 1:11). Baptism the Foundation of Religious Life. By virtue of our baptism, all Christians are consecrated for evangelization. We are reborn in Christ; our life is no longer our own. This exalted reality of the indwelling, always challenging and sometimes downright scary, takes a lifetime, indeed an eternity, to grasp. We have been chosen by God to take on the image of his Son, to be his child in our world today. And naturally we cannot attempt this alone, but God's abiding presence, the surpassing gift of grace, enables and ennobles us from within. What does being reborn in Christ imply, particularly for a religious? We are doubly chosen. Cradle Catholics were first called by God through our own particular birth circumstances; converts to Catholicism followed a circuitous adaptive route to being cleansed, empowered, Christified. Whatever the circumstances of our baptism, we have been called and sent, challenged by the Spirit to put on Christ. But as religious our further call is yet more radical. By our call to religious life, the fire that burns in the heart of all Christians is ignited into a new flame of desire for deeper union, deeper consecration, through the gift of our lives. As John Paul II tells us in Vita consecrata, "in such a life baptismal consecration develops into a radical response in the following of Christ through acceptance of the evangelical counsels" (§14). Apart from the consecration of our baptism, it is unlikely that we would .have heard any call to religious life. It is baptism's sacramental spark that ignites the steady flame of Christianity. But, for the steady flame to be strong, it requires of everyone the living of the evangelical counsels. For religious there is a renewed 62.4 2003 Scbultz ¯ Mirroring yesus commitment to them. This is a new source of fuel, our life newly offered to God in all its aspects, like so many grains of incense. The religious life, often symbolized by burning candles too, takes on a new intensity and brings the baptismal vows into a concentrated focus. Perhaps this is why the profession of the evangelical counsels has never been elevated to being a sacrament in the Catholic Church (which some have proposed). It is so obviously an efflorescence of the permanent sacramental character of baptism already present. It is also a deepening of that already living root. The Wedding Feast of Cana--"Do whatever he tells you" (In 2:5). Obedience. In this wonderfully human and touching scene from the life of Jesus, we hear the only recorded words spoken by Mary during the public life of her Son: "They have no wine" and "Do whatever he tells you." Indeed, these words inaugurate his public life. And, for religious women and men, this scene and these words teach a lesson on the vow of obedience. During the thirty years or so since I began learning about the vows in the novitiate, obedience, of all the vows, has undergone the greatest transformation. It has also held the most difficult challenges. (As in most paschal realities, these are not unrelated developments.) My juvenile understanding of "blind" obedience and merely "doing what your superior tells you" has unfolded into a passionate desire to seek the will of God in all its manifestations. Let us face it, how many direct injunctions do community leaders issue during a year to the group as a whole or to me individually? My obedience must be daily and personal. It cannot be relegated to a once-a-year acceptance of my assigned apostolate, though that has sometimes been traumatic enough. Because of the gift of my vow of obedience, I Review for Religious must strive each and every day to hear God speaking to me in a multitude of people, places, and circumstances. I must keep my heart attentive to all of God's calls and then responsive, doing "whatever he tells you." The response could be as small as picking up the phone when I am already engrossed in another task, or lovingly setting aside my own agenda when a sister needs my help. It could be as large as accepting a call to community leadership, or adjusting to the death of a loved one. I laid down my will at my profession. The "freedom" I renounced back then has given rise to a new deeper freedom of spirit. I am free to pursue holiness through the directives of God mediated by my community leadership, other community members, and the circumstances of my life. United with my sisters in community, I stand before God's will, ready to discern and accept. This requires an ongoing grace of faith, a sense of responsibility for myself and others, and a growing awareness of my gifts and limitations. In due time Jesus takes the water of my desire and turns it into the wine of his desire for me. Because of the gift of my vow of obedience, I must strive each and every day to hear God speaking to me in a multitude of people, places, and circumstances. Proclamation of the Kingdom--"The kingdom of God is at hand" (Mk 1:15). Chastity. In the eyes of society today, chastity for the sake of the kingdom is perhaps the most mystifying and countercultural of the three vows. It has been much written about in the past two years alone. Vv'hy give up marriage and the practice of a holy sexuality when it is 62.4 2003 Scbultz ¯ Mirroring yesus such a gift of God, when the witness of true marital fidelity is so sorely needed in today's world? Precisely to proclaim the kingdom! As John Paul II tells us in Vita consecrata: "Yes, in Christ it is possible to love God with all one's heart, putting him above every other love, and thus to love every creature with the freedom of God!" (§88). Not only is it possible, if one has really been called to it and possesses the graced capacity for the vow, but it is a most powerful means for proclaiming the message of the kingdom. The pure love called forth by this vow flows .from the very life of the Trinity, a communitarian life and love revealed to us in Christ. This life, this very same love, is the "stuff" of the Good News that we are called to proclaim, first by our lives, then by words if necessary, as St. Francis would say. By the evangelical counsels consecrated persons are immersed in the life of the Trinity, freed from the constrictions of an exclusive love, able to be totally available for the mission of the church as lived according to the particular community's charism. My chastity enables my obedience to come to fruition as I am called from one ministry to another, one house to another, even from one moment to another. I can and should live my life unattached, in the light of faith, with the joyful freedom of the new heavens and the new earth (see Rv 21:1). I have died and risen with Christ, and I am called to live in the now of the kingdom. The life of a religious man or woman symbolizes what it in fact is, a contact point between Christ and his church--and God's kingdom is truly at hand. The Transfiguration--"And he was transfigured before them" (Mt 17:2). Poverty. This mystical event in the life of Jesus gives his three apostles a glimpse of who he really is. His Review for Religious divinity shines forth, and they behold the glorious face of the Son of God. In reflecting on this incident afterwards, did it not strike them over and over what a tremendous emptying had taken place when Jesus assumed our human nature and for thirty-three years walked the earth as ordinary as themselves? These apostles, unlettered though they were, could not help reflecting on what they had witnessed. They were able to surmise the real identity of the One who called them to follow, the One for whom they too were emptying themselves, relinquishing things in their discipleship. During the vision Peter had exclaimed, "Lord, how good that we are here!" (Mt 17:4). Then he wanted to install three tents and make the experience a more permanent one. Jesus, however, drew them out of their mystical reverie: "When they raised their eyes, they saw no one else but Jesus alone" (Mr 17:8). He walked with them down the mountain, back to ordinary reality. This was the ordinary-looking Jesus, the man they knew and were used to, the friend they were leaving their ordinary lives to follow. He was "himself" again, and asking them to say nothing of what they had seen. For religious women and men who have left all things to follow the Master, the transfiguration can serve as a meditation on our vow of poverty. Jesus in his divine frugality "left behind" his Godhead to assume humanity, but how divine this poverty is, this incarnation, this "taking the form of a slave and being born in the likeness For religious women and men who have left all things to follow the Master, the transfiguration can serve as a meditation on our vow of poverty. 62.4 2003 Scbultz ¯ Mirroring Jesus of men" (Ph 2:7)! While on his earthly mission, Jesus downplayed his divinity or kept it to himself except for this sacred moment when his human poverty became apparent by contrast. Later Calvary was seen as the ultimate of human pain and humiliation, not by contrast as on Tabor, but in the depths of its willing self-sacrifice. By religious poverty we voluntarily give up personal accumulation and full personal use of worldly goods, even such things as time and talent. This emptying for the sake of Christlike availability is a way of doing something radical for God. It is true imitation of Jesus, "who made himself poor though he was rich" (2 Co 8:9). Where better do we see this stark reality than on Tabor? Living this vow, following the pattern of Christ, calls us to be poor in fact as well as in spirit. Religious need to give evidence of a simple lifestyle, with variations according to community charisms. We need to follow the call to empty ourselves radically, in imitation of the One who for our sake modeled a life of emptiness perfecdy. We face the challenge, especially in a materialistic society, of opting not to have, not to be caught up in the consumer mentality that is so suffocating and numbing. This voluntary self-renunciation makes sense only with the humble Christ before our eyes as ideal and strength. The Institution of the Eucharist--"This is my body to be given for you" (Lk 22:19). Community and Holiness. Religious life without a focus on the Eucharist is, to me, unthinkable and unlivable. How better can we be Christ, fulfill our baptismal consecration, and live the evangelical counsels than by daily receiving our nourishment from his very body and blood, by becoming what we eat? The gift of the Eucharist is the divine imagination's chosen way to be with us always, even to the end of time. Tending toward the holiness to which all founders and foundresses Review for Religious aspired, whatever their historical milieu, the members of religious communities must seek the Source of their graced desire for holiness in their Eucharistic communion. Finding it there, they also nurture one another. The bond of community is one of the distinguishing marks of religious life. We came to accomplish together what none of us can do alone. As members of the Mystical Body by virtue of baptism, we draw strength, light, and urgent zeal for evangelization from the sacramental Christ. "In the celebration of the mystery of the Lord's body and blood, the unity and charity of those who have consecrated their lives to God are strengthened and increased" (Vita consecrata, §95). In communal worship, community members reflect on Jesus' act of servitude in the washing of feet, his giving of himself in service. Turning to one another, we daily echo his words about his body being given for us (see Lk 22:19). To you, my sister, to you, my brother, in community, I give the gift of my personhood. Becoming bread and wine for the world, becoming nourishment for God's pilgrim people through our various ministries, is what consecrated persons are called to. No matter what our apostolic works entail, no matter where or how we minister to God's people, whether through prayer or action, we as religious are called and consecrated for holiness. We owe it to the Mystical Body. We owe it to the world. Our call, though individually discerned and individually professed, is lived in common. Our holiness can never be a private matter. We must be and become ever more really what we have publicly professed. While I am by no means suggesting that religious are on a pedestal, we surely are in a fishbowl, especially in the last few years. We must be who we say we are. Today's people have the right to expect that, when they look at religious, they will truly catch a glimpse of 62.4 2003 Schultz ¯ Mirroring Jesus Christ and the gospel values he preached and lived. It is he who must shine forth publicly. It is he who mysteriously and subdy works thi'ough our dull and sinful human selves, alone and in community. For putting on Christ, for living our vows and making ourselves receptive to communal Eucharistic holiness, we can hope to find the rosary's luminous mysteries providing us with fresh encouragement. Mary, our mother and guiding star, will be there as we begin, and at the end, and in between. Exchanging Gifts Even then, in that first star-guided Giving of gifts imported from lands afar: Not the most practical or the most useful For a young household, those gifts are That they offer: gold (of course, money Matters at any season of any year), . But however richly boxed, their potpourris Of high-priced frankincense and myrrh Fail to feed a family; still, nothing At all was ever expected in return, Unlike our ritual passings back and forth Of pricy imports and baubles, meant to earn More than mere admiration: the like exchange Endlessly of acquisitions from off the shelves Of shops, while that first starlit gift-recipient Gives us back endlessly our ransomed selves. Nancy G. Westerfield Review for Religious PETER CANTWELL Why Newly Professed Religious Leave This article was written to assist Franciscan lead-ers. They and others found it helpful.Without rewriting .it at the risk of losing some of its orig-inal flav~r, I offer it to other religious in the continuin~ conversation about this vital issue. As Francis of Assisi neared death, he said to his brothers, "I have done what is mine to do; may Christ teach you what is yours to do.''1 Implied in these words is a challenge for his followers to discover anew in each generation how to express his ideals. There can never be one fixed expression of such a rich gospel charism, nor should there be. Every age, every season of life, and every culture requires us to dig deep into the gospel as Franci~ read it and find new ways to live his simple but demanding religious perspectives Peter Cantwell OFIM, a Franciscan friar, has been a lecturer and practitioner in individual, couples, and family therapy for thirty years, and is director of ongoing formation for the Australian Franciscan province. His address is St. Francis Xavier Church; 1087 Whitehorse Road; Box Hill, Victoria 3128; Australia. 62.4 2003 Cantwell ¯ Wby Newly Professed Religious Leave message. Failure to take up that challenge condemns us to irrelevance and extinction. Over recent years I have often reflected on why some young friars who join us with enthusiasm and excitement depart from our community soon after final commit-ment. Just at that moment when possibilities for min-istry open out, when there is the exciting chance to walk the path of Francis in our world, some choose to leave us. (Incidentally, I believe the following reflections also apply to why more young men do not join us.) These are my own personal musings on this vexing question, musings with which you, the reader, might dis-agree. Behind them lie some of my own story in the Franciscans and several of my deeply held beliefs about our life. For thirty years I have been involved in renewal programs for religious and in the screening program for candidates for our Australian province. As a professional counselor I have helped many religious and priests at the moment of their departure. Visiting other provinces of the order, I have observed similar phenomena. My teaching of counseling in secular and religious tertiary settings has enabled me to talk with adults about how they see religious life. Behind my reflections are one deep personal convic-tion and one fact. My conviction is that the message and ideals of Francis--of bringing the gospel's peace mes-sage to the world, of seeing beyond the allurement of consumerism, of having a special concern for the poor-- are what is most needed by today's world, particularly today's youth. There is no malaise in the ideals proposed to us by Francis. They are as radiant and relevant as ever they were. The fact about Franciscan religious life today is that there is a gap--though perhaps it is narrowing-- between Francis's ideals for us friars and the lived real-ity of our fraternal lives and ministries. We express 6ur ideals in ways that have lost their relevance. Because of Review for Religious this, some young religious cannot recognize the fire of Francis in our daily structures, and they seek to imple-ment their ideals elsewhere. I do not share the pessimism of friars who say they would not invite young people to join us. I find such defeatism thoroughly unlike Francis; it betrays an unwill-ingness to make changes that we need to make. I write these reflections with hope and rising excitement. Hope and possibility are being shown by those with daring and vision. Baggage We Still Carry with Us In thinking and (alking about why young friars leave, we have often focused on only part of the picture. Thus, some have said that young friars leave because their gen-eration is selfish and not willing to make a commitment. Recent developments in family therapy suggest looking to the big picture--the whole family or, in our case, the whole "system"--for the cure. Formerly, acting-out ado-lescents were usually treated with individual therapy, on the theory that there was something wrong within the adolescent: correct that and all would be fine. But often there was a relapse. Therapy began to realize that the problem might be a reflection of what was happening in the entire family--and that the entire family might need to change its way of operating. Certainly there are times when the difficulty is mostly within the individual, but people cannot not be affected by the systems in which they live. Can these insights help us understand why some friars leave? Is saying that young brothers leave because their generation is "selfish and unwilling to make com-mitments" being fair about the part the system of reli-gious life plays in their departure? When I joined religious life in the mid 1950s, it somewhat resembled what is sociologically called a "total 62.4 2003 Cantwell ¯ Why Newly Professed Religious Leave Francis founded his brotherhood as complementary to the monastic movement. institution," one where the identity of the institution assumes priority Over the identities of the individuals who make it up. We dressed identically; we were exhorted to behave the same. To stand out or be "sin-gular" might indicate pride. Community life was the con-veyer of grace, so conformity to a detailed daily regimen was expected. Personal relationships were discouraged because they endangered celibacy: We were trained to be self-contained and to let our conformity and work express our commitment. Though much is now chang-ing, the nonrelational tone of some communities can cause isolation in young friars. Contemporary research says that religious life had become caught in a monastic lifestyle that many founders did not want) Francis founded his brotherhood as com-plementary to the monastic movement. He deliberately did not want to be absorbed into monasticism. He founded us to be a stark challenge, even a shock, to both civil and ecclesiastical society through living the gospel in a radical and transparent way. After his death the brothers, channeled into the monastic movement, lost mobility, lostpublic visibility, and lost a credible lifestyle. One writer says that we were tamed by the insti-tutional church. We do not live on the edge anymore except by courageous individual choice.3 Young friars find these monastic remnants quaint and a block to their ide-alistic vision. Do we provide opportunity for them to live out their dreams, or are they merely educated to fit in? After the departure of a young brother, I have heard such remarks as "He lost his vocation. I could see it coming. He had all those friends outside community." l~eview for l~etigious These words may reflect a theologically crass way of describing a vocation, absolving the community of any contribution to the departure. The vocation seems to be pictured as something in a hermetically sealed container, given to the recipient by God, and totally immune to and separate from fraternal influences. On one level there is nothing mysterious about the growth of a vocation. I had never met a Franciscan till I did a retreat during the last year of high school. I was impressed by the Franciscan who gave the retreat. He had been a professional reporter with a bright economic future, but he gave it up to be a friar. I thought there must be something pretty good in that life. I approached him. He was interested in me, came to visit my family, kept contact, became a friend (with a big age difference). He nurtured my interest and fanned the small flame of inquiry. He gave me literature on Francis, and I discov-ered that Francis had made a similar decision seven hun-dred years earlier. Francis had everything he wanted, but realized it was not enough. Wow! I could feel excite-ment when I left home to join thefriars. My three broth-ers had all married and were pleased with their choices. I felt I was making an equally exciting choice. It was the start of an adventure, an adventure that has never stopped. Friars supported me and cared for me; I formed deep friendships over the years. These friends offered me opportunities, and they challenged me to live the life. Would my vocation have .grown without them? Could I have nurtured my personal "grace of vocation" without them? I doubt it. A vocation is a delicate seed. It needs warmth and careful watering, especially during the early days. The atmosphere, the environment, affects its interior and exterior development. In a recent article a young per-son says that "true rapport, indeed a real friendship, with one religious is more valuable in discernment than one 62.4 2003 Cant'well ¯ Why Newly Professed Religious Leave IIll hundred religious asking me if I am interested in their order . It is very important that religious communi-ties develop friendships with us that nurture growth in faith and commitment to God.''4 In looking at the place of larger systems in the devel-opment of a vocation, we must say a word about the church. As is the case in the order, there are many seeds of hope within the church today. But ~here is something else as well. In a secular university where I teach coun-seling a couple of days a week, I have wonderful students on the whole, postgraduate students of mature age. About a third of them are nonpracticing Catholics. We often have interesting discussions at lunch breaks. They find it hard to understand how someone who is more qualified in their profession than they are can be both-ered being highly involved in church matters. They are not angry with the church. They just find the church irrelevant. The church sometimes gives the impression that it does not need to listen to people's .needs, that it knows the questions they should be asking. But, as Giacomo Bini says, the church can spend its time answer-ing questions that people are not asking. A Change of Culture The worst way we friars can live our Franciscan com-mitment is to ape in our time what Francis did in his. Our age presents challenges different from his, and here lies the rub. As friars we are called to be mobile, not only with our dwellings and our phones, but with our thinking. Change is of the essence of decent physical, emotional, spiritual, communal growth. The strange thing is not that yeligious life is changing, but that it managed to stay the same for so long. "It is equilibrium, not change, that is fatal." 5 The challenge is that we need to change. Are we Willing? The following thoughts try to catch the spirit of our Review for Religious times, point out the needs that we have to answer, sketch the cultural milieu to which we have to be relevant with our exciting Message. To be relevant, we will have to make 180-degree turns in many areas. Years after we ourselves grew up, what are some of the characteristics of the culture in which our new friars have grown up? One dramatic change in today's society is a shift from a work world to a relational world. Recent research in Australia society shows that around one-fourth of the people between the ages of thirty and sixty are "down-shifters"; that is, they have changed careers or reduced work hours and taken a pay cut in order to have more time for family and friends: "The lifestyle has given them a wealth of new friends from a wide cross-section of backgrounds, and the dis-tinction of knowing the names 0f everyone who lives in their street.''6 Obviously not all people are choosing to make this shift, nor should they, but it represents a new emphasis in modern life, a move away from workplace efficiency toward the full growth of the human person. The young writer quoted earlier supports such adaptation: "One of the most com-monly found features of Generation X is its sense of iso-lation and its yearning for stable companionship . We Xers are drawn wherever we feel welcome and find friendship.''7 "Intimacy" (how I relate to another human being) is an important element of human growth, occurring in early adulthood and building on people's sense of iden-tity (who I am). In popular parlance, intimacy is often wrongly identified with sexual intimacy. Intimacy tech- One dramatic change in today's society is a shift from a work world to a relational world. 62.4 2003 Cantwell ¯ Why Newly Professed Religious Leave nically means the capacity to function "up close" to another person in any situation of life. There is no evi-dence that physical sexual intimacy is "necessary for mature development, but there is a wealth of evidence that having close friends, feeling cared for and loved, and being able to relate to others without unnecessary barriers are central to happiness. Closely allied to having healthy relationships is the search for true community. More so than previous gen-erations, today's young people meet many of their inti-macy needs by belonging to a group. A young person observes that in his view "religious life is special in pro-viding everyday community practices that foster spiri-tual growth in ways that are difficult to find on one's own.''8 The young today value being in a supportive envi-ronment more than having job security. The breakdown of traditional neighborhoods and the mobility of Western populations are the causes of much loneliness and isola-tion. The multitude of support groups--from therapy groups to reading groups--witnesses to contemporary culture's hunger for community. Young adults do not Seek community as a soft option: "We do not want community just to comfort, us and give us a sense of security. We want to be stretched and chal-lenged to serve God and others with the community life serving as a support that allows us to reach beyond our-selves in the service of God through prayer and works.''9 And they actually seek structures in community, but ones that are alive and thoughtful and provide human and spiritual support. Among the tertiary students I teach, I find it.easy to initiate a discussion on "spirituality," but mention the word religion and the energy for the discussion dimin-ishes. "Religion" is seen to be connected to mainstream churches, which are often experienced as irrelevant. The young seek a spirituality that builds on human whole- Review for Religious ness. For them being "fully spiritual" is being "fully human." They often experience mainstream church life as a spiritual desert. "Xers are known for their great spir-itual hunger. When this deep hunger for religious mean-ing has not been satisfied within the religious practice of families, many of us have looked outside of the tradi-tional familial practices to come into contact with the transcendent meaning that we crave." 10 Young adults today are perceptive about genuine-ness: the medium is the message. "Religious need to present, themselves as people who have benefited immensely from their vocation and have found peace, mission, love, and a passion for the gospel and for God through their decision."11 The culture of the young has little time for the phony, for performance that does not come from the heart. They are very sensitive to any gap between what we ask them to profess and what they observe us living. Do we ask them to profess "poverty" and then live like upper-middle-class people? "In sum, Xers are not going to make a radical countercultural decision unless they see a radical lifestyle being lived out, one that has benefits that married life does not.''12 We ask them to give up everything. What is the excit-ing challenge we offer them? I am convinced that the issue for today's world is "justice," especially for disenfranchised groups and par-ticularly those without a social voice. Issues of church dogma--while not in any sense unimportant--evoke lit-tle energy compared with issues of people's rights to just treatment. Daily newspapers are full of human-rights and justice issues. "Experience indicates that [young adults] have a very strong sense of the common good and of collective social and civic responsibility.''13 They have little truck with cover-ups and social dishonesty, and find the behavior of some church officials in recent sexual-abuse issues obnoxious. 62.4 2003 Cantwell ¯ Why Newly Professed Religious Leave Today's young adults demand authenticity of person and action. Seeds of New Life My hope for the future of our brotherly life comes from my conviction that Francis calls us to a style of fra-ternal living and mission for which there is a thirst in our culture. If our young adults are calling for transpar-ent authenticity in personal life, for communal life that is supportive and challenging, for relationships rather than material efficiency, for spiritualwholeness, and for engage-ment with justice and peace in our world. Are these things not the message of Francis of Assisi and the ideals that today's Franciscans have at heart? It would take us beyond the present article to elabo-rate on these five emphases, nor is it necessary. I would like simply to quote from our Rule, from the contem-porary document Priorities of the Order, and from sev-eral other sources to show that what the young seek has always been and is now central in theory to our life. Today's young adults demand authenticity of person and action. Nothing characterized the life of Francis more than his untiring personal conversion, his belief that the best message he could offer to people was the transparency of his own life, being a "living memory of the gospel ofJes.us.''14 His journey to La Verna was a call to purify his own life, to make it as close to his Lord's as possible. The stigmata was the recognition, the physical manifestation~ of the union of Francis's spirit with that of his Lord. For Francis, fraternity is the first witness of the apos-tolate. For him, our relationship with our brothers and, of course, with God is the foundation of our way of life. What statement on fraternity could be better than the one in our Rule (chapter vI)? "And wherever the broth-ers may be together or meet [other] brothers, let them Review for Religious give witness that they are members of the one family. And let each one confidently make known his need to the other, for, if a mother has such care and love for her son born according to the flesh, should not someone love and care for his brother according to the Spirit even more diligently? And, if any of them become sick, the other brothers should serve him as they would wish to be served themselves." 15 The recent publication from our general chapter offers the same challenge for fraternity: "The Project of Fraternal Life. should be drawn up. so as to help the ministers, guardians, and friars to build up a real and profound fraternal life, to cultivate human values like dialogue, deep-level communication, a family spirit, mutual friendship, courtesy, willingness to serve, joy, jus-tice, transparency." 16 And Giacomo Bini says: "What a paradise . . . the atmosphere of the community becomes when the mem-bers have learned how to get to know one another and to engage in dialogue with themselves, with God, and with the others . We must therefore invest all our talents in promoting a formation to fraternal relationships and to relations with God. No excuses are acceptable: neither age nor temperament nor 'venerable' tradition can dis-pense us from this duty.''~7 One of the most delightful characteristics of both Francis and Clare was their abil-ity to relate to the high and the lowly, the rich and the poor, the powerless and the powerful, with equal com-mitment of spirit. The primacy of the spiritual in young people's search is highlighted in one simple quotation from Francis's Rule: "Those brothers to whom the Lord has given the grace of working should do their work faithfully and devotedly so that, avoiding idleness, the enemy of the soul, they do not extinguish the Spirit of holy prayer and devotion to which all other things of our earthly exis- 62.4 2003 Cantwell * Wb~ Newl~ Professed Religious Leave tence must contribute." 18 And in Priorities of the Order we are told: "The contemplative dimension must be that priority which orientates and animates our whole life: the manner in which we seek and live the presence of God in every day also determines our concrete style of life and our manner of pastoral action in the Fraternity.''19 Francis has been strongly identified with the peace movement, and his peace prayer is recited by many inside and outside the church. Francis devoted his energies to the justice and peace issues of his time. His attempts to mediate between local warring towns and his journey to speak with the Sultan of Egypt are just some examples of his commitment to and preoccupation with peace between peoples. The present pope gathered religious leaders in Assisi when he wished the world to pray for peace. The increasing concern with justice and peace throughout our order--seen in recent publications from our JPIC office in Rome and in the heavy involvement of friars in different parts of the world--witnesses to the clear focus of our communities on these issues. Priorities of the Order sums up the same idea: "The friars in their lives and in their words should be promoters of justice, and heralds and builders of peace and reconciliation, so as to be prophetic signs which fearlessly denounce all that which destroys the dignity of man and of creation." 20 How We Can HelpClose the Gap I believe that some friars leave our fraternity soon after final commitment because the gap between the "lived experience" of fraternal life and ministry and the ideals that were fostered and experienced during initial formation becomes too broad. Great work has been done on initial formation in our order over recent decades, but with final commitment the friar experiences the more ordinary lifestyle of the brotherhood. This older system with its more impersonal tone, overly routinized prayer Review for Religious life, and rugged individualism leaves them feeling iso-lated and unsupported, and they become work-oriented. After years of counseling numerous religious who have left, it is hard for me to remember someone who departed because interesting ministry was unavailable. The common comment has been that life became "too damn lonely." How can the different parties help to close the gap in this time of transition? Times of transition involve cri-sis, and any crisis has two possibilities: opportunity if the crisis is faced, danger oth-erwise. Facing the crisis means avoiding any split by keeping the conversation going, talking of differences and commonali-ties. No one side ever has the whole truth; the truth is a shared truth. I note much good-will on the part of older friars and enthusiasm on the part of the younger ones. There is much "good wine" in both generations. Given this good environment for cooperation, how can we work together? Are there practical moves we can all make? The follow-ing are some of my random suggestions, and maybe you can come up with others: We need to continue moving away from monastic-style buildings towards more ordinary homes. We need to find more visible, credible, and transparent ways of living. For many friars brought up on the older model, where relationships were discouraged and closeness was taboo, this change could present challenges. Contemporary research on religious life indicates that there is a move towards small groups immersed in local communities where there can be a more relational life. "We have need in our society for a countercultural way of life that wit- No one side ever has the whole truth; the truth is a shared truth. 62.4 2003 Cant'well ¯ Why Newly Professed Religious Leave nesses to the gospel call to transcend hedonism, greed, and the desire to dominate.''21 Living in more ordinary houses also makes us more mobile. If we need to do something different, we just sell and buy an ordinary house and are not stuck with a monastery to sell. But young friars .are often looking (like Francis) for a deeper challenge than "living in ordinary houses." They would like to live more simply than their ¯ surrounding culture. They are looking for a palpable sacrifice expressed in our way of living. Smaller houses also demand some of the ordinary decencies of day-to-day living that can be avoided in large houses: "How was your day?" "Sorry!" "Thank you." "May I--?" (Incidentally, the increasing tendency for religious to live alone in ordinary dwellings avoids, in my view, one of the fundamental witnesses of religious commitment.) My own picture of future community life has us liv-ing in ordinary houses and going from there to work. This provides some kind of boundary between work and fraternity. The very acts of leaving home for work and returning home after work are important symbolically. There is no reason why a parish community could not live in an ordinary house within the parish. Friars whose ministry is giving retreats or giving parish missions or working with the poor in the immediate neighborhood or teaching in a nearby school could live fraternally in an ordinary house. We should be slow to build homes or offices specifically for ourselves. If we need office space, we can always buy or rent--then move more easily if the need arises. The move to smaller community living requires more "conscious formation in relationships. Many of the broth-ers in my age group missed out on the "intimacy" stage of formation. There was no encouragement towards friend.ships, towards closeness, towards just ordinary con-nection with other friars. Often those who joined reli- Review for Religious gious life as late vocations have already experienced this stage of development. Gentle encouragement for older religious towards a more relational life can be a big help. Larger communities are sometimes necessary, espe-cially for those who are ill or need more attention, but a large building does not have to impede good fraternity. Attitude is the ruling factor. For instance, even a large din-ing room can be made homey through the use of smaller tables and random seating. House meetings can address, besides strictly busi-ness agendas, matters such as "How are we with each other?" Simple questions like "What is going well in the community?" and "What needs to happen for our life together to be even better?" focus on the positive and require friars to look ahead rather than grumble about difficulties. Such questions create space for friars' needs to be attended to regularly--a good principle of group dynamics. Having a community night--no scheduled work and no work" unless urge.nt--can really help to build frater-nity. Make the night a little special. The meal might be special or served differently or eaten later. The spiritual aspect of our lives should be present. A Eucharist that is thoughtfully prepared is one option, or a special variation on the prayer of the breviary. We need to keep reviewing our commitment to our min-istries, Youth are looking for an exciting ministry that gives witness to our Franciscan values. No ministry is excluded for us, but each ministry must flow out of who we are. The area of our lives which has been most tamed by the institutional church is that of ministry. We have become very mainstream. "Is the societal need that moved us into these works many years ago still relevant? Is the countercultural stance that characterized the socially radical and politica!ly subversive vision of the founders still operative?''22 62.4 2003 Cantwell ¯ Why Newly Professed Religious Leave Why are we doing what we are doing? One reason offered is "We have been doing it for a long time." Not good enough. Another is "We are doing good work and the people love us." I hope that the people will always love us, but that is not a sufficient reason to stay or.go. One danger is that, as priests become fewer, we will be tempted to fill slots for demanding bishops. We speak much about preferential option for the poor. Some of the exciting ventures in our order--and quite ordinary ones as well--are focused on this societal need. In my own province we have a small community of friars living in a housing settlement. They are doing great work in ordinary ways: forming neighborhood groups to keep the suburb clean, finding furniture for the needy, helping build local community support groups, being resources for addressing neighborhood troubles. Young men who are thinking of joining us rightly ask: "Why are you Franciscans doing that particular min-istry?" Can we answer them? I believe the recently introduced custom of mentoring younger friars is an excellent idea that deserves being imple-mented. Being a mentor has been challenging for me, and I believe that it has helped build bridges. Being mentored by more experienced friars has helped me enormously. Meetings of young friars and even meetings, of young reli-gious from different congregations provide support through the sharing of experiences and thus getting a sense of solidarity in a common venture. When the meeting has involved only friars, they have appreciated the presence of the provincial administration for some of the time during the meeting. Meetings of friars in which the experiences of the differ-ent age groups are shared can help build bridges. Recently in my province we asked our two newly professed friars, who had completed a very good novitiate in another Review for Religious pro-~ince, to share with us their experience of the novi-tiate. The theme was expanded to include what young people seek in religious life. Young and old enjoyed the experience. Often what seems like bad will is lack of information. I believe that young friars benefit enormously from hearing the experiences of the older friars, and that sharings like these help close the gap between generations. The proviso is always the priority on listening, coming to learn and understand, rather than being a know-all on either side. In particular, are we attentive to the promptings of the Spirit in the young friars? Do their contributions have their rightful effect on policy decisions? Have we helped them to be skilled at the culture gap? I want to make special mention of the great wisdom and contribution of the older friars. Often in this paper I have referred to age gaps. More correctly, they are cul-ture gaps. Some of the most up-to-date, psychologically flexible, and spiritually wise friars are those who have borne the heat of the day and who are able to offer their wisdom to any who listen. Keeping the conversation going between the different age groups is important in a time of transition. If we do not talk to each other, we build up fantasies of what "that other group" is thinking or doing. I believe we all have lo~s of goodwill, and behind our unwillingness is often fear. When I was prenovitiate director, I used to invite any friar who was passing through the area to "come and talk to the prenovices." The common worry was: "What will I talk about? I don't understand young people?" My response was: "Simply tell them what it has been like for you to be a follower of Francis." We had many enjoy-abl. e evenings, and imagined barriers were broken down. A prayer life that is simple but refreshing is the core of my fraternal life. There are many simple ways to vary common prayer: sing the hymn or play a CD, have some-one read the canticle reflectively, have silence instead of 62.4 2003 Cantwell * Wby Newly Professed Religious Leave Youth hearken to religious callings that offer a countercultural witness to the cultural trends of greed, power, consumerism, individualism. one of the psalms, omit a psalm and have a longer gospel reading or a nonscriptural reading. These suggestions do not require hours of preparation, but they draw us out of a numbing routine that certainly does not refresh my spirit. Faith sharing, too, deepens the experience of fraternity. There is often fear when faith sharing is mentioned: par-ticipants feel they will be asked to bare their souls before the brethren. I like to begin such sessions by saying that it is fine for any friar to be totally silent if that is his wish. One group with which I meet has a simple shared prayer that goes like this. First of all a text is read, usually from the Scriptures. After a short silence anyone who wishes shares just a phrase or word that stood out for him (no embellishment). The text is read a ,second time followed ¯ by a few minutes of silence. Then anyone who wishes . tells briefly what that text means to him or her. Finally we round off with a prayer. I always come away with some small inspiration. We will probably become poorer as a fraternity. Youth hearken to religious callings that offer a countercultural witness to the cultural trends of greed, power, con-sumerism, individualism. One of the most difficult chal-lenges I personally find is not taking the standards of average Australian society as the ones-for my own life. Some young friars have said that, when they joined the order, they went "up" in their standard of living. Can I live in such a way that, when lay people visit the com- Revie~ for Religious munity (or my room), they would find a simplicity of lifestyle that would make them think? Can we use for others the money people generously give us for our min-istry- and maintain a simple lifestyle in our fraternities? I believe Francis would want us to. As our numbers become smaller, we will probably become poorer as an order. I believe that will not do us any harm. When people--of whatever culture or race-- find that we are actually living side by side with them and are in need, they will provide for us. Finally, dare we do something new and exciting when numbers are going down--or even because numbers are going down? If young friars experience only the closing down of houses and nothing else, they might just feel they are on a sinking ship. If I Were a Young Man. If I were a young man with many bright opportuni-ties in Life before me, what kind: of Franciscan religious life would inspire me to join the fraternity? ¯ When I met individual friars, I would want to see the light in their eyes (like I found in the first friar I met) that would tell me they lived life with a passion. ¯ When I visited the communities~ I would want to feel genuinely welcomed (and I reckon I would quickly work out whether it was genuine, or not), not just another statistic. As I joined in community prayer, I would hope to find it fairly simple and thoughtful, not a rushed ver-sion of monastic prayei'. I would not want a lot of prayer--rather a quality about what I experience. And a certain atmosphere of silence at some times of the day would appeal to me. ¯ At recreation I would want to feel that the friars really wanted to have fun together and were not just going through another routine. I would be listening for such ordinary comments as "How was your day? What 62.4 2003 Cantwell ¯ Why Newly Professed Religious Leave were the results of Brother Juniper's visit to the doctor? Who has a new joke to tell?" ¯ I would want to talk to the older friars, to find out how they had experienced following Francis, to learn from their endurance and patience. I would want them to pray for my young journey and have confidence that I could make a contribution, even though different from theirs. I would want them to listen to my hopes, and I would want to hear theirs. Could they translate their struggles into something meaningful to me? ¯ I would hope the kitchen is a place where we all contribute--simple good food and good wine being essential to life. ¯ When they told me about their works, however simple, I would want to ask them why they did those particular things. How does the fire in their belly moti-vate what they do? I would be particularly excited about working for justice, for those without a social voice, for those who feel abandoned by our society. ¯ I would want to experience a rich diversity of min-istries: parishes (why this parish?), retreat work, work with the disadvantaged, skilled individuals doing some unusual ministries. The common denominator v~ould be the "Franciscan need." ¯ I would want to think that there is a certain mobil-ity about the brotherhood, that the friars have their ears to the ground ready to respond to new needs. ¯ I would want the accommodations to be simple yet comfortable--and that the rooms not be so self-contained as to be able to survive a nuclear attack. I would want the neighbors to call in when they think it important--and to be able to share our prayer life. But I would also hope there was a certain sacred space just for the community. ¯ I would want to feel encouraged to give rein to my dreams, to feel there is space for new wine as well as old. ¯ I would be most affected by friars who palpably Review for Religious enjoyed and passionately lived their lives, and who felt fulfilled as human beings and followers of Francis. Franciscan Fire I believe our world today is crying out for precisely those human and spiritual attitudes that Francis of Assisi lived so courageously. Through no bad will, we seem to have lost some of Francis's fire through excessive struc-tures and institutionalization. There is excitement in rediscovering it today, seeing the spark in people's eyes when they hear of Francis. Why do young friars leave? The ultimate answers are all individual. But some leave because the gap between the ideals of Francis and the lived experience of Franciscan life is or appears too great. Rather than blame either side--for blame simply darkens the space between us--can we see these departures as a call to stir the fire in our own lives? Numbers do not really mat-ter. Whether we are few or many is irrelevant, provided that friars are not leaving our midst because we are uncertain trumpets of truly good news. Our task is to echo credibly the ringing values of the poor man of Assisi. Francis and Clare became living and prophetic words to the people of their time. We are challenged to do the same, not alone but in tune with the Spirit. Let the last word be Oscar Romero's: This is what we are about. We plant the seed that one day will grow. We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise. We lay foundations that will need further development. We provide yeast that produces effects far beyond our capabilities. We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. 62.4 2003 Cantwell ¯ Why Newly Professed Religious Leave This enables us to do something, and to do it very well. It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord's grace to enter and do the rest. We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker. We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs. We are prophets of a future not our own. Notes 1 Murray 8odo, The Way of St. Francis (Cincinnati: St. Anthony Messenger Press, 1995), p. xvi. 2 Michael J. Breen (ed.), A Fire in the Forest: Religious Lift in Ireland, survey by John A. Weafer (Dublin: Veritas, 2001). 3 Johannes Baptist Metz, Followers of Christ: The Religious Life and the Church, trans. Thomas Linton (New York: Paulist Press, 1977). 4 Matthew T. Eggemeier, "Generation X and Religious Life: A Personal View," Review for Religious 59, no. 5 (September-October 2000): 485 and 484. s Breen and Weafer, Fire, p. 61. 6 Sydney Morning Herald, 11-12 January 2003, p. 12. 7 Eggemeier, "Generation X," p. 482. 8 Eggemeier, "Generation X," p. 482. 9 Eggemeier, "Generation X," p. 483. 10 Eggemeier, "Generation X," p. 481. 11 Eggemeier, "Generation X," p. 486. 12 Eggemeier, "Generation X," pp. 486-487. 13 Lori Spanbauer, "Snapshot of the Millennial Generation," Horizon 27, no. 2 (2001-2002): 15. ,4 Giacomo Bini, Clare of Assisi: A Song of Praise (Rome: Franciscan Press, 2002), p. 15. is Rule and General Constitutions of the Order of Friars Minor (Pulaski, Wisconsin: Franciscan Publishers, 1974), p. 29. 16 Priorities of the Order, General Chapter 1997 (Rome: Franciscan Press, 1998), pp. 8-9. 17 Giacomo Bini, Clare, p. 55. Review for Religious 18 Rule and General Constitutions, p. 28. ~9 Priorities of the Order, p. 6. 2o Priorities of the Order, p. 11. 2~ Breen and Weafer, Fire, p. 68. 2~ Breen and Weafer, Fire, p. 106. Seminary Woods The oak leaves quietly drift from the tall trees, landing softly on the lake, their edges curled skyward as they float along, blown by a gentle breeze. Father, may my hands ever be lifted to you in prayer, as I am blown about life's surface, a little leaf made to glorify your Name. Christine Diensberg OSF 62.4 2003 DONALD C. MALDARI Ignatian Insights into Evangelical Poverty Over the centuries Christian spirituality has, ironically, valued the practice of poverty as an aid to becoming rich in holiness. The inspiration for this evaluation of poverty comes first from its most limpid example, that of the kenosis (emptying) of the Son of God in the incarnation (Ph 2:7) and then from the lives of every person whom Christianity considers a saint. Catholic tradition recommends the practice of the "evangelical counsels" to all Christians as aids in their growth in holiness.~ They are manifold ascetical practices, especially obedience, poverty, and chastity, designed to counter sinful tendencies. They aim at checking human delusions of independence from God, such as pride and self-centeredness. They promote a relationship with God animated by the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love.2 They all appear oddly paradoxical, like pursuing wealth by way of poverty. Ignatius Loyola's spirituality sheds light on this paradox for all struggling to find hope. The young Ignatius sought fulfillment in the ways that conformed to the values of his or really any Donald C. Maldari SJ is an assistant professor in the Department of Religious Studies; Le Moyne College; Syracuse, New York 13 214. Review for Religious materialistic society: in riches and honor. His life was driven by the pursuit of courtly honor and of physical gratification. His convalescence from a serious wound at the battle of Pamplona forced him into a poverty of sorts: a lack of distractions that afforded him the opportunity to find authentic fulfillment in a newfound relationship with God. Upon reflection Ignatius concluded that the riches and honors that people seek may lead to a pride that is self-destructive. This pride obstructs a life-giving relationship with God. In order to battle against the suicidal temptation to self-sufficiency that riches, honors, and pride offer, Ignatius turned to evangelical poverty. Along with the great tradition of Christianity, the mature Ignatius understood evangelical poverty neither as destitution nor as austere disdain for material goods to earn divine favor. Destitution wounds the inherent dignity of human persons by depriving them of what they require to develop as God desires. Disdain for material goods denies the goodness with which God endowed creation. As is evident from the First Principle and Foundation of his Spiritual Exercises, Ignatius, on the contrary, rejoiced in the vocation to fulfillment that God extends to all people and recommended using created things for that purpose (SpEx §23). He grew to understand evangelical poverty as a spiritual attitude and material lifestyle that promotes the most fulfilling creaturely relationship with the Creator. That relationship is made possible by the life that flows from God to creatures, that is, by grace, and the hope that animates creatures and draws them into participation in the very life of God. There appears, therefore, to be a relationship between evangelical poverty and theological hope in the spirituality of Ignatius. Ignatius pursues evangelical poverty as a means of cultivating theological hope. This hope puts Ignatius in direct contact with God, as is 62.4 2003 Maldari ¯ I~natian Insights into Evangelical Povert~ Ignatius's spirituality of poverty and hope is countercultural, as is Christianity itself. characteristic of the theological virtues. One can trace the development of Ignatius's embrace of evangelical poverty in his Autobiography, and one can glimpse the results in the fragments of his Spiritual Diary that have survived. In these fragments one is privy to Ignatius's growing relationship with the Holy Trinity, which he perceives as a community of love that shares all it is and has. It, too, lives evangelical poverty! In his Spiritual Exercises Ignatius invites exercitants to develop their own relationships with the triune God. Ignatius's spirituality of poverty and hope is countercultural, as is Christianity itself. The Gospels assert that those who wish to live authentically need to lose their lives whereas those who selfishly cling to their lives destroy them. Sacrifice, the root meaning of which is "to make holy," seems inevitably to involve some sort of renunciation. The Christian tradition believes that this renunciation is necessary because of the sinful and selfish inclinations of humankind. Evangelical poverty is one of the sacrifices which Christianity values. The hope which it cultivates nourishes people, allowing them to participate even now in the life of God. Ignatius's Understanding of Evangelical Poverty Ignatius's Autobiography reveals a man who grows in his love for God. He attributes to God the initiative in their relationship, but recognizes that people can cooperate with God by taking graced action in developing the relationship. Ignatius grew in his recognition of the Son, the Second Person of the Trinity, as the mediator between God and humanity. He encounters the Son in all creation, Review for Religious which, created through him, is charged with his presence. He encounters him in a privileged way in the incarnate Christ, the fullness of the revelation of God. In Christ Ignatius experiences the dynamic of salvation: the descent of the Son into the human situation in order to effect the ascent of humanity into the life and work of God. As mentioned above, Ignatius relates to God not only in his divine unity but also as the divine community of the Holy Trinity. Poverty, which he refers to as a "mother," plays a crucial role in the development of Ignatius's relationship with this community (Constitutions, §287). As Maurice Giuliani opines, he even recognizes it in the Holy Trinity and in each of its members: The poverty of Jesus who does the work of his Father, the poverty of the divine Persons whose richness is the love which they have for each other, the poverty of the creature who wholeheartedly desires "reverence and respect" along with fidelity and service. How could Ignatius, thus interiorly instructed, henceforth choose anything else but this way of material poverty, a visible sign of human poverty vis-a-vis God and participation in the poverty of God himself?.3 Poverty was an ascetical practice for Ignatius. He understood asceticism as the exercise a person undertakes to attain a goal. His understanding of it developed from an integration of the insights of Christian tradition with insights drawn from his own experiences.4 He used it as an aid to his relationship with the Trinity.5 Javier Osuna Gil suggests that one consider Ignatius's understanding of asceticism from three perspectives: (1) as an effort to remove all disorder, all impediment, whatever makes us less free to receive the transforming action of God, who embraces us with his Love; (2) as a task for transforming oneself into an agile and flexible "instrument" of God, 62.4 2003 Maldari ¯ Ignatian Insights into Evangelical Poverty with increasing availability; and (3) as a way of "carrying the cross," the necessary cost of the historical impact between the project of Jesus and the project of this world.6 Ignatius uses ascetical practices in order to promote the disposition of sinners who seek to respond to Jesus' invitation to follow him and to cooperate in his mission.7 The Spiritual Exercises themselves are ascetical in character in that they are means of preparing and disposing our soul to rid itself of all its disordered affections and then, after their removal, of seeking and finding God's will in the ordering of our life for the salvation of our soul. (SpEx §1) They propose to facilitate the self-communication of God to the exercitant (SpEx § 15). In 1544 Ignatius penned a short document titled The Deliberation on Poverty that provides an insight into his discernment regarding the prescriptions on poverty in the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus. In this document one perceives Ignatius's use of evangelical poverty as an ascetical practice intended to promote his relationship with Christ. Manuel Ruiz Jurado distinguishes three motivations for Ignatius's choice of absolute poverty in this text: ascetic-mystical, apostolic, and Christocentric. The ascetic-mystical reasons include the recognition that poverty promotes absolute hope only in God because it separates one from reliance on secular things.8 The apostolic reasons include giving greater edification through example, having freedom to travel in imitation of Christ and the first apostles, whom Christ charged to live in poverty, and relying for consoling hope, not on secular goods, but on God alone.9 The Christocentric reasons include the desire to imitate Christ, who was poor and faced great adversities and who contin

Issue 58.3 of the Review for Religious, May/June 1999. ; f 0 r relig i ous Christian Heritages and ,Contemporary Living MAY-JUNE 1999 * VOLUME 58 ¯ NUMBER 3 Review for Religioug is a forum for shared reflection on the lived experience of all who J~nd that the church's rich heritages of spirituality support their personal and apostolic Christian lives. The articles in the journal are meant to be informative, practical, historical, or inspirational, written from a tbeological or spiritual or sometimes canonical point of view. Review for Religious (ISSN 0034-639X) is published bi-monthly at Saint Louis University by the Jesuits of the Missouri Province. Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393. Telephone: 314-977-7363 ¯ Fax: 314-977-7362 E-Mail: foppema@slu.edu Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor: Review for Religious ° 3601 Lindell Boulevard ° St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Correspondence about the Canonical Counsel department: Elizabeth McDonough OP P.O. Box 29260; ~,rashington, D.C. 20017 POSTMASTER Send address changes to Review for Religious ° P.O. Box 6070 ¯ Duluth, MN ~5806. Periodical postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri, and additional mailing offices. See inside back cover for information on subscription rates. ©1999 Review for Religious Permission is herewith granted to copy any material (articles, poems, reviews) contained in this issue of Review for Religious for personal or internal use, or for the personal or internal use of specific library, clients within the limits outlined in Sections 107 and/or 108 of the United States Copyright Law. All copies made under this permission must bear notice of the source, date, and copyright owner on the first page. This permission is NOT extended to copying for commercial distribu-tion, advertising, institutional promotion, or for the creation of new collective works or anthologies. Such permission will only be considered on written application to the Editor, Review for Religious. Editor Associate Editors Canonical Counsel Editor Editorial Staff Advisory Board David L. Fleming sJ Philip C. Fischer SJ Regina Siegfried ASC Elizabeth McDonough OP Mary Ann Foppe Tracy Gramm Jean Read James and Joan Felling Kathryn Riehards FSP Joel Rippinger OSB Bishop Carlos A. Sevilla SJ David Werthmann CSSR Patricia Wittberg SC Heritages and Contemporary Lfiv~ng MAY-JUNE 1999 * VOLUME58 * NUMBER3 contents 230 251 women religious Charism or Deep Story? Towards Understanding Better the 19th-Century Origins of American Women's Congregations Margaret Susan Thompson suggests that emphasis on "charism" may not be helpful in explaining the ,founding experiences of many women's communities in 19th-century America, and identifies some of the reasons why "deep stow" may be a more usable concept. The Need for Self-Criticism: Affirmative Comments Elizabeth McDonough OP suggests that the time has come for United States religious women to initiate some possibly difficult but genuinely constructive self-criticism and some corrective change of course in various aspects of postconciliar renewal. 261 266 women and the church The Annuario Pontificio: The Vatican's "Pontifical Yearbook" and a Recent Editorial Decision Larry N. Lorenzoni SDB updates a bit of history about who are included in the Vatican's "Pontifical Yearbook." Women and Canon Law Joan A. Range ASC investigates the extraordinary recent history of women entering the field of canon law. Review for Religious 286 295 mary Five Faces of Mary Robert P. Maloney CM offers five Marian faces as a way of meditating on the rich, varied tradition surrounding the Virgin Mary. The Temple and the Journeying: Mary of Sorrows Joel Giallanza CSC draws directions for our spiritual life's journey from reflecting on the traditional seven sorrows of Mary. 3O5 314 witnessing Blessed Maria Droste: A Good Shepherd Motif in Sacred Heart Spirituality Juliana Devoy RGS tells the story of Blessed Maria Droste, which gives witness to her vision of God's merciful love reflected in Sacred Heart spirituality. Echoes from My Fifty-sixth Annual Retreat Robert F. Drinan sJ shares reflections on God!s grace stirring thoughts and feelings in a retreat. 228 32O 325 departments Prisms Canonical Counsel: Visitation by External Authorities Book Reviews May-.~une 1999 227- Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. --John 14:9 Wean talk about God in some very un-Christian ways. As we "dress up" God in the various cultural and time-bound categories of our human world, we are inevitably limited, in both our reasoning and our imagining. When we get swept up into a highly intellectualized philosophical approach, we find our-selves projecting a vague abstract and sometimes fright-ening power and a childishly understood world. God without a face. Although Jesus lived within human limitations of time and culture, he dared to speak "with authority" about the reign of God in images and parables that tore down the temple curtain of separation to let people catch some glimpses of God that are new. The synoptic Gospels--Mark, Matthew, and Luke--talk of a celebra-tory invitation to a banquet, of a shepherd doggedly searching out a lost sheep, so that we come to know and relate to God with fresh affective response. But the Gospel of St. John stands out as the Gospel of the God revealed to us by Jesus as "Father." Few are the chapters in John's Gospel that do not have explicit reference to God as Father. The qualities of this Father-God tumble out. This God is the God of life: "Just as the Father who has life sent me and I have life because of the Father." Jn 6:44. This is a God who works: "My Father is at work until now, and I am Review for Religious' at work as well" Jn 5:17. This is a God who teaches: "My doctrine is not my own; it comes from him who sent me" Jn 7:16; "I say only what the Father has taught me" Jn 8:28. This is a God who cultivates growth: "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine-grower" Jn 15:1. Above all, this God is the one who loves: "The Father loves the Son and has given everything over to him" Jn 3:35; "the one who loves me will be loved by my Father"Jn 14:21. In retreat notes published as a book, The Ignatian Exercises in the Light of St. John, Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini SJ reflects that a way of considering the Fourth Gospel is to see it as a gospel of prayer, It is prayer not just from people responding to Jesus as we do so often in our prayer lives, but prayer also from Jesus to the one he lovingly calls Abba-Father. From Jesus We learn how we are meant to grow in our relationship with God. And so this Gospel, in teaching a way of relating to God for the mature Christian, is paradoxically the Gospel most insistent in remind-ing us that we are still "children" who have--and who need for our very existence--a Father. We are called, in imitation of Jesus, to relate to a God from whom we have everything--all that we are and all that we would call "our own." This is the God that Jesus describes as the One apart from whose words he himself has nothing to say, the God apart from whose works he has no work to do. As Christian evan-gelizers, then, we need to follow the example of Jesus so that what we say flows from our union with this God. As Christian ministers we need to strive that all our deeds and good works flow from the baptismal grace given by God that makes us all very special children, God's sons and daughters. It is from this God we have come--a Source we call by Jesus' word Father-- and it is to this God we direct our whole life as the One we, with John, identify as Love. If we let the words of St. John enter more deeply into our very being, we will find ourselves being shaped and molded by the reality behind our personally limited understandings of God as Father and God as Love. This is the revealed God of Scripture we seek to know and make known ever better in this year dedi-cated to God the Father. David L. Fleming SJ '229 May-June 1999 MARGARET SUSAN THOMPSON Charism or Deep Story? Towards Understanding Bett@r the 19th-Century Origins of American Women's Congregatigns Since the Second Vatican Council, the term charism increasingly has become associated with the identity, and .even the integrity, of religious congregations.1 Literally dozens of published essays explore the term's meaning and significance~ A substantial number of the community websites created in recent years contain a page about-- or at least an allusion to--the group's "charism," as do postconciliar constitutions, mission statements, and voca-tion paraphernalia. The hierarchy of the Catholic Church has not been silent either, particularly during the current papacy. For example, in its 1983 document "Essential Elements in the Church's Teaching on Religious Life 'as Applied to Institutes Dedicated to Works of the Apostolate," the Sacred ~Congregation for Religious and Secular Institutes used ~the term ten times, and it shows up a whopping eighty-six times in//Tta con-secrata, John Paul II's apostolic letter in response to the 1994 Synod on Religious Life. . Ironically, the word itself is not: to be found in Perfectae caritatis, the council document which treats the Margaret Susan Thompson PhD has written and lectured extensively on the history of women religious in the United States. She is associate professor of history and political sci-ence at Syracuse University; Department of History; 145 Eggers Hall; Syracuse, New York 13244. Review for Religious "Adaptation and Renewal of Religious Life." In fact, its first appearance in a magisterial treatise seems to be in 1971's Evangelica testificatio. Addressing religious themselves, Paul vI speaks of the "charisms of your founders" and the "charisms of the various insti-tutes" (§§11, 32), assuming, probably with justification, that the terminology would be familiar to his intended audience. But, for those in doubt about this nomenclature, Paul cites Perfectae cari-tatis §2b, which calls upon members of religious institutes to respect their "particular characteristics and work" and "their founders' spirit and special aims" as they proceed with their groups' renewal. Paul extends the discussion in Mutuae relationes (1978), using the term nineteen times and declaring, among other things, that "the very charism of the founders (Evangelii nuntiandi, §I 1) appears as an 'experience of the Spirit'" and that "every authentic charism implies a certain element of genuine originality and of special initiative for the spiritual life of the church" (§12). By now, therefore, one would assume that the meaning of a term so widely and authoritatively used would be clear, and one might also assume that the reality of the thing known as "charism" would be easily identifiable and inherent to religious life. Indeed, this seems to be implicit in various references from the two doc-uments of the current pontificate mentioned above. The first para-graph of "Essential Elements" refers to "the founding charism of a particular institute" and later even says that, through its appro-bation of a community's canonical status, the "God-given ministry of the hierarchy" has ratified the "authentic discernment of its founding charism" (§41):2 The references in Vita consecrata are too numerous even to summarize, but here are a few of them: "charisms proper to the various institutes," "fidelity to the found-ing charism," "[an institute's] Rule and constitutions [are approved] in accordance with a specific charism confirmed by the church," and "the uniqueness of their different ~harisms' (§§19, 36, 37, 53). Surely, then, "charigm" is intrinsic to religious life. Every con-gregation must have one, unique to that particular institute and traceable directly to its individual founder., But the rationale for this essay is precisely that none of the assumptions above seems necessarily to be the case. It is my con-tention that, in much of its current usage, charism is a term of such vagueness and ambiguity as to be almost meaningless. More impor-tantly, even if we can accept the connotations that John Paul II apparently regards as definitive (and he is hardly alone in this atti- May-~tune 1999 -231 . Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? tude), I would argue that a good many of the women's apostolic congregations that ministered in the 19th and early 20th century in the United States have no such thing as a "charism" according to this understanding. Thus, if, as John Paul II suggests, "charism" is an "essential element" of religious life, the very legitimacy of these congregations seems to be east into question--surely a seri-ous, perhaps even disastrous, consequence for the groups involved. What is needed, therefore, is some alternative to charism, some concept that is more in accord with the historical reality of many institutes and legitimates their experience and continued existence. It is unlikely that my consideration here will arrive at any defini-tive conclusions, but I hope to suggest some alternative ways of thinking that may prove useful in framing the historical and cur-rent context of sisters' experiences and perhaps assist in the pro-cess of religious revitalization and renewal. At the very least, from my ongoing research into women's religious life in the 19th-cen-tury United States, I think I can explain why the emphasis on "charism" in contemporary thinking about religious life is prob-lematic and historically unjustified, at least as a universal norm. Before we proceed, a few assumptions need to be made explicit. First, I believe that some congregations do have a charism and that in some cases it is traceable, at least in some degree, to an individual "founder." In other instances, its origin may lie with a founding group of individuals (a "founding generation"), while in still others a charism may have emerged later in a community's history--or a buried, neglected, or even repudiated charism may be discerned or refurbished by subsequent generations. Second-- and in this I am confirmed by the usages of several scholars as well as by both Paul vI and John Paul II--I believe there is also some-thing generic that can be called "a charism of apostolic religious life." Third, the lack of a particular charism does not render an institute (or its members or ministries) less significant, "spiritual," or legitimate than those which do have such a "gift":--just as the existence of one does not indicate superiority or greater validity. Indeed, given that the use of the term charism in connection with religious life is of such recent provenance, its application to past experience--particularly if it is considered to be some sort of uni-versal norm--actually may be ahistorically anachronistic. The word charism, of course, is Greek and means "gift." In contemporary Christian usage, it refers specifically to a spiritual gift, that is, "a free gift of grace." Moreover, virtually all Catholic Review for Religious scholars agree that a charism is not solely for the benefit of its direct recipient; rather, "it is a supernatural gift bestowed by the Holy Spirit for building up the body of Christ" or, in simpler terms, a "divine spiritual gift to individuals or groups for the build-ing up of the community." Within the context of religious life, the charism presumably is received initially by an institute's founder, who transmits it on to her followers. It is this "gift of grace" which is to imbue the community with its unique character or identity; as Richard McBrien puts it, "the unique gift of the founder., is given to every member from one generation to the next."3 Between 1727 and 1917, at least 422 Catholic apostolic con-gregations of women religious were active within the United States.4 Some were short-lived, but four hundred of them contin-ued to exist in 1917, and the overwhelming majority are extant today. Of the 422, a total of 273 belonged to one of ten large reli-gious "families," each of which could trace its birth to a particu-lar founder or pair of founders (see Table 1). Thus, each of these could be presumed to be a beneficiary of the. "charism" of the per-son or persons with whom that family began. Moreover, many of these groups also regard themselves as having their own particular founders, who "re-visioned" the familial identity in some way that imparted a special or distinct character to it.s Table 1 U.S. Al~ostolic Women's Communities andTheir Religious "Families" . FAMILY FOUNDER(S) NO. OF COMMUNITIES Benedictine Benedict, Scholastica 32 Carmelite (reform) Teresa of Avila 3 Dominican Dominic 30 Franciscan Francis 54 St. Joseph Jean Pierre Medaille 27 Mercy Catherine McAuley 65 Presentation Nano Nagle 7 Ursuline Angela Merici 30 Vincentian Vincent de Paul and Louise de Marfllac 10 Visitation Francis de Sales and Jane Frances de Chantal 15 May-June 1999 233 Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? No one can or will deny that these communities have---since their founding, in most cases--been known by one of these "fam-ily names." Still, this begs some important questions. How many of even these congregations can be said to have been "birthed" into the charism of their family forebears? How many incorpo-rated themselves into a particular family with explicit awareness of the spiritual and ecclesial consequences? How many can assert with confidence that their history is one of explicit and consistent acknowledgment of and fidelity to that charism? In other words, to what extent did "charism" traditionally play a part in shaping the identities of at least some of these institutes? Alternatively, how many of them became, in fact, "generic" apostolic entities doing good work, composed of good (even holy) people, but ~undistin-guished by any familial or "particular" spiritual identity that would differentiate them clearly from others of theoburgeoning number of women's religious orders that came increasingly to "do their thing" in the United States in, the 19th and 20th centuries? Finally, most of the nearly one hundred fifty other women's congregations I have studied also assert that they have particular "founders' charisms." Are all of them justified in their claims? It naturally is impossible to provide in one article definitive answers to any of these questions. Instead, I intend to offer some representative examples from the histories of the communities I have studied, examples that I believe will demonstrate some of the major problems with the assumptions about charism that charac-terize so much of what has been said about religious life in the past quarter century. Let me emphasize thavnone of these exam-ples is unique; rather, each is suggestive of all-too-typical congre-gational experiences. Each indicates some aspect of why I believe that the notion of a "founder's?' or "founding" charism is so prob-lematic and why the notion may, in fact, do more to obscure the realities of women's religious history than to illumine it. The Most Common Scenario: Instrumentalism Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, the Catholic population of the United States exploded. As early as 1850, Catholics constituted the largest single body of believers in the nation, a ranking they have maintained ever since. But, hardly monolithic, they consisted of an ecer growing number of proudly distinct (and sometimes mutually antagonistic) ethnic groups, many Review for Religious of which came to the New World specifically to escape religious persecution or to preserve their cultural identities. Most were poor when they arrived in their new nation; few except the Irish spoke English. Their secular and Protestant neighbors greeted them with suspicion and often with overt hostility. Clearly, these were peo-ple with numerous and diverse needs to be met, and church lead-ers, beleaguered and fearful of "leakage" from the faith, sought ways to respond effectively. It is not surprising, therefore, that dozens of institutes were started in or brought to the United States to provide practical ser-vices, often to specific subgroups of Catl~olics. Both individual community histories by the score and various more com-prehensive works attest con-vincipgly-- and, before 1965, unapologetically--to what I call the instrumental motivation for so many foundations: to teach the ever growing number of school-age children,6 to provide healthcareand relief (primarily, of course, but not only to Catholics), and, increasingly, to work with persons from partic-ular immigrant groups who needed ministers who understood both their languages and their traditions and could both foster cultural survival and ease the pro-cess of Americanization. Others were started for equally functional purposes: to do housework for priests or to offer catechetical instruction to children outside the parochial schools. Consider, for instance, the following accounts of foundings, taken almost randomly from the 1964 edition of Thomas McCarthy's Guide to the Catholic Sisterhoods of the United States-- perhaps the most successful comprehensive "vocation book" ever published in this country:7 [Sisters of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin:] A school, but no teachers, and none to be had from any religious commu-nity in spite of numerous requests by Father Jean Harper. ¯. He decided to act upon his curate's suggestion: "We can-not obtain nuns? Then, let us make some!" And so the con-gregation came into existence . . (p. 192). Dozens of institutes were started in or brought to the United States to provide practical services, often to specific subgroups of Catholics. 235--- May-~une 1999 Thompson * Charism or Deep Story? [Franciscans of Tiffin, Ohio:] Father Joseph L. Bihn . . . founded this Franciscan community to help him care for the many children orphaned as a result of the Civil War. Three of his parishioners, Elizabeth Schaeffer, a widow, and her two daughters, formed the nucleus of this congregation. (p. 271). [Sisters of Sts. Cyril ahd Methodius:] The early 1900s was a critical period for the many immigrants from Slovakia who setded in the United States. Father Matthew Jankola of the Scranton diocese was keenly aware that this adjustment required not only the building of schools but also of secur-ing sisters to staff them. As a result of his efforts, this dioce-san congregation was established in 1900 (p. 189). [Sisters of the Holy Family, San Francisco, California:] "I have another work for you to do," Archbishop Joseph S. Alemany OP said to young Elizabeth Armer when she came to consult him about entering a contemplative order. The archbishop unfolded to the future Mother Dolores his plans for an insti-tute to give religious instruction to children who could not attend Catholic schools. (p. 295). [Little Daughters of St. Joseph:] Father Antoine Mercier, a Sulpician priest., who desired to establish a congregation of nuns who would consecrate themselves to the spiritual and material welfare of the clergy and seminarians, founded this community with the assistance of Miss de Lima Dauth, the co-foundress. On April 26, 1857, both began this eminently apostolic work of helping priests and seminarians by means of a life of prayer, self-denial, and manual labor (p. 36). [Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, Houston, Texas:] "A multitude of sick and infirm seeks relief at your hands" was the irresistible plea of Rt. Rev. C.M. Dubuis when he went to France to seek volunteers to help him in his missionary labors in Galveston, Texas. Three young women answered his appeal and with these he founded the congregation in 1866. The community, which built the first Catholic hospital in the state, has papal approval and conducts twenty-six insti-tutions. (p. 120). 236 Where, in any of these stories, can one discern a charism? Ministry, yes; inspiring service to needy people, certainly. But two obstacles to discerning a "charism of the founder" recur in each instance. First, the reason each community came into being was functional, not charismatic. And, second, at least as these accounts would have it, the initiating impulse came not from the women who would offer to respond, but from clerics--men who, by def- Review for Religious inition, were persons outside of the community itself and thus hard to recognize as part of the group's intrinsic "lived tradition.''s Random Rule Selection and the Problem of Charism Every autonomous congregation has its own constitution, but, properly speaking, only four Rules (St. Basil, St. Augustine, St. Benedict, and St. Francis) were approved by Rome, and every com-munity had to select one of these as the basis for its organization and gov-ernance. 9 This helps to explain, for example, why so many women's con-gregations belonged to the Franciscan "family"--generally speaking, it was considered the most "flexible" of the four and therefore the easiest to adapt to a variety of instrumental purposes. To assume, then, that every commu-nity designated as "Franciscan" also and intentionally embodied a Franciscan charism requires an enor-mous leap of faith; in fact, even some founders who wanted to be "Franciscan" sometimes began by organizing themselves by another Rule. Two contrasting examples will illustrate the problem. First, there is that of the Sisters of St. Francis of Perpetual Adoration, originally founded in Olpe, Westphalia, in 1859 (and eventually established in the U.S. in 1875). The founder, Mother Mary Theresia (Aline) Bonzel, had great devotion to St. Francis and wanted to be Franciscan, but one of her co-founders, Clara Pfaender, had previously belonged to a con-gregation which followed the Augustinian Rule. We may let the community's first historian, an unusually forthright individual, take the story from there: Aline Bonzel wanted the Franciscan Rule by all means. But seemingly she was not well acquainted with the basic Rule of religious orders . Clara Pfaender knew the Augustinian Rule from her convent days with the Sisters of Christian Charity. She felt she could write a constitution based on that Rule. Since she was the superior and responsible for admit-ting candidates into the community, it s~emed advisable, in this very beginning, that she have the liberty to employ her To assume that every community designated as "Franciscan" also and intentionally embodied a Franciscan charism requires an enormous leap of faith. 237 May-June 1999 Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? full experience in religious life. Only on this basis can one explain how a community which uniformly desired to live according to the Franciscan Rule began with the Augustinian Rule, but with the intention of later converting to the Franciscan Rule. In this procedure the character of the times can readily be detec(ed. Many most likely saw basically lit-de difference whether one lived according to the Augustinian or the Franciscan Rule. The development of a specialized spirituality came later and in many instances vqry much later. As this author put it elsewhere: So many religious congregations came into being in the 19th century, and many chose their Rule by chance. Charitable activity called, and congregations were founded to fill the need to serve God and man. With some it seemingly made no difference what religious Rule was followed, for all were good and sanctifying~ . . . Foundations flourished which at first simpl); set up the aciivities and objectives of the apos-tolate and later wrote the rule and constitutions. Often enough at the very beginning it was purely accidental rather than a conscious effort that one or the other rule took hold.l° Contrast this with the experienqe of the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Third Order of St. Francis (SSJ-TOSF). Their history has been recounted superbly in two volumes by Josephine Marie Peplinski; basically, the group owed its origins to ethnic conflict within the School Sisters of St. Francis. The School Sisters were predominantly German, and the founding SSJ-TOSFs were Polish members who, after many incidents distressing to them, decided in 1901 to break off and found their own congregation. They took the Rule and name of "Franciscan" with them, but their self-claimed identity was fundamentally Polish. Indeed, as Peplinski has docu-mented, part of the problem was that, for its first few decades of existence, the community's leadership was passed back and forth between two very different individuals, one of whom (Mother Mary F~licia Jasku, lski) had a real devotion to St. Francis, while the other (Mother Mary Boleslaus Rybicki) "moved the congre-gation toward a popular Jesuit interpretation of obedience and authority--military in tone." As Peplinski puts it, "She exerted great influence in developing the spirituality of the congregation throughout her lifetime . . . and afterwards through those who adopted her ideals. It is ~v0rthy to note that until 1940, fourteen years after Mother Mary Boleslaus's death, almost all of the retreat masters invited to th~ congregation were Jesuits." Peplinski describes tlie congregation during its first sixty years as a Review for Religious "Franciscan sisterhood adapted to the post-Tridentine paradigm of religious life serving the American immigrant church . A basic problem was that canon law rather than the gospel law of love was set up as the ideal." In fact, not until after Vatican II, under Peplinsld's own leadership (she led the congregation 1968-1976), did the SSJ-TOSFs make a concerted and systematic effort to dis-cover what "bein~ Franciscan:' was all about. But, while they in fact embrace a Franciscan spirituality as they enter into their sec-ond century, is it at all accurate, despite their name, to regard it as their "founding charism"?II What Happened to the Benedictines? .Peplinski's congregation was not the only one "adapted to the post-Tridentine paradigm of religious life serving the American immigrant church." What happened to the Benedictines was equally dramatic and potentially of even more profound conse-quence to what they were supposed to be all about. It is a com-plicated story, ably told from somewhat different perspectives by Judith Sutera, M. Incarnata Girgen, and Ephrem Hollermann.12 The first nuns came to St. Marys, Pennsylvania, in 1852 from Eichst~itt, Bavaria, where they had lived in a way that permitted full cenobitic, monastic observance, including recitation of the Divine Office and solemn vows according to the Benedictine formulary: stability, conversatio ("conversion of life"), and obedience, However, within less than ten years after their arrival in the United States, a complicated series of events ensued, resulting in fundamental alterations to their tradition. Stated simply, the right to take solemn vows was abrogated (because the women were unable to observe strict enclosure), pressures of "life in mission territory" (as well as the elimination of solemn vows) led to "permission" to miti-gate the requirement to recite the full Divine Office (allowing substitution of the Little Office of th~ Blessed Virgin Mary, parts only of the Divine Office, or ~ven rosaries and other devotional practices), the jurisdiction of community leaders was made sec-ondary to that of diocesan, bishops (who could, among other things, approve or reject the election of prioresses and the admission of new members--something unheard of, normally, in Benedictinism). Even the simple vows the women now professed wer~ not neces-sarily the Benedictine ones. As Sutera explains, some took the tra-ditional vows, some took the three vows common to other May-June 1999 Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? communities (poverty, chastity, obedience), Others took five vows and some four (not stability, because there were rumors that the women were to be reorganized into a large congregation complete with provinces, regional novitiates, and so forth). She summarizes the consequences this way: "What Rome had done was to create a canonical anomaly, a group of unenclosed monastic women who retained the right to the designation of 'O.S.B.' This right implied some recognition that they were nuns of the ancient order rather than sisters of a later congregation despite their simple vows. However, it left them as technically neither one nor the other. [Practically speaking,] they faded into the mass of apostolic orders." 13 Sutera and Hollermann's books, especially, are potent wit-nesses to the extent to which American Benedictines struggled over the following century both to respond 'to the ministerial and apostolic demands placed upon them and to remain as faithful as they could to their Benedictine heritage. Both accounts verify the existence and persistence of Benedictine charism, however "re-visioned" in the American context, despite the many and substan-tial obstacles put in the sisters' way. Thus, when Vatican II came along, with its call for renewal in the spirit of the founders, the Benedictines had a strong foundation on which they could rely. Nonetheless, the disparate experiences of the various autonomous foundations during the years between their foremothers' arrival in the U.S. and the postconciliar period raise important questions about how, and the extent to which, "fidelity to charism" shaped the historical reality of American Benedictine sisters. If one reads the descriptions of them in McCarthy's 1964 compendium, for instance, they seem virtually indistinguishable from the plethora of apostolic institutes that surrounded them.14 "Charisms" Buried, Repudiated, or Denied At least the Benedictines had a strong tradition, never com-pletely lost, that they could revitalize when called to do so by the Second Vatican Council, Others, however, were not so fortunate, The situations of those who chose their traditions randomly, or who were founded for largely instrumental purposes, have already been discussed. But what about those who did have more charismatic founders, whose legacies, for various reasons, were obscured or even rejected? Probably the most famous such case is that of the Institute Review for Religious of the Blessed Virgin Mary, founded by the remarkable Mary Ward in 1609; not until the papacy of Pius XI! were they able to claim her officially as the founder of their congregation. But other instances pertain more directly to the U.S. Catholic experience; here I will refer to just three of them (by no means the only ones). As late as McCarthy's 1964 Guide (p. 317), the sisters founded by Margaret Anna Cusack in 1884 were identified unqualifiedly as the "Sisters of St. Joseph of Newark" and were described as having been founded by "Bishop Bagshawe of Nottingham, England . . . in 1888." Then, we are told, Bishop Michael Wigger of Newark, New Jersey, "received the community into his dio-cese shortly after its establish-ment." The latter sentence, technically, is true, but the foundation was in 1884; by 1888 the controversial Cusack had left both Newark and the Catholic Church. The myth of Bagshawe's role, as well as the rather skewed chronology, evolved largely to bury the fact that this group's founder--a woman who did, I believe, have a charism and who had a very revolutionary vision for her community--was regarded at the time of her death as an "apostate." Dorothy Vidulich has provided a first-rate account of how Cusack's community rediscovered her in the aftermath of Vatican II, officially reclaiming her in 1970 as their founder and reclaiming, too, her original name for the congregation: the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace. Since then, the group has devoted enormous effort to uncovering and taking ownership of her and their charism; nonetheless, the fact that her very connection with the institute was buried for eighty-five years (starting less than four years after it began) makes it difficult to discern the extent to which her charism ever played a meaningful role in its earlier historical expe-rience. Is the identity of this community primarily traceable to Cusack? Or, like an adopted child, must this group, like it or not, acknowledge that other "parents" may actually have been more significant in shaping their ongoing lived reality? 15 American Benedictines struggled both to respond to the ministerial and apostolic demands placed upon them and to remain as faithful as they could to their Benedictine heritage. May-June 1999 Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? Which person or persons must be acknowledged as having contributed-- and how--to the congregation's actual history ? The founder of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, of Monroe, Michigan, was never, stricdy speaking, denied; her central role in the congregation's founding was, how.ever, unde-niably minimized and obscured. Theresa Maxis Duchemin was the offspring of an unwed "woman of color." Both her "race" (her mother was an immigrant to the U.S. from what now is known as Haiti) and her "illegitimate" parentage were, of course, problem-atic. So was the fact that she obscured both of them when she came to Michigan in 1845 to found the congregation ("passing" as "white")--in doing so, she left the commu- 'nity she had belonged to since 1829, the Oblate Sisters of Providence. (This group was the first African American con-gregation in the history of Catholicism. Duchemin was one of its first ,four members, its only American-born founder, and was onetime superior gen-eral of it. In the 1830s her mother, too, joined the community.) What perhaps contributed most, however, towards her role in Monroe IHM history becoming "shadowy" were her ongoing con-flict with Edward Joos (an early spiritual father assigned to the congregation by the bishop), her decision to establish a foundation in Pennsylvania (which the bishop did not approve of, and which soon turned into two), her subsequent conflicts with the .authori-tarian bishop of Philadelphia who succeeded Duchemin's beloved John Neumann, and tier resultant eighteen years of exile in Canada, during which she was forbidden contact with any of the three IHM communities she had founded. Eventually Duchemin was allowed to return to the Philadelphia foundation; ironically, however, only the Scranton one has always acknowledged her role in its begin-nings, In Monroe, meanwhile, Mother Mary Joseph Walker, who succeeded Duchemin as superior in 1859, was becoming regarded as the group's "true foundress," while Joos, who served 'as its eccle-siastical superior from 1857 to 1901, was referred to as the "beloved father." 16 How is a grouplike this to return to the "charism of the founder"? Even in the 1990s the Monroe community is ambivalent Review for Religions as to how it should refer to Duchemin: was she their "founder," their "co-founder" (along with Louis Gillet, the Redemptorist who called her to Michigan in 1845 and departed' abruptly two years later), or simply one of the "first four"? What about the "found-ing" and "formative" roles of Walker and, especially, Joos? At the time of the latter's death, his loss was apparently considered so traumatic that the then general superior "had to assure the sisters that it was possible for the congregation to continue without him." True, Margaret Brennan IHM has documented the persistence of certain very specific elements of Duchemin's spiritual legacy, even through the decades when her contribution was denied, but impor-tant questions still remain.~7 As with the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace, which person or persons must be acknowledged as having contributed--and how--to the congregation's actual history? "The Most Reverend Archbishop William Gross CSSR of Oregon City founded [the Sisters of St. Mary of Oregon] in Sublimity, Oregon, in 1886 . A vastly scattered flock, with . only a few religious to care for them, made Archbishop Gross determined to establish his own community of sisters."18 It seems a typical 19th-century story; unfortunately, it has almost no basis in reality. The real root of this community is a group of lay peo-ple who more than a decade earlier followed a schismatic priest of the Congregation of the Precious Blood, Charle~ Albrecht, out of Ohio into exile in Wisconsin and Minnesota (where Albrecht died) and then moved (with Albrecht's body) on to rural Oregon. There a young,girl in the group--who had been "bequeathed" to the cultish "trusteeship" of a trio of laymen ("devotees" of Albrecht, whose body during many months after his death,was kept in a cof-fin mounted above the dining table in the group's community room in Minnesota and then, quite ossified, was transported illegally to Oregon)--sought help from some Benedictine monks of Mount Angel Abbey, who put the future Mother Wilhelmina Bleily in touch with Gross, who eventually "regularized" the status of those who sought it and provided official recognition for the "sisters." Shortly thereafter he deposed Wilhelmina from the superiorship to which she had been duly elected, brought in a sister from Wisconsin to provide "formation" for the. community, and reshaped its identity completely. Although the original sisters had retained a strong devotion to the Precious Blood from their Ohio heritage, for instance, Gross refused to allow them to include this in the name of their congregation. By the 1960s, after decades of denial, May-June 1999 9A2 Thompson * Charism or Deep Story? Inappropriate reliance for spiritual grounding upon "a" founder and her or his significance can lead to a spirituality that is static or reactionary. Wilhelmina's contributions had been forgotten (and her diary, which recorded all that had happened, both before 1886 and after, lay gathering dust in the community's attic, not to be rediscov-ered until a new motherhouse was constructed in the 1970s), and the only things that remained from their roots were a red cord (on which they wore a crucifix around their necks) and a vague acknowledgment of a "devotion to the Precious Blood," one among many devotions that had been accepted without explanation for several generations29 More than either of the other two groups dis-cussed. here, the SSMO's decision to bury its past (not to mention Albrecht's body) certainly is understandable. It is also under-standable that, because of their "rescue" from the "trustees" by Gross, this really rather remark-able group has always prided itself on its loyalty to and reverence for the hierarchy. But how to imple-ment that loyalty whe, n the hier-archy charges one with "restoring the founder's charism"? In this case, what are they to do with Albrecht, with the trustees, with years of schismatic and extremely odd cultic spirituality, with the deposing of Wilhelmina, and with the clearly subordinate status that "in gratitude" the SSMOs were expected to tolerate in the Portland Archdiocese for most of the yea.rs of their existence? In this paper I have offered reasons why emphasis on the founder's charism--which has characterized so much of post- Vatican II religious renewal--deserves reexamination regarding its relevance and utility to the histories (and subsequent revitaliza-tions) of many religious congregations. Clearly, in many cases it is not something that can be easily identified, and, in some cases where it can be, that very recognition leads to problems of a dif-ferent sort. I could have discussed other issues as well: that certain congregations owe their origins to groups rather than to individ-uals, that emphasis on "formal" founders (founders who have offi-cial canonical recognition from the [male] prelates charged with 9rid "verifying" the "authenticity" of a congregation, and many of Review for Religiotts whom, for women's congregations, have erroneously been identi-fied as men) tends to obscure the cumulative and ongoing respon-sibilities that all community members have for their collective spirituality, and that inappropriate reliance for spiritual grounding upon "a" founder and her or his significance can lead to a spiritu-ality that is static or reactionary. All of these matters deserve explo-ration; unfortunately, constraints of space in the present circumstances prevent their serious consideration here. What I do offer for present consideration is an alternative approach to "charism" that may prove of value to communities that recognize some of their own histories in what I have been able to include in this essay. It is developed most fully, perhaps, in a 1989 article in Review for Religious by Bernard Lee SM.2° Lee begins with a clear assertion: The "recovery of charism" may be one of the most unsup-portable and unnecessary burdens a religious institution has ever been asked to bear, because it cannot be done. Charism is not a property. It is not a possession. It is not transfer-able, not transmittable, and not controllable. Charism is a deeply historicized social phenomenon. It cannot be dupli-cated in any other time or place. Charism has never been a movable feast. (p. 124) Instead, Lee suggests the notion of "deep story" as an alter-native to the emphasis on charism. He defines this as a category of interpretation that comes out of structuralism, which is a method for interpreting group identity. It pre-supposes that group identity is rooted in a narrative structure, that is, in recurring patterns of relationships and social activ-ities. The narrative structure of any complex and interesting group, however, is extremely elusive because it is instinctual and unconscious even more than it is deliberate and self-conscious . Deep stories are exhibited in rituals that cel-ebrate them (for example, rituals of profession), in special words and phrases that belong especially to them. Stephen Crites says that all of these things are elusive expressions of deep stories (he calls them sacred stories) "that cannot fully be told, because they live, so to speak, in the arms and legs and bellies of the celebrants. These stories lie too deep in the consciousness of a people to be directly told: they form con-sciousness rather than being among the objects of which it is directly aware." (p. 126)z' What Lee intends to suggest by all this, I think, is the con-tinuous and cumulative process of a community's identity forma- Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? tion--its spiritual nature (my term), its history--which, of course, in sacred time and space, encompasses the present and future as much as the past. Thus, to turn to Lee once again, "the founder's or foundress's gift is not a community's charism. The real found-ing gift is a narrative structure that supported and reflected a charismatic event in the foundation's birth, and may do so again" (p. 129). But, as I understand this, it cannot remain static; instead, a "community of memory"--while "creatively rooted" in, or faith-ful to, its deep story--must always be on its way to the realization of a new charismatically gifted reality, one in which all members must participate and assume responsibility. I believe that the notion of deep story--as a paradigm--can help all of us cope with ongoing foundings and refoundings in religious life. Seen as participants in deep story, Wilhelmina Bleily, Charles Albrecht, and William Gross, Theresa Maxis Duchemin and Mary Joseph Walker and Edward Joos, Mary Felicia Jaskulski and Mary Boleslaus Rybicki, Margaret Anna Cusack, Theresia Bonzel, and Clara Pfaender, countless Benedictines, and tens of thousands of others, living and dead, can all find space and be "at home'--not comfortably, perhaps, or e~sily, but the Christian story, the deep story, is never easy or comfortable. It is, however, real, as real as the ongoing spiritual "gift" (dare I, after all this, say "charism"?) that has called so many over the centuries to fol-low the path of religious life. Notes ~ This essay was presented originally at the 1998 History of Women Religious Conference in Chicago. Though not every point is supported by refei'ences, this essay rests upon my decade-long research into the history of American women religious, including work in the archives of about seventy-five congregations and familiarity with virtually all the published materials on this subject, including historical and biographical works on over three hundred individual communities. On the subject of charism, I read all Vatican documents dealing with religious life, as well as approximately three dozen articles directly or indirectly on this sub-ject that have appeared in Review for Religious (U.S.A.) and Religious Life Review (Ireland). Many of the incidents and ideas recounted here are developed more fully in some of my previous publications; see, in par-ticular, "Discovering Foremothers: Sisters; Society, and the American Catholic Experience," U.S. Catholic Historian 5 (Summer/Autumn 1986): 273-290; "To Serve the People of God: Nineteenth-Century Sisters and the Creation of an American Catholic Religious Life," Cushwa Center Working Papers, Series 18, no. 2 (1986); "Women and American Review for Religious Catholicism, 1789-1989," in Perspectives on the Catholic Church in America, 1789-1989, ed. Virgina Geiger and Stephen Vicchio (Westminster, Maryland: Christian Classics, 1989), pp. 123-142; "Sisterhood and Power: Class, Culture, and Ethnicity in the American Convent," Colby Library Quarterly 25 (1989): 149-175; "Women, Feminism, and the New Religious History: Catholic Sisters as a Case Study," in Belief and Behavior: Essays in the New Religious History, ed. Philip VanderMeer and Robert Swierenga (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1991), pp. 136-163;."Cultural Conundrum: Sisters, Ethnicity, and the Adaptation of American Catholicism," Mid-America 74 (1992): 205-230; "The Validation of Sisterhood: Canonical Status and Liberation in the History of American Nuns," in A Leaf of the Great Tree of God: Essays in Honor of Ritamary Bradley SFCC, ed. Margot H. King (Toronto: Peregrina Publishing Co., 1994), pp. 38-78; and "Concentric Circles of Sisterhood," in Building Sisterhood: A Feminist History of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1997), pp. 1-21. For their insights into this subject, I offer my thanks to Ritamary Bradley SFCC, Thomas J. Costello, Barbara Garland SC, James Hennesey SJ, Mary Ann Hinsdale IHM, Elizabeth A. West ICM, and many of the participants in the Sister-L internet discussion group 2 In this, SCRIS reiterates a point made in a document it issued five years earlier, Mutuae relationes: "Bishops, in union with the Roman pon-tiff, receive from Christ the head the duty (see LG §21) of discerning gifts and competencies, of coordinating multiple energies, and of guid-ing the entire people in living in the world as a sign and instrument of salvation. They, therefore, are also entrusted with the duty of caring for religious chariSms" (§9); and "It is .the duty of bishops as authentic teach-ers and guides of perfection for all the members of the diocese (see CD §§12; 15; 35, 2; and LG §§25, 45) to be the guardians likewise of fidelity to the religious vocation in the spirit of each institute . Bishops, along with their clergy, should be. firm guardians of the specific character of each religious family both in the spiritual and in the apostolic field" (§28). These passages, as well as that from EssentialElements (§41), raise some serious questions about the autonomy and integrity of religious charisms, since the implication is that they cannot be presumed to exist "authentically" until those in (external) hierarchical authority say they exist. Certainly, this is a matter deserving of substantial Consideration; but, unfoi'tunately, that is outside the scope of this paper. 3 Wilfrid Harrington, "Charism," in A New Dictionary of Theology, ed. Joseph A. Komonchak et al. (Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1987), p. 180; The HarperCollins Encyclopedia of Catholicism, ed. Richard E McBrien (HarperSanFrancisco, 1989), pp. 299-300. 4 These figures, as well as information included in Table 1, are derived from a detailed listing of all Catholic women's apostolic communities that I have located to date that existed in the United States between 1727 and 1917. Included in this list are com.munities which, for most or all of their existence, engaged in some form of active ministry. Thus, for May-June 1999 247 24S Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? instance, contemplative Benedictines are omitted, as are purely contem-plative Visitation monasteries. In compiling these data, principal sources were: Elinor Tong Dehey, Religious Orders of Women in the United States, rev. ed. (Hammond, Indiana, 1930); Joan M. Lexau, Convent Life: Roman Catholic Religious Orders for Women in North America (New York, 1964), pp. 209-387 (Index of Orders); and Evangeline Thomas, Women Religious History Sources: A Guide to Repositories in the United States (New York, 1983), pp. 169-176 (Table of U.S. Founding Dates). Some information came from other sources, which are identified on the comprehensive list in my possession. s In that respect, they bear a similarity to the rest of the 149 U.S. con-gregations that have more individualized origins and have "founders" that they share, if at all, with only a handful of others. I shall return a bit later to the question of charism as it affects them. 6 All eight of the first indigenous communities of women studied by Barbara Misner in her landmark work, "Highly Respectable and Accomplished Ladies": Catholic Women Religious in America, 1790-18Y0 (New York: Garland, 1988), devoted most or all of their early ministerial energies to teaching. So did the vast majority of foundations initiated from abroad-- including the first in what is now the United States, the New Orleans Ursulines (founded in 1727). By 1884 the U.S. bishops, gathered at the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore and extremely concerned about "leak-age" from the faith, paid tribute to the success of these pioneers (and to their belief that the education of youth was the best way to keep people within the church) by their declaration that every parish in the country should establish at least one school within the next two years. That, in turn, increased the demand for religious teachers (the overwhelming majority of them women, and sisters), just as the "new immigration" (c. 1880-1917) from heavily Catholic eastern and southern Europe was get-ting underway. See also Gerald Shaughnessy, Has the Immigrant Kept the Faith? (New York: Macmillan, 1925); "The Pastoral Letter of 1884," in The National Pastorals of the American Hierarchy (1792-1919), ed. Peter Guilday (Washington, D.C.: National Catholic Welfare Council, 1923), pp. 280-282; Thompson, "Women and American Catholicism," p. 125. 7 This Guide (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1964) appeared in six editions, the first in 1952 and the last in 1966. The 1964 edition was selected for use here because it appeared only one year before Perfectae caritatis called upon religious to renew themselves "in the spirit of their founders," thereby initiating the whole postconciliar emphasis on "charism." It should be noted that McCarthy acquired his information from the communities; therefore, these are the founding stories that the sisters themselves had identified and transmit-ted to him for inclusion. s I have written extensively elsewhere about the fact that many of these stories bear little or no resemblance to reality. That is, communi-ties which traditionally cited clerics as founders have, since Vatican II, in quite a number of cases, identified and reclaimed women as their prin- Review for Religious cipal initiators. Nevertheless, we cannot dismiss the significance of these founding stories (often recounted and thereby reinforced for several gen-erations) either. Whether or not men actually took the principal initia-tive in founding particular communities, it did affect the self-understandings of hundreds of sisters who were taught, and who believed, that the men had done so. 9 William Humphrey SJ, Elements of Religious Life, 2nd ed. (London: Thomas Baker, 1903), p. 164. 10 p. Lothar Hardick OFM, He Leads, I Follow: The Life of Mother Maria Theresia Bonzel, Foundress of the Sisters of St. Francis of Perpetual Adoration, trans. Sisters M. Honora Hau and M. Clarahilda Fischer (Colorado Springs, I971), pp. 23, 30-31, 185-186. Ironically, perhaps, Pfaender later separated and founded her own religious congregation, which also was Franciscan (known in the U.S. as the Wheaton [Illinois] Franciscans): M. Brunilde Probst, The Burning Seak Mother Mary Clara Pfaender, 1827- 1882 (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1960). n The founding of the community is recounted in great detail in Vol. 1 of Josephine Marie Peplinski SSJ-TOSF, A Fitting Response: The History of the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Third Order of St. Francis (South Bend, Indiana: priv. pub., 1982, 1992); material here is taken specifically from Vol. 2, pp. ix, 49-50, 239 (italics in the original). Jaskulski was superior general for 1902-1908, 1918-1928, 1940-1942 (when she died); Rybicki was superior general for 1908-1918. Both were perpetually in leader-ship, either as head of the congregation or on its council, from its foun-dation until their deaths (Ryb!cki died in 1926); their lives, spiritualities, and contrasting administrations are described meticulously in chapters 1, 4, and 5 of Vol. 2. I also have written about the SSJ-TOSF story; see esp. "Sisterhood and Power" and "Cultural Conundrum" (see note 1). 12Judith Sutera OSB, True Daughters: Monastic Identity and American Benedictine Women's History (Atchison: priv. pub., 1987); M. Incarnata Girgen, Behind the Beginnings (St. Joseph, Minnesota: priv. pub., 1981); Ephrem Hollermann, The Reshaping of a Tradition: American Benedictine Women, 1852-1881 (Vv'inona: St. Mary's Press, 1994). ~3 Sutera, True Daughters, esp. chaps. 4-5 and pp. 38, 42, 53-56. 14 McCarthy, 1964 Guide, pp. 195-197. ,s Dorothy A. Vidulich, Peace Pays a Price: A Study of Margaret Anna Cusack, the Nun ofKenmare, 2nd ed. (Washington, D.C., priv. pub., 1990; orig. 1975); see also Irene Ffrench Edgar, Margaret Anna Cusack (Dublin: Women's Press, 1979); Margaret Anna Cusack, The Nun of Kenmare: An Autobiography (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1891). 16 The Monroe IHM story is told in fascinating detail throughout Building Sisterhood (see note 1, above); see, in particular, Marita-Constance Supan IHM, "Dangerous Memory: Mother M. Theresa Maxis Duchemin and the Michigan Congregation of the Sisters, IHM," pp. 31-67; Suzanne Fleming IHM, "She Who Remained: Mother Mary Joseph Walker and the 'Refounding' of the IHM Congregation," pp. 69-92; and Thompson, May-Jutte 1999 Thompson ¯ Cbarinn or Deep Story? "Concentric Circles," esp. pp. 5-8, and "Part l:The Context," pp. 25-28. L7 Fleming, "She Who Remained," p. 91; Margaret Brennan IHM, "'No Two Exactly Alike': IHM Spirituality," in Building Sisterhood, pp. 95-109; see also Rosalita Kelly IHM, No Greater Service: The History of the Congregation of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Monroe: priv. pub., 1948), esp. p. 132. L8 McCarthy, 1964 Guide, p. 325. ~9 The SSMO story is told with honesty in Wilfred P. Schoenberg SJ, These Valiant Women: History of the Sisters of St. Mary of Oregon, 1886- 1986 (Portland: priv. pub., 1986)~ I also have read Wilhelmina's diary in the SSMO archives, Beaverton, Oregon. Three of the original members of the Ohio group left it during the days in Wisconsin and became found-ing members in 1869 (one of them first superior when the group was of officially established) of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity in Manitowoc; see M, Teresita Kit~:ell OSF, Refining His Silver: Pioneer Days of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity, Manitowoc, Wisconsin, 1866- 1911 (Manitowoc: priv. pub., 1979). This, among other things, serves to document the length of time that the: schismatic "cult" was in existence before the SSMO's "founding" in 1886. 20 Bernard Lee SM, "A Socio-Historical Theology of Charism," Review for Religious 48, no. 1 (1989): 124-135; see also Doris Gottemoeller RSM, "Befriending the Wind," Review for Religious 53, no. 6 (1994): esp. p. 811. n See also Stephen Crites, "The Narrative Quality of Experience," Journal of the American Academy of Religion 39 (1971). Open Wounds Be bold, twin brother. Probe the wounds doubt demands to see. The gash is but entrance to his heart. Pry it wide to penetrate the core. Review for Religious Demand and desire, too, are twins that seek to let his hallowed, hollow hands transform old hurts to quiet awe. , ~Eugene Cartier ELIZABETH McDONOUGH The Need for Self-Criticism: Affirmative Comments I n the United States the precipitous decline in numbers of postolic women religious since Vatican Council II will surely have far-reaching consequences for all segments of the church as the third millennium begins. Church-related educational and healthcare institutions will probably continue to be transferred to nonecclesial and sometimes for-profit auspices, and many Catholics may grow up unaware that apostolic congregations of women reli-gious exist as ways of life that could have appealed to them. ~ Recently, in commenting on the years of renewal in religious life since Vatican II, Sister Doris Gottemoeller RSM noted that "for the most part we have not identified and reflected on the learnings" from this experience and that "critical reflection on our present reality" has been lacking.1 She is currently president of the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas, is a recent past president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), was a participant in the 1994 Synod on Consecrated Life, and is one of the original members of the Catholic Common Ground Initiative. Her comments may represent a pivotal change in perspective by someone in an influential leadership position. And, since critical self-appraisal has been neither prevalent nor popular among American women religious since Vatican II, her comments may also represent a significant change at this time. Elizabeth McDonough OP has written the Canonical Counsel column in this journal since our issue of July-August 1990 and has contributed several other articles as well. Her address is P.O. Box 29260; Washington, D.C. 20017. ,~'h~y-~une 1999 McDonougb * The Need for Self-Criticism Though voices of criticism have consistently been raised about the postconciliar renewal efforts of religious life--by members of the hierarchy, by diocesan and religious clergy, by lay people, and by sisters themselves--critical reflection from without or from within has frequently been openly excluded Or quietly ignored in many, and perhaps most, women's apostolic communities. Over the years, members of women's religious communities have, in both speech and writing, lodged various objections to the general direction the path of postconciliar change was taking, a path that people now see as leading to pos-sible demise. The objections made over the years concerned, among other matters, the tendency towards having women religious governed by groups or by intermediate administrative personnel rather than by specific individuals elected to particular offices; the steady move-ment towards (so-called) total-participation chapters, which fre-quently exclude actual participation for many sisters; the general abandonment of easily recognizable identity symbols, along with the failure to maintain various community practices that many found meaningful; the increased use of open placement regarding sisters' employment, with the concomitant results of expanded apostolic diversity, an inability of congregations to make or meet institutional commitments, and the lessening of opportunities for community living. But in many women's congregations such objec-tions have not been well received by leadership or by segments of the membership. Moreover, although explicit internal objections regarding prevalent renewal patterns seem to have diminished over the years and to be somewhat rare now, it seems that members who still wish to embrace a renewed but traditional form of religious life (and who may be in their sixties, seventies, or even eighties) now channel their efforts elsewhere because of their experience of func-tional or systematic exclusion from effecting changes in internal governance. Many now direct their energies to living the remain-ing years of their vowed life by witnessing simply to the values they have consistently embraced but felt circumstantially unable to practice during much of the course of renewal. That is, they now consciously seek opportunities to live in common, to share com-munity prayer, and to minister in an apostolate traditionally related to their charism. Meanwhile, younger members--that is, mem-bers mostly under fifty--have initiated regular intra- and inter- Review for Religious congregational gatherings and networking in search of mutual sup-port and deeper religious meaning. Regarding various community renewal policies and proce-dures, then, numbers of community members have voiced explicit criticism--and by their practice have made some implicit criticism unmistakably clear too. Beyond this criticism arising from within apostolic communities of women religious, critical assessments have come also from people outside these communities. These assess-ments have been met with a similar pattern of rejection. Comments that even border on being critical have been categorically discountenanced as arising variously from arrogant, intemperate, shallow, uninformed, traditionalist, or ignorant sources. Criticism from the hierarchy and diocesan clergy seems often to have been excluded because they are regarded as hopelessly embedded in patriarchy. Criticism from religious priests seems to have been judged unacceptable because they are con-sidered to be unduly influenced by their experience of clerical advantage. And criticism from lay people seems to have been readily rejected because many of them are viewed as harboring unrealistic expectations of a lifestyle in which they do not share. Indeed, a pattern of negative reaction to critical assessmentsof what has happened since Vatican II is evident in responses to a recent article concerning possible causes for the current dearth of religious vocations in some communi-ties) It often appears that only certain internal, ostensibly self-perpetuating authorities or select special-interest groups are judged as adequately expressing the renewa! process among women reli-gious. Any suggestion from any source that any viable religious life in the future might diverge from the direction envisioned by the prevailing progressive model seems to be all too readily con-sidered as patently reactionary, as categorically negative, as arro-gantly uninformed, as judgmentally ignoring women's unique lived Any suggestion from any source that any viable religious life in the future might diverge from the direction envisioned by the prevailing progressive model seems to be all too readily considered as patently reactionary. ;'~,lay-JuJle 1999 254 McDonough ¯ The Need for Self-Criticism experience, as unfairly critical, or as an emotionally immature attachment to a former way of life) Furthermore, as postconciliar renewal has continued, it is not only critical observations that have been shunned .by women reli-gious in this country. Significant research data and pointed rec-ommendations from comprehensi'be sociological studies have also been embraced only selectively and implemented only sporadi-cally. Results from the ongoing, multifaceted, and controversial "Sisters' Survey"--as formulated and conducted under the direc-tion of sociologist Marie Augusta Neal SNDdeN--were systemat-ically distributed to participating congregations, published in several books~ and regularly reported at national meetings of major superiors from 1967 through the late 1980s. In stark contrast, amazingly little attention has been given to the more recent findings of psychologists David Nygren CM and Miriam Ukeritis CgJ. These researchers surprised participants at a 1992 Chicago workshop when, in presenting data from their study on the Future of Religious Orders in the United States (abbreviated as FORUS), they announced that many religious communities in this country had only a "ten-year window" in which to alter the present course of decline if they wished to perdure many years into the third millennium. The conferences of major superiors (CMSM and LCWR) were directly involved in the planning and execution of the FORUS study, which rendered some startling results about reli-gious in the United States. Included in these discoveries were. a lack of role clarity among religious (especially in apostolic groups of women), a high degree of cultural assimilation by religious, a general ministerial invisibility of religious, a relative dearth of effec-tive leadership in most religious communities, an apparently less-ened inclination to sacrifice among religious, and a widespread loss of institutional commitments by religious congregations.4 More than half a decade has passed since Nygren and Ukeritis projected that there was only a "ten-year window" of opportunity for the viability of religious institutes in America. During this time the FORUS findings seem to have gone largely unheeded or to have been relegated to convenient oblivion. Could it be that this study was greeted with a less than enthusiastic response precisely because its findings were unpopular among the group being assessed? For, indeed, the FORUS results did not shower unbounded accolades on the postconciliar transformation of reli-gious life in America; did not unquestioningly advocate contin- Review for Religious ued pursuit of the progressive model of renewal, and did not offer unrestrained optimism for the future prospects of religious insti-tutes. Or could it be that the FORUS findings, perceived as being all too accurate, were simply too painful to accept and conse-quently were met with at least unconscious denial at individual and collective levels in most congregations, particularly those of women religious? Over the years, religious in several areas of expertise have also sounded calls for critical reassessment of current practices in light of the manifest patterns of continuing decline in religious institutes. These calls, too, seem largely unheeded. The historical and sociological analyses of Raymond Fitz SM and Lawrence Cada SM, which appeared in the mid 1970s, got little attention after several months of popular discussion. Their work said quite clearly that probably only a small fraction of the then extant communi-ties would successfully negotiate post- Vatican renewal efforts,s Might the brief notice that Fitz and Cada's anal-yses received.be due, at least in part, to their intimation that religious con-gregations over the centuries have had identifiable lifespans, that many con-gregations did not last long after a per-vasive experience of absolute doubt regarding purpose, and that this seemed to be precisely the situa-tion at that time for thousands of religious in America? In 1983 CARA (Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate) in Washington, D.C., published a translation of the 1972 land-mark monograph of Raymond Hostie SJ, Vie et mort des ordres religieux, on which the Fitz and Cada material was directly based.6 The introduction to this booklet, by historian Dolores Liptak RSM, explains its significance, its application to ~enewal among American religious and specifically women religious. But this, too, appears to have received only scant attention within women's communities in the United States. All through the early 1990s, Eleace King IHM, of CAR& pub-lished data about--and reasons for--the steady decline in voca- Religious in several areas of expertise have also sounded calls for critical reassessment of current practices in light of the manifest patterns of continuing decline in religious institutes. 255 May-,]une 1999 McDonougb * The Need for Self-Criticism tions to progressively oriented communities along with parallel data about the constant flow of vocations to traditional groups.7 Little note, however, has been taken of these results. At the beginning of this decade, David O'Connor ST offered a balanced and readable summary of the various cultura!, eccle-sial, theological, and ideological shifts that may be contributing to the (possible) disappearance of many religious institutes in this country; but his work is rarely cited or even referenced in reli-gious- life circles.8 In 1991 I myself published what the editor of America magazine referred to as a "trenchant critique" of the then prevailing trends in religious life, while the editor of First Things described it as "a first-rate analysis of what has gone awry in the many worlds of American religion."9 This analysis and critique received an overwhelming positive response from members of reli-gious communities around the world, but it was simultaneously greeted with resounding silence from those in leadership. Albert DiIanni SM has offered thoughtful considerations based on his experience of the renewal of religious life as it currently relates to religion, to modernity, to modern psychology, to com-munity, to decreasing vocations, and to certain laicizing trends in the post-Vatican II era; but his observations have been met with either studied unconcern or strident rejectionJ° And little heed has been paid to the recent, assessment of sociologist Patricia Wittberg SC that the future of most religious communities is severely limited--if not rather bleak---precisely because a coinci-dence of internal and external factors has resulted in a collapse of their ideological framework and a lessening or elimination of their functional supports.~ Regarding postconciliar religiousqife trans-formation, are only laudatory comments able to be perceived as having any meaning and value for communities of women reli-gious in America today? In many of these communities, a pattern of dismissing with studied disdain or even open derision any factual data that leads to disconcerting conclusions about their lives has been ill too evi-dent in the response to Ann Carey's recent book, a book (widely conceded to be well documented) that details decisions and actions taken in the decades since Vatican II within the conference of major superiors for women's institutes.~2 Note, hbwever, that Lora Ann Quifionez CDP and Mary Daniel Turner SNDdeN published a book earlier in the decade that traced precisely the same era of transi-tion and detailed most of the same topics, but from a different Review for Religious perspective and with less specific documentation.13 In contrast to Carey's work, the Quifionez-Turner book was well received and has been highly touted as an accurate portrait of renewal. Yet both books present renewal as deliberately intended and carefully planned. Both books address the influence of cultural context, the impa6t of the Sisters' Survey, the effect of feminist initiatives, the disruption from internal conference conflicts, the consequences of hierarchic confrontations, and other such topics in reference to postconciliar religious life. Both books name those who were instrumental in the renewal process at national and local levels in this country. And the authors of both books offer assessments of what has actually occurred. Could the disparity in recep-tion of these two works be due at least in part to the fact that the Quifionez- Turner book evaluates these happen-ings positively while the Carey book views the results as more than slightly wide of the mark envisioned by Perfectae caritatis? To be sure, journalist Carey is a laywoman who judged the evidence she amassed as anything but complimen-tary to the renewal process and those who directed it, and she called for critical reassessment of renewal results. On the other hand, Quifionez and Turner are women religious--both former executive secretaries of LCWR and both instrumental in effecting the postconciliar transformation--who judged the results thus far as entirely positive and urged further development along the same course of renewal. It is a truism of historical scholarship that those attempting an analysis of a set of events need a realistic broad familiarity with the historical context. But does this explain why the perspective on religious-life renewal presented by those who guided it should so readily be judged more accurate or more objective or more accept-able than the perspective of someone who has carefully pored over official documentation and verifiable data and has her own lived familiarity with post-Vatican II renewal? Could it be that negative assessments of religious-life renewal from whatever source are Could it be that negative assessments of religious-life renewal from whatever source are simply unacceptable to women religiousm for whatever reason ? 257 May-June 1999 McDonougb ¯ The Need for Self-Criticism t_g_ 1 simply unacceptable to women religious--for whatever reason? For an explanation of the present situation of decline and demise, are many women religious simply incapable of looking further than a speculatively fascinating and vaguely consoling convergence of sociological circumstances that impact religious life fr0m outside? Is none of the decline and demise of the past thirty-three years attributable to decisions made and actions taken within religious communities? Have dispersed ministries and secular attire (with lapel pins) and apartment living had absolutely no detrimental effect, whether expected or not? Are women religious able to look at none of the above? And, if so, why? Though the suggestion made ten years ago by sociologist Wittberg that the behavioral patterns among congregations of women religious might "actually be dysfunctional for organiza-tional survival" appears to have been effectively ignored, it may well identify a pertinent reality that needs to be at least acknowl-edged- if not directly addressed--by religious congregations of women today.14 And perhaps women religious would also do well to attend to the warning, offered in 1988 by psychologist Donna Markham OP, that the positive perception they had of themselves did not match the perception of others--something that did not bode well for vocations.~s Indeed, with rare exception, vocations have declined steadily throughout the decade since Markham's observation, and in most communities of apostolic women reli-gious the median age has gradually increased. " True enough, religious life is not merely a functional institu-tion, and it certainly ought not to be reduced to a numbers game. But is it unrealistic to suggest that a minimal number of members is needed for a community to perdure, to serve effectively, and to hand on a religious tradition? And, when women religious look over their shoulder for younger women walking in their footsteps and see no one there, is it really unfair to surmise that what they have been fashioning since Vatican II may not be a viable form of future religious life after all? Or, again, when congregations begin realistically to project that by the year 2010 fewer than ten percent of their members will be under sixty-five years of age, is it unduly critical to suggest that someone somewhere somehow may have made some decision(s) in the three-plus decades of post-Vatican II renewal that ought seriously to be reassessed and perhaps even altered? I think not. Review for Religious Indeed, on the part of women religious in America (and per-haps elsewhere in the world, too), some possibly difficult but gen-uinely constructive self-criticism and some corrective change of course in various aspects of postconciliar renewal ought to be hon-esdy welcomed.'6 And both may be long overdue, because the real-ity at issue has import far beyond the ever-dwindling numbers of ever-aging apostolic women religious themselves. Notes 1 Doris Gottemoeller, "Religious Life: Where Does It Fit in Today's Church?" in Review for Religious 57, no. 3 (March-April 1998): 146- 160. 2 Albert Dilanni, "A View of Religious Vocations," America 178, no. 6 (28 February 1998): 8-12. 3 See various responses to the Dilanni article (note 2 above) among letters to the editor in the March and early April issues of 1998. 4 David J. Nygren and Miriam D. Ukeritis, "The Religious Life Futures Project: Executive Summary," Review for Religious 52, no. 1 (January-February 1993): 6-55; also. Origins 22, no. 15 (24 September 1992): 257-272. s Lawrence Cada and Raymond Fitz, "The Recovery of Religious Life," Review for Religious 34, no. 5 (September-October 1975): 690-718. 6 Raymond Hostie, /,qe et mort des ordres religieux (Paris: Descl~e, 1972), translated for a limited English edition as The Life and Death of Religious Orders (Washington, D.C.: CAP, A, 1983). 7 See the CARA Formation Directory for Men and Women Religious (Washington, D.C.: CARA) as edited by Eleace King IHM for the years 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1994-1995. s David O'Connor, Witness and Service (New York: Paulist Press, 1990), pp. 145-162. 9 See, respectively, Elizabeth McDonough, "Beyond the Liberal Model: Quo Vadis?" Review for Religious 50, no. 3 (March-April 1991): 178-188; editorial in America for 13 July 1991; and "The Public Square," First Things, no. 17 (November 1991). ,0 Albert DiIanni, Religious Life as Adventure (New York: Alba House, 1994). " Patricia Wittberg, The Rise and Fall of Catholic Religious Orders (New York: SUNY Press, 1994). ,2 Ann Carey, Sisters in Crisis (Huntington, Indiana: Our Sunday Visitor, 1997). ,3 Lora Ann Quifionez and Mary Daniel Turner, The Transformation of American Catholic Sisters (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1992). ,4 Patricia Wittberg, "Outward Orientation in Declining 259 May-June 1999 McDonough ¯ The Need for Self-Criticism Organizations: Reflections on LCWR Documents," in Claiming Our Truth, ed. Nadine Foley (Washington, D.C.: LCWR, 1988), pp, 91-105. 15 Donna Markham, "The Decline of Vocations in the United States: Reflections from a Psychological Perspective," New Catholic World 231, no. 1381 (January-February 1988): 13-17. 16 See, for example, the recent comments of Doris Gottemoeller, "Religious Life in Crisis," Origins 28, no. 36 (25 February 1999): 634- 638. The Treasure Long ago a rainbow arc'd my storm-tossed sky, and the pot of gold I found then is still bottomless. Since that serendipitous moment, faith has claimed its reality. I see with clarity--over the clouds, beyond the rains--that joy and pain alike qualify to mine the treasure, provide the coin to buy the Kingdom, here on the green earth for a time, and there in the meadows of Eternity. Anna Marie Mack SSJ Review for Religious LARRY N. LORENZONI The Annuario Pontificio The Vatican's "Pontifical Yearbook" and a Recent Editorial Decision Fourteen years ago the Religious Life Review, edited in Dublin by Father Austin Flannery OP, published an arti-cle with the catchy title "The Single Sex Church of the Annuario Pontificio." Its opening paragraphs noted the almost total absence of women's names in the church's official directory. The same article was later reprinted in Sisters Today with a milder title: "The Annuario Pontificio and Women in the Church." The Annuario Pontificio is the 4.25"-by-6.5" 2500- page yearbook of the Roman Catholic Church. Bound in red cloth with a golden papal coat of arms on the cover, it contains annually updated information about the College of Cardinals, all archbishops and bishops (with basic facts about their respective dioceses), all prelates and abbots, the secretariat of state, the Roman tribunals, congregations, councils, and commissions, the Vatican Library, the church's worldwide diplomatic representa-tives (nuncios and pronuncios), all the ambassadors accredited to the Holy See, the administration of Vatican City, all officially approved religious orders of men and Larry N. Lorenzoni SDB, a Salesian priest, served in the late 1980s as director of the documentation, information, and press office of Caritas Internationalis in Rome. Currently director of development for his province, he may be addressed at Salesians of St. John Bosco; 1100 Franklin Street; San Francisco, California 94109. 1999 261 A former noteworthy feature of the Annuario was the almost total absence of females in its pages. 262 Lorenzoni ¯ Tlse Annuario Pontifido of women, academies, atheneums, pontifical universities (six: Gregoriana, Lateranense, Urbaniana, San Tommaso d'Aquino [Angelicum], Salesiana, and the new Santa Croce), a number of seminaries and colleges, and various other institutes and cultural organizations. The Annuario closes with a hundred pages of historical notes and six hundred pages of alphabetical lists: names of all the dio-ceses, prelatures~ and titular dioceses (in their Latin adjectival form, Latin noun form, and modern Roman-alphabet form) and the names and page references of some 25,000 persons. It is a fascinat-ing book. Of the 151 living cardinals listed in the 1997 Annuario (to cite a rather significant fact one can easily cull from its pages), 4 were created by Pope John xxIII, 31 by Paul vI, and 116 by Pope John Paul II. A former noteworthy feature of the Annuario--it used to distinguish it from virtually eve .ry other directory in the world--was the almost total absence of females in its pages. The alpha-betical list at the end of the directory was conse-quently 99.99 percent male. Historical, doctrinal, and traditional considerations are essential for a proper understanding of this situation. One page from the 1985 article (in RLR) found its way to the Vatican underground and quickly became the subject of some interesting conversa-tions during my four years (1986-1990) at Caritas Internationalis, the church's worldwide charity wing. In the penthouses of Palazzo San Callisto, where the Caritas offices are located (near Santa Maria in Trastevere), lived a number of active and retired cardinals (Roger Etchegaray, Bernardin Gantin, Paul Poupard, Ferdinando Antonelli, Francesco Carpino, and Francis Arinze). I came to know best Cardinal Francis Arinze, from Nigeria, the genial president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. Occasionally I see him mentioned among the papabili and featured as a speaker on Mother Angelica's EWTN television programs. He is keenly intelligent and friendly, a good listener, articulate and ever an opti-mist. Open to new ideas, he weighs carefully all arguments against the truths of the faith and then follows them courageously t6 their logical conclusions. I remember in particular one conversation I had with him at Review for Religious Palazzo San Callisto, a conversation occasioned by some para-graphs from that December 1985 article (of mine) in RLR, which some friend had shared with him. The paragraphs are these: One glaring lacuna [in the Annuario Pontificio] is hard to understand, and even harder to accept, because of the anger it is likely to provoke today when everyone is being increas-ingly sensitized against all kinds of discrimination. I am refer-ring to the omission of the names of the superiors general of women religious where the individual congregations are listed with the address of the generalate and current information as to the number of foundations and of professed members. .This anomaly came to my attention when I needed to check the spelling of the name of the new mother general of our Salesian sisters. I had just looked up the name of the superior general of the Fathers of Mercy (whose ad I had seen in The Wanderer), so I turned instinctively to the Annuario for the answer to my question. It was not as sim-ple as I thought. For every male congregation, the name of the superior general is invariably given (and, in 99 percent of the cases, also that of the procurator general). One learns, for instance, that the Very Rev. John O'Brien is the superior general of the Fathers of Mercy (an order founded in 1808), even though the order has only seven members worldwide. Fifty-four religious orders of men have less than I00 pro-fessed members, seven have 25 or fewer, but in each case the name of the general is prominently displayed. I was chagrined to discover that in the case of the orders and congregations of women one looks in vain in the Annuario for the names of the mothers general. Some 120 of those congregations have a membership of over 1000 sis-ters. In vain did I look for the name of the superior general of the Salesian sisters, even though the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, as they are officially known, have a worldwide membership of nearly 18,000. They are the sec-ond largest congregation of women in the church, after the 34,000 Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul. Such a discriminatory omission tends to reinforce all the worst stereotypes one hears about the institutional church and its treatment of women, since it conveys a number of admittedly unintentional but nonetheless inescapable mes-sages: (1) Women are of little consequence in the church. (2) The father superior of ten men is more important than the mother superior of I0,000 women. (3) Names of females, no matter how important, need not be listed in the Annuario because the church does not discuss matters of consequence with them anyway. (4)Male religious superiors are routinely consulted, and hence it is necessary to have their names listed May-June 199.9 Lorenzoni ¯ The AnnuarioPontificio in the Annuario, but listing the flames of the superiors gen-eral of women does not serve any useful purpose since very rarely does one need to know who they are and even less deal or correspond with them. (5) Sisters are supposed to accept obediently and without too many questions whatever Holy Mother Church says. Unfortunately, in the thinking of many, Holy Mother Church is often equated with male power structure. No dissenting voice was heard from those who had joined our conversation. Both retired Cardinal Francesco Carpino (a man of rare nobility, who died 5 October 1993) and Cardinal Francis Arinze agreed that the Annuario should at long last join the mod-ern age and list the names of women religious superiors alongside those of their male counterparts. But Rome moves slowly. The 16 December 1994 issue of Commonweal carried this item under its Et Cetera rubric: Speaking in support of requests by women's religious orders for an end to discrimination by the church against women, Archbishop Maurice Couture of Quebec pointed to the 1993 Vatican Yearbook (Annuario Pontificio); it lists the names of the superiors general of all institutes of men, but none of the names of the superiors general of women (Origins, November 3). Good for the archbishop, but he's ten years late. Writing in Religious Life Review for November-December 1985, our correspondent Larry Lorenzoni SDB [Correspondence, November 18] recalled turning to the Annuario to find the name of the superior general of the Fathers of Mercy, an order founded in 1808 which has seven members worldwide. The name was there: the Very Rev. John O'Brien. He also looked for the name of the superior general of the Salesian sisters, the second largest congregation of women in the church: nearly 18,000 members. No name. Some of the mes-sages conveyed (Father Lorenzoni, a kind man, says they are "admittedly unintentional but nonetheless inescapable"): "Women are of little consequence in the church; the father superior of ten men is more important than the mother supe-rior of 10,000 women; there's no point in publishing the names of women superiors because who needs to know them." I have before me the 1997 edition of the Annuario Pontificio. I see with some personal satisfaction that each religious congrega-tion of women now routinely carries, as an additional entry, the name of the mother general. The change can safely be labeled "routine" since it started with the Annuario's 1996 edition. Review for Religious No doubt, some gentle nudging by a few highly placed mem-bers of the College of Cardinals, as well as by bishops convinced that the previous practice was clearly discriminatory, helped level the field. Word eventually reached the offices of the Vatican sec-retariat of state, on which the Annuario Pontificio depends, and suitable action followed with the publication of the 1996 edition. A recent phone call to the secretariat of state enabled me to reach Angela Zanetti, a most personable and knowlegeable lady who was for twenty-six years connected with the production of the Annuario. Her new supervisor, Monsignore Fermenti, intro-duced her to me as a "walking encyclopedia on the history of the Annuario Pontificio." Here are some interesting facts from our con-versation: ¯ The first list of male religious orders (Istituti Mascbili) appeared in the 1838 edition of the Annuario. ¯ The first list of female religious orders (Istituti Femminih) appeared 98 years later, in the 1940 edition, without the name of the mother general. ¯ The two lists continued to be published (Ordini Mascbili first, Ordini Femminili second) in the years following, each order of men shouting prominently the name of the general, each order of women lacking that particular information. * At last, in the 1996 edition, for the very first time, the information concerning each religious order of women included also the name of the mother general, as had previously been done for even the smallest reli-gious orders of men. I am reminded of what Pat Paulsen, the late tongue-in-cheek presidential candidatei once said with his usual aplomb: "No one should be denied equal rights because of the shape of their skin." Subs'criptions to Review for Religious can flow b~ ordered,or renewedoby FAX; and paid forby Ma~terCard ~o'r Visd. FA~ the order form inside the back cover, or cALL our o~c~ ~wi~ "th your credit card number: IF~: 31z~-977~7362 0, ~'HONE: 314-977-7363 1999 JOAN A. RANGE Women and Canon Law Cbanon law, as a support for the life of the community of elievers, that is, the church, has a history almost as old as the community itself. Over the centuries, its formulation has not been the work of women, a fact that is readily understandable. Women did not have the status nor society the liberality for that kind of contribution. Women were, however, a vital part of the church and society: in the church as members of the various ordines that supported the living community and in society as wives and mothers2 History witnesses to this fact and those roles. Women's lives, moreover, were guided by the protection, pre-scriptions, and sanctiohs of the church's law. In church courts of the ¯ Middle Ages, women were parties to suits brought against alleged violations and also were sued for alleged violations of others' rights. The activity of women in the world of canon law is well attested to in the church's history.2 But as members who formulated the law or who addressed the church's courts (defending others or doing advocate work for oth-ers) or judged cases (even as collegiate judges), all this women never did until this century. In this century women have performed all these functions in their own right as members of the church and as canon lawyers. The future is clear for their continued func-tioning to be even more vigorous. This rather astonishing fact needs consideration. Given the absence of women in all these roles before this century, how did this change come about? Joan A. Range ASC is associate professor in the Department of Theological Studies at Saint Loui~ University. Her address is Humanities Bui_lding; 3800 Lindell Boulevard; St. Louis, Missouri 63108. Review for Relig4ous Women's Status in Canon Law ~ Before this century, as a rule women's status was that of persons limited before the law. Mostly, women were considered--as were minors and the mentally incompetent--unable in their own person and name to bring a case before the court. This reflected Roman law, from which much of canon law is derived. When, however, asso-ciations of women became moral persons with rights and duties in the law, they were able to bring cases to court, as history shows. Besides bringing cases to the church's tribunals when their rights were being infringed or violated, women were also sued by others if the petitioner felt that his own rights were being infringed or violated by women. This was often a matter of property rights. As time progressed it might also be a matter of marriage rights as well, especially when it concerned the legitimacy of children and their right to inherit. Other than these cases, however, women's presence in~ the laws themselves usually had to do with their status within the church and society, that is, as daughters, wives, moth-ers, widows, nuns, or women of ill repute. Beginning early in the church's history, the protection of wid-ows and orphans was a great concern since these groups were socially the most vulnerable. As time passed and Roman law found its way into the church's mentality, other laws concerning women were developed to protect the virgin from marriage if she resisted, from abduction and rape, and later as a member of a community of consecrated women) Most of the legislation had to do with the women as wives and mothers, however, and especially with their ability to bear children. Laws agains.t adultery, contraception, and abortion were the most prominent since they infringed upon the husband's potency, paternity, or virility.4 Apart from these matters, women as individual persons were not dealt with in the church's laws. The 1917 Code did not always treat women equally with men, as studies testify.5 The 1983 Code, in contrast, states that the "there exists among all the Christian faithful a true equality with regard to dignity and the activity whereby all cooperate in the building up of the Body of Christ in accord with each one's own condition and function.''6 The excep-tion to this is when the nature of the case clearly indicates other-wise, such as the laws having to do with ordination.7 Women began to engage themselves in the activities of the Canon Law Society of America (CLSA) since about the middle of this century. It is that story upon which we now focus. May-June 1999 ,267 Range * Women and Canon Law Women and the Canon Law Society of America The pivotal event for the growth in female membership in the CLSA was the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965).8 Before that event there were clear hints that the status of women in the world and in the church needed to be addressed.9 The council documents, too, indicated those concerns,l° In the United States, women's professional involvement in canon law began in the mid 1960s. Clara Marie Henning, the first woman to become a member of CLSA, applied for membership in 1968. She was then a student in the School of Canon Law at the Catholic University of America, from which she later received the licentiate in canon law (JCL). Other women were members of the CLSA, but their reason for membership was their position as supe-riors of religious orders, not their status as canon lawyers. Even before Vatican II, beginning with Pope Pius XrlI, efforts had been made by the church to bring about a simplification and an updating within the various orders and congregations of women religious worldwide.~ This was a remote cause for interest in canonical matters and membership in the CLSA. After the documents of the council and the implementation decrees of Pope Paul vI had been issued, there was a need and desire to learn about canon law and its usefulness in the efforts of religious congregations toward adaptation and renewal. These efforts had a significant effect on the work during the 1970s toward formulating the new and revised Code. Initially, then, the impetus for women to become members of the CLSA was that congregations of women religious might derive more benefit from canon law. Another reason for women to begin studying canon law and to become members of the CLSA was an academic one. As Catholic universities opened graduate programs in theology for lay people, some women students became interested in pursuing degrees in canon law. This interest included both the relation of canon law to theology and the historical development of canon law. The membership records of the CLSA are limited in a number of ways. For many year~ the records were the responsibility of the coordinator and were not kept in a permanent office. It was only in 1980 that a full-time director and staff began to have an office (with a permanent place for records)at the Catholic University of America. The records up to 1979 were given to the Cushwa Center for .the Study of American Catholicism and are available there as archival records. The membership records are incom- Review for Religious plete, however, because they were not systematically kept, a not uncommon omission when an organization's importance is not understood in its early days22 Nevertheless, the records show a remarkable growth in female membership after the mid 1960s. In 1968 there were hardly five women members. In 1971 the first woman was elected to national office in the CLSA.13 This event witnessed to a movement within the society to include women as active members. In 1976 there were 38 women members; by 1984 there were 139. The 1990 directory lists almost 200 women members.~4 At' the time of the 1996 direc-tory, the female membership stood at 223 out of a total of 1557 members, or about 14 percent. The history of the growth of the membership of women in the CLSA is part of the growth of la~Yomember-ship. Already in1,37 the CLSA's committee on membership was concerned with appropriate criteria. The concern was not specif-ically about women, but about qualifications that would assure that interested persons, lay or clerical, would have knowledge about the science of canon law. Before this point a potential mem-ber was sponsored by a current member and his name given to the committee on membership for its approval before being voted on by all those gathered at the national convention. That this rather cumbersome way of enrolling new members needed to be revised was a common opinion at the time. Thomas J. Lynch,~5 chair of the committee on membership, wrote in a report to the board of governors that, in the proposed revision of the constitutions (1967), the CLSA will "rid our con-stitution of any unnecessary clericalism and will also insure that the active and voting membership of the society will be composed of persons whose professional qualifications give them a special com-petence in matters of renewal and revision of law." ,6 As executive secretary, after receiving increased correspon-dence from many interested parties, James Provost laid his con-cerns about qualifications for membership before the board of Initially, the impetus for women to become members of the CLSA was that congregations of women religious might derive more benefit from canon law. Mt{y-June 1999 Range ¯ l, Vomen and Canon Law governors.'7 In 1980 a constitutional amendment was finalized requiring a person to have a degree in canon law in order to be an active member. Others could be associate members, but without the right to vote at the conventions.~s In 1995 a survey was distributed to women members at the annual convention held in conjunction with the Canadian Canon Law Society in Montreal. Its purpose was to discover the experi-ence of women as members of the CLSA. One hundred three responses were returned, with seventeen women indicating asso-ciate membership, the rest active membership. The responses demonstrated a positive experience within the society; there were a few exceptions, but even they did not indicate major difficulties. One commented that the CLSA was "one of the best kept secrets of the American Church." A tone must have been set many years ago, another respondent speculated, to be inclusive of women.19 Although there is no documentation of a policy decision that ver-ifies that statement, the facts sifice 1968 attest to its reality. The inclusion of women on committees, their election to national posi-tions as officers and consultors, and their presentations at plenary sessions and seminars during regional and national conventions-- all this has been remarkable over the last thirty years. Already in 1971 a woman was a member of the religious-affairs committee; in 1972 a woman was on the legal-council committee as well.2° Twice women have been elected vice-president/presi-dent- elect and have assumed the full responsibility of that office. This office is a challenging one for its incumbent, whether male or female, and certainly for a nonordained female. In addition to chairing the board of governors, the president's responsibilities include communications with the hierarchy of the United States, with the various dicasteries of the Vatican, with the canon-law societies of other countries, and with the members of various dioce-san offices throughout the country. The leadership of the society is challenging internally also, since most of the members are still clerics, including bishops, archbi.shops, and cardinals. Besides the increased membership of women in the society and their activity within it, the agendas of the CLSA have been modified because of the interests of the women members and the" commitment of the leadership and membership to women's issues. Already in 1970, at the national convention in New Orleans, a resolution was passed that stated: "The Canon Law Society of America instructs the subcommittee of its task force on the revi- Review for Religious sion of the Code of Canon Law to study the canonical institutions concerning the dignity, freedom, rights, privileges, offices, and obligations of women in the church and to propose those changes necessary to ensure the equitable consideration of all persons regardless of sex by the law of the church.''2~ In 1973 the society cosponsored with the Adrian Dominican Sisters a meeting of canonists and theologians at their college, Siena Heights, to address the question of the ordination of women from a variety of per-spectives?~ In 1972 the board of governors established an ad hoc com-mittee on the status of women in the church; it became a regular committee in 1973.23 At the conven-tion of 1975, Margaret Brennan IHM presented a major address titled "Standing in Experience: A Reflection on the Status of Women in the church." In 1976 a symposium was held at Rosemont College in Pennsylvania on Women and Church Law; in view of the revision going on at the time, it studied how the law addresses women. It published a con-sensus paper, signed by the twenty-four participants, with sug-gestions concerning how the church in the United States might address some of the inequities from which women suffered.24 In 1987 the members of the committee on women raised the question of its future viability. Even though it regularly invited the society's membership to present it with significant issues, the committee had little business to deal with, This was the reason for the eventual elimination of this committee. Its concerns were taken up by a new committee on the laity in the church?5 From 1988 on, some members of the CLSA were involved with the canon-ical dimensions of the U.S. bishops' Letter on Women that was eventually published in 1990.26 A resolution was taken by the society in 1992 to study the question of the diaconate for women. In 1995 the report by the ad hoc committee, "The Canonical Implications of Ordaining Women to the Permanent Diaconate," was presented to the national con-vention and accepted by the membership.27 This document received a wide distribution to other professional societies and to the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB). A resolution was taken by the society in 1992 to study the question of the diaconate for women. 271 May-.Tune 1999 Range ¯ Women and Canon Law With the promulgation of Pope John Paul II's apostolic let-ter Ordinatio sacerdotalis stating that the church has no authority to ordain women, the activity of the society on some of these issues perforce ceased, and no new initiatives on this issue have been forthcoming. Some study is being done on the question of the laity sharing in the power of jurisdiction, obviously an important issue, for .lay people function more and more in various offices in the church, It remains to be seen, however, if gender-specific issues will continue to inform the society's agenda. Participation in the annual conventions also reflects the change in the presence of women. In 1967 there were no women at the national convention. In 1968 the female participants were superi-ors of religious orders. In 1969-1970 some women religious were present as well as some major superiors.2s In 1971 there were 9 women registered at the convention in Atlanta, out of 224 partic-ipants. As more and more women begame members of the CLSA, more and more of them have attended both the regional and national conventions.29 In the women's responses to the question-naire mentioned above, they noted the quality of exchange at both regional and national conventions. They are a continuing educa-tional experience for the female membership, as they are for oth-ers who attend these meetings. 272 Women's Education in Canon Law It is clear that many of the women members of the CLSA are active members with degrees in canon law. The obtaining of these degrees is a completely novel achievement in the history of women and canon law. In North America there are two schools from which a woman can receive a degree in canon law: the Catholic University of American in Washington, D.C., and St. Paul University in Ottawa. Most U.S. women have chosen one of these two schools for their canonical education. Among the European schools, most women have chosen the Angelicum, which teaches courses in English, and a few the Gregorian, which until onl~ recently taught its courses in Latin. In 1990 John E. Lynch CSP published an interesting and infor-mative article about the history of the Department of Canon Law at the Catholic University of America, "Laying Down the (Canon) Law at Catholic University.m° The occasion for the article was the centenary of Catholic University. In it he remarked that in Review Jbr Religious 1959 women were enrolling in canon law in Rome.3' That had not yet occurred in North America and not at Catholic University, but it would occur in 1967. The first woman to enroll was Clara Marie Henning, a native of Germany. After that, the numbers of women students increased gradually and now have remained con-stant for some time. The first women students, except for Ms. Henning, were women religious.32 The topics of their theses and dissertations represented the concerns of women in the early 1970s, after the close of the council: religious formation, authority, the LCWR, the legal status of women, the pastoral nature of canon law.3~ Besides this continued interest in the concerns of women religious, later tides indicate an interest in the position of lay people in the church: for example, participation in the munus sanctificandi, and ministry and the layperson.34 Still later tides indicate a broadening of inter-est: for example, the relation of canon law to civil law, and the relation of bishops to diocesan church institutions. Licentiate (JCL) theses usually presaged what those who con-tinued on to the doctorate in canon law (JCD) would write their dis-sertations about. Many of the topics arose from the first draft of the soon-to-be-revised Code: lay employees, rights and obligations of Christian parents, tribunal personnel. Also, a number of theses compared the historic 1983 revision with the 1917 Code. When women first entered Catholic University's Department of Canon Law as students, it could be presumed that they would make a difference in the classroom. After the early wave (women religious, all but one), a number Of lay women as well (and men, too) entered the ranks of students. To assess this presumption of difference, I seized an opportunity to interview the faculty of the department in December 1996: Father James Provost (chair), Father John E. Lynch CSP, Father Thomas Green, Father Edward Pfnausch, Sister Rose McDermott ssJ, and Father John Beal.3s Their reflections on the difference women make are interesting and substantiate what I consider an exceedingly important dimen-sion of women's contribution to canon law, that is, women's human-izing effect. Every one of the faculty indicated that the presence of women made the conversation within the class richer; the questions they asked and their observations were different from the ques-tions of the traditional clerical students.36 At first the women stu-dents did not know some of the vocabulary (nor did entering laymen). One of the faculty recalls mentioning the title "vicar May-ffune 1999 273 Range ¯ Women and Canon Law forane," a term completely unfamiliar to the women. But, when this and other technical phrases were learned, the difficulty was sur-mounted. Women and men, according to ~he faculty members inter-viewed, are equally intelligent. A number of them indicated that women seem to work harder, perhaps to catch up with the clerics because of the unfamiliar discourse, perhaps because of a greater personal commitment to learning the field. By and large women are eager students and indicate an appreciation for the dedication of their ifistructors. They suffered from some rather mediocre teaching, but the men suffered from them equally with the women.37 No resentment toward women students precisely because of their gender, however, seems to have marred their educational experience, Women have been elected to leadership within the student body and have functioned well in those positions. They quickly initiated social events that, rich in student exchange, aided schol, arly interests along with providing amiable relaxation. The male students in those same positions of leadership had not been as cre-ative in these important social dimensions of student life. The mission of the faculty in this department derives from their conviction that canon law is g/tided by its theological and pastoral nature. This conviction permeates the curriculum and challenges the students to understand it as an ecclesial discipline, a sister to scriptural, systematic, moral, and church-history stud-ies and influenced by the conclusi6ns of those studies, even as canon law has an influence on them. This understanding of the nature of canon law informs the entire curriculum and therefore shapes the intellectual formation of the students for their future careers as canon lawyers. In my discussions with the faculty, the question arose about the influence of feminism on canon law. In general, the faculty agreed that the agenda of feminism, as various as it is, does not signifi-cantly influence either the students or the classes. Earlier on, given especially the newness of women to the field, the place of women in the 1917 Code, and the questions about women's place in the revised Code, women's'issues had more sig-nificance than they currently have. At that time (through the 1970s) some of the female students manifested some anger due to these issues. Today, however, the nature of law seems to move the direc-tion of the students' questions and concerns much more than gen-der issues do. The women students are not angry, nor are their Review for Religious instructors. Rather, they are typical students focused on complet-ing their studies and finding positions that fulfill their educational goals. The question of secure employment in the church, with its attendant concerns, is more of an issue with them, women and lay men alike, than gender issues. However, as justice issues, gender concerns remain for both instructors and students, now usually subsumed in the issues of the role of the layperson in the church. Women's Involvement in. Writing Canon Law Perhaps the most original activity that women have engaged in regarding canon law is the actual writing of legislation intended to be incorporated within the revised Code of Canon Law. Whether or not the canons made their way into the final text of the 1983 Code is not the point here. Rather, it is the activity itself, utterly newin the history of the church as far as I have been able to determine. How did this creative effort on the part of women begin? Sister M. Luke Tobin SL, president of the CMSW from 1964 to 1967, was invited in 1964 to be an official observer at the Vatican Council during the 1964 and 1965 sessions. This invitation itself indicated that the council fathers wanted the participation of women in the process of developing the church's self-understand-ing in the modern world?8 The law of the church, canon law, needed to express this new self-understanding ,as well. In the United States, women religious felt that their experience of their own lives as women religious was an important contribution towards an appropriately revised Code of Canon Law. This activ-ity would engage many of the members of the CMSW during the late 1960s and the 1970s. The board of CMSW began in 1965 to consider writing the regulations for ~governing the lives of women religious in the Code of Canon Law)9 It initiated a project for accomplishing this. Committees were formed in the several regions to write proposed canons dealing with the various aspects of religious life: the vows, authority, community life, formation, apostolate, prayer, and so forth. At the annual conventions of the CMSW from 1967 to 1971, the committees gave reports about the progress of their work. Eventually the conference published a document containing the proposed norms. It received a wide distribution in this country May-June 1999 275 276 Range ¯ Women and Canon Law and abroad, going to all the religious congregations and to the bishops.4° As this endeavor continued, the confidence of the women grew; they recognized the possibilities of the project. Moreover, they sought assistance from canonical experts to assist them in this unique activity. The CLSA was instrumental in assisting the various committees in this endeavor. Father Paul Boyle CP, a canon lawyer, was out-standing in his leadership in this area for women religious.4' Already as president of CLSA, he had communicated his vision of including women in the revision process. Later, as executive sec-retary, he increased his activity along this line. The recognition by the canonists of women's lack of education in canon law led to the establishment of summer institutes for a number of them. Certificates were earned and credit gained for these educa-tional endeavors. Father Kevin O'Rourke OP assumed the respon-sibility for these institutes by sponsoring them, developing them, enlisting the faculty for them, and negotiating their locations. They were held in different Catholic colleges in the country. A number of the graduates of these programs later completed their education in canon law at pontifical schools of canon law. Besides this educational assistance, the CLSA, following Paul VI's Ecdesiae sanctae (1966) implementing the conciliar document Perfectae caritatis, developed institutes to assist women religious in managing the process of renewal in their congregations. Pope Paul's decree instructed communities to hold general chapters to write their constitutions and to somehow engage the entire con-gregation in that effort. Experimentation, too, was mandated. Experimentation and writing canonical documents were some-thing for which most religious communities needed assistance. These endeavors of the CLSA were empowering experiences for the women and their religious communities. Hitherto the women were by and large ignorant of canon law and canonical procedures. They were, however, well-educated, intelligent, competent leaders within their religious congregations and deeply committed to the renewal that the church had mandated. The assistance of the CLSA empowered them and many other women in their congregations. Enthusiasm to recover the origins of their congregations, to learn about the remarkable women who had founded them, to encounter the Word of God through a knowledge of the Scriptures, and to assess the needs of the world through a study of the "signs of the times" generated an enormous energy within these communities.42 Review for Religious The results of this monumental effort have not yet been com-pletely assessed. Many studies today record it, some positively, other negatively, but it is still too close chronologically for it to be judged adequately.43 The energy, however, remains within reli-gious communities, smaller and older though they may be. Initiatives in forming new kinds of religious communities con-tinue in the church as well.** The renewal enterprise conducted among the CMSW, the reli-gious communities, and the CLSA is one of the finest stories to come out of the post-Vatican II Church. It included not only these organizations, but also the hierar-chy of the United States. There was an extraordinarydemonstra-tion of mutual encouragement and support among these diverse orga-nizations regarding the revision of the Code of Canon Law. The pos-sibility of participating together in the revision of the canons that governed the life of women reli-gious was realized through this " effort. The Conference of Major Superiors of Men (CMSM) was obviously interested in the same endeavor.4s The Canon Law Society of America responded to the announcement by Pope John XXIII as professional canon lawyers whose expertise was not sim-ply in the practice of law, but in developing it through the proposed revision process.46 These three organizations joined in this endeavor with an unusual demonstration of cooperation. Besides these, the bishops' conference in the United States became the conduit through which the efforts of the organiza-tions were channeled to the Pontifi(al Commission for the Revision of Canon Law, whose responsibility it was to finally formulate the revision. Communication among these organizations was full of enthusiasm and respect. There was no hint of competitiveness, no turf war, no condescension toward women, who were at that time uneducated as canon lawyers. What was desired from the women was the expression of their experience of their own lives and their reflection upon that experience. The mutuality of this common endeavor is one of the finest examples of how women and men can work together to accom- Experimentation and writing canonical documents were something for which most religious communities needed assistance. 277 May-.~une 1.o99 Range * Women and Canon Law plish something for the benefit of all. As the process of revision continued, difficulties emerged, of course. When the canonical text, the Code itself, and the communities' constitutions were finalized and promulgated, the energy that had informed the orig-inal process waned. The vitality of experimentation, of developing powerful and inspiring texts, of consulting all the members of communities in that effort, of creating a vocabulary that resonated with the language of the documents of Vatican II and with the pat-rimony of individual communities--all this vitality wound down as perhaps it inevitably had to after final, authoritative texts were promulgated. As rdigious communities developed their constitutions during these years, their experience shaped their identifies in a remarkable way. The expressions within many of these constitutions were utterly original as documents for identifying and regulating the lives of women religious. In the process of havin~ their constitu-tions reviewed, both the Congregation. for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life and the individ-ual congregations had much to learn. Although by now most of the problems have been resolved, there are still some communities that do not have their constitutions approved. This phenomenon bears the marks of the encounter between creative initiatives, orig-inal expressions of religious life, and traditional modes of canon-ical expression. The Code defines the constitutions of religious communities as' their particular law. The universal law within the Code presents the guidelines for the constitutions, but does not provide their content. Nevertheless,.the originality of many of these documents from religious communities presented new difficulties for both the congregations themselves and the Vatican officials, who had never seen such documents before. This encounter has been very instructive for all the institutions involved. With the promulgation of the revised Code of Canon Law in 1983 and with the finalization of their constitutions, women are no longer engaged in writing the law that regulates their lives. Periodically constitutions need to be resubmitted to the church for approval. Calls for change and for dispensations are part of the regular communication between the Vatican and women's con-gregations. But creativity and initiatives no longer inform the legal expressions of women religious. Extraordinary documents, though, still emerge from congregational meetings addressing the issues Review Jbr Religio~ts that women religious face at the end of the second millennium. How these documents influence the legally binding texts remains a question for the future. Past, Present, and Future This article has investigated the extraordinary entrance of women into a

Issue 34.4 of the Review for Religious, 1975. ; Review ]or Religious is edited by faculty members of the School of Divinity of St. Louis University, the editorial offices being located at 612 Humboldt Building: 539 North Grand Boulevard: St. Lot, is, Missouri 63103. It is owned by the Missouri Province Educational Institute; St. Louis, Missouri. Published bimonthly and copy-right @ 1975 by Review [or Religious. Composed, printed, and manufactured in U.S.A; Second class postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri. Single copies: $1.75. Sub-scription U.S.A. and Canada: $6.00 a year; $11.00 for two years; other countries, $7.00 a year, $13.00 for two years. Orders should indicate whether they are for new or renewal subscriptions and should be accompanied by check or money order payable to Review ]or Religious in U.S.A. currency only. Pay no money to persons claiming to represent Review ]or Religious. Change of address requests should include former address. Daniel F. X. Meenan, S.J. Everett A. Diederich, S.J. Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. Editor Associate Editor Questions and Answers Editor July 1975 Volume 34 Number 4 Renewals, new subscriptions, and changes of address should be sent to Review for Religious; P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, Minnesota 55802. Correspondence with the editor and the associate editor together with manuscripts and books for review should be sent to Review for Religious; 612 Humbuldt Building; 539 North Grand Boulevard; St. Louis, Missouri 63103. Questions for answering should be sent to Joseph F. Gallen, S.J.; St. Joseph's College; City Avenue at 54th Street; Philadelphia, Pennsyl-vania 19131. Women Priests and the Episcopal Church Leonel L. Mitchell Leonel L. Mitchell, whose most. recent publication is: Liturgical Change: How Much Do We Need? (Crossroad Books, 1975), is an Episcopal priest and Assistant Professor, Department of Theology; University of Notre Dame; Notre Dame, IN 46556. It is the intention of this paper to treat the topic of the ordination of women quite narrowly. It will not deal with the general question of the biblical, historical, and theological considerations involved in the ordination of women to the priesthood, but will attempt the more modest task of reporting the con-temporary debate as it exists in the Episcopal Church. This debate has two related but distinct foci: (1) the desirability of amending the canon law of the Episcopal Church so as to permit the ordination of women to the priesthood, and (2) the "ordination" last year of 11 women to the priesthood by three bishops without diocesan jurisdiction in violation of the presently existing canons. There are many in the Episcopal Church who strongly favor the or-dination of women, but condemn the action th~it was taken in Philadelphia on July 29, 1974. ". The 1973 Canterbury Statement of the Anglican-Roman Catholic Inter-naiional Commission ( A R CI C ) entitled "Ministry and Ordination" detailed in 16 headings a common statement of Anglica.n and Roman Catholic understand-ing of the meaning of "ordination in the apostolic succession." A few quotations from this statement should make clear what ministry it is to which women seek ordination in the Episcopal Church, and why this debate is of con-cern to Roman Catholics: Despite the fact that in the New Testament minisiers are never called 'priests' (hiereis), Christians came to see the priestly role of Christ reflected in these ministers and used priestly terms in describing them . Not only do [Christian ministers] share through baptism in the priesthood of the people of God, but they are--particularly in presiding at 51~. / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/4 the Eucharist--representative of the whole Church in the fulfillment of its priestly voca-tion of self-offering to God as a living sacrifice (Rom 12:1) Nevertheless their ministry is not an extension of the common Christian priesthood but belongs to another realm of the gifts of the Spirit. (Par. 13) Ordination denotes entry into this apostolic and God-given ministry, which serves and signifies the unity of the local churches in themselves and with one another. Every in-dividual act of ordination is therefore an expression of the continuing apostolicity and catholicity of the whole Church. (Par. 14) What is involved, then, in the Anglican discussion is not whether women are full members of the Body of Christ and share in the priesthood of the Church, nor is the question one of their suitability to serve as Christian ministers. Women can and do serve in non-sacerdotal ministries in the Episcopal Church. The question is solely whether women can (not should) be ordained to the ministerial priesthood and serve as presidents of the Eucharistic assembly. I do not believe that arguments based on the inexpediency of ordaining women deserve serious consideration. It will always be inexpedient to do something we do not wish to see done. If women can be priests, then what but masculine prejudice prevents them from being so ordained? The question then turns on the hinge of "Are women proper subjects for the sacrament of priestly ordination?" Anglicans do not usually formulate the question in this way, but it is what they mean. Unlike the Roman Catholic Church, the Episcopal Church permits the or-dination of women to the diaconate. In 1862 the Bishop of London revived the order of deaconess in the Church of England by ordaining a woman by "im-position of hands." In 1885 the first such ordination was performed in the United States by the Bishop of Alabama, and in 1889 the American Episcopal Church regulated what it called the "setting apart" of deaconesses by ap-propriate canons. By setting up separate regulations for deacons and deaconesses, however, the canons raised the question of whether deaconesses were deacons, or ministers of some other sort. They did not wear stoles, nor assist in ministering Communion. In remote mission areas without a priest, deaconesses often led prayer ser~iices, officiated at Matins and Evensong, and conducted baptisms and funerals, but in ordinary parishes they served as sacristans, parish visitors, and directors of Christian education. They were, in fact, considered by many priests to be, as it were, "secular nuns" who could do useful things around the church. The fact that the diaconate itself was not well understood did not help to clarify the role of the deaconess. The apostolicity of the order of deacon has been continuously asserted by the Anglican Church, but in fact, deacons who are not fledgling priests have been almost totally unknown since the 16th cen-tury. The.revival of the "perpetual diaconate" for men in the period following World War II has produced a revival of interest in the diaconal ministry, and a beginning of the study of the diaconate as a ministry in its own right, not as a rung on the ladder of ecclesiastical preferment. Women Priests and the Episcopal Church In the Episcopal Church the question of the status of deaconesses was forcefully raised by the late Bishop James A. Pike, who (whatever his failings) was never afraid of a good fight. In 1965 he declared on his own authority as Bishop of California that deaconesses were women deacons, and proceeded to act on that assumption by recognizing Deaconess Phyllis Edwards of his diocese as a deacon. In a ceremony at Grace Cathedral, San Francisco~ he in-vested her with the deacon's stole and presented her with the New Testament from which she read the eucharistic gospel. She also assisted in the ministra-tion of communion in the manner usual for Anglican deacons, by ad-ministering the chalice. The lawyer-bishop was careful to explain that the ser-vice was not an ordination, since, in his view, Deaconess Edwards had already been ordained a deacon when she was "set apart" as a deaconess. Since most Episcopalians had never given any thought to the subject of the ordination of deacons of either sex, they were horrified. The bishops reacted (as Anglican bishops frequently do) by appointing a study commission to report on "The Proper Place of Women in the Ministry of the Church." At about the same time in England a similar report, entitled "Women in Holy Orders," was presented to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York. In 1968 the Lambeth Conference, the decennial meeting of Anglican bishops from all over the world, accepted the principle that deaconesses were "within the diaconate" and referred the question of the ordination of women to the priesthood to the various national churches or provinces, for further study. In 1969 the General Convention of the Episcopal Church, meeting at the University of Notre Dame, amended its canons to permit women for the first time to be licensed as lay readers and to administer the chalice. The 1970 Convention formally endorsed the position that deaconesses were women deacons and amended the canons to that effect. From 1970 on, therefore, men and women have been ordaindd to the diaconate in the Episcopal Church under the same set of regulations, by the same rite, and clearly to the same office. There was, of course, one important difference. Male deacons were either candidates for the priesthood, or they intended to combine service as a "perpetual" deacon with another occupation from which they expected to derive their income. The women, on the other hand, were go-ing into full-time professional ministry, like most of the men with whom they had graduated from seminary. Few of them saw their vocation as being to the "perpetual" diaconate, but the possibility of ordination to the priesthood was denied them. In 1971 the Bishop of Hong Kong and Macao, acting after consultation with his diocese and the Bishops of South East Asia, ordained two women to the priesthood. The previous bishop had pe~'formed a similar ordination in 1944, during World War II, but the Archbishop of Canterbury had formally refused to recognize the ordination, and the woman ordained, ki Tim Oi, renounced her orders for the peace of the ChurCh. This time the Anglican Con-sultative Council (which is a secretariat rather than a decision-making synod) interpreted the resolutions of Lambeth 1968 to permit him to act: ~i14 / Review for Religious, l~olume 34, 1975/4 This Council advises the Bishop of Hong Kong, acting with the approval of his Synod, and any other bishop of the Anglican Communion acting.with the approval of his Province, that, if he decides to ordain women to the priesthood, his action will be accept-able to this Council. (Resolution 28, Anglican Consultative Council, Limuru, Kenya, 23 February-5 March 1971) The resolution carried the Council 24-22, and it was on the strength of this ap-proval that Bishop Baker p~:oceeded with the ordinations. In that same year the American bishops were asked to endorse the princi-ple of the ordination of women to the priesthood and the episcopate, and to prepare legislation for that purpose. The resolution was presented by the Bishops' Committee on Ministry. The House of Bishops (in customary fashion) appointed a study committee of seven bishops. This was the second study commission of the American bishops on the ministry of women in l0 years. The complaint of women that the question has been sufficiently studied would seem to be justified. The report was presented to the bishops in 1972. A straw vote was then taken on the question of the ordination of women to the priesthood. This was a simple expi'ession of personal opinion, not a legislative vote. The bishops voted 74-61 in favor of admitting women to the priesthood. This is the approval of the bishops so often mentioned in the debate since. The report itself exhibits an internal schizophrenia, including two different versions of a section on "Scripture, Tradition, and Images," one favoring the ordination of women, the other opposing it. It was distributed, not only to the bishops but to all priests and other interested persons, in mimeographed form, and was later printed in the 1973 Convention Journal. It begins with the assertion that the Church admits both men and women to the diaconate, and cites New Testament precedents (Romans 16:i, Acts 9:36, I Tim 3:8-13) and the opinion of C. H. Dodd: We may fairly suppose that the order of deacons which emerged in the second century. had its origin in Paul's own time; and that it included women as well as men. (Dodd, C. H., The Epistle of Paul to the Romans, p. 235) The report describes the contemporary understanding of the diaconate as ':murky and confused" and calls for a fresh statement of the meaning of the diaconal ministry. It is interesting that the acceptance of women as deacons is not considered controversial by the bishops, but is the assumed starting ground for further discussion. Certainly no such consensus could have been obtained in 1965. Turning from the diaconate to the priesthood, the report describes the or-dained priest as "called of God and authorized by the body" to act for both the Lord and his Church "in ways far beyond our understanding." It asserts: His priesthood is not derived from the Church nor has anyone a right to claim priesthood; the priest is called to receive a gift in ordination, which comes from the Father. But his call and the gift are alike recognized and ratified by the Church; he acts for them in exer-cising the gift. Thus the authority and accountability conferred in ordination have a dou-ble reference. No man exercises priesthood in a vacuum. Women Priests and the Episcopal Church / 515 When it considers the possibility of the ordination of women to the episcopate, the report confronts the question directly: In the case of episcopacy, as in that of priesthood, the suggestion of a duality of repre-sentative roles raised in some of our minds the question as to the significance of male-hess as a necessary attribute or characteristic of the Bishop. Perhaps even more than the priest, the episcopal Father-in-God imagery is that of a male figure and none of us doubts the extraordinary tensions and problems which would confront the Church were women to be chosen to be bishops. But the question remains, in some of our minds, whether it can be said that female-ness is a diriment impediment to their consecration as bishops. I believe that this puts the question in proper terms. It is not a matter of whether one thinks a specific woman would or would not make a good priest. That is a pastoral question to be answered by those specifically charged with approving candidates for ordination. Some women, like some men, would make unbelievably bad priests. If this is true of some of the 11 women or-dained in Philadelphia in July 1974, it is demonstrably true of many of the already ordained male priests in the Episcopal Church, and, 1 assume, in other churches as well. The report then proceedes to two sections upon which the committee was divided. In the first it presents arguments again~st the ordination of women, and in the second it presents arguments for it. Most of the debate on the sub-ject in the Episcopal Church has been simple and straightforward. Opponents of the ordination of women have said that there is no support for it in Scripture or Tradition, that the Church has never ordained women, and to do so now would be stark novelty, and therefore both uncatholic and heretical, its ad-vocates have countered that there is nothing in Scriiature to forbid it, that there is no a priori theological reason for not doing it, and that the mere fact that it has never been done is no argument at all. They point out that to argue simply on the basis of contrary practice is to commit the Church to the view that change is either impossible or wrong--a doctrine which all admit has been widely believed, but which deserves to be relegated to oblivion--and which is demonstrably untrue in such cases as the Church's attitude toward slavery. A great deal of the literature which supports the ordination of women has argued with undeniable truthfulness that much of the opposition of male priests to the ordination of women stems from the men's insecurity in their own sexual and ministerial roles. Itis undoubtedly also true that at least some of the women seeking ordinat.ion have comparable problems, but neither point seems worthy of serious consideration, and the bishops' report does not raise it. It is, of course, theoretically possible to argue that although all of the people actually opposing the ordination of women are doing so from unworthy motives, the position itself is true. It is likewise possible to argue that although none of the candidates actually presenting themselves should be ordained, it is proper to ordain women. More concretely, it is hardly reasonable of the Church for it to set up a system in which all but the most stout-hearted will become discouraged long before they are actually accepted as candidates for ordination, and then complain about the lack of humility and modesty of the 511~ / Review for Religious, l/olurne 34, 1975/4 survivors. The principle of abusus non tollit usum needs to be applied with great rigidity here. The section of the bishops' report which opposes the ordination of women to the priesthood may be taken as representative of the best argumentation on this side in the Episcopal Church. The "prominent and honored place" of women in the ministry of the New Testament and the Early Church is freely admitted. Phoebe is recognized as a deacon, Dorcas as a "disciple," the daughters of Philip as prophets, and others as teachers and evangelists. It further affirms that women have an honored place in the ministry today, but that place is not in the presbyterate. It permits, even urges, the ordination of women to the diaconate, and condemns the failure of the contemporary Church, including that of many priests and bishops, to understand the meaning of the diaconate as ari order separate from, but not subordinate to the presbyterate. It makes a sharp distinction between the priesthood which is shared by all Christians, men and women alike, as full members of the community, and ad-mission to the cultic ministry: To belong to the cultic ministry is no part of the perfection of Christian membership in Christ. That the Church has acted as if it were, and as if lay-people were second class Christians is only too true. It is only too true that lay women have been excluded from the decision making processes of the Church; this is one of the causes of their present anger and frustration. But we cannot right this wrong by committing another. The actual arguments raised against the ordination of women to the priesthood appear to be two, one symbolic and one historical. The symbolic argument is summed up in the conclusion: The ordained Christian priest must act officially in the person of Christ, and male-ness is therefore required for a priest to act in this way. A woman priest, it is claimed "must lack the full symbolic meaning of Chris-tian priesthood, and to that extent must be defective." Masculinity and male-ness are seen as symbolizing the initiating creative and recreative act of God toward mankind, an act transcending nature, and constitutive of the Church. The historical argument is that, although women exercised a multitude of ministries in the early Church, there were no women presbyters or bishops. On the evidence, to admit women as Bish'ops and Priests is to overturn the practice of the New Testament Church, and the Catholic Church ever since. It considers that some evidence of an unmistakeable intervention of the Holy Spirit "such as we find in Acts" would be necessary for so momentous a change, and rejects the idea that the fact that some women genuinely believe themselves called to the priesthood is evidence of such an intervention. It has always been the duty of the Church to tell a man whether or not he has a true voca-tion to the priesthood, and the Church has this task today. If the Church says no to these aspirants, it would seem proper to assume that their question has been answered by the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Women Priests and the Episcopal Church This section of the report concludes: This momentous step must not be taken by a small branch of a particular Catholic Church on its own initiative, without reference to the remainder of catholic Christendom, and, 1 am sure, against the convictions and sentiments of a majority of its members. The appeal to the consensus fidelium of the Catholic Church of the ages strikes strong responsive chords in most Anglican hearts, and their concern for the effect of any unilateral action on the Anglican-Roman Catholic or the Anglican-Orthodox dialogue is genuine. The section of the report defending the ordination of women compares it with the adoption of the Canon of Holy Scripture or the development of the threefold ministry as "legitimate developments of what was implicit in the revelation of Christ from the beginning." It makes extensive use of the article "Biblical Anthropology and the Par-ticipation of Women in the Ministry of the Church" by Professor Andr6 Dumas of the Protestant Faculty of Theology in Paris, which was published in 1964 in Concerning the Ordination of Women. a report of the World Council of Churches. This article contrasts the Jahwist account of the creation and fall in Genesis 2:4-3;24 with the Priestly account in Genesis 1, in which man and woman are both made in the image of God and given joint authority over crea-tion. According to Dumas, the only theologically significant reason for the ex-clusion of women from the Old Testament priesthood was the belief that woman's true vocation was to be a mother in order to perpetuate Israel until the coming of the Messiah. This, he says, Christianity specifically rejected as anti-Messianic. There is, he points out, nothing in the New Testament about motherhood as a sacred vocation, since that vocation has been fulfilled by the motherhood of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The report admits the power of the male imagery applied to priests, but comments: Its power is derived from deep springs in the human spirit and from important forces in our culture and his.tory. Insofar as it reflects truths about masculinity and femininity it can be a significant instrument in our grappling with reality. Its limitations lie, of course, in the fact that there is no analogy in Deity to such imagery, no way t6 identify in Deity the anguish and the beauty inescapably part of the man-woman differentiation in humanity. The overwhelming tradition of the Church against the ordination of women is freely admitted, but declared to be irrelevant. The profound changes in the roles of men and women in society, it feels, ~eans that any decision in-volves change: The problem for Christians is not how to get back to what was, but to bear witness in the midst of what is; and even the choice to stay where we are, if we make it, will be the choice of a new position which has got to be mai:le in the presence of real people, not ghostly memories. The report notes that thep0sition of other Churches is also changing, and the effect of permitting the ordination of women on the ecumenical scene may 51~! / Review for Religious, I/olume 34, 1975/4 as easily be positive as negative. It also points out that popular opinion, and the spirit of "women's lib" are not valid considerations, but the Church must deal solely with the question "Is God now calling women to Priesthood?" If the answer is yes, the Church must respond, whatever the cost, and if it is no, the Church must also take the consequences of that decision. The final section of the report raises a number of questions, on the answers to which the committee was presumably divided: Is it not true that Christ's priesthood is too comprehensive to be contained by the sym-bolism of one sex, that in fact its variety and d.epth call for full sacramental feminine ex-pression in order to represent a God who sustains both masculinity and femininity? If this is true, might we not be on the threshold of a new dimension and awareness of the un-searchable riches of Christ? Far from confusing sexual roles or affirming "unwise" values, might not the ordination of women assure the enrichment of our understanding of humanity in Christ by guaranteeing the presence of both its components visibly present in the offering of the Oblation which is Christ's and ours? Like many discussions of synods of bishops, the report ends with no recommendations, except to "meet the issue head on." The bishops concluded their discussion with the straw vote already mentioned. When the Anglican Consultative Council met in Dublin in July 1973, they reaffirmed their position that individual national or regional churches might proceed to ordain women, if they so decided according to their synodical processes. The vote in favor was 50-3, compared with the 24-22 vote in 1971. The next significant step in the process occurred when the General Conven-tion of the Episcopal Church met in Louisville in September-October 1973. Legislation. to change the canons to permit the ordination of women to the priesthood and the episcopate was introduced into the House of Deputies, and was there debated at length. The final vote fell short of the needed majority. Since this vote has been the subject of much subsequent controversy, it re-quires further elaboration. The General Convention is the legislative body of the Episcopal Church. It consists of bishops and clerical and lay deputies. The deputies are elected by diocesan synods, four priests and four lay persons from each diocese, regardless of size. On substantive matters the deputies vote by dioceses and orders and a majority is required in both orders for passage. The vote on the ordination of women was clericalmYes 50, No 43, Divided 20; Lay--Yes 49, No 37, Divided 26. The divided delegations were split 2-2 and therefore unable to vote either for or against the resolution. The result was that although the proposal had a plurality of votes, it did not receive the absolute majority re-quired. This situation is not a "fluke." The rule, like that requiring the ratification of amendments to the U.S. Constitution by three-quarters of the States, was written into the Constitution of the Episcopal Church to make it difficult to change basic items of Church structure, and to make it impossible for a bare majority to do so. The question of whether the majority of clergy and laity of the Episcopal Church actually favor the ordination of women to the priesthood is difficult to answer. Certainly many have made it abundantly clear that they will "leave Women Priests and the Episcopal Church / 519 the Church" if such action is taken. On the other hand, at least one bishop has promised to resign if the ordination of women is not permitted, and some women have indicated that they will withdraw from the Church if the ordina-tion of women is finally defeated. Since the resolution did not pass the House of Deputies in Louisville, it was neither debated nor voted upon by the bishops. "A Statement of Conviction concerning Ordination of Women'~ signed by 60 bishops was inserted into the minutes, on a point of personal privilege by the Bishop of Indianapolis. This was intended to encourage the women deacons, whose genuine disappointment in the failure of the Convention to authorize their ordination to the priesthood was recognized by all. I share the opinion of many of those present at the Louisville Convention that a number of those who voted against the ordination of women did so in the firm belief that the Church was not prepared for this step at that time. Their opposition was not absolute, but conditioned by the need to prepare the "folks back home" for such a radical change in practice. As the Anglican Con-sultative Council had phrased it in 1971: Anglicans have genuine difficulty in entertaining the idea that there might be women priests, and, lacking experience, they cannot forsee the consequences if any were to be or-dained. In the days following the defeat of the resolution by the Deputies, rumors spread through the Convention that some bishops intended to go ahead without authority and ordain one or more women. The House of Bishops, wishing to squelch these rumors, passed a resolution of collegiality and loyalty, pointing out that the Deputies had rejected the principle of the ordina-tion of women, and that the Presiding Bishop was appointing a "competent committee" to study the matter in depth. The resolution affirmed the adherence of the Bishops "to the principles of collegiality and mutual loyalty, as well as respect for due constitutional and canonical process." It was clearly the failure of four bishops to abide by this decision which caused the House of Bishops to react as it did to the July ordination in Philadelphia. They looked for a full discussion and decision in 1976 at the next General Convention. But the situation was not to remain static till then. On July 10, 1974, four bishops, all retired or otherwise without jurisdiction, met in Philadelphia, at the urging of a group of lay and clerical leaders, to con-sider the possibility of proceeding to ordain women to the priesthood. Bishop Charles Hall, retired of New Hampshire, withdrew after this first meeting. On July 20, the Rt. Rev. Lyman Ogilby, Bishop of Pennsylvania, in whose diocese the service was actually held, refused both his consent and his approval to the ordination. On July 25 the Most Rev. John Allin, the new Presiding Bishop, telegraphed the eleven women and three bishops, asking them to reconsider their decision. At this same time Bishop Ogilby notified his diocese that clergy who par-ticipated in the proposed ordination would be "conducting themselves in viola- 520 / Review for Religious, P'olume 34, 1975/4 tion of the Constitution and Canons of the Church," and would thereby be subjecting themselves tO possible discipline. He and the Diocesan Standing Committee also met personally with the Rt. Rev. Robert DeWitt, the former bishop of that diocese, and asked him to withdraw from the proposed ordina-tion. On July 29 the ordination took place. The ordaining bishops were the Rt. Rev. Robert DeWitt, formerly of Pennsylvania, the Rt. Rev. Edward Wells, Retired Bishop of West Missouri, and the Rt. Rev. Daniel Corrigan, formerly director of domestic mission work for the Episcopal Church and later dean of Bexley Hall Divinity School in Roches~ter, New York. The Bishop of Costa Rica, the Rt. Rev. Antonio Ramos, was present but did not participate in the ordainiiag. He was the only diocesan bishop in the group. On July 31 the Presiding Bishop called the House of Bishops into special session August 14-15 in Chicago to consider the situation. In the meanwhile, formal charges were filed against the participating bishops by the Bishop of Western New York. They were later withdrawn, then reinstated, and at the present writing are still pending. 146 bishops voted at tha~ meeting. They adopted this resolution by a vote of 129-9 with 8 abstentions: The House of Bishops in no way seeks to minimize the genuine anguish that so many in the Church feel at the refusal to date of the Church to grant authority for women to be considered as candidates for ordination to the priesthood and episcopacy. Each of us in his own way shares in that anguish. Neither do we question the sincerity of the motives of the four bishops and 11 deacons.who acted as they did in Philadelphia. Yet in God's work, ends and means must be consistent with one another. Furthermore, the wrong means to reach a desired end may expose the Church to serious consequences unforseen and undesired by anyone . Resolved, that the House of Bishops, having heard from Bishops Corrigan, DeWitt, Welles, and Ramos the reasons for their actions, express our disagreement with their decision and action. We believe they are wrong; we decry their acting in violation of the collegiality of the House of Bishops as well as the legislative processes of the whole Church. Further, we express our conviction that the necessary conditions for valid ordination to the priesthood in the Episcopal Church were not fulfilled on the occasion in question; since we are convinced that a bishop's authority to ordain can be effectively exercised only in and for a community which has authorized him to act for them, and as a member of the episcopal college; and since there was a failure to act in fulfillment of constitutional and canonical requirements for ordination. The resolution went on to call for the 1976 General Convention to recon-sider the issue of the ordinationof women, and for all involved to wait for that reconsideration. Apparently this is not going to happen. There have been several occasions on which various of the women have functioned as priests. The most publicized events were the celebration of the Eucharist at Riverside Church, and the ap-pointment of two of the women priests to the faculty of Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass., with the provision that they will function as priests in the seminary chapel. There are at least two cases being prosecuted Women Priests and the Episcopal Church / 521 against male priests, for allowing one or more of the women to celebrate or con-celebrate the Eucharist in their parishes. The truly important aspect of the Bishops' August statement is not their disapproval of the ordination. No one seriously expected them to approve the flaunting of canon law and their own resolution of collegiality. It is the ap-parent acceptance of Bishop Arthur Vogei's theological analysis of the ordina-tion, and the bishops' refusal to accept the "validity," not simply the "regularity" of the ordination. It is freely admitted on all sides that the ordina-tion was in violation of the actual canon law of the Episcopal Church on several counts: 1. There is no provision for ordaining women to the priesthood. 2. The women were ordained neither by their own ordinaries, nor with their consent. 3. The required canonical consent of the Diocesan Standing Committees was not obtained. Two of the candidates did attempt to obtain this consent, but it was refused. One diocese (Central New York) has granted it post fac-turn. (The Standing Committee is an invention of the American Episcopal Church in the 18th century which sought successfully to limit the arbitrary power of bishops by requiring the formal consent of a Standing Committee of priests and lay persons to all ordinations, sales of church property, and certain other acts.) Prior to voting on the motion, the Bishops received the report of their Committee on Theology, delivered by the Rt. Rev. Donald J. Parsons, Bishop of Quincy, and formerly Dean and Professor of New Testament at Nashotah House Seminary, and the Rt. Rev. Arthur Vogel, Bishop of West Missouri, a member of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission and formerly Professor of Systematic Theology at Nashotah. The resolution adopted quotes verbatim from their reports. Bishop Vogel's view, expressed in his report, is that validity means "juridical recognition of a ministry by the Church." In this view to call a ministry "invalid" does not mean that it is not true, efficacious, or genuine, but simply that it is not juridically recognized. It is apparently this recognition which the House of Bishops denied the ordination of the women. My personal interest in this decision is that it shifts the ground of "accepted" Anglican theology from the old mhnual theology which calls sacraments valid if the criteria of proper matter, form, intention, minister and recipient are present, to a newer concept. There can be no doubt, in the old terms, that the ordaining bishops intended to ordain the women to the priesthood. They went out of their way to use the "right form," by using the official 1928 version of the ordination rite, rather than the commonly used provisional form of 1970. There has never been any dispute about the right of retired bishops to continue to exercise episcopal functions, and, in fact, many retired bishops have been the principal consecrators of their successors. The stand is taken by Bishop Vogel, and the House, instead, on the nature of the Church as a Eucharistic community, under the presidency of the Bishop. 522 / Review for Religious, l/olume 34, 1975/4 The Holy Eucharist is offered by the whole community; the bishop unifies the action of the community by his presidency of the assembly. The bishop at one time, in a sacramen-tal manner, (1) represents the Son to the assembly, (2) represents the people of God, (3) represents the Church to itself. His actions in ordaining, then, are actions within the Community. He ordains "not as an individual but as the head of the eucharistic community." Bishop Vogel quotes the Orthodox theologian Dr. J. D. Zizoulas in saying, "There is no ministry in the Catholic Church that can exist in absoluto," and again, "there is no apostolic succession which does not go through the concrete com-munity." He comments: Within a diocese the bishop and presbyters form a college among themselves; the bishop and deacons constitute another community. The important point is that ordination, ac-cordingly, is entrance into a new community--the ministerial community--rather than the bare bestowal of a power. In ordination bishops do not pass on a power which they possess as individuals to other individuals who do not have it. That would be a baton-passing theory of ordination; the community would count for no more than the crowd watching a relay race. Here we find sacramental theology and theology of ministry tied solidly into ecclesiology, so that they are not left to wander in absoluto, causing endless problems for sacramental theologians. Ministry is within the eucharistic community of the Church. This is a primitive, and patristic view, often associated with the name of St. Cyprian of Carthage, and is, in the best sense of the word, "Episcopal" ecclesiology. Bishop Vogel concludes: The intention must originate in the community and be sacramentally personified by the community's bishop or his delegate within the episcopal college. Such authorization is necessary, or the people and bishop are not acting as a community--as one with the Church. Where there is no such authorization, where the jurisdiction of one bishop and com-munity is usurped by a bishop (or bishops) without jurisdiction, community and collegiality are broken . The ingredients of an ordination simply were not present. The bishops' conclusion that the group assembled in P, hiladelphia was not a real eucharistic community can, of course, be debated. On the other hand, the bishops, priests, deacons, and lay people who gathered in the Church of the Advocate in Philadelphia on July 29, 1974 did not claim to be a local con-gregation gathered around their bishops, nor did they claim to be the "rem-nant" of the True Church, separating themselves from a false institution. They claimed to be acting in and for the Episcopal Church, of which they were all members. But, the bishops object, they were not only unauthorized to act for the Episcopal Church in ordaining these women, the ordaining bishops were specifically bound by an undertaking with their brother bishops not to act in this way. The inevitable result is that the Church does not recognize their act. At this point, some people cry "Foul!" They object that they have meticulously followed the rule~ of the manuals to make sure that their acts would be recognized as valid, but the bishops have changed the rules, moving from a Medieval scholastic conce.pt of validity to a Cyprianic and Eastern one. Women Priests and the Episcopal Church / 523 The protest certainly has point, but it is paradoxical that most of the usual supporters of the kind of manual theology which the bishops rejected in Chicago are opposed to the ordination of women, while those most vocally concerned with the communal nature of the Church support their ordination. The idea, however, is not novel in Anglican theology, and fits well, in fact better, into traditional Anglican teaching than does manual theology. Both William Temple and Michael Ramsey spoke of the bish@ in ordination as not acting apart from the Church. This presentation, of its nature, cannot end with conclusions, but only with an observation, and a number of questions, which I believe to be those that presently face the Episcopal Church. They will, 1 believe, illuminate the dis-cussion of related issues in other Churches. The observation is that the Bishops of the Episcopal Church appear united in their belief that women have been given too small a share of the decision-making processes of the Church, and, whether or not the ordination of women to the priesthood is authorized in 1976, it seems clear that women will get more important positions in the "power structure." The questions are these: 1) Is female gender a diriment impediment to ordination to the priesthood? In this context the remarks of Robert F. Capon are exceptionally apt: If women are human, we can no longer go on talking about them as if they were some of our best friends. They are us. Any doctrine of the ministry, therefore, which effectively says that they are anything less must be abandoned. ("The Ordination of Women: A Non-Book," in Anglican Theological Review, SS 2 [Sel~t. 1973] p. 77) There are, nevertheless, a few Anglican theologians, and several bishops who would respond to our question with a solid yes. 2) If it is granted that women can be ordained, should a Church as numerically insignificant as ~he American Episcopal Church, even with the support of the worldwide Anglican Communion, alter 1900 years of contrary custom and proceed to do so? Many Anglicans would answer with the Orthodox that such things must await the summoning of the 8th Ecumenical Council. Anglicans are com-mitted to the view that they are only a part of the Catholic Church, and are reluctant to go out on a limb alone. Ordaining women will certainly cause the Episcopal Church problems in its dialogue with both Roman Catholics and Orthodox, but if it is right, then fear of unjust excommunication has never been an acceptable defense for failure to act. 3) Granted that it is possible, is it necessary for the Episcopal Church to ordain women, even at the cost of splitting our own Church? Certainly, if we do ordain women, we must be aware of the'havoc we shall raise with thestatus quo. There is already a shortage of"payingjobs" for priests in the Church and ordaining women will compound the problem. The women themselves are also likely to wind up underpaid and overworked in parishes that men have turned down. These dangers must be honestly faced. 524 / Review for Religious, lZolume 34, 1975/4 4) Finally, there are the large questions of the meaning of ordination. Can bishops, simply by virtue of their orders, and without the authority of the com-munity whose bishops they are, confer orders? Traditional Western sacramental theology has said yes, but that it is wrong for bishops to act in this way. Traditional Eastern sacramental theology has said no, that they act only in and for the Church. This is the position which the American House of Bishops took in Chicago. It is a position which seems to hold promise for a sacramental theology based upon the doctrine of the Church as the Body of Christ, and Christ Himself as the true minister of the sacraments. Reprints from the Review "The Confessions of Religious Women" by Sister M. Denis, S.O.S. (25 cents) "Institutional Business Administration and Religious" by John J. Flanagan, S.J., and James I. O'Connor, S.J. (20 cents) "Authority and Religious Life" by J. M. R. Tillard, O.P. (20 cents) "The Death of Atheism" by Rene H. Chabot, MoS. (20 cents) "The Four Moments of Prayer" by John R. Sheets, S.J. (25 cents) "Instruction on the Renewal of Religious Formation" by the Congregation for Religious (35 cents) "Meditative Description of the Gospel Counsels" (20 cents) "A Method for Eliminating Method in Prayer" by Herbert Francis Smith, S.J. (25 cents) "Religious Life in the Mystery of the Church" by J. M. R. Tillard, O.P. (30 cents) "Profile of the Spirit: A Theology of Discernment of Spirits" by John R. Sheets, S.J. (30 cents) "Consciousness Examen" by George A. Aschenbrenner, S.J. (20 cents) "Retirement or Vigil?" by Benedict Ashley, O.P. (25 cents) "Celibacy and Contemplation" by Denis Dennehy, S.J. (20 cents) "The Nature and Value of a Directed Retreat" by Herbert F. Smith, S.J. (20 cents) "The Healing of Memories" by Francis Martin (20 cents) Orders for the above should be sent to: Review for Religious 612 Humboldt Building 539 North Grand Boulevard St. Louis, Missouri 63103 Revision of the ConstitiJtions: Meaning, Criteria and Problems Juan Manuel Lozano, C.M.F. Father Juan Manuel Lozano was Visiting Professor of Spirituality in the Divinity School of St. Louis University during the past semester. He is on the faculty of Lateran University and of his Institute's seminary: Claretianum; Via Aurelia 619 15, 00144 Rome, Italy. Religious communities are at present engaged in the final stage of the revision of their Constitutions in the aftermath of Vatican Council 11. Most of them, indeed, have already celebrated their first General Chapter after the Special Chapter of Renewal; and, according to the norms in force they must send the resulting text to the Holy See after the last touches are made by the next General Chapter. Institutes are still bustling especially because all the members of the various communities have been called to participate in the review of what had been their basic codes. Perhaps it will be helpful to set forth some personal ideas and experiences on the meaning of the present work of revision and on the problems which have been created by it. 1. The Starting Point The revision of their Constitutions by all religious institutes had been made obligatory by Vatican II in its decree, Perfectae Caritatis (par. 3). From the text of the decree itself, it is evident that the center of gravity of this paragraph was not the revision of documents, but rather the spiritual renewal and adapta-tion to the times of religious life in all its various aspects: the manner of living, praying and working, and the government of the various institutes. The revi-sion of the Constitutions emerges as a consequence of this in the second part of the paragraph cited: "Therefore let constitutions, directories., be suitably revised and, obsolete laws having been suppressed, be adapted to the decrees of this sacred synod." 525 526 / Review for Religious, l/olume 34, 1975/4 The principle for the revision of the Constitutions, basic documents that are intended to inspire and rule the life of a religious community, is, therefore, to be drawn from the preceding paragraph of Perfectae Caritatis (no. 2) where both renewal and adaptation have been defined. In fact, even if in the text, probably because of Latin usage which prefers to join adjective to a substan-tive rather than two substantives, has the form: accommodata renovatio, in-stead of renovatio et accommodatio, the rest of the paragraph makes it clear that the council is referrit~g to two different realities by the term: a movement of spiritual renewal in fidelity towards the Gospel and towards the spirit of the founder, and another movement of fidelity to the real, historical condition of man: "renewal" and "adaptation." In speaking of the first movement, the council uses a biblical term: to go back, to return (sh~b) with God as its object is an expression commonly used in the Bible to designate conversion.~ A constant return to the sources of Christian Life and to the founder means, therefore, that a permanent move-ment of conversion must characterize religious communities. Religious life has always to return to being the privileged expression of Christian and authentic religious sentiment. Since this privileged expression was formulated in the past, in those historical periods in which the Church and the religious com-munity were founded, this conversion implies a return to the past, a pilgrimage back to the sources. Yet this return to the past happens only on the surface, since neither Christ nor the gifts of the Spirit that were granted to the founder belong!to the past; they are always alive. From this perspective, renewal might better be termed "a going inside" rather than "a going back." For its part, adaptation also should mean "a going inside"--an entering into actual, living humanity. And thus, religious life, following the logic of the Incarnation, must embrace both the Spirit that comes from God and the needs that come from society. Both renewal and adaptation, then, are two different expressions of a constant search for authenticity. This means that there are two basic facts, subsumed by the council in its recommendation of renewal and adaptation, that will influence the revision of the constitutions: human fallibility, and human historicity. In terms of these realities, religious life is constantly exposed to a series of trends that originate both from within (the community itself) and from without (society). And so religious life must constantly return to its double source of inspiration. As a matter of fact, human fallibility seems to have more effect on the daily life of the religious than it does on his Constitutions. For, even if the charism of infallibility does not extend to the spiritual doctrine that is ex-pressed in the Constitutions (they remain, after all, a purely human comment on the Gospel), it is nevertheless true that very often they have been written by one who was a faithful disciple of Christ, and that they have always received the approval of the Church. And this approval of the Church guarantees that the Constitutions are at least a sufficient guide by which to lead a life that is ICf. Jer 3,22; 4,1. Hos 6,1; Joel 2,12 . . . Revision of the Constitutions: Meaning, Criteria and Problems / 527 committed to divine service. On the other hand, the approval of the Church does not assure us that the text of a given Constitution will keep its value per-manently, or that it is the best possible expression of spiritual doctrine, etc. This reality, of course, is connected rather with human historicity than with human fallibility. Nor does it seem to me that the approval of the Holy See guarantees fidelity on the part of the community to what had been the idea of the founder. The Church, to be sure, gives canonical approval to those ideas that the com-munity believes best expresses its spirit. And in so doing, the Church recognizes that the community in pursuing its project has a right to exist within the People of God without interference in regard to the more technical problem of the fidelity of some later changes to the idea of the founder. There are some communities which have obtained from Rome approval for a change in the formulation of their ministries which research has demonstrated were not truly faithful to the idea of the founder; they are now going back to the older formulation. On this level of being faithful to the original idea of the founder, Constitutions are subject to human fallibility, just as is religious life itself; and a revision may thus be necessary. Historicity touches the Constitutions more deeply, In certain instances, even when they were actually written by the founder, Constitutions appear too strictly conditioned by the limits of a mindset that was common at a certain time and in a certain society. Founders were, thank God, real, living men; they were not only the recipients of a charism, but they were also the products of a particular ambience. Some Constitutions, composed in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, i.e., in a time when spiritual theology was in decadence, show an approach to some features of Christian religiosity that may hardly be kept as permanent, classical formulations: for example, a purely negative ap-proach to consecrated chastity, a negative way of expressing mortification, a passive doctrine of obedience. Now, can we honestly think that a text which spoke of chastity only to forbid any kind of sexual acts expressed the basic value of consecrated chastity? Or that a text which expressed a very austere image of self-denial without enlightening it by the glory of the Resurrection could be the direct reflection of the Gospel? Or, on the contrary, were these the fruit of the spiritual attitude of a particular culture the natural causes of which can be uncovered by historians? We have to come to the conclusion that in the area of spiritual theology there are obsolete expressions just as there are ob-solete juridical or disciplinary norms. Not only Canon Law, but theology, too, is a product of history. Other, more recently written Constitutions have a purely juridical-disciplinary character in that they reproduce with few variations the Normae secundum quas, a document that was elaborated by the Congregation for Bishops and Regulars at the end of the last, and beginning of this century.2 2Published, e.g., by L. R. Ravasi C. P. in De Regulis et Constitutionibus Religiosorum. Rome 1958, pp 187-226. 52~1 / Review for Religious, l/olume 34, 1975/4 Now the Normae expressly exclude from the Constitutions every kind of text dealing with theology and spirituality.3 This was quite understandable as a reaction against the simple exhortatory booklets that had been sent to the Holy See by most of the founders during the last century. It was also the result of the juridical optimism which had engulfed the Church in years in which Congregations of simple vows received their first official acknowledgement as religious institutes, receiving for the first time definite norms concerning their status in the Church, and years in which the entire Latin Church became in-volved in the creation of its first Code of Canon Law. What we have is the product of a certain mentality, one which belongs neither to the basic evangelical values of religious life nor to the charism of particular founders. This mentality is connected with a certain historical situa-tion. And, of course, it is impossible for any text to be in complete abstraction from its own times. Even the Rules of St. Augustine, St. Benedict and St. Francis are historical monuments, the reflection of a particular period of human history, as well as source documents of profound spirituality. In calling for renewal, th~n, th6 Church is clearly not asking that religious remove their Constitutions from every historical context, since, in any case, this would be quite impossible. But there are different ways of being related to history. A classic text, even if it keeps the flavor of the times in which it was composed, can give a balanced formulation of values that are permanent, and for this reason it will appeal to many generations. Other texts, however, re-main more on the surface, and tend to be influenced more strongly by the limitations of the culture in which they were written. This should neither sur-prise nor disappoint us. It takes time, after all, to develop a classical master-piece! Immediately after the promulgation of the decree, Perfectae Caritatis on October 25, 1965, two tendencies began to emerge among religious. One tendency, the more conservative, tried to limit the revision of the Constitutions to the suppression of obsolete norms and to adaptation to the new decrees. Revision, understood thus, followed the criteria which had inspired the earlier re-edition of Constitutions that had been necessary after the promulgation of the Code of Canon Law in 1917. The other tendency, more liberal and aware of cultural conditioning, pres-ent in many texts, affirmed the need to adapt the entire text of the Constitutions to the "spirit of the Council," i.e., to the theological and spiritual vision which had been growing in the Church during recent decades but which has burgeoned enormously in the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council. Since the decree, Perfectae Caritatis, speaking in a very general way, could not fix precisely the extension of the revision it called for, the problem remained aNormae I, IV n 33: Ravasi p 183. The prohibition was practically abolished in the new Normae issued in 1921. Cf Ravasi p 231. But at that time most .of the Constitutions of the modern Congregations had already received their last form. Revision of the Constitutions: Meaning, Criteria and Problems / 529 unsolved until the motu proprio, Ecclesiae Sanctae, was promulgated, in which Paul VI fixed criteria for the revision that was to take place. Prior to this, it had been possible to suppose that the depth of any revision would de-pend in every case on the quality of the original basic text. But this was precisely what was at issue in the discussion between both tendencies within the various communities. 2. Criteria for Revision On August 6, 1966, Pope Paul VI published his motu proprio, Ecclesiae Sanctae, which looked to the implementation of four decrees of the Council, the second of which was Perfectae Caritatis. In this portion of the document, one section is dedicated to the laying down of criteria for the revision of Constitutions: Ecclesiae Sanctae II, 12-14. The motu proprio, in dealing with principles for the revision of Constitutions, showed genuine development. Not only did it fix some points firmly, but it traced the general pattern that all Constitutions must follow. The criteria he gave can be summarized as follows: A. Constitutions, as religious life itself, must have a twofold aspect: doc-trinal and canonical. "Doctrine" here embraces two different facets: 1) the common elements that are essential for religious life in its union with the Church; 2) the par-ticular charism of the institute, expressed by the original idea of the founder and developed by an authentic living tradition. The "canonical elements" are to define the character, purpose and means of the institute. Character refers to an Order with autonomous monasteries or with centralized government, a Congregation of simple vows, an Apostolic Society, a Secular Institute, etc. Purpose embraces the general goal of religious life, and the particular charism of the individual community. Some communities have special ministries. Others are oriented in general towards evangelization in all its forms. The universal or particular character of their mission in the Church should be clearly expressed. In the Normae secundum quas that is followed by most of the modern Congregations, the general and particular goals were separated in two different paragraphs? These two paragraphs can be blended into one rich formulation that reflects the living unity in which they are associated in reality. Means are all the particulars that further community life, the profession of the evangelical life and the special ministry of the community. Therefore, they include spiritual and canonical 4No~'mae 1901 il, I, 1 nn 42-46, Ravasi p 195. cf also p 234. In the Normae the two purposes were called primary and secondary, using a terminology which sounds at least strange when applied to institutes whose founders had been first moved by the idea of responding with an apostolic ministry to certain concrete needs of the Church. The apostolic purpose (sometimes expressed through a fourth vow, or an equivalent commitment) has been the core around which the religious life has developed in many Institutes, from the Knights of Malta, to the Dominicans, Jesuits, Lasalle Brothers, Claretians . This is the reason why the praxis of calling both purposes general and specific has prevailed. ~i30 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/4 norms, basicstructures of government, requirements of formation and incor-poration, and the works of the apostolate. The introduction of this first principle in the motu proprio, i.e., that both doctrinal and canonical elements are required in any proposed revision, con-stitutes a fortunate change of direction in the policy that had formerly been followed by the Church. We have seen that the Normae secundum iluas ex-cluded every kind of doctrinal expression. And even if the idea was later tempered, in actual fact Constitutions remained mostly juridical codes. Now, if this might have been acceptable for Constitutions of the Regular Orders which also have a "Spiritual Rule" as part of their basic documents, in all in-stitutes founded after the Mendicant Orderg, the Constitutions are their only basic code. Therefore they have need of a doctrinal definition of the vocation and spirit of their respective communities. B. Constitutions are to be a text of essentials. The motu proprio emphasizes this characteristic. Constitutions must con-tain "the principles of religious life/and/the necessary juridical norms" (no. 12). For this reason, all elements that are not related to the basic features of the kind of religious life professed by the particular institute should not be in-cluded in its Constitutions. This recommendation of the Pope offers a very rich idea of what Constitutions ought to be. Constitutions should be a "charter" of charity, of communion,5 in which all the members of the institute, though they belong to different times and cultures, are able to recognize their own vocation and spirit. This implies that only the really essential features, of that vocation and spirit should be defined in the Constitutions, leaving the res~ to the initiative of the Holy Spirit and to the inescapable pluralism that varying circumstances demand. St. Benedict had well expressed this idea when, in explaining why he is opposed to setting down many norms about food and abstinence, he states in his Rule: "Everyone has received from God his own gift, one in one way, another in a different way. So it is with some hesitation that we fix/any/ measures for others.''6 From this point of view, Constitutions should express a minimum--the essential minimum. C. The motu proprio explicitly excludes from Constitutions all elements which are subject to change, which are now obsolete, or which correspond to local usages. Behind this criterion lies the idea 'that Constitutions should, as far as possi-ble, retain a permanent value.A community cannot change its Constitutions frequently without jeopardizing the peace and stability of the community. Therefore Constitutions should now tend to be what the "Rule" was for the Orders: a permanent and undiscussed source of inspiration. D. Regarding the form of Constitutions, the motu proprio recommends concision and precision. SThis was the. title given by the Cistercians to their most ancient constitutional text. Cf PL 166,1377-1384. 8Regula 40,1-2. Revision of the Constitutions: Meaning, Criteria and Problems / 531 Concision: "necessary norms., not excessively multiplied" (no. 12, b). Precision: "in suitable and clear words" (no. 12, a); "in an adequate manner" (no. 12, b). 3. Conclusions and Problems The first criterion, viz., that Constitutions should contain both doctrine and laws, often de facto means the redaction of a new text. As we have already mentioned, many modern Constitutions had only a juridical-disciplinary character. This is probably the main reason why the Sacred Congregation for Religious and Secular Institutes, in a statement published on July 12, 1968, declared that the revision of the Constitutions could be understood as the writing of a new text. The only condition is that the individual community must remain within the limits set by the nature, aims and spirit of the institute. Another reason that recommended the composition of a new text was the great difficulty experienced by many communities when they began to in-troduce partial emendations such as new paragraphs on obedience, celibacy, community, liturgy. There were deep differences between two approaches to spirituality: the one being largely individualistic and ascetic, the other being communitarian, liturgical and ecclesial, and these began to appear more strongly. Some communities which had begun to modify the old text finally arrived at the decision to write a new text. Other communities had decided from the beginning to write a new one. In my own experience with different in-stitutes, this decision to rewrite has been a wise one. The application of the criteria laid down by the Ecclesiae Sanctae has given a new shape to Constitutions. This fact has provoked a certain uneasiness among many religious. At first, they did not know what to do with the new doctrinal style. They missed the old disciplinary norms. And we cannot blame them for this. They had been accustomed for years to another kind of legisla-tion. Some of them even expressed their suspicion that the suppression of prac-tical norms was of[en the fruit of a certain relaxation. This attitude seems to result from a twofold misunderstanding: First of all, the new texts do not really make concessions in the direction of relaxation. Certainly they show a more positive approach to the basic features of Christian life and, therefore, the negative vocabulary~ that had been cherished by the Christian spirituality of the last two or three centuries tends to disappear. But if emphasis is placed on the positive and central elements of Christianity, this does not dissipate the negative consequences. Even if new Constitutions focus on following Jesus, they do not forget that in order to follow Him, we have to leave everything for Him. We cannot forget that this is the precise perspective of Christian spirituality as it is presented in the Gospels. On the other hand, there are doctrinal statements which are much more exigent than practical rules prescribing certain austerities. The invitation to be "a sign of contradiction" found in a new text is much more exigent than the rule requiring permission every time a sister leaves the house. The second misunderstanding concerns the value of the doctrinal section. 532 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/4 Religious are commonly agreed that the new doctrinal texts express in most cases a very rich spirituality. But some of them do not seem to appreciate the exact value of these statements which seem to them to be less binding than the old, disciplinary texts. This is a mistake. The doctrinal texts of the Constitutions do not contain a mere theological reflection. They express the idea that the community itself has of its own vocation and spirit in the Church. And therefore, they bind all the members as long as they desire to remain in the community. Far from being a merely theoretical explanation, they contain what might be called a "constitutional doctrine." Religious who are uneasy with the new style of Constitutions should recall that a text which traces the basic features of a vocation and spirit, a text which describes a mode of existence instead of prescribing a set of practices, a text which prefers the indicative to the imperative is actually more in line with the evangelical idea of Law. The deep difference between the Old Law and the Sermon on the Mount is that Jesus proposes a vocation to men who are no longer servants but friends.7 And who will argue that the Beatitudes are less binding than the Decalogue, even though they move on a different level? The commandments of not killing, of not committing adultery, of not stealing re-quire a material observance, because they express a minimum. The beatitudes on peacemakers, on purity of heart and on poverty on the other hand require a growing fidelity to the Spirit. They express the basic features of Christian ex-istence. If, from one point of view, as has been mentioned, the Constitutions should be the definition of an essential minimum, at the same time the principle that states they should contain the doctrinal formulation of the vocation and spirit of the community makes them also to be the expression of an ideal maximum. They propose a calling which is never completely fulfilled; they show a path on which no one should stop; they set forth the means by which religious can grow in the Spirit. This, also, is the exact meaning of the Beatitudes. We are never completely "poor in spirit," but the poorer we are, the more blessed we are. "You came here to be one heart," writes St. Augustine at the beginning of his Rule for the Servants of God? But he knows that on this earth we are never completely "one heart.''a St. Benedict, too, is well aware of this fact, when he finishes his Rule with the invitation to grow and to grow yet more.~° Constitutions are supposed to reflect the dynamic tendency of Christian ex-istence. Consequently, their observance implies a double fidelity: fidelity to the letter of the essential common laws, and, more profoundly, a dynamic, grow-ing fidelity to the Spirit. 4. Constitutions and Complementary Norms The reduction of the Constitutions to an essential "basic rule" implies as a 7Saint Ambrose, De l~iduis 12,72-73, PL 16,256-257. aRegula ad Servos Dei I, PL 32,1378. Epistola 211,5 PL 33,960. aDe bono coniug. 18,21 PL 40,387-388. ~°Regula 73. Revision of the Constitutions." Meaning, Criteria and Problems / ~i33 consequence the need for a complementary code that should contain more detailed norms. The idea of this complementary "Directory" was suggested by the Pope in Ecclesiae Sanctae. Such a code formerly existed in many Congregations: called in French institutes the Directoire, in the Roman canonical tradition of other Congregations it has been called the Codex luris Addititii (the code of complementary laws.) This Directory is supposed to contain the norms that are ordained to im-plement the Constitutions in all the aspects of the life of the community; prayer, particular traditions, formation, government. All norms which can easily be subject to change should be inserted into this complementary text rather than into the Constitutions. The Directory remains under the exclusive responsibility of the General Chapter while the Constitutions, after their ap-proval by the Holy See, can no longer be modified by the community without approval from Rome. There is today an even greater need for a complete legislation in each in-stitute, for, if the criteria followed in the provisional draft of Canon Law in regard to religious becomes definitive, many norms which were before fixed by common law will be left to the initiative of the individual institute. Since such a "complete legislation" will be made up of two texts, the Constitutions and the Directory, the institutes which have postponed the composition of the second text should now begin to work towards the formulation of their Directory. In suggesting this, we are aware of the heavy burden that such a procedure places on the religious especially of smaller communities. On the other hand, it is worth cautioning against an attempt to fix rapidly an abundance of such com-plementary norms just for the sake of having a "complete legislation." However, at least the most important norms, such as those concerning elec-tions, requirements for certain offices, incorporation into the institute, re-quirements for formation, etc., should be fixed, and the decisions made by the General Chapter should be listed clearly and in order (following the same order as the Constitutions). Furthermore, the Directory should be provisional. Since it will remain within the competency of the institute, the General Chapter will be able to improve upon it in progressive fashion. 5. Definitive Approval of the Constitutions and the New Canon Law The announcement that a new draft of Canon Law in regard to religious is now under study seems to have introduced a new factor of uncertainty in the process that leads to the fixing of a definitive text of the Constitutions. And we can surmise that definitive approval for revised Constitutions will not be granted by the Holy See until the promulgation of the new Canor~ Law. Cer-tainly, since both the new Canon Law and the Constitutions of each com-munity will contain fewer details, there will be less possibility that some points of the Constitutions will be in contradiction to the new code. But there will be many points in which it would be better if the Constitutions used the ter-minology adopted by the code. Will this mean that the period during which the Constitutions will remain under the responsibility of the individual institutes 534 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/4 will be prolonged by the Holy See? Since religious seem now to have overcome in large part the insecurity which had accompanied the change of their con-stitutional norms, it is possible that the Holy See will study the possibility of giving more time to the maturation of both the Constitutions and the Direc-tory. But it is also possible that the Sacred Congregation for Religious will prefer to open a period of dialogue with individual communities in which the Constitutions will be subjected to examination from both sides, even if they will no longer be under the exclusive responsibility of the individual institute. Surely in either case Roman sagezza will find a way of avoiding the repetition of what happened in the first decades of this century when many Constitutions approved in the first fifteen years of the century had to go back to Rome ten years later to be adapted to the then new Code of Canon Law. Back Issues of the Review The following is a list of the back issues of Review for Religious that are presently available: The first twenty-five volumes (1942-1966) inclusive of the Review have been reprinted in twenty-five clothbound volumes. Volumes 1 to 20 (1942- 1961) sell at $6.50 the volume; volumes 2l to 25 (1962-1966) sell at $7.50 the volume. 1967: All issues 1968: All issues 1969: All issues 1970: All issues 1971: All issues 1972: All issues 1973: All issues 1974: All issues 1975: All issues (except January) (except January) Some of these issues are available only in small numbers. The issues cost $1.75 (plus postage) each and should be ordered from: Review for Religious 612 Humboldt Building 539 North Grand Boulevard St. Louis, Missouri 63103 Affirmation: Healing in Community Sister Gabrielle L. Jean House of Affirmation, Inc., is an international therapeutic center for clergy and religious, located at 120 Hill Street; Whitinsville, MA 01588. Sister Gabrielle L. Jean, Ph.D., is Director of the Worcester Consulting Center; 201 Salisbury Street; Worcester, MA 01609. Founding of the House of Affirmation The House of Affirmation is an outgrowth of the Worcester Consulting Center for Clergy and Religious which was established in 1970 in response to the expressed needs of the religious professionals of the diocese. The impact of Vatican II had been strongly felt by the clergy and religious who had to meet increased pressures from the demands of decentralization and responsible in-volvement in social and ecclesial issues. The services of the Consulting Center provided a religious professional the opportunity for self-discovery through the contemporary approaches of psychiatry and psychology in ongoing dialogue with theological developments. The Vicar for Priests and Religious, Diocese of Worcester, when ap-proached by the members of the Interim Senate for Religious, was informed of the fact that a sister-psychiatrist was working at the Worcester State Hospital; it was suggested she would probably help in the organization of mental health services for the religious and clergy of the area. The sister, Anna Polcino, a Medical Missionary physician-surgeon who had returned from West Pakistan a few years earlier, was invited to membership on the planning committee which had been brought together to think through the logistics of the enter-prise. She then became the first director of what was to become the Worcester Consulting Center. A young diocesan priest, Thomas A. Kane, was then com-pleting his doctoral work in clinical psychology and he became co-director of the Consulting Center. 535 636 / Review for Religious, l/olume 34, 1975/4 The overriding goal of the Consulting Center was to help the clients become fully human, consistently free persons within the context of their ecclesial calling and social insertion. Sister Anna and Father Kane undertook to meet this goal through a threefold program of service, education and research. Since its opening, the services and programs of the Consulting Center have included individual consultation, group consultation, group process communication labs, personal growth groups, candidate assessment, lectures and workshops. After two full years of operation, however, it became apparent to Sr. Anna that the outpatient facilities were not sufficient for some religious and clergy who had come to the Consulting Center; there was definite need for an inten-sive residential treatment program. Thus was the House of Affirmation con-ceived. It became a reality in October, 1973, when the doors were opened to its first residents in Whitinsville, Massachusetts. Dr. Anna Polcino assumed the responsibility of psychiatric director of therapy and Dr. Thomas A. Kane became its executive director. The residential center pursues the same goals as the Consulting Center; namely, service, education and research. Philosophy of the House of Affirmation The philosophy underlying the House of Affirmation's existence and operation can be succinctly stated as: treatment of the whole person in a wholly therapeutic environment. Mental health professionals adhering to this basic philosophy meet a real challenge when their clientele is constituted by other professionals whose religious values are central to their vocational choice and identity. Religious men and women have chosen a celibate way of life which jars with the usual Freudian model of therapy. And so an alternative had to evolve to meet the needs of this relatively important and clearly delineated sociological group of celibate religious professionals seeking psy-chological help. A group situation provides a favorable environment for the social relearn-ing that constitutes therapy. Modern psychology emphasizes the tremendous power of the environment on human development and behavior; our sur-roundings exert a molding influence on our behavior. In "milieu therapy," the expectancies and attitudes of the treatment staff are central to bringing about social rehabilitation but the "psychotheoiogical community" concept of the House of Affirmation goes beyond this milieu therapy with its inherent psy-choanalytic orientation and reductionism. There is an existential concern with rediscovering the living person amid the compartmentalization and dehumanization of modern culture. Interest centers on reality as immediately experienced by the person witl~ the accent on the inner-personal character of the client's experience. The therapeutic community supplies the type of accept-ing or impartial reactions from others that favor social learning. Besides, the therapeutic environment prevents further disorganization in the client's behavior by reducing his intense anxieties. Affirmation, Healing in Community / ~i37 Psychotheological Therapeutic Community The House of Affirmation has developed a unique model in its psy-chotheological therapeutic community. The expression "psychotheological community" implies a quest for communion with God and with man. It is an accepted fact that personhood can only be realized in community, and this phenomenological aspect of man's human predicament aligns the model with the existential therapeutic movement.-It seeks to analyze the structure of the religious professional's human existence in view of understanding the reality underlying his being-in-crisis. It is concerned with the profound dimensions of the emotional and spiritual temper of contemporary man. The importance of community looms large in the current psychological literature. Stern and Marino state that "religion and psychotherapy encourage community engagement with life; both can be distorted to emphasize a kind of pulling back in order to ensure personal safety. Insofar as they foster openness, they become true protectors of the role that love can play in cement-ing human relationships, and consequently, the reconciliation of society. The establishment of relationships is the first step in establishing the community. As a stranger becomes familiar, we are in a better position to reach out to him, to join our lives more closely. Our differences will never disappear and we will find it necessary to sacrifice a degree of autonomy.''1 Each person in the community remains a unique individual. He may grow and change in the community but he will retain his identity. Personal union of community members serves to bring out and enrich what is uniquely true of each individual. "Growth in community will be effected by all those active and passive elements that created favorable conditions for the growth of unity and charity: openness, receptivity, sharing, giving, receiving. Community connotes oneness without loss of identity, a sharing in the interiority of another without the sacrifice of personal integrity.''~ The adaptations recommended and wrought by the Second Vatican Coun-cil have changed the pattern of environmental demands on Christians at large, but it has wrought this change even more on formally professed religious men and women. Some have adjusted quickly and almost with eagerness to these changes wliile others have been.floundering in the insecurity of a slow and painful assimilation of change. The poignant experience of confusion, doubt and sense of loss has taxed the coping ability of many who, cut off from safe moorings, question their identity and authenticity in what they consider an un-charted land. The post-Vatican period demands maturity and balance on the part of those chosen to minister to the people of God especially because much risk is involved. ~E. Mark Stern and Bert G. Marino, Psychotheology (Paramus, N.Y.: Newman Press, 1970), p. 66. ~Sister Daniel Turner, "The American Sister Today," in The Changing Sister (Notre-Dame, Ind.: Fides, 1965), pp. 309-310. Review for Religious, l/olume 34, 1975/4 The Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, emphasized the aspect of community when it spoke of the Church as a "sign and sacrament of man's union with God and of the unity of the whole human race" (LG, 1). The religious community as such cannot form the person although it should provide a setting in which the individual human being can emerge as a fully functioning adult. For too long, religious communities of men and women as well as priests in rectories have had. a task-oriented rather than person-oriented environment. Yet personal development is a basic prerequisite to a meaningful life in society at large and in the local community where the celibate lives. This follows logically from the principle that love of self precedes love of others. However, I can only know myself if another reveals me to myself just as I can only come to a real love of self when I come to the realization that I am loved by another. Likewise does man find his meaning and sense of identity in and through others. The person-oriented group helps man realize his personhood when, through the truth and goodness'of his con-freres, man's own powers of knowing and loving are released. In the therapeutic community of the House of Affirmation, the resident can formulate his own reactions, share them in social communication and thus become aware of the commonness of his own anxieties. By sharing his reac-tions with peers, he is practicing the very techniques of social interaction in which he has typically remained unskilled. In the reactions of his peers with whom he shares his daily activities, the resident finds the acceptance, support, protection, challenge and competition which enable him to develop more valid self-reactions. In addition, the therapeutic milieu provides the opportunity for social interaction among residents and staff. The House of Affirmation is neither a place of confinement nor a haven for "rest and recreation"; rather, it is a miniature social-religious community planned and controlled to facilitate the social learning of its residents. The professional staff members have accepted as the general goal of psychotherapy to help the "unfree," childishly dependent person become a genuine adult capable of "responding affirmatively to life, people and society.''3 The focus is on self-understanding and insight-building of an immediate and current nature in view of helping the individual to grasp the meaning of his existence in its historical totality. Ultimately, the mentally healthy client will attain freedom to choose, maturity in outlook and responsible independence. The life of the celibate can be viewed as an ongoing process of interaction with the religious, social and natural forces that make up his environment. The meaning that life assumes for a celibate depends on his personal response to these forces. The celibate community constitutes a union of persons who par-ticipate in a common love-response to the call of Christ.4 The key to a proper 3John Dalrymple, Christian Affirmation (Denville, N.J.: Dimension Books, Inc., 1971), p. 10. 'Sister Helen Marie Beha, OSF, Living Community (Milwaukee, Wis.: Bruce Publishing Co., 1967), p. 21. Affirmation, Healing in Community understanding of community lies in participation which becomes a unifying force which, at the same time, allows for individual differences. Is not willingness to receive from him one of the dearest gifts one can give to another? Participation characterizes the relationship of individuals united by love in community. All encounters assume meaning in that context; they become avenues to change. The difference his presence makes in the overall community process gives meaning to the celibate's life. Being human really means coming to grips, in a creative way, with the concrete situation in which we find ourselves. The ex-perience of here-and-now is crucial, for life is today--not yesterday or tomorrow. The same applies in the therapeutic situation be it individual or group: the ongoing, immediate experience of residents and therapists as they interact becomes the phenomenological focus in therapy. The total phenomena ex-perienced at any moment in time is what describes man's existential situation; the experienced event is what is brought to therapy. Listening to others as per-sons, looking into their eyes, mind and heart with deep sympathy, feeling that this person is suffering, is appealing to us as a person--is this not affirmative response to Christ's summons: "Love one another as I have loved you" (.In 13:34)? The call to Christian life is ideally expressed in the experience of the Eucharist which is the community experience par excellence. The Eucharist builds up a community of faith, and so it stands at the very center of the psy-chotheoiogical community that is the House of Affirmation; it reveals the solidarity of all members in Christ. It is the same solidarity that is expressed in the opening words of the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes: "The joys and hopes, the sorrows and worries of the men of our time are ours" (GS, 1). The House of Affirmation has thus accepted the challenge of the Fathers of Vatican II who urged, in the same document that we make appropriate use "not only of theological principles, but also of the findings of the secular sciences, especially of psychology and sociology" (GSo 62) to help the faithful live their faith in a more thorough and mature way. In its Decree on the Ap-propriate Renewal of the Religious Life, Perfectae Caritatis, the Council Fathers pursued the same line of thought: "The manner of living, praying, and working should be suitably adapted to the physical and psychological con-ditions of today's religious., to the needs of the apostolate, the requirements of a given culture, and to the social and economic circumstances" (PC, 3). In the article pertaining to chastity, religious are urged to "take advantage of those natural helps which favor mental and bodily health . Everyone should remember that chastity has stronger safeguards in a community when true fraternal love thrives among its members" (PC, 12). Celibate religious professionals who are trained in psychiatry and psychology can bring to bear their own experience in coming to a better understanding of the emotional problems of religious and priestly life today. Such is the case in both of our outpatient Consulting Centers and the residential treatment center of the House of Affirmation. ~i40 / Review for Religious, l/olume 34, 1975/4 For too long, celibates have been frustrated when seeking professional help since they were limited to psychiatrists and psychologists who had little un-derstanding of their religious commitment; the misconceptions that could arise often deterred religious and priests from seeking psychiatric-psychological help. Our residential treatment center has been set up to minimize the threat and the possible alienation attendant on presenting oneself to a professional-type establishment. A home-like atmosphere has been developed which has proved most therapeutic and which prepares the individual to respond to therapyin a very positive manner, and that contrasts with the resistance that is frequently found when working with the laity. At present, there are twenty residents at the House of Affirmation of which thirteen are men. An attempt is being made to establish a better men/women ratio but the fact is that more men than women are referred for residential treatment. The professional staff presently includes one psychiatrist, six psy-chologists, two pastoral counselors and one registered nurse. The basic com-ponents of the therapeutic program are: Mode of therapy Time per session Weekly Individual 1 hour twice Group (same therapist) 1 1/2 hours twice Intercommunication lab I 1/2 hours once Psychodrama 1 1/2 hours once Residents' group (no therapist present) 1 hour once Group design I hour once Ancillary therapies: Photography I 1/2 hours once Movement therapy 2 hours once Physical therapy 1 hour once Alcoholics Anonymous 1 hour once Ceramics 2 hours once Yoga 1 hour once Art therapy 3 hours once Lectures; Psychology/psychiatry 1 hour once Psychotheological reflections I hour once Spirituality 1 hour once An individual priest, sister or brother may be referred to the House of Af-firmation for the purpose of coming to a better understanding of his emotional problems and/or to resolve them. However, the client is always informed that unless he comes of his own free will, therapy will be of little avail to him. No resident is accepted for treatment on the mere recommendation of his religious superiors; the applicant must indicate willingness to come for therapy. The principle of confidentiality is crucial to the operation of the House of Affirma-tion; privacy is maintained at all times. This has produced a sense of security Affirmation, Healing in Community / 541 and trust and the clientele has grown geometrically. Since its inception, it has been stressed that the purpose of the House of Affirmation is not so much keeping the celibate in the religious or priestly life as helping him become truly human and consistently free. Through therapy, he can come to his own deci-sion about his future. In the course of therapy, the client comes to view his experience in wider perspective and he gains a better future orientation. Self-growth demands that the individual have something to aim for, a goal which can be brought into reality through committed action. The individual's task will then be to ac-tualize this possibility, to make it a reality. As a person begins to respond to his feelings, he sees possibilities in his future and makes attempts to achieve these; by so doing, responsible independence increases in his life-style. Many of the problems that have been presented at the consulting centers and at the residential center have been classified as deprivation syndromes and as what Freud has described as repressive neurosis. In the first case, lack of love and acceptance (lack of affirmation) has crippled the psychological func-tioning of individuals; in the latter case, one encounters priests and religious who have made excessive use of the defense mechanism known as intellec-tualization. Many of these individuals are not aware of their emotions and have even repressed anger in their life as celibates. The repression in this in-stance often came about by faulty training which presented the emotion of anger as "unvirtuous," an emotion not to be expressed at any time. Yet Christ found it appropriate to express His emotions: "The angry man who picked up a cord to drive the buyers and sellers out of the temple, who wept in sadness over Jerusalem, who was bathed in sweat before His arrest was not a stoical, emotionless man.''s Through therapy, individual clients become aware of their emotions, are informed that their emotions are basically good and are encouraged to express them in a healthy way within the context of a celibate life. Individual therapy is supported by group therapy where anger-feelings may be expressed and accepted as such. The re-educative process is somewhat long and painful but it "pays off" in a more personally satisfying and productive life. Having been af-firmed by a significant other in the course of individual therapy and, in turn, affirming others, the healed resident knows and feels who he is. He finds that he is different from others but that he is acceptable, that he belongs in com-munity, that he is contributing to it and changing it. He has come to realize that there is a unique place for him in society, that he has a unique contribu-tion to make to it, that he can choose freely to do and to love.6 The effectiveness of this model has already been substantiated by in-house research. It is very likely that it will find still further support for its claims with the passage of time. 5Dalrymple, op. cir. p. 111. nThomas A. Kane, Who Controls Me? (Hicksville, N.Y.: Exposition Press, 1974), pp. 75-76. Prayer: A Thematic Bibliography Compiled by David Ricken Mr. David Ricken is a seminarian of the Diocese of Dodge City, Kansas. His current address: 1501 Belleview--Apt. //3; La Junta, CO 81050. The purpose of this bibliography is to present some of the best authors and books on prayer to a variety of people who are in(erested in prayer for a variety of reasons. This bibliography is divided into several themes so that the reader may easily select that book which is best suited to his interest and purpose. Of course, division brings limitation, and the placement of each work into one particular theme is, on occasion, arbitrary and personal. Attempt has been made, however, to classify each work according to that theme which appears to be central to the book. Obviously, there are many more books on prayer which have not been listed here. However, better to have read one book and to pray than to have read many books and to not pray. l--Prayer: Introductions: Bloom, Archbishop Anthony. Beginning to Pray. Paramus: Paulist. This book is an experience in prayer and contains helpful suggestions and en-couragements to begin one's quest of love for God. Chapman, Dom John. The Spiritual Letters of Dora John Chapman. London: Sheed & Ward, 1935. This work is a compilation of letters, and does not pretend to be a survey or summa of the spiritual life; );et it has become a classic, mostly because of its sound advice on spiritual life in general and mysticism in particular. Guardini, Romano. Prayer in Practice. New York: Pantheon, 1957. 542 Prayer." A Thematic Bibliography / 543 Written by an excellent theologian of several years ago, Prayer in Practice is a thorough, highly intelligible introduction to prayer. The scope of the book is broad, and the author delicately intertwines and balances theory and practice. Jarrett, Bede, O.P. Meditations for Lay-Folk. St. Louis: B. Herder This book is a series of well-thought-out essays on every aspect of Catholic thought and living, but the few sections on prayer are especially fine. Father Jarrett shows prayer to be, in one sense, the "pondered love of God," the lifting of the mind through the heart, and the gradual taking on of God's point of view. It also tries to relate prayer to every possible circumstance of life, thus broadening the base of prayer, making it something more than a narrowly spiritual activity. Father Jarrett shows that there is a totality to prayer, as there should be a totality to man's life with God. He also shows that prayer is normal, since God is interested in every human being and every human being is called to a deep and intimate life with Him. For Father Jarrett, prayer is eminently the "'voice of faith," the living embodiment in one's life of what one believes. It is the natural blossom-ing of the knowledge of the Faith in one's life. It is the voice and nourishment of a per-sonal seeking of God. Maritain, Jacques and Raissa. Prayer and Intelligence. New York: Sheed & Ward, 1943. Comprising less than fifty pages, it is a study of prayer based on St. Thomas and St. John of the Cross. It is not written in philosophical or theological language, but sets forth in very simple language the path of prayer for Christians and is applicable not only to the learned theologian and religious teacher, but also to the ordinary housewife who is a child of God and called to a life of prayer. McNabb, Vincent, O.P. The Path of Prayer. Springfield, 111.: Templegate. This small book is written in the form of a "diary of Sir Lawrence Shipley," and in it Father McNabb embodies some of the fundamental principles of prayer, based on the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas. Prayer is shown to be the habit of leaning on God and the total ordering of one's life to God. It also shows that prayer does anything but produce passive men. Rather it opens up every human possibility and the use of every human gift in God's service. It is a careful reflection on the principles and implications of the life of prayer, enabling one to begin building a personal "pragmatic" of prayer. Rahner, Karl, S.J. On Prayer. Paramus, N.J.: Paulist. With that bold insight and careful respect for the truth so characteristic of him, Rahner has given us the fruit of his search for God. It is clearly discernible that for this eminent theologian, there is hardly.a distinction between theology and prayer. In a style which is easy to understand, he articulates his vision of prayer, one which is truly authentic and truly beneficial. ll--Prayer: Reflections: Caretto, Carlo. Letters From The Desert. Maryknoll: Orbis, 1972. This is prayer incarnate. Prayer as passion, as compassion, as the life and breath of a virile and contemplative mind in a passionate search for the core of his being. Prayer drove Carlo Caretto into the desert, where he could listen to the voice of God in silence and solitude. There is a freshness and primitive innocence to his words as God begins to take hold of his whole being. This is the chronicle of one man's desert experience. Caretto, Carlo. The God Who Comes. Maryknoll: Orbis, 1974. ~i44 / Review for Relibious, Volume 34, 1975/4 This is another presentation of Brgther Carlo's thoughts and reflections from his solitude in the Sahara desert. Written in a simple and direct style, the main thrust of his writing deals with man's hope for "the God Who comes." The book treats ofthe Church as an in-stitution of men and women and as a divine reality which through its renewal and change will evermore make known the gratuity of God. In parts, Brother Carlo speaks of his own life in solitude, his prayer, his contempla-tion and his own dialogue with Jesus. Farrell, Rev. Edward J. Prayer is a Hunger. Denville: Dimension, 1972. Father Farrell writes of prayer as a hunger to be intensely experienced and as a journey to be creatively undertaken. These reflections in solitude encourage the reader to keep a "journal" as an enticement to prayer. The book itself exemplifies this "'journal" ap-proach and helps one to begin to see what prayer is all about. Nouwen, Henri J.M. With Open Hands. Notre Dame: Ave Maria, 1972. With gentleness and authenticity, Nouwen has here developed an artistry which is at once rare and most welcome. With Open Hands is a prayer, for it helps the one who enters into it to allow the walls which he has built around himself to crumble. The author truly teaches the reader to open his hands. Turro, James. Reflections--Path To Prayer. Paramus, N.J.: Paulist, 1972. The beautiful blend of captivating color photographs and a profound text has produced a masterpiece which can lead to prayer with ease. Ill--Prayer: The Presence of God. Abhishiktananda (Henri Le Saux, O.S.B.) Prayer. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1972. To be Christian is to be contemplative. To be Christian is to live in awareness of the presence of God. Contemplation is not the private possession of monks and nuns, priests and religious. It is a gift of God to every man to be exploited and enjoyed. Born in the West, this monk has completely immersed himself in the spiritual heritage of the East. He is one of those phenomenal men who has not lost the roots of his own tradition, but is himself a bridge between East and West. Brother Lawrence. The Practice of the Presence of God. Springfield, I11.: Templegate, 1963 (3rd Edition). This little classic is Franciscan in its primitive simplicity, almost like a page out of a diary of St. Francis. The sheer beauty of God has captivated the heart of Lawrence, and the glimpses that he gets of God in the world around him and in God's Word shatters his heart, developing a spirituality that destroys every last ounce of the fear and diffidence that once motivated him. The introduction by Dorothy Day puts the times of Brother Lawrence into focus and the trans.lation by Donald.Attwater is limpid and clear. This is an account of growth in genuine prayer and the gradual opening of one man's mind and heart to the loveliness of God. It is a paradigm of prayer of great depth and beauty. IV--Prayer: Hesychasm or Prayer of the Heart: Anonymous. The Way of the Pilgrim, and The Pilgrim Continues His Way. (translated from the Russian by R. M. French) New York: Seabury Press, 1965. Prayer." A Thematic Bibliography / 545 After hearing in an Epistle the exhortation of St. Paul "to pray without ceasing," a pilgrim sets out on a journey to do exactly that--to pray ceaselessly. In inspiring narratives, the author instructs the reader about continual interior prayer. This is an ex-cellent introduction to the "Jesus Prayer." Chariton, Igumen (compiler). The Art of Prayer: An Orthodox Anthology. London: Faber & Faber, 1966. Dove Publications. This great anthology is concerned chiefly with one particular prayer, the "Jesus Prayer." This simple prayer has become the edifice upon which many Orthodox have built their spiritual life and through which many have penetrated to truth. This compilation of texts from spiritual men of many ages demonstrates the depth and riches of such a simple prayer.*** Kadloubovsky, E., and Palmer, G. E. H., translators. Writings from the Philokalia on Prayer of the Heart. London: Faber & Faber, 1951. "Philokalia" means "'love of the beautiful" and it was the purpose of the Fathers of the Eastern Church to instill a sense of the beautiful and the sacred in their disciples. Concerned with hesychasm or prayer of the heart of which the "Jesus Prayer" is the prime example, these writings instruct and exhort the Christian in the way of the prayer of the heart.*** Maloney, George, S.J. The Jesus Prayer. Pecos: Dove Publications, 1974. George Maloney is steeped in the Russian hesychasm tradition, and this little booklet is an invaluable introduction to this form of prayer. A Monk of the Eastern Church. On the Invocation of the Name of Jesus. Ox-ford: S.L.G. Press, 1970. Nearly every sentence of this little book is loaded with power. To really appreciate it one must live with it, almost devour it. The author proceeds very logically from an explana-tion of the form of the "Jesus Prayer" to the explication of the theological implications and nuances contained in the "Jesus Prayer." A Monk of the Eastern Church. The Prayer of Jesus. New York: Desclee, 1965. This is considered the ciassic guide to, and explanation of, the "'Jesus Prayer." V--Prayer: The Scriptural Approach: The Psalms by God and man. Von Balthasar, Hans Urs. Prayer. Paramus, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1961. Father Hans Urs Von Balthasar has divided prayer into three main sections: "The Art of Contemplation," "The Object of Contemplation," "Polarities in Contemplation." He approaches the subject in a very masterly fashion, applying copiously many texts drawn from Sacred Scripture. He re-orientates prayer by re-orientating man, reminding him that he is redeemed, a son of God. Bro, Bernard. Learning to Pray. Staten Island: Alba House, 1966. 546 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/4 Despite his many assertions of generous disposition and openness to God, man always seems to find an excuse not to pray. Expanding on the texts, "Lord, teach us how to pray," and "could you not watch one hour with Me?" Bro sets out to show that prayer is a very necessary and vital part of faith. Johnston, William. "The Mystical Reading of the Scriptures--Some Suggestions from Buddhism." Cistercian Studies, #1, 1971. Johnston maintains that while Scriptural exegesis has "boomed ahead with great 61an," the understanding of Scripture at a deeper level than scholarship has made little progress. He suggests that Christians can learn from Buddhism ways of understanding Scripture at a deeper level--primarily through the use of the Koan and mantras taken from Scripture. Worden, T. The Psalms are Christian Prayers. London: Chapman, 1962. The purpose of this book is to re-orient andto change the reader's outlook on the ideas of the Old Testament. It attempts, and succeeds in creating a new mentality in the reader, one which assents to the truth that the Psalms are Christian prayers. VI--Prayer: Mental: Lehodey, Dom Vitalis, O.C.S.O. The Ways of Mental Prayer. Dublin: M. H. Gill & Son, 1955. Noted for its simplicity and clarity of style, Lehodey has succeeded in writing an excellent guide for mental prayer. The accomplishment of Lehodey in this work should not be dis-missed or overlooked because of what appears to be, in recent decades,, a declining in-terest in mental prayer. Rohrbach, Peter Thomas. Conversation with Christ: An Introduction to Men-tal Prayer. 3rd Ed. Denville: Dimension, 1965. Modeled after the prayer of St. Theresa of Avila, Conversation With Christ makes one point: mental prayer is "conversation with Christ." The style is simple and lucid. This makes an excellent introduction to this form of prayer. VII--Prayer: The Oriental Approach: Johnston, William. Christian Zen. New York: Harper & Row, 1971. Almost entirely practical in nature, this little book tries to make sense of Zen for the Christian by explaining some of the methods which can lead to "enlightenment." (cf. The Still Point, a book by this author which gives a psychological explanation of Zen and a discussion of the meeting point of Christian mysticism and Zen.) (cf. Silent Music, another book by this author which treats of the science of meditation. He writes of the similarities of the deep states of consciousness in various religious traditions. A good scientific evaluation.) Stevens, Edward. Oriental Mysticism. New York: Paulist, 1973. This is an integrated treatment of mysticism which combines experience, theory, and practice. Treading Buddhism, Zen, Hinduism, Taoism, the author discusses the necessity of meditation and the need of Western man to develop this ancient art. Temple, Sebastion. How To Meditate~ Chicago: Radial Press, 1971. Prayer." A iThematic Bibliography / 547 The author, a former Hindu monk, provides here n.ot only a "'complete guide to yoga techniques," but also an excellent resource book foi" meditation. VIII--Prayer: Contemplative and Mystical: ' Anonymous. The Cloud of Unknowing and the Book of Privy Counseling. (ed. William Johnston) Garden City: Doubleday, 11973. This is the classic Western exposition of the Byzan~tine tradition of mysticism which found its richest form in the writings of the "Pseudo-Dionysius." Recognizing that God is beyond all our concepts, that the Lord of Heaven add Earth is clothed in Mystery, the "Cloud," formulates a pragmatic of prayer based upon this profound insight into the transcendence of God. The unknown author recognizes that the vitality of prayer must be maintained and that the very obscurity of faith can deter from prayer. Prayer here is not understood as a static act, however, and that is where the author recognizes that he may be misunderstood: it is an attitude of mind, a "looking towards God," a life-style and a modality of thinking and acting. The Introduction by William Johnston is scholarly and thorough, linking the Cloud with other prayer traditions. The Cloud itself is a tightly reasoned book and is meant rather as an encouragement to those who find themselves quite alone in their searching and pursuit of God. This aloneness, this "forgetting," this "unknowing" is part of the pursuit, and the profound advice of the author of the Cloud leads to a number of important convictions in the whole business of prayer.*** Borst, J.M.H.M. "A Method of Contemplative Prayer." Review for Religious 33:4 (July, 1974), 790-816. The author makes an orderly recommendation of different "phases" of contemplative prayer and strongly urges that if one wants to be contemplative, he must practice con-templative prayer regularly. Catherine of Sienna. The Dialogues of St. Catherine of Sienna. Westminster: Newman Press, 1950. St. Catherine's dialogues are a lucid commentary on a living relationship with God and in them she mediates and articulates the full implications of theology regarding man's relationship with God. She lays down the conditions for growth in a vibrant and vital relationship and by the use of stirring and striking imagery communicates something of the scope and texture of true holiness. What is especially significant is the positive view of human things and the role of personal initiative and responsibility. From the theological point of view, she articulates the reality of a "personal providence," the intimate care and concern that God has for each one per-sonally and the tension and dynamics of this personal Providence. The end result is the strengthening of the spirit in a profound and personal hope in God and the growing ability to read the living signs of this hope in one's own life. This is "mysticism" at its best, but a mysticism completely devoid of subjectivity, opening up the mind to the rich possibilities of a personal encounter with God. Unfortunately, the translation is a bit archaic, but the living thought of St. Catherine still comes through.*** Higgins, John J., S.J. Merton's Theology of Prayer. Spencer, Mass.: Cistercian Publications, 1971. 54B / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/4 This study of Thomas Merton's theology of prayer shows the total consecration to com-panionship with God which was Merton's legacy. It shows the unity of Merton's thought and development, the spiritual passion that characterized his early years and the develop-ment of that passion to something close to spiritual genius. Merton's ability to nourish his prayer-life from hundreds of different sources, and the blossoming of that prayer-life in his varied writings reveals the depth and dimensions of this remarkable spiritual per-sonality. Prayer, in all its richness and beauty, is shown to be the result of normal faith and normal intelligence--but as fully exploited in a personal pursuit of God. This is different than is to be found in some other studies of prayer, in that it shows the embodi-ment of a prayer tradition in the life of one man, a man for whom God and prayer were the totality of life. Merton, Thomas. The Ascent.to Truth. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1956. The finest introduction in any language to the mystical theology of St. John of the Cross. A lucid and clear exposition of the whys of prayer in the Juan de la Cruz tradition, with distinctions and clarifications which make it a very valuable theological work. Perhaps the finest of Merton's early works in which he shows himself to be a superb and masterly theologian. Merton, Thomas. Contemplative Prayer. New York: Herder & Herder, 1969. In Merton's solid "educated English," he traces the steps to an "educated awareness of God," the cultivation.of which is the finest fruit of faith. His thought ranges from the lim-pid simplicity of the early monks to the most brilliant insights of contemporary theology. This is adult spirituality at its best, with the Merton mind showing the full human and personal implications of a life of prayer. In this book, Merton becomes the guru, the prayer-tutor, sharing his own convictions and prayer-life with a wider audience. Merton, Thomas. New Seeds of Contemplation. N.Y.: New Directions. in this book, Merton covers all the elements of the interior life building up to a solid con-templative life of prayer. This is a very good psychological description of the experience of contemplative prayer. It is a revision of one of Merton's early works, perhaps the most enduring of the early writings. Morales, Jose L. (editor) Contemplative Prayer according to the Writings of St. Theresa of Jesus and St. John of the Cross, Doctors of the Church. An excellent compilation of texts about contemplative prayer by two great con-templatives.*** Underhill, Evelyn. Practical Mysticism. New York: Dutton, 1960. This highly competent and well-known author in the area of mysticism has here succeeded in clearing up the nebulous, ethereal thinking that is often characteristic of things dealing with the mystical. Voillaume, Rene. The Need of Contemplation. London: Darton, 1971. Contemplation is ndcessary for man's very survival, and it is time for man to begin to cultivate a contemplative attitude by proceeding to the heart of things. Love will overflow from the reservoirs of each individual's living contact with Christ. Love begets love; love begets contemplatives. Whalen, Joseph, S.J. Benjamin: Essays in Prayer. New York: Newman, 1972. An initiation into the world of wonder is an appropriate description of Benjamin. Whalen perceives the contemporary human situation and introduces the reader to the con-templative act--to wonder. Prayer." A Thematic Bibliography / 549 IX--Prayer: The Holy Spirit: Bennet, Dennis & Rita. The Holy Spirit and You: A Study-Guide to the Spirit- Filled Life. Plainfield, N.J.: Logos Int, 1971. This is an especially thorough and helpful explanation of that facet of the experience of God which is often called "the Spirit experience." Well done. John of St. Thomas. The Gifts of the Holy Ghost. (tr. by Dominic Hughes, O.P.) New York: Sheed & Ward, 1951. This classic work, using the framework of the traditional teaching on the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, focuses on the action of God leading a person to freedom, to openness to God and to a deep life of prayer. The book shows how the gifts and action of the Spirit prepare a man for his encounter with God, giving him clarity of vision, flexibility and resilience, making fertile his freedom, and leading him to explore the wonder and magnitude of God. The book is difficult reading in places, but the implications of the teaching are critical to any real life of prayer. John of St. Thomas shows that the gifts are purification, education, insight and are the full blossoming of faith and a vibrant love of God. By the gifts, the seeker of God begins to share, in some small degree, in the abundance and plenitude of God. In the words of St. Thomas, the gifts are the deep interior currents of a life of prayer, giving to a man a certain kinship, a connaturality with Divine Things. They make a man a lover of God, the~, bring about a state of intimacy with God and Divine Things, and give a foretaste of beatitude. By tl~e gifts, a man exchanges a human standard for a Divine one, and begins to measure his life and his expectations by a Divine yardstick. They open wide the horizons of loving God, enabling a man to "'dream the im-possible dream." Sherrili, John. They Speak With Other Tongues. N.Y.: Pyramid, 1964. A very skeptical journalist relates his contact with and eventual experience of the gift of tongues. This is a valuable explanation of the not-too-long-ago unusual phenomenon which has become wide-spread and highly significant. X--Prayer: Best Sellers: Carothers, Merlon R. Prison to Praise. Plainfield, Logos, Int., 1970. Praise and thank God for all things, even for bad situations and circumstances. This is the basic tenet of a series of books on praise, written by this author. Carothers uses l Thess 5:16-17 as the basis for this form of prayer which has proven itself a powerful aid in revolutionizing people's lives. Parker, Dr. William F. and St. Johns, Elaine. Prayer Can Change Your Life. New York: Pocket Books, 1957. This best seller discusses "prayer therapy," a psychological experiment in prayer which helped forty-five people to grow to greater emotional wholeness and to gain peace of mind. For a good understanding of the nature of Western Mysticism, see "The Nature of Mysticism" by David Knowles in the Twentieth Century En-cyclopedia of Catholicism. ***It is to one's advantage to bring to this book some experience in prayer and especially an understanding of the spiritual, theological and philosophical milieu of the age in which the author wrote, in order to appreciate the full impact of the work. it is also to one's advantage to read this book under the guidance of a spiritual advisor. Models of Poverty Gerald R. Grosh, S.J. Gerald R. Grosh, in addition to teaching theology at Xavier University in Cincinnati, is a member of the staff of the Jesuit Renewal Center; P.O. Box 289; Milford, OH 45150. In his latest book, Models of the Church,~ Avery Dulles elucidates five models2 of the Church which he finds operative "in the minds of the faithful. He analyzes each one in terms of the advantages and disadvantages that each model has in aiding Christian living. Ultimately, Dulles says that the Church is a mystery and that no one model can adequately encompass a mystery. Rather, he states that the models are mutually complementary like the ¯ different shades and colors that blend together to create a total picture. The book is very freeing since it allows for various models and opens up other dimensions of the Church--especially for those persons who are locked into one framework. The aim of this article is to do for our notion of poverty what Dulles has done for our notion of the Church. In our time religious generally are uneasy about their practice of poverty. Often it seems that specific features of our practice of poverty can be amply justified if they are taken one by one. But the features taken all together, the total picture, clearly leave much to be desired. What is wrong? Where do we fail? Perhaps the failure in poverty, if indeed it is failure, results from a too exclusive concentration on one model of poverty, from our failure to let our own dominant model of poverty be balanced ade-quately by other models. It is the belief of this author that a clarification of the 1Avery Dulles, Models of the Church (Garden City: Doubleday and Company, inc., 1974). 2A model is an attitude of mind or a mental framework. It is a way of looking at and understand-ing a particular phenomenon, it points more to a structure of the mind than to a particular con-tent. 550 Models of Poverty / 551 models involved would facilitate the discussion as well as the choices that are made. I shall delineate seven models which 1 see operative in our discussions of poverty. I shall briefly describe each model, indicate the spiritual value which it strives to encompass, indicate its advantages and disadvantages, and list some practical suggestions which might be in accord with a given model. 1. Pnverty as Cnmmunitarian Sharing The call to religious life is a call to living the vows in community. Religious life witnesses to the experience of community as we share our lives together and work toward the common goal of preaching the good news of Jesus Christ. The vow of poverty, then, calls us to share not only our living together and working together but also our material goods. This is rooted in the experience of the early Church: "The whole group of believers was united, heart and soul; no one claimed for his own use anything that he had, as everything they owned was held in common" (Acts 4:32). This model of poverty as communitarian sharing points to the fundamental unity which we have as religious--namely, a unity of heart. We are all believers. We share a common vision of faith and hope. We are united in love. Each person's value is not what he owns or has, but who he is. So deep is our oneness that we live in community and share our possessions. The goal is the underlying unity of mind and heart. One of the advantages of this model is that it aims at eliminating differences between "rich and poor" and focuses on the equality of all. It at-tacks the roots of ownership which can so easily foster vanity and greed. Thus whatever is given to one is given to the whole community and goes to "the common barrel." The spiritual foundation for this mutual sharing of goods is the mutual care that the members of a given community have for one another. The disadvantage of this model is that it becomes more difficult to live as life becomes more complex. We know that we need certain things for apostolic use. How, then, does one regulate the quality and quantity of goods that are needed? How does one maintain the equality of all and the non-ownership of all? The traditional response t6 this dilemma has been to link the acquisition and use of goods with receiving permission for them from the superior. The underlying purpose of asking permission has been to aid our acting as non- . owners and to help free us from the power that is present in ownership. But it has been difficult for individuals not to compare what they have with what others have and therefore to justify their own acquisition of the same thing or of something else. It has been difficult for a superior to say "no" to one where he has said "yes" to another. Furthermore, critics of the system have pointed out that an adult makes his own decisions and that this practice has often seemed infantile. Also, as superiors so readily grant permission, the require-ment has come to be seen by many as a formality to be gone through or even ignored. It has also been difficult to draw a fine line between what one needs and what one wants. 552 / Review for Religious, Volume 34, 1975/4 In the judgment of this author, in so far as poverty has been linked to ask-ing permission for goods, it has failed--whether one blames the notion itself or the persons who have failed to live it. However, the model of poverty as com-munitarian living does have something to offer us today. The essence of the model is the mutual sharing of material goods in community. It would seem to preclude the private appropriation of goods (personal TVs, personal cars, etc.). It would also seem to preclude the free disposition of one's salary, e.g., the buying of books or equipment, travel, relaxation, or even almsgiving. 2. Poverty as Simplicity of Life- The second model of poverty is that of the frugal life-style or "simplicity of life." This model focuses clearly on poverty as a fact, i.e., material poverty. The spiritual foundation of simplicity of life is that it aids to singularity of pur-pose and locus--namely on the Lord and His work. Nothing else matters that much. This model of poverty is easily linked with the model of poverty as un-ion with the poor. Stated simply, this model of simplicity of life points to the fact that a poor man does not have a lot of material possessions or the free dis-position of a lot of money. The advantage of this model is that it can act as a deterrent or as a negative norm for how we spend our money. Does a poor person have a color TV or is he able to jet across the country, or have a stereo set? How often can the poor person or family afford steak? Lavish spending is seen as an insult to the poor who struggle for their food and their meagre existence. Such spending is also seen to imply contempt for human w~rk and the dignity of man involved in working hard for a day's pay. Also, as with the model of poverty as com-munitarian sharing, this model takes away the sense of power that is involved in the possession of goods and in the lavish disposition of one's finances. The advantage, then, of this model of poverty is that it keeps one mindful of his union with the poor Christ and honest in terms of what he spends. Its primary disadvantage is that it can cause one to be so absorbed in bookkeep-ing and penny-pinching that he loses the perspective of apostolic service. However, there are also other possible disadvantages that can accompany this model. Too great an emphasis on material things can lead to a pharisaism which overlooks the more important poverty of spirit. It can also result in divisiveness and criticism within communities as some will need more things than others to carry out their apostolic work. The particular way of living according to this model would call a person to be continually mindful of how his or her standard of life compares with' the poor. Such things as careful personal and community budgets, economical automobiles, buying articles on s.ale, adjusting budgets to meet emergencies, are evidences of the

Issue 65.1 of the Review for Religious, 2006. ; Inspiration The Spirit QUARTERLY ~ 2006 Review for Religious fosters dialogue with God, dialogue with ourselves, and dialogue with one another about tb~ holiness we try to live according to charisms of Catholic religious life. As Pope Paul vl said, our way of being church is today the way of dialogue. Review for Religious (ISSN 0034-639X) is published quarterly at Saint Louis Universit3£ by the Jesuits of the Missouri Province. Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393 Telephone: 314-633-4610 ¯ Fax: 314-633-4611 E-Mail: review@slu.edu .° \¥eh site: *~,w.reviewforreligious.org Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor: Review for Religious ¯ 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, MO 63108-3393 Correspondence about the Canonical Counsel department: Elizabeth McDonough OP ° Pontifical College Josephinuln 7625 North High Street ¯ Columbus, Ohio 43235 POSTMASTER Send address changes to Review for Religious ¯ P.O. Box 6070 ¯ Duluth, MN 55806. Periodical postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri, and additional mailing offices. See inside back cover for information on subscription rates. ©2006 Review for Religious Permission is herewith granted to copy any material (articles, poems, reviews) contained in this issue of Review for Religious for personal or internal use, or for the personal or internal use of specific lihrarv clients within the limits outlined in Sections 107 and/or 108 of the United States Copyright Law. All copies made under this permission must bear notice of the source, date, and copyright owner on the first page. This permission is NOT extended to copying for commercial distribu-tion, advertising, institutional promotion, or for the creation of new collective works or anthologies. Such permission will only be considered on written application to the Editor, Review for Religious. view for religious Editor Associate Editor Canonical Counsel Scripture Scope Editorial Staff VVebmaster Advisory Board David L. Fleming SJ Philip C. Fischer SJ Elizabeth McDonough OP Eugene Hensell OSB Mary Ann Foppe Tracy Gramm Judy Sharp Clare Boehmer ASC Stephen Erspamer OSB Kathleen Hughes RSCJ Louis and A~. gela Menard Bishop Terry Steib SVD Miriam D. Ukeritis CSJ QUARTERLY 65.1 2006 contents prisms 4 Prisms context American Catholicism's Chaos-- and Its Future Richard Gribble CSC reviews the present situation of the post-Vatican II era of American Catholicism through an analysis of contemporary authors while providing hope for the future. 21 23 3O challenges 0 Religious Life in the Third World-- a Shangri-La? Anthony Malaviaratchi CSSR paints a rather sobering picture of the difficulties involved in discerning a vocation for third-world candidates and in superiors' exercise of leadership. Personal Reflection Questions and Group Discussion Propositions Challenges for Communities' New Members Guire Cleary SSF sets out some of the challenges experi-enced by new members of religious communities, drawing on his own experiences and observations and on personal histories from other new religious. Review for Religious inspiration 43 A Spirituality of Surrender--A Jesuit's Story Rosemary Stets OSF shares with us the making of a prayer of surrender from her conversation with and the living example of the Jesuit Walter J. Ciszek. 48 57 Two Mysteries in One: Implications for Ministry Giovanni Zevola OMI delves into the meaning of the Annunciation and the Visitation to find there the richness of theology and pastoral care, encountering each other in pastoral experience. Truth: Religious Simplicity Revisited Robert P. Maloney CM focuses on Vincent de Paul's choice of simplicity as "being in the truth" with God, with oneself, with others, and with the created universe; He then discusses some of the dilemmas involved in combining the simplicity of the dove with the prudence of the serpent. Prayer Reflection and Group Discussion 7O Sharing God the Ignatian Way David L. Fleming SJ indicates how Ignatian spirituality affects the ways we understand and relate to God. Personal Reflection and Group Discussion 76 the spirit Led by the Spirit: St. Patrick Andrew Ryder SCJ views the working of the Holy Spirit in the life and missionary activity of St. Patrick from his own witness given in his Confession. departments 92 Scripture Scope: The suffering of Jesus ~ 96 Canonical Counsel: Chapters and Other Meetings 102 Book Reviews 65.1 2006 4 ~hen was the last time that we felt that we were making a flesh start? Maybe it was a flesh start in our getting regular exercise. Perhaps it was a fresh start that we needed in establishing a better relationship with a co-worker or a relative. Or it might be the flesh start we need in working on our spiritual or church life. We hear and are well aware of the bromides like "That's the way it has always been done" or "We always do it that way." It seems that there is nothing more deadening than a routine life, a life of frozen patterns. Yet it is normal, even necessary, that we estab-lish patterns in our everyday living. For exam-ple, for good health we are encouraged to keep to a pattern of sleeping hours. It is usually helpful for us to establish patterns for our personal prayer, or else we begin to find ourselves too busy to take time to pray. We as a church are always calling ourselves to start afresh. That is a purpose of church sea-sons. We have recently finished the Christmas season. We are entering Ordinary Time, which we will shortly interrupt for the Lenten and Easter seasons. Each time the liturgy, through these seasonal emphases, calls us to a fresh assess-ment of how we are relating to God and how we are living our Christian life. What does it mean for us "to start afresh"? It does not mean that we reject everything that we have been doing. It does not call for us to break totally with our past and act as if we have Review for Religious no personal history. Each one of us is only one person, from birth to death and into resurrection. We are the ones that God loves into creation and identifies with, as sons and daughters in the redemptive action of Jesus. We must always work with our God-given gifts and limitations. But, accepting and living with the mystery of our own person, we receive God's call to start afresh, always to be growing, which means change and development. The foods that we liked as children should not keep us from foods we could well like as adults. When was the last time we tried something new to eat? Maybe we are very comfortable attending Eucharistic holy hours, but have we ever taken time to visit people in a nursing home or in a hospital? Perhaps we keep our weekends to our-selves, but are we open to volunteering for our parish's special pantry preparation and delivery for poor people in our neighborhood? Every Eucharist we celebrate invites us to start afresh with Christ. The risen Jesus, in his everlasting stance of offering himself anew totally to God and totally to us, extends his arms to embrace us in his offering as we enter into Eucharist. And so each Mass, with its own ritual pat-tern, is God's invitation to us to start anew. In the simple practice of the daily examination of conscience--once again a helpful pattern in our Christian lives--we find ourselves always being alerted to the surprising ways that God has entered into our lives this day and perhaps, to our sorrow, we have not responded. In a paradoxical way, by our looking back over our day in the examen, we find ourselves starting afresh in our relationship with God. "Starting afresh with Christ"--is this the "routine call" we hear every day? We may find that this call freshens the whole of our everyday way of living. David L. Fleming SJ 6Y.I 2006 RICHARD GRIBBLE American Catholicism's Chaos--and Its Future context In his recent book The Catholic Revolution: New Wine, Old Wineskins, and the Second Vatican Council, the priest sociologist Andrew Greeley uses new wine in old wineskins to describe con-temporary American Catholicism's chaotic state. He contends that, while appearing strong, Roman Catholicism's structures were fragile, for they had not been adequately adapted to chang-ing times. Thus, when the progressive teach-ings of Vatican II came all at once, the structures were not ready for them and chaos ensued.l Can this chaotic situation be a turning point to a stronger church in the future? Using the work of several prominent American Catholic intellectuals, this essay continues the discussion and seeks to increase hopes for the contempo-rary church. Richard Gribble CSC is an associate professor of religious studies at Stonehill College; 480 Washington Street; North Easton, Massachusetts 02356. His current email address is rgribble@stonehill.edu Review for Religious The American Church Today American Catholics today can be divided into two groups. The "spirit of Vatican II" Catholics, the majority of American Catholics, view John xxIII's aggiornamento as a move toward solidarity with the present age. Following the opening words of Sacrosanctum concilium, "The sacred council has set out., to adapt more closely to the needs of our age those institutions which are sub-ject to change," these more liberal Catholics see Vatican II as a starting point for adaptation. Greeley says, "Catholics [today] believe that the church can change and that they can disregard the pope when it comes to making decisions, especially about sex and gender.''2 Some refer to those in this category as "cafeteria Catholics," who feel free to pick and choose what teach-ings they accept and reject. George Weigel, senior fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C., calls such an understanding of the faith "Catholic lite," perceiving this "watered down" Catholicism as the root of the recent sexual-abuse crisis and, by extension, the general malaise in American Catholicism.3 Greeley characterizes the lassitude in the church as "beige Catholicism," with the Catholic imagination, once a source of unity, now replaced by a colorless Catholic life that has little enthusiasm.4 The other group, those labeled "conservatives" in the literature, accepts Vatican II at face value, but goes no further. These Catholics accept and promote what the council taught, but, unlike the more progressive element, do not believe that the council licensed the generation of multiple theologies. They reject the idea that the "spirit of Vatican II" should govern the church. In the eyes of this group, an overemphasis on aggiornamento created the disunities of "Catholic lite" and "beige Catholicism." James Hitchcock, professor of history at St. Louis 6Y. 1 2006 Gribble ¯ dmerican Catbolicism's Cbaos Despite Vatican II's emphasis on the active role of the laity, the hierarchical church is slow to relinquish power and authority. University, is a standard bearer for this position. He writes, "Liberal religion treats secular culture as pos-sessing a superior wisdom and restricts religious beliefs to what the culture allows, including endorsing every movement deemed to be progressive." He suggests fur-ther that liberals have no sense "that modernity itself, in the full sense oi: the term, is simply antireligious, that rejection of belief is essential to its self-understanding." s Given these divisions in American Catholicism, what are the dominant issues? The Catholic editor and writer Peter Steinfels, in his popular book A People Adrift, says the church must nego-tiate (1) the passage from one generation to the next and (2) the pas-sage of power from the clergy to the laity.6 The first passage is compli-cated: those formed religiously after Vatican II ask questions without sufficient background. v_ _ As for the second pas-sage, despite Vatican II's emphasis on the active role of the laity, the hierarchical church is slow to relinquish power and authority. Steinfels concludes: "Today the Roman Catholic Church in the United States is on the verge of either an irreversible decline or a thoroughgo-ing transformation." 7 For Catholicism worldwide and here in the United States, the ideas Catholics had about Pope John Paul II had a strong influence. Almost universally he was well respected for his worldwide crusade for social justice and his influence in the fall of Communism. More conser-vative critics such as George Weigel saw the pope's lead- Review for Religious ership in church affairs, one based on past traditions, to be precisely what was needed to curb uncertainty and dissent. Clearly John Paul saw Vatican II as a point of arrival, not one of departure for church development. Strong authority is needed, Weigel suggests, "to ensure Christians do not settle for mediocrity." 8 In similar sup-port, James Hitchcock claims that John Paul made "a broad and ambitious attempt to relate the Catholic faith to everything positive in modern culture.''9 On the other hand, the columnist David Gibson has written, "For all of John Paul's unparalleled accomplishments, his popu-larity came with a hidden cost to the church.''1° Similarly, the French journalist Alain Woodrow well summarizes how many American Catholics viewed John Paul: "John Paul is self-assured, convinced of his 'divine mission,' and determined to drag the church--kicking and scream-ing if need be--into his own vision of the 21st century, a vision shaped by his Polish ecclesiology and sustained by his theological certainties. No soul searching or admission of doubt here, but a ringing cry: 'Be not afraid'; I am the pope and I know best!''1~ The Church Today: Specific Ideas Vatican II's emphasis on the church as the people of God brought attention to the important role of the laity. In their outstanding study of the Catholic laity today, William D'Antonio and his colleagues have compared the theology and tendencies of three groups of Catholics: (1) those formed before Vatican II, (2) those who matured during Vatican II, and (3) those raised in a post-Vatican II church. All three generations studied seem to want a more democratic church. A positive view of lay partici-pation in the church increases with a generation's prox-imity to Vatican II. Yet participation as measured by Mass attendance and knowledge of church teaching declines 65.1 2006 Gribble * American Catholicism's Chaos 1_ol from the pre- to post-Vatican II church. 12 While lacking an accurate gauge, the study suggested that, because of less religious formation, post-Vatican II Catholics are less committed than their predecessors.~3 The rapid and significant growth of lay ministry, while a blessing ~o the church, has also caused a few problems. The 1999 "Study of Lay Parish Ministry" found that the theology and church policies necessary to govern this explosion of lay involvement have not kept pace with the advance. Additionally, some have raised concerns that the laity's movement into more tradition-ally priestly or religious roles may eclipse the primary role of the laity in the church and/or lead to a clerical-izing of the laity. Some also fear that careerism rather than a desire to serve, a problem called clericalism when noted in the clergy, may invade the ranks of the laity.14 Another concern raised with the post-Vatican II rise of the laity is an evolving mutual distrust and conflict between the clergy and the laity. David Gibson suggests that the rise in lay ministry has created a backlash and retrenchment on the part of priests. The clergy is flex-ing its muscle and standing aloof from the laity.~s Priests find themselves caught between two forces, the laity, with whom they generally agree theologically but dis-trust, and the institutional church, which they trust but do not agree with. Priests generally support the laity's more positive view of sexuality, have a greater sensitiv-ity to women, and possess respect for the laity's freedom to make decisions, especially on moral matters. 16 Yet cler-icalism and poor homilies, among other things, have cre-ated a gap between priests and their flocks. Rather than assigning any blame to themselves for this situation, the clergy generally point to family breakdown, divorce, and apathy as reasons for the divide.~7 In addition to the gap between the laity and the lower Review for Religious clergy, a division exists between the laity and the hier-archy. During the last several years, accentuated greatly by the 2002 sex-abuse crisis, bishops have lost much credibility with priests and the laity. At the June 2002 meeting of the U.S. Catholic bishops in Dallas, Scott Appleby, the church historian and former director of the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism, summarized the problem while proffering a solution: The crisis confronting the church today cannot be understood and thus not adequately addressed apart from its setting in a wider range of problems that have been growing over the last 34 years. At the heart of these problems is the alienation of the hierarchy and, to a lesser degree, many of the clergy, from ordinary laywomen and laymen . To be faithful to the church envisioned by the council fathers of Vatican II, bishops and priests must trust the laity, appropriately share authority with them, and open their financial, legal, [and] administrative practices and decisions to full visibility. 18 Unfortunately, Appleby's call for transparency has not been heeded sufficiently. In many ways the separation between the hierarchy and the laity has widened on account of the bishops' poor reception of the Voice of the Faithful, the laity's effort to seek accountability while supporting the institutional church. The laity's status in the church and its conflicts with the clergy are highlighted by the ongoing struggle for women to gain proper recognition and equality. How paradoxical that, while women are more active in church ministries, they are mostly relegated to the fringes in authority and privilege. The moral theologian Christine Gudorf has stated that, despite church social teaching on the equality of women, papal teaching on the nature and role of women still accentuates the theme of motherhood. Not only does the pope view motherhood as an element 6Y. 1 2006 Gribble ¯ American Catholicism's Chaos 12 of being female; he views it as a definition of woman-hood. 9 The Benedictine nun, lecturer, and writer Joan Chittister, believes that to design doctrines on marriage, family, and sexuality--all of which deeply and directly impinge on women--without their input is to adopt "posi-tions that are incomplete as well as arrogant." 20 Views opposed ~0 the rise of feminism are also pre-sent. In a strong statement James Hitchcock has written: The rise of militant feminism has been one of the most serious crises in the history of orthodox religion, because women have always tended to be more pious than men and the churches are thus alienated from some of their hitherto most faithful communicants, and because militant feminism logically rejects not only a male savior but the very idea of monotheism.21 The crisis experienced by the laity in today's church is present as well in the priesthood, although manifested differently. Before Vatican II the priesthood in general sustained a vertical.rather than a horizontal faith. The priest was symbolic and functional and was character-ized by the concept of alter Christus (another Christ). The popular 1950s television show "Father Knows Best" could have been easily applied to the priest, who stood as a symbol of the institutional church and functioned to serve God's people in every way. Life for the priest and his people was centered in the parish. While some clergy became prominent as social activists or in other specific roles, the operative model was the all-purpose priest-hood. With rectories and seminaries full and the gener-ally high respect afforded priests, as typified by Father O'Malley in the box-office favorites "Going My Way" and "The Bells of Saint Mary's," priesthood in the American church was .strong. Vatican II's emphasis on the priesthood of the laity and on the church as the people of God "demanded a Review for Religious formal and full reconsideration of the role and identity of the priest in the new church.''22 The tumultuous 1960s, the increased pressure on priests to serve as the-ological and spiritual leaders, and the increasing numbers of men leaving the priesthood transformed the remain-ing priests from "all-purpose" to "orchestra leaders." The priest was now called to identify and foster the unique gifts in each parishioner for service to the church. Empowerment of the laity to fulfill its man-date from Vatican II became an integral part of the priesthood. Yet this demand was not negotiated well by many, leading some to suffer an identity crisis and loss of purpose . With many of the faithful serving as ministers of the Eucharist, ministers of the word, ministers to the sick, and similar functions, what was distinctive about the ordained ministry?z3 Father Donald Cozzens, in his Changing Face of the Priesthood, has described 1980 to 2000 as the "priest-hood's dark night." He writes, "The postconciliar years have tested the mettle of priests--crisis after crisis 'shak-ing the foundations' and turning their lives inside out and upside down." 24 He says that the fallout from Vatican II, most notably the rise in dissent, has eaten away at the priest's moral authority and curtailed the cleric's ability to offer pastoral guidance. Yet, despite these conditions, Cozzens believes the priesthood's present dark night has led to a deepening of spirit and a purification of soul and thus a grace and blessing. The dark night was necessary to bring about the conversion of mind and heart that the Empowerment of the laity to fulf!lt its mandate from Vatican Il became an integral part of the priesthood. 6Y.1 2006 Gribble ¯ American Catholicism's Chaos priesthood needed to serve the people of God in a post-conciliar world.2s The priesthood faces additional challenges that must be addressed in the 2 lst-century church. Some more progressive commentators, like Andrew Greeley, suggest that clericalism allows the clergy to hide behind a veil of secrecy and keeps priests from accepting responsibil-ity for their actions. The natural and important cama-raderie that exists in the clergy has too often been used as an excuse to cover up information and actions that might be seen as prejudicial against the institutional church. One need look no further than the recent sex-abuse controversy to find clear evidence of this. Members of a fraternity will not speak ill of each other. In the same light the priesthood's traditional hierarchical posi-tion above the laity gives license for some to dominate God's people or disregard their opinions.26 More con-servative writers lay much of the blame for lassitude in the church at the feet of the clergy. James Hitchcock has written: The spread of secular attitudes in Catholic cultures has not been primarily the work of professors and journalists, but of priests. Laymen who would be disposed to resist secularization, especially as they see it emanating from hostile sources outside the churches, abandon their resistance at the parent bidding of their spiritual leaders.27 Polarization of theology is another contemporary phenomenon in the priesthood. The researcher Dean Hoge in his First Five Years of the .Priesthood provides a convincing argument that younger priests are more con-servative in their theology and align themselves more strictly along the views of Pope John Paul II.28 Andrew Greeley agrees with Hoge's analysis, especially noting the views of young clergy toward optional celibacy and Review for Religious women priests. He suggests three reasons for their views: (1) These priests do not understand Vatican II, (2) they want the security of a clerical state, and (3) they reject uncertainty.29 More positively, Greeley debunks the myth that priests are unhappy men, especially as a result of the celibacy requirement. Greeley's analysis shows that, while priests may not be paragons of maturity and personal well-being, they are similar to married men with com-mensurate educational backgrounds. His data demon-strates that only two percent of active priests see celibacy as a problem and only sixteen percent of clerics who resign do so because of celibacy. Rather, priests leave because they do not like the work. Celibacy becomes a problem only when ministry is not satisfying.3° What is needed for the American Catholic priest of the 2 1st century? Peter Steinfels presents three signifi-cant qualities of future priests. First, they must possess the theological capacity to celebrate the sacraments, preach the word of God, and make contemporary life meaningful. Second, they must have the ability to ani-mate and guide others. Third, they must be account-able. 3~ John Boissonneau, auxiliary bishop of Toronto, provides a different but consistent list of attributes. Successful priests must view their role as countercultural and not be afraid to take risks. Future clergy must place a premium on authenticity in their personal lives and ministry. And, lastly, successful future priests must avoid isolation, drawing their life from the people they serve.32 The Church Tomorrow To speak intelligently about the needs of the future church, one should know what has proved successful in the past. Andrew Greeley's call for a return to what he terms "the Catholic imagination" deserves some review. 65.1 2006 Gribble * ~qmerican Catbolicis~z's Chaos Catholicism must recover the things of beauty that were summarily swept aside in the wake of the spirit of Vatican II, For Greeley the glue that held worldwide Catholicism was the many metaphors that stressed the immanence of God. Rather than perceiving God as transcendent (the general theological perspective of Protestants), Catholics have always been attracted by multiple sense images of God's presence. The smell of incense, the sight of Eucharistic adoration, processions, and statues, and the words of novenas, parish missions, and the rosary have long served as a glue for Catholics. These were practices to which all could relate; all Catholics were on the same page. Scratch one Catholic and the whole church bled. Greeley does not suggest a return to the 1940s or 1950s, but the "beige Catholicism" that predominates today is not the answer either. He believes that Catholicism must recover the things of beauty that were summarily swept aside in the wake of the spirit of Vatican II. Greeley says the church needs chant, statues, and patron saints; we need metaphors for God.3.3 David Gibson agrees, but goes further. He believes that subsidiarity, a principle of Catholic social teaching, must become operative in the church universal. For Gibson, loyalty to Catholicism is rooted in the local parish. Rather than from the top down, he suggests that governing be from the bottom up, giving voice and authority to the laity. He says that what is important for the church is unity, not uniformity.34 Where must the church move in the 21st century in order to be the viable and healthy institution that will Review for Religious well serve the people of God? Peter Steinfels laments that Cardinal Joseph Bernardin's dynamic Common Ground initiative was summarily cast aside and a reasser-tion of papal authority put in its place. He suggests that the Catholic leadership of the future must break out from trench warfare that has constricted discussion in the American Church since Vatican II. He believes that a balance must be struck between theology and pastoral reality and that the lack of dialogue has been harmful, and so he sees Bernardin's plan as the optimum.35 On a similar track the journalist David Gibson sees the future church in the hands of the hierarchy. There are two routes to follow. Of the two, the more conser-vative one would want Rome to reassert its power and its claim on Catholics' loyalty. The other one would admit problems and seek systemic change. Gibson opts for the second, with the belief that bishops must become more vocal politically and seek avenues whereby those ele-ments of the faith that can be adapted to the uniqueness of the American environment are changed.36 The present crisis in .the church must be a point of renewal that affords growth and a brighter future.36a Clearly it is impossible to return to the pre-Vatican II Church, even if one should desire such a move. The ben-efits that Vatican II brought must be fostered, yet the initial postconciliar "throwing the baby out with the bath" must be avoided. The council called for greater inclusivity as manifest in opportunities for laity and open-ness to other people of faith. Recent developments, as expressed in church documents on various levels, have been seen by many as a regression from Vatican II. In August 2000 the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith proclaimed concerning Protestants: "If it is true that the followers of other religions can receive grace, it is also certain that objectively speaking [emphasis in the 65.1 2006 Gribble ¯ American Catholicism's Chaos document] they are in a gravely deficient situation in comparison with those who; in the church, have the full-ness of the means of salvation.''37 This regression of Vatican II's more open position toward Protestants does not bode well for the future. The church must reinvig-orate the spirit expressed in Nostra aetate: "Ever aware of her duty to foster unity and charity among individuals, and even among nations, she [the church] reflects at the outset on what men have in common and what tends to promote fellowship among them.''38 Additionally, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has alien-ated many of the faithful laity by stating: "If extraordi-nary ministers of Holy Communion are required by pastoral need, they should not approach the altar before the priest has received communion.''39 In an effort to return to more reverence for the Eucharist, the bishops have effectively placed on ice the council's call for active lay participation on all levels. The council called for a pastoral approach to the lived faith and for a greater sense of dialogue with the world in order to harness the advancement of human knowledge for the betterment of God's people. While the church must continue to oppose secularism and be a countercultural light to the contemporary fascinations of power, wealth, and prestige, she cannot do so effec-tively through a dogmatic and defensive stance. John Paul II reannounced this unyielding position, casting aside dialogue on key issues when he proclaimed in 1994: "I declare that the church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judg-ment is to be definitely held by all the church's faith-ful.'' 4° The church must be open to dialogue, within its own ranks and with other people of faith. The sensz~s fidelium must be addressed by listening to God's people and having the courage to admit error and to effect Review for Religious change. The church cannot stand aloof from the world, but must engage society on all levels. American Catholicism today is at a moment of crisis, even in chaos, but the church need not panic nor be downcast or without hope. Even a cursory review of church history, both universally and in the United States, demonstrates that there have been many crises in the past, but all were negotiated as moments of change, not despair. Such is the case with the contemporary situa-tion. The fate of the church is in our hands; we are, as Lumen gentium states, the people of God. We must not wring our hands or lament with loud cries; rather, as individuals and community, we must use the present cri-sis as a springboard for action. We might not produce systemic change tomorrow, but we need to think globally and act locally. Margaret O'Brien Steinfels has aptly placed the challenge before us: "We can no longer indulge the slothful habit of postponing the church that we need until the next papacy, until the seminaries are full, until the controversies are resolved, until some faith-ful remnant rules the church. We need to bring the new life into the project of church renewal that we have neglected too long.''4~ Are we listening to the church's contemporary voice and willing to act? Only we can answer. Notes ~ Andrew Greeley, The Catholic Revolution: New Wine, Old Wineskins, and the Second Vatican Council (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004), pp. 1-4. z Greeley, Catholic Revolution, p. 58. 3 George Weigel, The Courage to Be Catholic: Crisis, Refor~n, and the Future of the Church (New York: Basic Books, 2002), pp. 219-232. 4 Greeley, Catholic Revolution, pp. 81-89. Drawing from David Tracy's Analogical Imagination, Greeley suggests that the glue to Catholic life has always been its "Catholic Imagination," e.g., a metaphor for ritual, 6Y.I 2006 Gribble ¯ American Catholicism's Chaos devotion, and music. While Catholics today find themselves across the board on many issues, religious and secular, the Catholic imagination has kept unity. Today's understanding and practice of Catholicism threat-ens this cohesion. See Andrew Greeley, Catholic Imagination. s James Hitchcock, "Interpreting Vatican II: Version One, A Continuum in the Great Tradition," Commonweal 128, no. 5 (9 March 2001): 19, 18. 6 Peter Steinfels, A People Adrift: The Crisis of the Roman Catholic Church in America (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2003), pp. 1-14. 7 p. Steinfels, People Adrift, p. 1. s George Weigel, "Liberal Church? Conservative Church?" Crisis 19, no. 10 (November 2001): 32. 9 Hitchcock, "Interpreting Vatican II," 19. 10 David Gibson, The Coming Church: How the Faitbful Are Shaping a New American Catholicism (San Francisco: Harper, 2003), p. 327. 1, Alain Woodrow, "Superstar or Servant?" in The Papacy and the People of God, ed. Gary MacEoin (Maryknoll: Orbis Press), p. 83. lz William V. D'Antonio et al., Laity American and Catholic: Transforming the Church (Kansas City: Sheed and Ward, 1996), pp. 65-66, 73-79. Interesting statistical figures compare the three generations of American Catholics. For pre-Vatican I! Catholics, Vatican II Catholics, and post-Vatican Catholics respectively, the figures were 63 percent, 45 percent, and 23 percent as regards "active perticipation" (Mass atten-dance etc.). For daily prayer the figures were 90 percent, 67 percent, and 56 percent. When asked if Mass attendance is necessary to "be a good Catholic," 60 percent, 74 percent, and 80 percent said no. This lat-ter statistic, while consistent with the decline in participation over the generations, shows pre-Vatican Catholics not feeling as strong an obli-gation to attend Sunday Mass as they formerly did. 's D'Antonio, Laity, pp. 84-99. 14 "A Study of Parish Lay Ministry," Origins 29, no. 7 (1 July 1999): 103-104, 107. is Gibson, Coming Church, pp. 35-62. ~6 Greeley, Catholic Revolution, pp. 120-127. 17 Andrew Greeley, Priests: A Calling in Crisis (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004), pp. 86-99. 18 R. Scott Appleby, "What Is at Stake in the Present Crisis?" Origins 32, no. 7 (27 June 2002): 116. 19 Christine E. Gudorf, "Encountering the Other: The Modern Papacy on Women," in Change in Official Catholic Moral Teachings, ed. Charles Curran (New York: Paulist Press, 2003), p. 273. Review for Religious ~o Joan Chittister OSB, "Women in the Church: A New Pentecost in Process," in MacEoin, Papacy and the People 0fGod, pp. 11, 6. Chittister has said, "We need a papacy that can see the oppression of women by the church itself and is willing to model their inclusion at the highest levels of Vatican planning." See "Women in the Church," p. 10. 2~ James Hitchcock, "The Guilty Secret of Liberal Christianity," New Oxford Review 63 (October 1996): 12-13. 22 R. Scott Appleby, "Historical Overview Priests in America, 1930- 2002," Origins 33, no. 4 (5 June 2003): 55. 23 Weigel, Courage, pp. 9-34. 24 Donald Cozzens, The Changing Face of the Priesthood: A Reflection on the Priests' Crisis 0fSoul (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2000), p. 130. 2s Cozzens, Changing, p. 137. See also Cozzens, "Priesthood Emerges from a Dark Night," America 180, no. 9 (20 March 1999): 24. 26 Greeley, Priests, pp. 100-113. :7 Hitchcock, "Guilty Secret," p. 15. z8 Dean Hoge, The First Five Years of the Priesthood: A Study of Newly Ordained Catholic Priests (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2000), pp. 3-4. 29 Greeley, Priests, pp. 73-85. 3o Greeley, Priests, pp. 33-35, 48-72; Greeley, Catholic Revolution, pp. 120-127. 3t Steinfels, People Adrift, pp. 307-351. ~2 Bishop John Boissonneau, "Future Effective Priests," Origins 32, no. I0 (1 August 2002): 174. 3~ This is the theme of Greeley's Catholic hnagination. See also Greeley, Catholic Revolution, pp. 131-149. 34 Gibson, Coming Church, pp. 82-108. ~s Steinfels, People Adrift, pp. 352-360. In April 1996 Bernardin sug-gested that the dissension in American Catholicism could be transformed by seeking common ground amongst the various viewpoints. Bernardin's idea was severely criticized by Cardinals Bernard Law of Boston and John O'Connor of New York. ~6 Gibson, Coming Church, pp. 293-317,336. ~6~ Editorial note. Along with some brief quo.tations, these conclud-ing paragraphs contain some ideas that are current in the church in the United States and are often assumed to express Vatican II's spirit and to be its crystallized mandates. They have not always been argued care-fully. They deserve our careful consideration. The hopes we all have call all of us to this care. 37 Dominns Jesus (On the Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus 65.1 2006 Gribble * American Catholicism's Chaos Christ and the Church), August 2000, §22. 38 Nostra aetate, §1. 39 "Norms for the Distribution and Reception of Holy Communion under Both Kinds in the Dioceses of the United States of America," 14 June 2001, §38. ~o Ordinatio sacerdotalis, §4. See Origins 24, no. 4 (9 June 1994): 51. 41 Margaret O'Brien Steinfels, "The Crisis through the Laity's Lens," Origins 32, no. 7 (27 June 2002): 112-113. Rope Bridge At Ava, once, I crossed the ravine on a lattice of slats knotted into rope; undulant, it bucked at every step. That bridge rode its own law at war with gravity and my bulk. I never breathed as my feet swayed above the pines. I'd pry loose one hand from the guide rope thinned to spider silk to cling an inch farther along. And once on solid land, the terror rose: there was no other way to return. But midway back, I learned the sway, could look down at leaves, guess at bird names, not Jear the hawk's arc. I took a breath, and another, and held less tightly. M. Doretta Cornell RDC Review for Religious ANTHONY MALAVIARATCHI Religious Life in the Third Worldma Shangri-La? The attraction to get into the first world is irre-sistible to many of the people in the third world. As everyone knows, thousands knock on the doors of the first world's embassies. Arrangements and rearrangements are made to accommodate them, and of course many more find their way into their chosen Shangri-Las illegally. Throughout its history, religious life and the church itself have often been microcosms of their own social milieu. Religious life has felt the currents and undercurrents of the world around it. However much religious life .chooses to insert itself into its milieu, in no way is it called to succumb to the social trends of its place and time. This, however, is all too likely to happen, even when we think we are relying deeply on Jesus' words "Do not be afraid, I have overcome the world." Anthony Malaviaratchi CSSR is at present involved in mis-sion and retreat work. His address is Santa Maria; George Silva Mawatha; Kandy, Sri Lanka. challenges 65.1 2006 Malaviaratchi * Religious Life in the Third 14form The founding fathers of the church in the third world were members of religious orders who came in the com-pany of world-conquering colonial powers. Religious life did not sprout in the soil of the third world. Rather, like Western democracy, it was brought there and planted there by zealous missionaries. It is natural, then, that it bears the features of the first world's status and security. Religious life and priesthood in the third world offer to those who join its ranks the status and security that third-world people seek in the first world, and so it is no sur-prise that young people in poor countries join religious life by the hundreds. Two factors are at work in this phenomenon. The first is the poverty of the third world. Since the arrival of television, the "attraction of the eye" has motivated peo-ple to go after the goodies of the developed world. What they see with their eyes literally empowers them to go after those material goods. Second, the competition in the job market frightens many. They sense that, if they have neither great talent nor academic qualifications, they will end up as dropouts in the race. A "vocation" is an attractive alternative, a way of escaping such social pressure and yet attaining a position of prestige. Historically, many have embraced religious life and the priesthood for a variety of such ulterior motives. Vocational Discernment In this situation, vocational discernment has become next to impossible. Whether they are aware of all their motives or not, those seeking religious formation from mixed motives know how to play the game, what to say and do and whom they need to impress, bishops, provin-cials, councilors, formators, and so forth. Even honest per-sons' motivations may come to the surface only after final vows or ordination. Then they may be seen in the lifestyle Review for Religious adopted, which may include having a vehicle of one's own, a personal computer, and a cell phone and being head of an institute that provides plenty of money and freedom for foreign trips, for higher studies in the first world, and so forth. Even those who develop crises soon after ordina-tion are offered the opportunity of settling down in the first world in or outside of religious life. Some congrega-tions do not mind offering these perquisites, these "perks," as a cost of their institutional survival even though it is a blatant compromise of the meaning of religious life. For how long? History will answer this interesting question in the not so distant future. Given these circumstances, then, vocation discern-ment is possible only after final vows or ordination! Discernment can take place only over what is humanly discernible and not over motivations that remain largely hidden from all concerned. Some formation programs have begun to take the first steps in countering this situation by insisting that those in formation live and be employed like any other young person for a considerable period of time. This is probably the vocation discernment exercise best suited for the situation. But many congregations and superiors still seem to prefer numbers. As long as there is poverty and unemployment, they will surely have "vocations." The money poured in by the congregations' first-world units positively encourages this situation. In non-Christian monasteries and hermitages, voca-tion discernment is a lifelong process. When a monk or hermit does not live the life that he embraced, he is asked to leave. So it is in any human organization. When mem-bers of a football club want to play ice hockey, they leave. It is not so in religious life. Members remain in the foot-ball club playing not only ice hockey but polo as well. This situation attracts more "vocations." Not only are 65.1 2006 Malaviaratchi ¯ Religious Life in the Third Worm prestige, status, and security offered but permissiveness as well. Remarkably, the situation we are looking at is found largely in the Latin (Western) form of religious life. Eastern and non-Christian "religious" have protected themselves with the help of authority, laws, traditions, and, in some instances, fundamentalism. Religious life of the Western tradition is flooded with evils that sur-round it: secularism, horizontalism, individualism, and permissiveness. Religious life is thus being suffocated by the very evils from which it is supposed to save not only itself but the world as well. 26 Present Leadership Style In the face of these forces, leadership in religious life has largely failed to fulfill its prophetic and pastoral roles by making only innocuous statements, after which it is "business as usual" in the ranks. Absolutely nothing fol-lows till the next innocuous pronouncement. Thus, many third-world religious, who are culturally much more authority-dependent than their Western counterparts, now have to try to be faithful in an authority vacuum. Leadership paralysis is aggravated by the fact that the modern superior is often an elected one. The ballot directly or indirectly produces leadership according to the voters and their expectations. As seen above, too many voters joined religious life for status and security. Today there are as many private agendas as there are voters. These voters will ensure that the superiors will be past masters at compromise, who will accommodate every private interest. The superiors elected thus will on no account insist on group fidelity to the spirit of the con-gregation nor demand the self-forgetfulness that the nature of religious life requires. Superiors who do will not be reelected. Hence superiors avoid this public Review for Religious humiliation by putting up buildings and expanding apos-tolic commitments. They are glad to be blissfully unaware of what is happening at the roots. It is known today that many third-world nations are culturally unable to handle Western democracy. In spite of that, religious in the third world are expected to rise above cultural barriers and vote for their superior. Western democracy is not the only way in which humans involve themselves and make group decisions for their common good. Superiors now belong to a generation which follows the path of least resistance, namely, the path of conve-nience, the first step of which is the avoidance of all that is unpleasant. Confrontation and correction of individ-ual members is unpleasant, ~ . embarrassing, and painful and is therefore carefully avoided. Also superiors are aware that frequently their correction will be ignored and erring individuals will refuse to change. The~e, however, are situations foreseen in the Gospels ~. and church law, and mea-sures to be taken are prescribed. In the situation we are looking at, the superiors may not themselves believe in those measures. People all around choose "the broad highway to hell" rather than "the narrow path" of growth in fidelity. L~adership paralysis is aggravated by the fact that the modern superior is often an elected one. A Trend and Subsidiarity Aiding and abetting today's leadership style is the widespread trend of looking and speaking only about what is positive. Thus, all negatives (such as, in religious 65.1 2006 Malaviaratcbi ¯ Religious Life in the Third World 28 life, unfaithfulness) are evaded at various evaluations. For any human group that wishes to survive, what ulti-mately matters is not what is positive or negative, but rather what accomplishes or prevents the attainment of its goals. Superiors who take precautions to avoid what is negative seem to imitate monkeys who "see no nega-tives, hear no negatives, and speak no negatives." Thus they fail to keep before them the Leader whose repre-sentatives they are and who did not hesitate to speak of "this evil and adulterous generation." Leaders who reli-giously avoid facing what is negative among their members are likely to be the first to attend to the negatives when their laptop fails, their cell phone needs recharging, or their dog needs worming. In this situation the valuable principle of subsidiarity is much abused in our day. The principle means that the lower levels of authority are encouraged and facilitated to perform to the maximum within their ambit. The principle itself, however, demands that higher levels of authority readily step in when lower levels fail in their one and only duty, namely, ensuring faithfulness to the way of life of the particular congregation. Usually only the first half of the principle is followed today, which amounts to passing the buck. Even when it comes to items vital to religious life, the general chap-ter leaves it to the superior general and his council, the superior general to the provincial, the provincial to the local superior, and the local superior to the individual. The result usually is that the matter is thrown over-board--" leaving it to the individual" being a euphemism today for "forget about it." No structure of religious life--nor religious life itself will survive if it does not learn to evaluate all things with the measure given by the Lord: "By their fruits you will know them." Despite all the above, religious life is not without Review for Religious hope. As a radical way of faith, religious life is called at this juncture to be also a community of radical hope, with its only hope in God and in what he will do. Personal Reflection Questions 1. Have I found that my motivations for my religius voca-tion have changed or been purified over the years since entrance? 2. How do I try to be a help in clarifying another's vocation decision? Group Discussion Propositions 1. In an affluent country, we expect that vocations to reli-gious life will be small in number. 2. In developing countries, vocations to priesthool and reli-gious life have a prestige and security factor that clouds the motivation of candidates and makes discernment more diffi-cult. 65.1 2006 GUIRE CLEARY Challenges for Communities' New Members TRAnglican Church in Aotearoa/New Zealand held eligious Life Conference for religious commu-nities in New Zealand, Australia, and Fiji. Some fifty religious from more than twelve communities gathered at the Tainui Endowed College in H0puhopu 17-21 February 2005. Principal speakers included a Roman Catholic Cistercian and a Sister of Mercy. The location itself was significant. Hopuhopu is the center for the Tainui people, the Aotearoan tribe from which the Maori sovereign is selected. Most of the meetings were held in the tribal debating chamber as a show of solidarity with a people recovering their dignity and strength. One of the workshops was titled Issues of Anger in Religious Communities, presented by an experienced priest and spiritual director, the Rev. Pamela Warnes. Her workshop was a brilliant combination of articulating Guire Cleary SSF, an Anglican Franciscan friar whose "novitiate was a trial for everybody," has worked in New Zealand for social justice and currently is stationed in Hawaii: 2463 Kuhio Avenue, apt. 905; Honolulu, Hawaii 96815. He would welcome comments or questions at guirejohncleary@aol.com. Review for Religious issues and discussing solutions, all conducted in a context of prayer and concluded With a healing ceremony. One paper was my own, setting out some of my experiences as a new religious and my observations of the experi-ences of other new religious. Participants said they had experienced almost everything I mentioned and added a few of their own. At the conclusion of the workshop, one asked me, "Have you been a fly on our wall?" I said I was probably more of a mosquito. The challenges set out below are challenges to most communities, not just religious communities. The largest challenge is getting past the frustration and anger of these experiences to the heart space that allows healing and mature development in the community. To be a new member in any organization or group is always a challenge. The process of incorporation and mutual learning is not easy, and only the experience of service, community, and love make it worthwhile or even tolerable. Incorporation can run the gamut from hazing and emotional abuse to a joyous mutual discovery. Often new members experience anger and shock when the real costs of community life become apparent, and religious communities are in difficult transitions to new models of life. Different types of persons are entering and try-ing their vocation. Having left the novitiate eighteen years earlier, I was just a few days short of my forty-sixth birthday when I was re-received as a postulant in my community in the United States. The age restriction was waived because of my prior connection with the com-munity. Since I joined in 1997, four more men have tried their vocation. All but one were even older than I was. Some of these challenges are peculiar to the mindset of liberal Americans or unique to my own emotional makeup and quirks. New members in conservative com-munities or communities of the third world might expe- 65.1 2006 Clearg/ ¯ Challenges for Communities' New Members 32, rience only a few of these, or not in the same way. Interestingly, communities following a conservative rule and communities of the third world are attracting the most new members. ¯ Age Disparities: Although today's novices may be older than the novices of earlier generations, they are still entering communities where most members are at least twenty-five years older than the new members. ¯ Work Experience: New members have generally had one or more careers and generally outside the religious world. A community may have members who have never had paid employment or have never paid into any pen-sion plans, private or public. This may result in con-flicting valuations of the new members' worth and contribution. ¯ Nationality/Culture: A religious house may consist of members from many nations and cultures. New mem-bers may find that they are minorities in houses within their own native country and may encounter members who lack understanding of the language and culture of the very nation where they are living. In other words, new members may find themselves aliens inside the com-munity and natives only when they are on the other side of the front door. ¯ Relationship Experience: New members generally have had emotional relationships or been married or in partnership before joining the community. Older mem-bers have seldom had such experiences and so may approach communication and relationships differently. Members who have not had mature adult relationships before entering the community may have a tendency to adolescent humor and may be unable to "fight fairly and cleanly." ¯ Big Fish in Little Ponds: Some new members may have had executive careers or may have exercised signif- Review for Religious icant power in education, health, law, politics, or com-merce. Such people may not understand how a long-term member of a religious community can be so incensed over someone putting dishes in the "wrong" place and why that would matter so much. A sister who before joining the community has been responsible for millions of dollars may find it difficult to sit through a lecture on conserving toilet paper. Sometimes the failure of new religious to respond to concerns that seem insignificant leads to a misunderstanding of their motives. One reli-gious told of having said nothing because of hav-ing no opinion about a small matter and then being accused of "holding out for the main chance" by a senior member. In reality the younger religious was unlikely ever to hold an opinion on "the use of antiphons." You may hear in this an echo of Winston Churchill's observation that academic politics is so vicious because the stakes are so low. ¯ Multiculturalism and Multifaitb Experience: Newer members generally have a broader experience of other cultures and faiths and often incorporate elements from them into their own spirituality. Older members usually have begun and continued on a path of traditional Euro- American Christianity. They may disparage or discount the religious experiences or practices of new members, who often have exercised great discipline in their spiri-tual lives for years before joining the community. ¯ Neocolonialism: Much of the growth of religious Somet!mes the failure qf new retigious to respond ,to concerns t~at seem insignificant leads: ~io a misunderstanding of their ,mot, ives. 6Y. 1 2006 Clear)/ ¯ Challenges for Communities' New Members communities with which I am familiar has taken place in countries of the third world. As often as not, how-ever, leadership and finances are in the hands of members of the first world. One of the most peculiar anecdotes of neocolonialism occurred in America. English mem-bers who had been transferred to the United States sub-jected a new religious of American citizenship and Irish descent to ethnic slurs and disrespect. Ironically, when this religious spent time in another country, he received abuse from a fellow religious in his host country for being an American. You do not have to live in the third world to experience tribalism. ¯ Diminisbment of Citizenship: One religious observed that, when on assignment out of her native country, she had to ask permission to return to her home country. The irony is that the decision making was shared by for-eign residents who had never acquired citizenship in the country to which they were not permitting the native-born citizen to return. ¯ Disempowerment: No matter how communities pre-sent and sugarcoat the need for the probation and test-ing of new members, the fact is that new members are disempowered for a number of years. Voting rights might not be earned or granted until years after entrance into the community. Conversely, some communities allow full voting rights tO life-members for their lifetime, no matter their debility or their being out of touch. ¯ Prior Debts: Some new members enter communities with unpaid education debts that have to be paid even-tually. How doe~ the community approach this issue? One community allowed new members to live in'a com-munity house rent-free before being received as postu-lants so that they could continue in employment and thereby manage to pay their debts. Other communities have simply told their aspirants to postpone their voca- Review for Religious tions until all debts were paid. These communities rarely saw those aspirants again. ¯ Preexisting Families: The spirit of the times no longer holds that religious are dead to family and friends. Some new members may still have obligations to aging parents or to children or grandchildren. I chuckle at the recollection of a mother superior exclaiming after a string of widows applied for entrance into her community, "Aren't there any virgins left in America?" One com-munity in the United States had a creative approach to assisting new members who still had some family obli-gations. All new members were given educational loans that did not have to be repaid if the member were life-professed for a certain number of years. In one situation a new member was allowed to use the loan for court-ordered child support. ¯ Financial Identity: Most vocations do not survive into life profession. New members would be severely handicapped if they were to reenter the world with an impaired credit rating. Can the community tolerate the new member's keeping a credit card? The vow of poverty might have to be applied differently among community members. Perhaps differing applications of poverty within the same community are not such a new idea at all. ¯ Decay of Professional Qualifications: Some new mem-bers enter community with outstanding professional qualifications that require continuing education. Recent new members of one community have included a physi-cian, chiropractor, attorney, andparalegal. Failure to maintain those professional qualifications means that new members might lose that qualification o.r, if they leave community, find it difficult to return to their prior career or to their prior salary level. ¯ Health: Newer members are not only younger than the majority of the community, but are generally in much 65.1 2006 Cleary ¯ Challenges for Communities' New Menzbers 36 better health. Frequently that better health is due to memberships in gyms or health clubs. What is the com-munity's commitment to the new members' health reg-imen, especially if they are going to be looked to for doing a large share of physical work? ¯ Secret Customaries: Often it appears that there is a "secret customary" that is not available to new members. Sometimes it is merely poor communication. Other times it is simply a way of older members' maintaining power by asserting that a certain way of doing things is house or community custom. This is a form of manipulation by esoteric knowledge. ¯ The Rule: One novice guardian opined to me that older members usually oppressed the new members on those sections of the Rule of which the older members were least observant. On the other hand, older members have felt harried by new members who took on the role of Brother "Living Rule." As the old saying goes in reli-gious communities, "Wherever you have saints you will have martyrs." ¯ Survivors: Many of the older members of commu-nities are survivors of religious and cultural wars. New members, too, have fought the battles of inclusivity, litur-gical reform, gender, sexual orientation, hierarchy, and so forth, but not in the same way as the older members, and so the new members might not bear the same scars or have the same invested positions. The new members might not be aware of the cost the community has paid for a position. The older members may not realize that the struggle has moved to new fronts or past previously adopted positions. ¯ Loss of Disposable Time and Personal Space: New members frequently have to give up the freedom of dis-posable time and larger accommodations. Often new members have lived alone in housing that they did not Review for Religious share with anyone. Living in close quarters is a major adjustment for new members. I had to get used to using headphones with my CD player. ¯ Peers: New members, with few peers in the novi-tiate, lack the mutual support which they and their lay friends once had and which older religious had as novices. My noviceship was a particularly lonesome time. ¯ Wages and Support: With more of the community entering retirement, there is greater pressure for the new members to support the older members financially. New members are sometimes annoyed at being pressured to find full-time employment and encouraged to find sec-ular employment if the pay is better while some older members are working part-time or only started to con-tribute much money to the community when they began receiving pensions. There is further annoyance that members may bring in a vital salary but have no vote on how the money is used. It has happened that a current bad financial situation was caused by the incompetence or negligence of a prior generation, and then new mem-bers bringing in salaries were expected to assist in the bailout. ¯ Full-time Employment: Many religious, especially younger religious, now have to hold full-time jobs. The community still expects them to participate in commu-nity functions, retreats, and chapters. The only time available might be their vacation time. Physical and spir-itual exhaustion are common results. Sometimes the only compensated employment open to new members is sec-ular employment. They might wonder why they sacri-ficed so much only to find that religious ministry is not available or will not fill the .community's income needs or expectations. ¯ Lost Vocation and Still in Community: Perhaps the saddest members of religious communities are those 65.1 2006 Cleary ¯ Challenges for Comntunities' New Members The religious life is a voluntary choice, but still there is a loss of family, friends, status, and autonomy. 38 members who have essentially lost their vocation. They would like to leave their community, but economic con-venience, advancing age, and fears of adapting to a changed world while losing their vocational self-esteem make them choose to stay. Their bitter or sullen presence disheartens everyone. These members are often a terror to new members arriving with belief, motivation, and fresh ideas. The new members represent what the sullen members have lost and thus become objects of spite. ¯ Pecking Order: New members have the least power. For senior members who process their anger or frustra-tion by petty acts of spite, the new members are the nat-ural prey. Then there is enough pain to go around for everybody. ¯ Isolating the Complainers: It is destructive when severely damaged members of the community are allowed to create environ-ments that are emotionally and sometimes physically unsafe. This behavior may go on for years without challenge because the other members are paralyzed with fear. Newer members who challenge the behavior are sometimes told that they are the ones with emotional problems and need to be "more community minded and charitable." I have seen three communities where former superiors were severely oppressed by dam-aged members. In one case, a former superior simply left the local community rather than raise the issue. What caused them to collude in their own oppression? ¯ Grief, Loss, and Anger: All new members are going through a period of grief and loss and possibly anger at Review for Religious their changed situations. The religious life is a voluntary choice, but still there is a loss of family, friends, status, and autonomy. What are the tools to process the transi-tion? How can new members communicate the extent of their loss to members who may never have had the same degree of freedom or experience in their lay life? * Legal Rights: Religious communities are expected to adhere to the civil and criminal statutes of the nations in which they live and work. Often this means certain expectations regarding privacy and protection that were not present in an earlier era. Violations could result in civil penalties or even in lawsuits from disgruntled for-mer members. Some courts in the United States are look-ing at the relationship between members and their communities in the light of employment law with all the obligations that entails. ¯ Conflicting Ethics: Before entering my community, I had been employed as a paralegal with a specialization in tax law. I was sometimes astonished by financial shenanigans I witnessed in churches and religious com-munities. It seemed that some religious or church author-ities believed they were not subject to the same ethical and legal obligations of other nonprofit corporations. If anything, the secular world showed a higher standard of ethics. Communities or institutions that were finally caught by government or church authorities have some-times received an expensive lesson in the ethics from which they thought themselves exempt. No number, however, can be put on people's loss of trust in religious bodies to which they had looked for a higher level of ethics and honor than they expect from the secular world. ¯ Minefields: New members cannot be aware of exist-ing interpersonal dynamics of the community. Some have reported stumbling into personality conflicts that had been going on for decades. Others have reported that 65.1 2006 Clear)/ ¯ Cballenges for Communities' New Members 4O differences of opinion among older members about for-mation methods resulted in new members' bearing the animosity of the losing side. ¯ Infantilization: When you are put in the position of having to ask for permission, of having your future decided by others, of having to please others at some level in order to be accepted, and of giving up much of your personal power, you have to a degree been infan-tilized. A formation director told me he believes that some infantilization of new members helps to surface immature elements of their personalities that can then be worked on. I was left with the impression that this was wishful thinking. A topic came up in the workshop that was not part of my original paper. People agreed that they had all expe-rienced instances of anger and depression due to the sit-uations described above. Many said they were conflicted because they felt their anger was somehow wrong, even though probably justified on a number of levels. Guilt haunted and paralyzed them. What could they do about these feelings of guilt? Unfortunately, this could not be dealt with in a ninety-minute workshop that was already rich in content. One Of my teachers, a Buddhist, once told me that he frequently contrasted the views of anger held by two religious leaders of great experience and deep insight. Pope John Paul II is said to have written, "I try not to get angry." The Dalai Lama is quoted as saying, "I try not to stay angry." These two approaches are perhaps valuable in tandem. On a personal note, a friend of mine once observed that, when it comes to anger, I may be unlucky in being of Irish and German descent. He said, "Irish and German: burn fast and burn long!" I try to bring that thought to mind when humor seems a remedy. Communities can be hard on their new members. The reverse is also true. A life-professed member of my Review for Religious community once said of a newly arrived postulant, "Ah! Another brother sent by God to test my vocation!" While serving as the curator of one of California's historic mis-sions, I was shown a document describing brothers not speaking to each other, undermining each other's min-istry, taking sides, complaining to religious and secular authorities, and showing every sign of advanced dys-functionality. Recent situation in one's own house? But this description pertained to the Franciscan mission in San Francisco in the 1790s. The more things change, the more they remain the same. One of my more insight-ful Jesuit teachers once asked a brother what gospel med-itation came to mind when he thought about community. He responded with apparent pain, "The agony in the garden of Gethsemane." Thomas Merton had his own difficult experiences with his abbot. St. John of the Cross was imprisoned by his community. We have all been there--usually the imprisonment is emotional. Where and what is the key to freedom? What miracle will bring healing and resurrection? We have a duty to speak the truth to our communities and work for the maturing of us all in Christ, even though we might not see any change in the behaviors that sadden, oppress, or anger us. A wise priest was counseling a young religious who was having a frightening time with his community and was trying to make the community see things from his perspective. After listening patiently and acknowledging the brother's wounds, he said, "Brother, you have assumed that the brothers you are struggling with are suddenly going to smack their foreheads and say, 'Oh my goodness! I never realized that! You are sooo right, and we are going to change our wicked ways.' Brother, you have assumed a level of health that is not in them. What are you doing to grow your own spiritual and emo-tional maturity?" Sometimes a person just has to outlive 65.1 2006 Cleary ¯ Challenges for Communities' New Members a situation. My bishop once told me that there is a say-ing in New Zealand among the Maori people: "Question: How do you get even with your komatua [tribal elder] ? Answer: Outlive him!" It reminds me of a Southern proverb in the United States, "Change comes by funer-als." I wanted to conclude this essay with some pithy wis-dom that would have universal application and solve all ills. Unfortunately, or fortunately, we Anglicans are bet-ter at the questions than the answers. As I was thinking out this section, I was on a long walk on a late summer day in New Zealand. The Maori name for this country is Aotearoa, land of the long white cloud. Our sky was true to its namesake with billowing white clouds in a flawless blue sky. My ears were full of the soaring con-clusion to Rachmaninov's Second Symphony coming from my CD player. My problems with my community, my community's problems, and my problems are still in place. But there is something greater at work that is soar-ing and unfolding within me. I pray that it is my faith, my hope, and hopefully my love that are growing and mak-ing community possible and actual both for me and those who have agreed to let me join my life to theirs. Review for Religious ROSEMARY STETS A Spirituality of Surrender A Jesuit's Story In 1964 Walter J. Ciszek, a Jesuit priest who had been ordained almost thirty years earlier to be a missionary in Russia, returned to the United States with an unbelievable story of faith and deliverance. In 1939 World War II began in Eastern Europe, and in 1941 Father Ciszek's mis-sion was cut short when Russian police arrested him and kept him in Lubianka Prison for five years, mostly in solitary confinement. Accused of being a Vatican spy, he was interrogated, beaten, forced to sign a false confession, and sen-tenced to fifteen years at hard labor. Sent to labor camps in Siberia, he secretly began a priestly ministry to fellow prisoners, men and women near despair in the inhumane conditions. During these years he lost all contaEt with his family and the Society of Jesus, but he never lost hope or faith in God's providence and protection. In a Rosemary Stets OSF is vice president for mission and ~nin-istry at Alvernia College; 400 Saint Bernardine Street; Reading, Pennsylvania 19607. inspiration 6Y.I 2006 Stets ¯ A Spirituality of Surrender A Jesuit's Story Father Walter could see all life's ~circumstances not just at eye level, but from a higher plane-- a position ofgrace and surrender. kind of miracle, through the efforts of his family and fel-low Jesuits working with the U.S. government, he was finally released from Russia and arrived in New York as a free man, a hero, beginning a mission in his homeland. When Father Ciszek returned to the United States, he was in relatively good health, considering all the hard-ship and suffering he had endured during his long years of captivity in Siberia. He was almost sixty years old, but still an active and fit man, writing books, giving retreats, travel-ing to parishes across the country, and meet-ing groups who invited him to speak about his life and his spirituality. He had always been a strong man, and he embraced his new life with energy and excite-ment. His correspon-dence was voluminous, and the phone calls were endless. Since Father Ciszek had two sisters in my congregation, he often visited our convents, sharing his personal spiritual journey with us and inviting many of us to continue the conversations. That was the beginning of my personal friendship with him, which lasted until his death in 1984. Shortly after his return, along with the ever increas-ing demands on his time for talks and retreats, Father Walter began writing his autobiography With God in Russia. A few years later he wrote another book, He Leadetb Me, this one emphasizing the spiritual struggles of his journey, In just a few years he had more commit-ments than he could manage, but kept working. A decade Review for Religious later he suffered two major heart attacks and his health began to fail. . During the last decade of his life he had to modify his schedule and pace at a time when, because of his books and his media appearances, he was probably in greater demand than ever. These restrictions frustrated him because of his deep compassion for others and his gen-erosity toward all who sought his advice and spiritual counsel. But ultimately the changes required by his declining health led him to the spirituality of surrender. Change, it seems, is something most of us greet with reluctance, especially if we are comfortable or content with the way things are in the present. We like to feel that we are "in control" and that things are going well, or going the way we want them to go. And so we are jarred and unnerved when our world turns upside down, overwhelms us, makes us feel helpless. One day, as his health became worse and his sched-ule was accordingly being reduced, Father Walter shared with me during a telephone conversation some of his spiritual response at this difficult time. This was not unusual, for Father Walter moved easily from the natu-ral to the supernatural, and he could see all life's cir-cumstances not just at eye level, but from a higher plane--a position of grace and surrender. As he spoke, I was suddenly inspired to make some notes on the conversation, writing down his words and phrases, listening intently and trying to capture the essence of what he was saying. Afterwards I took the lit-tle scrap of paper with the words I had written and put it in my daily prayer book. As I read the words over and over, I realized they were like prayers themselves, but something more. Whenever I felt overcome by the frus-trations of life, by anger, by annoyance with others, or by sudden dark moods like a summer storm on a lake, I 6Y.I 2006 Stets ¯ A Spirituality of Surrender--A Jesuit's Story ,46] would turn to those words for.comfort and strength. A profound peace would return after I entered fully into the spirit of what I was reading. It seemed that chains fell away from my heart. It was as if a door opened, a prison door that had kept me confined and helpless. I felt joy return. My heart felt light again. It was not just a mental understanding, not just a letting go in my mind, but a sense of surrender which lifted my spirit out of the darkness and into a place of spiritual light. As I surren-dered to God in this prayer, I would sense that I was united with Jesus in his abandonment in the garden. I believe I was united.with God's will in those nanosec-onds. A "yes" to the Father was a leap of faith to a new place. It would give me strength to begin a new task, a natural and spontaneous freedom to let go and move on. It would amaze me: the peace was palpable. Many years ago I shared this story with a friend who was going through a difficult struggle, and she was so moved by the simplicity and peace of the words I had jot-ted down that she asked for a copy. I typed it on a small card, calling it the Prayer of Surrender. We soon were mak-ing more copies and giving them to other friends, who also grew to love and value this prayer, Several years later, after the cause for Father Walter Ciszek's canonization had been opened, I sent my notes, letters, and writings about Father Walter to the Prayer League charged with organizing the materials for his cause. The postulator found the Prayer of Surrender in my notes and decided to distribute it through the Prayer League. This is the prayer that has become my daily bread, the prayer I offer to everyone who is desperate for God's help, going under, barely hanging on. It is a prayer filled with wisdom. It does not remove our suffering, but rather it gives us the courage to accept it without anger or fear. Saying the prayer .during times of intense suffering can Review for Religious be difficult, almost heroic, but each time it enables me to emerge whole, strong, and at peace. Father Walter expe-rienced great suffering in his life, in his long sojourn in Russia and in many trying moments that circled his life like a crown of thorns--and like the pains, humiliations, loneliness, and losses that afflict us all. But suffering was also his banner of glory, uniting him to Jesus, who endured everything for us out of love, the love that saved the world. The Prayer of Surrender is Father Waiter's gift to all of us, a moment of grace remembered and passed on to those who love him, cherish his memory, and seek to understand with him that surrender to God's provi-dence is the way to sublime joy, the grand freedom of finding God in all things. Prayer of Surrender Lord, Jesus Christ, I ask the grace to accept the sad-ness in my heart as your will for me, in this moment. I offer it up, in union with your sufferings, for those who are in deepest need of your redeeming grace. I surrender myself to your Father's will, and I ask you to help me to move on to the next task that you have set for me. Spirit of Christ, help me to enter into a deeper union with you. Lead me away from dwelling on the hurt I feel, to thoughts of charity for those who need my love, to thoughts of compassion for those who need my care, and to thoughts of giving yo those who need my help. As I give myself to you, help me to provide for the salvation of those who come to me in need. May I find my healing in this giving. May I always accept God's will. May I find my true self by living for others in a spirit of sacrifice and suffering. May I die more fully to myself, and live more fully in you. As I seek to surrender to the Father's will, may I come to trust that he will do everything for me. Amen. 6Y.1 2006 GIOVANNI ZEVOLA Two Mysteries in One: Implications for Ministry 48 All who are involved in ministry would say that the Bible is a source of strength for their own spirituality and for their pastoral ministry. Biblical themes support our dedication, our zeal, our commitment to people and situations demanding attention and care. In this article I will show that the Bible is not only a source of texts to use in particular circumstances of the ministry,~ but also a pure and continuous fount of spiritual life especially for the those in pastoral ministry. Biblical themes and figures of the Old and New Testament are familiar to pastoral caregivers, and we all may have heartfelt favorites in our own spiritual life. For the various situations that may occur in pastoral care, some biblical figures and themes have special pertinence. For example, the Exodus experience, Samuel's vocation, the social concerns in the prophetic literature, Zacchaeus's desire to see Jesus, and the Holy Spirit overshadowing Mary can be signs "of certain hope and comfort to the pilgrim people of God" (Lumen gentium, §68). Giovanni Zevola OMI continues doing apostolic work in South Korea. His address is 196-51 Yuhyun Dong; Kang Nam Ku; Seoul 135-210; South Korea. Review for Religious Mary can be considered from different points of view, and the few passages of the New Testament where she is mentioned can be sources for understanding our role as disciples and cooperators in the economy of salvation. One meaningful passage is the Visitation recorded in Luke 1:39-56. The verse "During those days Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah" motivated my vocation many years ago. I joined a missionary congregation to dedicate myself to a life of service, and that verse still inspires my life and commitment to the poor. Through the years Mary's attitude of service has informed my spirit, and new insights have helped me grow spiritually and as a human being. The words "she went as quickly as she could" caught my attention and fostered my desire to share with others my sense of the presence of God in my life. I was convinced that, like Mary, we should not keep our own Annunciation for ourselves, but should share it with others through what we do--and doing what we do without delay, "in haste." Mary is the perfect disciple who shares her Master's concerns, values, and attitudes. In Mark's Gospel, Jesus is presented on the scene right away, being baptized by John and proclaiming "The time (kairos) has come," there has to be no delay. Jesus is shown to be in a constant hurry, particularly in chapter one, where it is interesting to note the Greek word euthus. Immediately the Spirit descends on him (1:10) at the baptism. Immediately the Spirit drives him out into the desert (1:12). Simon and Andrew leave their nets at once and follow him (1:18). Immediately he calls James and John (1:20). As soon as the Sabbath comes, he goes to the synagogue to teach, and just then performs a miracle (1:23). His reputation rapidly spreads everywhere (1:28), and he goes straight to cure Peter's mother-in-law (1:29). 6Y.1 2006 Zevola ¯ Two Mysteries in One the force of God's grace : brought to: her in the Annuncia ion,,qnd she becomes a messenger " ff good new.s. In the Visitation, Mary shares Christ's attitude. There is an urgency in proclaiming the good news she has just received through the angel. In Luke 1:26-38 she is presented as the recipient of God's grace, and she becomes the active subject who cannot contain what she has received. She goes to ' -~'~ share it. (Recall here Paul is surfing by . saying "The love of ~. Christ impels us," 2 Co 5:14.) In Mary we see how a disciple is called to announce that "the time has come": the divine project that God has prepared is coming to its maturation and is being made known, and so there is no more delay. Paul expresses the same idea in Galatians 4:4-5: "Vv'hen the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to ransom those under the law, so that we might receive adoption." Perhaps I can express all of this in an image. Think of a surfer waiting for a big wave to come in. When the right time comes, he rides it and enjoys the surfing--a combination of ability (human effort) and force of the wave (grace). In Luke 1:39 Mary is surfing by the force of God's grace brought to her in the Annunciation, and she becomes a messenger of good news. "During those days Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah." The wave made by the wind of God's Spirit is for everyone. Every disciple of every age has to surf that wave; in doing so we are blessed. See Romans 10:15: "How beautiful are the feet of those who announce good news," how welcome the Review for Religious sound! The personal relationship we have with God is not something we can keep for ourselves; it is a gift to be shared. God invites us to the communion (koinonia) of those called by his grace. The personal relationships in the life of the Trinity should be reflected in our human relationships. For a pastoral caregiver, contemplation and action go together. The vertical relationship of us with God is connected with our horizontal relationships with one another. We are called to do "contempl-action." At the very beginning of the church, in the upper room where Mary and the other disciples are gathered, this doubleness is already present. They receive the Spirit and share the mission of Jesus to proclaim the Good News. Perhaps we can imagine Mary showing the eleven how to ride this new wave of the Spirit and thereby fulfill Jesus' promise: "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and then you will be my witnesses not only in Jerusalem but throughout Judea and Samaria, and indeed to the ends of the earth,' (Ac 1:9). Mary belongs indissolubly to the mystery of Christ, and she belongs also to the mystery of the church from the beginning, from the day of the church's birth. At the basis of what the church has been from the beginning, and of what she must continually become from generation to generation, in the midst of all the nations of the earth, we find the one "who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord" (Lk 1:45).~It is precisely Mary's faith which marks the beginning of the new and eternal covenant of God with man in Jesus Christ; this heroic faith of hers "precedes" the apostolic witness of the church, and ever remains in the church's heart hidden like a special heritage of God's revelation. All those who from generation to generation accept the apostolic witness of the church share in that mysterious inheritance, and in a sense share in Mary's faith. (Redemptoris Mater, §27) 65.1 2006 Zevola ¯ Two Mysteries in One With the inner conviction that Annunciation (experience of God) precedes any Visitation (our apostolate or any form of pastoral care), some years ago I was sent to the Philippines for a missionary experience. What I had received (experience of God through the years of seminary formation) I was ready to share with people in my ministry, and there, through a crisis, God's grace brought a deeper understanding. I could not expect my past experience of God to provide me with enough of what people needed from me. I had to be always open to new Annunciations because we can share only what we have at the moment. My personal contact with the poor (Visitation) was a deeper way for me to experience God. The poor were giving me occasions to take notice of God's Annunciations to me and to receive deeper understandings of them. It was like Mary visiting Elizabeth and, during her time with her, coming to further understanding of the meaning of the Annuciation. She was, in the words of her older cousin, blessed for being mother of the Lord and particularly for her faith in the promise. At this moment the Spirit evokes Mary's Magnificat. Everything was already present at the Annunciation, but comes to light at the Visitation like a seed expressing its vitality gradually. Through my experiences in the Philippines, I came to understand that Annunciation and Visitation are not two separate moments, but only one mystery: the Spirit introducing us into the mystery of Christ. In pastoral care we do not go to others with something already cooked. We might already have the necessary ingredients, but it is the interaction that makes it complete. William Barry says something similar when he considers Jesus interacting with his disciples at Caesarea Philippi (Mt 16:13-20), where Jesus seems to come to a better understanding of his identity: "Could it not be that Jesus needs the disciples' response in order to clarify his Review for Religious own sense of his identity and destiny? . . . Jesus, like any human being, could not establish his identity without the help of others. Looked at in this way, this scene shows that Jesus needs Peter's response to 'confirm' his own sense of mission.''2 Elizabeth does this for Mary, and it is similar for any disciple following in Jesus' footsteps. The Annunciation and Visitation considered as but one mystery show that faith is a journey on which we increasingly come to understand and live the fullness of our vocation. Particularly in Luke, Mary is presented as a woman of reflection upon her life experiences (see Lk 1:29, 2:19, 2:33, and 2:51). In so doing she progresses in faith, like Abraham: Mary's faith can also be compared to that of Abraham, whom St. Paul calls "our father in faith" (see Rm 4:12). In the salvific economy of God's revelation, Abraham's faith constitutes the beginning of the Old Covenant; Mary's faith at the Annunciation inaugurates the New Covenant . Certainly the Annunciation is the culminating moment of Mary's faith in her awaiting of Christ, but it is also the point of departure from which her whole "journey towards God" begins, her whole pilgrimage of faith. (Redemptoris Mater, § 14) This insight invites me to review my tmderstanding of pastoral care and particularly the relationship I establish with the people whom I am called to serve. They are not only the recipients of my attention and commitment, but also my companions on the journey. It is this dimension of faith that gives and renews the strength necessary to be witnesses in caregiving situations and ultimately frees us of the idea that we are the ones fixing problems, that we are the saviors. In fact, our caregiving becomes a kind of school, a place where we learn more about ourselves, other people, and God, who in this school fosters a more intimate relationship with us. The caregiver is also a visitor and guest. The whole history of salvation reads 65.1 2006 Zevola * Two Mysteries in One like a series of moments when God visits his people. Jesus himself was always on the go: "Let us go elsewhere to the neighboring towns." Without any fixed abode, he lives a life of continual visiting. And no sooner is Mary visited from on high than she makes all possible haste to .visit her cousin Elizabeth. She, the visited one, becomes the visitor. There is a missionary dynamic here, for us as well as for Mary. As visitors and guests among those we minister to, we listen differendy, more attentively; we dialogue and tell our stories differently; we become present to others in new ways, ways that make dialogue, shared existence, and even revelation possible. In short, we come empty-handed like Jesus, the vulnerable visitor from heaven, and this can perhaps serve as the reason for our hope. Recently, while working in South Korea (another Visitation), I recognized anew that people are agents of the Spirit inviting me to understand more deeply the message that I would Announce to them. Late in the evening we were driving back to the office after a day visiting the company where Mohamed had had an accident while operating a pressing machine. After a long discussion with the manager, the possibility for this Bangladeshi worker to get insurance was now more concrete. Mohamed and one of his friends invited me to supper in a small restaurant. Suddenly he asked me something that surprised me: "Father, why are you doing this for us?" At first I did not know what to say, because my motivation for the ministry with the foreign workers was something I had not talked about. Finally I said, "My experience of God is at the core of this or any other ministry." I was surprised when Mohamed seemed to agree and reinforce my answer. Mohamed's question had forced me to reconnect theology and ministry as the source and goal of any Review for Religious apostolate. Through reflecting upon our pastoral experience, we learn anew that God's call is the source of our commitment within the church. This led me (Mk 8:14-21) to Jesus, in the boat with his disciples, subtly referring them to his recent feeding of two large crowds and then asking, "Do you still not see or comprehend?. Do you still not understand?" It is theology and ministry together that enable people's faith to recognize God's presence right before their eyes. If ministers focus only on their ministerial activities, they are likely to end up implementing nothing but their own plans and projects. The theological reflection has a double movement, namely, (1) our going to the experience for reflection and (2) coming back for a serene and more objective evaluation. A particular pastoral experience be-comes the stuff for reflecting upon the min-istry that we are involved in. We make a point of noticing that God was present in the experience and how God was present. !t is !heology and ministry together that enable people's faith to recognize, God's presence fright before their eyes. It is in this movement, in the connecting of theology with the experience, that we can "interpret" and "name" the experience lived in faith. The experience thus interpreted and clarified tells more than we originally expected: our experience enriches our theology. Theology and pastoral care, encountering each other in the pastoral experience, are reciprocally enriched.3 Theology enables us to understand God's presence as continuing through time, like the continuing mystery of the incarnation. Pastoral care gives us the here and now in which we can readily find the divine presence revealing itself. 6Y. 1 2006 Zevola ¯ Two Mysteries in One The theological reflection adds depth to the richness of the experience, which otherwise might be quickly forgotten. On the other hand, pastoral care gives theological reflection something very real and concrete from which to get a lively idea of God working, working along with us in the human experience. Mary has been for me a model and now is more of a companion in my pilgrimage of faith, reminding me that Annunciation and Visitation are parts of one wonderful mystery. In everything, like Mary, we can give only what we have received. On this truth Henri Nouwen is very explicit: "To help, to serve, to care, to guide, to heal, these words . . . express a reaching out toward our neighbor whereby we perceive life as a gift not to possess but to share." 4 Notes ~ See D. Capps, Pastoral Use and Interpretations of the Bible, in Dictionary of Pastoral Care and Counseling, ed. R. Hunter (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1990), pp. 82-85. 2 See W. Barry, God's Passionate Desire and Our Response (Notre Dame: Ave Maria Press, 1993), p. 101. 3 See R. Kinast, Pastoral Theology, Roman Catholic, in Dictionary of Pastoral Care and Counseling, pp. 873-874. 4 H. Nouwen, Reaching Out (New York: Doubleday Image Books, 1986), p. 109. Review for Religious ROBERT P. MALONEY Truth: Religious Simplicity Revisited E veryone needs a guiding star, but the stars in the ky are countless. Saints have chosen different ones. Jerome focused on the Scriptures: "Love the Holy Scriptures, and wisdom will love you." Francis of Assisi fixed on God's love in the gifts of creation and the cru-cified Lord, praising God in Brother Sun and Sister Moon and uniting himself with suffering humanity. Vincent de Paul, especially as he grew older, chose sim-plicity, or truthfulness, as the star to guide him to know what to say and do. "It is the virtue I love most," he wrote to a priest-friend, Franqois de Coudray. "It is my gospel," he told the Daughters of Charity, the commu-nity he founded with Louise de Marillac. There are many conte~nporary ways of describing simplicity: authenticity, integrity, genuineness, realness, passion for the truth. In the two sections that follow, I Robert P. Maloney CM, having served for-two terms as superior gen-eral of the Congregation of the Mission, works as project administra-tor for D.R.E.A.M., a joint project of the Community of Sant'Egidio and the Daughters of Charity for combating aids in Africa. His address is Theological College; 401 Michigan Avenue N.E.; Washington, D.C. 20017. 6~. 1 2006 Maloney * Truth: Religious Simplicity Revisited will focus first on simplicity as "being in the truth" with God, with oneself; with others, and with the created uni-verse surrounding us. Then I will discuss combining the simplicity of the dove with the prudence of the serpent. Simplicity as "Being in the Truth" There is a wonderful freedom in those who live sim-ply. They project joy and peaceful confidence. One of the most popular hymns in the English-speaking world, Joseph Brackett's "Simple Gifts," began proclaiming in 1848: "'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free." Simplicity involves making God our ultimate concern, identifying our will with what God is asking. Vincent de Paul remarked rather wryly to Louise de Marillac: "How easy it is to become a saint. The only thing necessary is to do the will of God in everything." For simple persons the kingdom of God becomes the focal point of their life, the ideal that integrates all that they are and do. Of course, growth in single-minded-ness before God, in purity of intention, is a lifelong pro-cess. Our sinfulness continually interrupts our unity with God's purposes. Limited objectives like self-promotion easily distract us from our single-minded pursuit of God's kingdom; even worse, they may substitute for it. In our sinful condition, we are never able to pull our lives together into a perfect opus, finished once and for all. Even those who seem to have done so fall often, some-times badly. Our final integrity comes only from God's forgiving, healing love. It is a gift. In commenting on the simplicity and purity of inten-tion that he had witnessed in the Shaker tradition, Thomas Merton once wrote, "The peculiar grace of a Shaker chair is due to the fact that it was made by some-one capable of believing that an ~ngel might come and sit on it." That sentence is surely worth meditating on. In Review for Religious religious life, many helps have been offered for being in the truth with God: the daily Eucharist, daily mental prayer, and daily examination of conscience are among the most prominent. Human beings are social beings. Human relation-ships are not just an add-on. They make us who we are, forming us gradually. Having friends, falling in love, building a family, joining a community, being part of a nation, an institution, a movement--all these forms of union with others are possible only if there is truth-filled communication. In fact, the English word truth is related etymologi-cally to trust, faithfulness, covenant. Older English-speaking readers may recall the now archaic marriage o tr thfut-reiationships ' with others; implicity - ;:, :haS,its:most: obvious meaning: hoheStg: promise: "I plight unto thee my troth,", which we might translate today as: "I pledge to you my truth (my word, my trust, my commitment)." In fact, we still speak of a promise to marry as "betrothal." In truthful relationships with others, simplicity has its most obvioias meaning: honesty. Trust in the word of another is the condition for life together, for friendship, marriage, community, business ventures, and all sorts of other relationships. Lies bring about the disintegration of communities, the fracture of marriages, the downfall of governments. Lies are not just verbal; they may be present in actions. Marriages collapse through infidelity. Families break down through covert, competing interests. Friendships unravel through secret betrayal. Being in the truth keeps people together; falsehood tears us apart. To put it tersely, simplicity unites; duplicity divides. 6Y.I 2006 Maloney ¯ Truth: Religious Simplicity Revisited 6O Necessary as it is, speaking the truth with consis-tency in religious life is difficult. We are tempted to blur the truth for our own convenience or to avoid being embarrassed. It is difficult to be enduringly true to our word when circumstances change. In the present our statements are true or false right then and there, but, when we make a commitment for the future, it is true only if we keep it true. Truth is fidelity. It is especially in this sense that Jesus is true to us. He promises to be, and is, with us always, even to the end. We too are called to be true in this way--to vows, to friendships, and to our commitments to serve. Thomas Merton once wrote: "We make ourselves real by telling the truth." The truth at the core of each human person strives to emerge. When we express the truth, we construct and reveal our true self. When we distort the truth, we damage not just our relationship with others, but the center of our own being too. Being in the truth with our own self is, of course, vitally related to being in the truth with God and being in the truth with others. BUt our own truth is nevertheless distinctive. There is a distinctive giftedness, a personal vocation from God, that we may not renounce, but must treasure. Simplicity calls us to integrity, authenticity. But, as we journey in quest of personal wholeness, most of us expe-rience our own fracturedness. We sense inner contra-dictions, a broken center, cracks in our personality; sometimes we fall apart. Philosophy, psychology, and sociology have described polarities that people sense within themselves: body/mind, feeling/thinking, heart/ head, unconscious/conscious. Being true to oneself is not as easy as it might seem. Accurate self-knowledge is rare, as Robert Burns elo-quently noted: "O wad some Power the giftie gie us / To see oursels as ithers see us! / It wad frae mony a blun- Review for Religious der free us, / An' foolish notion: / What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us, / An' ev'n devotion!" Knowing oneself accurately is essential in life. The philosopher Wittgenstein observed: "You cannot write anything about yourself that is more truthful than you yourself are. That is the difference between writing about yourself and writing about external objects. You write about yourself from your own height. You don't stand on stilts or on a ladder but on your bare feet." Regular confession and the relationship we call "spir-itual direction" are very important means toward self-knowledge. A perceptive confessor or spiritual guide can be a mirror, reflecting back to us what we are not able to see on our own. Speaking the truth is especially impor-tant in such relationships. We choose a "soul friend" so that, with his or her help, we may grow in the Lord's life and in discerning those things which promote God's kingdom. It is imperative, therefore, that this relationship be characterized by free self-disclosure and by the avoid-ance of "hidden corners" in our lives. We need others to echo back to us what is happening or not happening on our journey toward the Lord. The quality of spiri-tual guidance will depend largely upon the simplicity with which we disclose ourselves. Philosophers and theologians have recognized from the earliest times that human existence is inseparable from matter. We are not pure spirit, but have bodies. The philosopher Merleau-Ponty reminds us: "I am my body." We are also related to and dependent on the earth. In a certain sense, as Genesis suggests in the creation story, we come from the earth. Food, water, air, sunshine, and other elements are nutrients of our human existence. Consequendy, if we are to be in truth with God as the Creator, with ourselves as incomplete beings, and with others, we must also be in truth with the created uni- 65.1 2006 Maloney * Truth: Religious Simplicity Revisited verse that is our home. In other words, being fully human involves caring for the earth. In broader terms it means caring for the surrounding universe, whose proportions are staggering and even incomprehensible to us. We do not yet have a comprehensive ecological the-ology, but some of its foundation stones are quite visible and have been set for centuries in Christian tradition: ¯ the presence of God in all creation; ¯ the goodness of all that God has made; ¯ God's providence in accompa-nying history and ongoing creation; ¯ the gratitude, won-der, contemplation, and care for God's gifts that people have as a response to God's gifts. Those who live close to the land often see its impor-tance more vividly than others. When in 1851 the pres-ident of the United States, Franklin Pierce, proposed to buy two million acres of land from the Indian tribes around Puget Sound in the present state of Washington, Chief Seattle (after whom the state's principal city is named) reacted. His famous reflections from the 1850s, about which some historians raise doubts, are neverthe-less a most eloquent environmental statement: Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist on the dark woods, every clearing and humming insect is holy in the memory and experiences of my people . We are part of the earth and it is part of us. The perfumed flowers are our sisters; the deer, the horse, the great eagle, these are our brothers. The rocky crests, the juices in the meadows, the body heat of the pony and man--all belong to the same family. We will consider your offer to buy our land. But it will not be easy. For this land is sacred to us. This shining water that moves in the streams and rivers is not just water but the blood of our ancestors. If we sell you the land, you must remember that it is sacred, and you must teach your children that it is ~acred and that each ghostly reflection in the clear water of the lakes tells of events and memories in the life of my peo-l~ eview for Religious pie. The water's murmur is the voice of my father's father . You must teach your children that the rivers are our brothers and yours, and you must henceforth give the rivers the kindness you would give any brother. These words were prophetic. Polluted rivers, con-taminated air, and depleted forests rank high among the problems of modern society. In this matter, as in many others, immediate gratification often wins out over long-range goals. But when the environment is neglected, society pays a heavy price, with the poor suffering most. In many places where religious missionaries serve, eco-logical deterioration adds to the crushing burdens of the neediest of the needy. The Simplicity of the Dove and the Prudence of the Serpent Even for those with a bright guiding star, Christian living is filled with paradoxes: initiative/obedience, flex-ibility/ stability, listening/advising, animating/directing, creativity/humility, trusting/planning, serving/govern-ing, simplicity/prtidence. Matthew's Gospel recognizes that the simplicity of the dove must cohabit, in the same person, with the prudence of the serpent. And in life people's common sense and prudence quickly teach them that they cannot simply speak the unabashed truth at all times. Experience teaches us that virtues like truthful-ness, charity, and respect for the privacy and good name of others at times "compete" with one another. In moments of apparent conflict, prudence enables us to balance and blend such competing virtues. Over the centuries moral theologians have written volumes on the dilemmas that arise in the context of truth-telling. Below I simply offer a few reflections on three of the most common moral dilemmas that reli-gious and all those committed to truth-telling face. 6L 1 2006 Maloney * Truth: Religioux Simplicity Revisited Growing in love involves penetrating to the ddep truth of the beloved, Truth derives from God. It is related to beauty. But the expression of "truths" can sometimes be ugly, cold, arro-gant, and angry. Declarations like "I'm just telling you the truth!" can be a facile excuse for harsh words or an escape valve for pent-up rage. In the Christian tradition truth and love are inseparable. Growing in love involves penetrating to the deep truth of the beloved, coming to understand others not just on the surface but deep down. Likewise, growing in truth involves moving toward deeper communion, overcoming dif-ferences, "looking for the larger truth that embraces my little truth and that of the other," as Timothy Radcliffe reminds us. There is a delicate interplay between mind and heart in the search for truth. For those with a highly intellectual formation, Pascal's corrective can be helpful: "The heart has its rea-sons, which reason does not know. We feel it in a thousand things." Antoine de Saint-Exup~ry in The Little Prince expresses the same conviction: "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." The problem is that we sometimes use "the truth" to massacre others. Under the pretext of being sincere, we destroy truth with "the truth." In a striking essay, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was himself a martyr for the truth, wrote as follows: If it is detached from life and from its reference to the concrete other person, if "the truth is told" with-out taking into account to whom it is addressed, then this truth has only the appearance of truth, but it lacks its essential character. Review for Religious It is only the cynic who claims "to speak the truth" at all times and in all places to all people in the same way, but who, in fact, displays nothing but a lifeless image of the truth. He dons the halo of the fanatical devotee of truth who can make no allowance for human weaknesses; but, in fact, he is destroying the living truth between persons. He wounds shame, des-ecrates mystery, breaks confidence, betrays the com-munity in which he lives, and laughs arrogantly at the devastation he has wrought and at the human weakness which "cannot bear the truth." We must learn to speak the truth while taking other truths into account: the dignity of other persons, their human weakness and ours as well, the love that must characterize all Christian relationships. Our statement of a truth must blend with these other truths. Speaking the truth is therefore.a delicate art rather than a blunt instrument. Very early in life we learn that it is sometimes harm-ful to tell the truth. Our parents teach us as children that some personal and family matters are private; others have no right to know about them. As we grow up, friends begin to entrust secrets to us. As problems arise in our own lives, we ourselves sense the need to talk with some-one, but only on the condition that what we say is kept utterly confidential. These universal human experiences have given rise to a whole body of ethical and legal liter-ature concerning truth-telling, secrecy, and confidential-ity. Confessors and spiritual directors, doctors and nurses, psychiatrists and counselors, lawyers, secretaries, jour-nalists, and many others are bound, in varying circum-stances and within various limits, to professional secrecy. Paradoxically, we have a moral obligation to tell the truth, but we sometimes have a moral obligation not to tell the truth. This is often the case in religious life, where others frequently entrust us with matters of con- 6Y.1 2006 MMoney ¯ Truth: Religious Simplicity Revisited ,66 science and where there are also many "family matters" that are private and should remain within the community. So how does one protect private, even "sacred" truths? Silence, of course, is often the most effective method. In some cases, in the face of inappropriate inquiries, we may be able to communicate, with a combination of gen-tleness and firmness, the delicacy of our situation: "I am sorry, I am not really free to talk about that. I hope you understand." Sometimes, too, with a little bit of inge-nuity, we may say something that some or all recognize as good.humoredly evasive. But for centuries philosophers and theologians have pointed out that there are situations where silence or evasion simply make matters worse and where the right course seems to be to dissemble the truth. To resolve such moral dilemmas, Thomists, defining moral truth as correspondence between what we think and what we say, used the "broad mental reservation." Others, defining truth in relational terms (communication of what is in one's mind to someone who has a right to know), per-mitted "false speech" when utterly necessary to put off those who have no right to know. Neither theory is ideal. Each, in fact, has notable weaknesses. But both recognize that at times there is a moral obligation to "protect" the truth and to put off importunate, inappropriate inquiries, even by misleading the inquirer. In the end, strange though it may seem, one must "learn" to tell the truth. Each word has its own place, its own time, its own audience. Much depends on who is calling me to speak and what entitles me to speak. One of the most poignant, and wise, lines in American liter-ature is what Hester Prynne says to her daughter, Pearl, in The Scarlet Letter (chapter 22): "Hold thy peace, dear little Pearl. We must not always talk in the market-place of what happens to us in the forest." Review for Religious Statements involve a relationship with the person being addressed and at times also with third parties. The truth-teller respects those relationships and maintains them. The nosey inquirer seeks to violate truth and intrude on relationships that truth fosters carefully. It is important to learn how to put such inquirers off, and to put them off well. Truths not only have their time, their place, and their proper audience; they have their own particular peda-gogy. Certain truths have their "moment" in history. Victor Hugo once pointed out that, when an idea's time has come, not even armies can resist it. But, until that time, "new" truths enter most minds and hearts slowly. As mothers and fathers instinctively know, the wise teacher must often wait for the right moment and the right place. I once gave a rather pacifist-sounding con-ference to a group of college students, who loved it. A few days later I gave the same conference to a parish group, which hated it. The time and place were almost the same, but I learned rather painfully that a new audi-ence often requires a new pedagogy. How to present the truth is the key question. This question becomes all the more important as we grow in consciousness that our goal in speaking is not merely the transmission of data but communication and commu-nion in the truth. From that perspective pedagogy is not just a clever means of packaging a "truth" well; rather, it is an integral part of communicating a truth to the other. Emily Dickinson puts it this way: "Tell all the Truth but tell it slant. The Truth must dazzle gradually." This lesson is especially important for teachers who think they have done their job when they have lectured for an hour, citing all the facts and uttering all the "truths." But they must ask themselves whether they have communicated truth or simply uttered it in front 65.1 2006 Malone)/ ¯ Truth: Religious Simplicity Revisited of an inattentive audience. Method is important. Teachers must often reflect not only on the content they wish to communicate, but also on the m~ans for communicat-ing it. The same is true of parents, friends, counselors, and others who must sometimes communicate truths which they know hearers will find it hard to accept. The Greek ~ord for truth, al~theia, means "uncov-ering." Speaking the truth opens us out. What lies within us comes forth. In speaking truthfully we disclose what otherwise remains hidden in our depths. In Greek mythology the goddess of truth puts two pathways before Parmenides: one of uncovering and one of hiding. It is only by "uncovering" that one's true self emerges. The New Testament states this very clearly: "Put on a new self, created in God's image, whose justice and holiness is born of truth" (Ep 4:21). Prayer Reflection Ponder the words of the hymn (perhaps sing it to yourself): Simple Gifts Shaker Hymn Written by Shaker Elder Joseph Brackett, Jr., in 1848 'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free, 'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be, And when we find ourselves in the place just right, "Twill be in the valley of love and delight. When true simplicity is gain'd, To bow and to bend we shan't be asham'd. Review for Religious To turn, turn will be our delight, Till by turning, turning we come round right. Group Discussion Share situations where you have found that you are com-promised in telling the truth. What kind qf principles did you use in the situation for your way of acting? The Not-So-Holy Grail The commonest cup may serve. As chalice for the King. Even now he pours the wine Until the heart can hold no more. See the crimson And taste the death That is our life. Teresa Burleson 65.1 2006 DAVID L. FLEMING Sharing God the Ignatian Way I n speaking about God, we each have our own way of rying to express our experience. Christian, non- Christian, Eastern, Western approaches differ and yet often point in directions that move in similar ways towards the same goal--a union or an identifying with God. In this reflection, we are trying to share among our-selves the richness of our experience of God as we have received help from Ignatius Loyola, particularly guided by the experiences of the Spiritual Exercises. There is no doubt that Ignatius has been able to enter us into an experience of God that has some specific characteristics that mark what is now identified as Ignatian spirituality. We need to remember that no Christian spirituality is so unique in its characteristics that we do not find it rooted in the Gospels. But characteristics special to a particular spirituality such as Ignatian include the kind of emphasis given to certain aspects or areas, the intercon-nections of elements, and the vision and imagery that David L. Fleming sJ is editor of this journal. He may be addressed at 3601 Lindell Boulevard; St. Louis, Missouri 63108. Review for Religious become the vehicle moving this particular spirituality. Let us review some of these characteristics of Ignatian spirituality from our experience. We experience a God of gifts. The Ignatian Principle and Foundation is not presenting just a picturing of a creator God. Ignatius provides a fuller picture. In creat-ing, God has chosen us and gifts us that we might choose God through the means of the gifts that are meant to help us to know and to love God. This God has created a human world of gifts-- all provided for us that we might come to know and love God the better. Of course, with so many gifts provided, we find it necessary to make choices, even in terms of developing and using the personal gifts of talents and abilities that God has given to each one of us. Ignatius brings home to us that life is choice, and our choosing is always directed towards God. What does it mean for us to choose God in return? Do we share the God that gifts us with this responsibility? We experience that God is always trying to speak, to communicate with us, through his gifts. As a lover, God does not just speak words to us, even in Scripture. God acts, and his deeds are his expressions of love for us. Ignatius helps us to make the world transparent so that God and God's love shines through the whole of cre-ation. God is not a silent God. For Ignatius, God is always a God in conversation. Are we people who are attentive to God's communicating with us? Do we share with others our experience of this kind of an intimate God? "For'Ignat the. seven days of creation are all vart of God's .,:presence to,us. .71 65.1 2006 Fleming ¯ Sharing God the Ignatian Way 72] We experience God as One who is active and involved with his world--a busy God. Ignatius does not literally understand the six days of creation with God being very active on each of six days and then on the seventh day resting. So that, for many people, God stayed that way--restingmever since! No, for Ignatius, the seven days of creation are all part of God's presence to us. It is all part of God's Now. When Jesus says, ."My Father works, and I work," Ignatius believes him. The dynamic of creation continues and God works. This God, ever active and working with us and with his world--is this the God we share? We experience God in Jesus inviting us to be with him in his work identified as the coming of the kingdom or the reign of God~ In the Pauline mysterious image of the pleroma we know that God intends a certain fullness or completion to his creation, and we human beings---~e ones he loves--are called to play our part within this movement. Does our praying "Thy kingdom come" inspire us in our response to God's invitation to work with God so that the kingdom shines out through our dealings and activities in our ordinary world? Is our working with God in the vineyard of the kingdom the God we share? We experience a God who waits upon our response to this invitation. Just as God waits upon Mary for her response to God's invitation to allow herself to be his mother, so God waits upon each one of us in a similar way to allow ourselves to bring God's life to the world in which we live. Like Mary, we are to have a growing inti-macy with Jesus, and because of his risen life Jesus desires an intimacy that knows no boundaries. Do we share a God who is patient, long-suffering, who waits, for our hesitant and often waffling response? Do we share a God who delights in intimacy with us? Review for Reli~ous We experience our living and working with God. Working does not take us away from our God since God is a busy God, and, being busy, we are right alongside him. Praying, too, flows naturally in a relationship with .a God who converses in so many ways, if we but learn to listen--as when we take time to pray. And so Ignatius shares with us a union with God in the contemplative action of praying and working. There is a wholeness--a unity--in our life that does not take us away from God. Do we live, like Jesus, as contemplatives in action? Is this the God we share? If, in Ignatian spirituality, these are some of the ways we experience God and are moved to share God with others, we need to observe next how this experience flows into how we act. For Ignatian spirituality is above all caught up in a "way of proceeding." Some spiritual-ities identify themselves with a certain horarium--a daily order of set prayers at certain time, such as the Liturgy of the .Hours, one practice that marks a monastic approach to life. Some spiritualities revolve around cer-tain devotional practices, whether so many rosaries prayed within a day, so many set prayers read or recited, perhaps so many hours spent before the Blessed Sacrament. A "way of proceeding" in Ignatian spirituality does not demand any of these devotional obligations, but it does leave a person free to observe any one of them or any combination of them. Just as the text of the Spiritual Exercises remains free of particular devo-tional practices, so Ignatian spirituality imposes no arti-ficial boundaries: prayer times, prayer styles, amount of prayer, particular devotional practices, certain life styles, or specific jobs or responsibilities. Ignatian spirituality is an adaptable "way of proceeding" in our developing a relationship with God, with others, and with our world. From his experience of God, Ignatius wrote the texts 6Y.I 2006 Fleming ¯ Sharing God the Ignatian Way of both the Spiritual Exercises and the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus. We find that both these texts are "to be used"; they provide us with a way of proceeding. They are written for the purpose of the practice they generate. Both are written, not just as a rule of life or just a description of a good life, but as an invitation to experi-ence what Ignatius calls in the Two Standards prayer exercise "the true life." Jesus re

Matthew Godfrey ; The Weber and Davis County Communities Oral History Collection include interviews of citizens from several different walks of life. These interviews were conducted by Stewart Library personnel, WeberState University faculty and students, and other members of the community. The histories cover various topics and chronicle the personal everyday life experiences and other recollections regarding the history of the Weber and Davis County areas. ; 36p.; 29cm.; 2 bound transcripts; 4 file folders. 1 video disc: digital; 4 3/4 in. ; Oral History Program Matthew Godfrey Interviewed By Rebecca Ory Hernandez 21 October 2011 1 November 2011 i ii Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Matthew Godfrey Interviewed by Rebecca Ory Hernandez 21 October 2011 1 November 2011 Copyright © 2013 by Weber State University, Stewart Library iii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. Archival copies are placed in the University Archives, which also houses the original recording so researchers can gain a sense of the interviewee's voice and intonations. Project Description The Weber and Davis County Communities Oral History Collection include interviews of citizens from several different walks of life. These interviews were conducted by Stewart Library personnel, Weber State University faculty and students, and other members of the community. The histories cover various topics and chronicle the personal everyday life experiences and other recollections regarding the history of the Weber and Davis County areas. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the Stewart Library of Weber State University. No part of the manuscript may be published without the written permission of the University Librarian. Requests for permission to publish should be addressed to the Administration Office, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah, 84408. The request should include identification of the specific item and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Godfrey, Matthew, an oral history by Rebecca Ory Hernandez, 21 October and 1 November 2011, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. Matthew Godfrey ca. 1999 1 Abstract: Matthew Godfrey (June 30, 1970) was born in Ogden, UT. He spent his childhood years in North Ogden and attended Weber High School. Matthew attended Weber State University, where he got a master's degree in accounting and was an All-American on the track team. Matthew sat down with Rebecca Ory Hernandez in the Mayor's Office before the end of his third term. He shares stories of his life growing up and living in North Ogden, as well as his education and serving as Ogden's Mayor. He reflects on his time running for Mayor and discusses some of the major economic and development projects he worked on in his several terms after elected to beautify Ogden City. His father was William V. Godfrey, mayor of Harrisville. Matthew is currently working as a consultant and continues to serve on various community boards. He is married to Monica. ROH: Today is November 21, 2011. Seated in Mayor Matthew Godfrey's office are Rebecca Ory-Hernandez and Mayor Godfrey. We're here to talk about your history. Let's start with where and when you were born. MG: I was born here in Ogden at the old McKay Dee hospital that was across from Weber State. That was June 30, 1970. ROH: Did you have any brothers or sisters? MG: Growing up, there were five of us. I have an older sister, Malinda, then Jason and then me. After me were Deborah and Laura. I had another sister who died when she was eleven days old; her name was Rebecca. ROH: How much older are Jason and Malinda? 2 MG: The first four are all two years apart. Malinda was born in 1966, Jason in 1968, I was in 1970, and Deborah in 1972. Rebecca was born in 1974, and then she passed away. I think Laura was born in 1976. ROH: Did you grow up in Ogden? MG: I grew up in Harrisville. We lived right behind where the Wal-Mart is now. We grew up in the same house my mom grew up in. I never distinguished it much from Ogden. ROH: What are the names of your parents? MG: William Verl Godfrey and Carol Jeanne Godfrey. My mom went by Jeanne and my dad went by Bill. ROH: Tell me a little about your childhood growing up in Harrisville. MG: It was a wonderful place to grow up and I had a great childhood. We had land around our homes so we would go and play and ride bikes with friends. We did a lot of fun things together as boys—myself, my brother, and my cousin, after he moved in behind our house. It was a great time growing up. We got along really well. I enjoyed spending time with my family. It was kind of a family compound. Next door to us were my mom's parents; behind us were our cousins, the Fields, which was my mom's sister; behind them, later on, the Montgomery's built, and they were the family of another of my mom's sisters. ROH: Where did you go to school? MG: I went to Pioneer Elementary School, Walhquist Jr. High School and Weber High. Education was never stressed by my parents. Both of them went to a semester or two of college but didn't graduate. They never pushed it or said it was 3 important that we be good at math or reading or other topics. We got good grades and we all liked school, but I don't recall my mom saying I needed to go to college. I enjoyed school both academically and socially. I ran for some offices and had good experiences. ROH: What offices did you run for? MG: Eighth-grade president and then student body president at Walhquist Jr. High School. ROH: What other extra-curricular activities were you involved in? MG: I ran track. I really wanted to play basketball because basketball was a cool sport and track was not. I tried out for the basketball team. I was the last kid cut. I still remember that Lynn Wood and I had a one-on-one game at the end of practice to decide who was going to get on the team. He beat me by one basket. In hindsight, it was a good thing because if I'd made the team I would have pursued basketball and that's certainly not where my skills were. I played football my eighth and ninth grade years, which is tough when you're only a hundred pounds. I got my bell rung plenty, but I had a good time. My science teacher got a ferret and there were two of us that would go and take care of it. Those are the only extra-curricular things I did. ROH: What about high school? MG: I ran track and cross country. I was on seminary council my junior year and I was seminary president my senior year. It was against the rules to be a student body officer and be on the seminary council, so when I was asked to be on the 4 seminary council, I couldn't run for office. I think it was a good thing. I did debate as well. High school was a fun time. ROH: What was a typical day like for you in high school? MG: We woke up around 6:30 and we always had breakfast as a family. We'd pray and read scriptures as a family, then rush off to catch the bus to school. In high school, my parents had a car for all the kids. They didn't want us to have our own car. It was an ugly green GMC pickup truck that we were embarrassed to drive. We thought it was such an ugly truck. My junior year, much to my surprise, my dad bought a Fiat X-19. My dad bought it from my uncle who was glad to get rid of it. My junior and senior year I was able to drive this cool little sports car to school—when it worked, which it didn't much of the time. School would start around 7:15 and end around 3:00. Then, I would go run track or cross country until 5 or 5:30. I was always famished when I got home, and we always had dinner as a family around 6 or 6:30. ROH: What did your parents do for a living? MG: My mom stayed at home with us. My dad was an insurance agent. He had a tiny little yellow shack of an office until I was in my senior year in high school, when he went to work for Heiner's Insurance. My dad was the mayor of Harrisville and a councilman before that. I think he ran for mayor the first time while I was in high school and he lost by one vote. He ran again and won the second time around, which was just after I was married. He had a heart attack and was in the hospital the night he won the election. He came out of open heart surgery and found out that he'd won the election. 5 ROH: Was he influential in your decision to run for mayor? MG: He told me not to run. Almost twelve and a half years ago I went to talk to him out in the garage and said, "Dad, I'm thinking about running for mayor." He said, "Why would you do that?" I gave him my reasons. He said, "I would advise you not to do it. Maybe I'm being over-protective." He shared with me some experiences he had had of people being mean-spirited. He said, "Your friends and the people you go to church with are going to yell at you and say terrible things about you and I would rather you not have those kinds of experiences." He said that if I did decide to run, he would be supportive. I didn't have a political bug in me—we had to deliver fliers when he ran for office and I did not enjoy that at all. I didn't have much interest in politics, even though I'd run for two offices in school—that was more for fun. After I decided to run for mayor, my dad was a great support. ROH: Back up a little bit and let's talk about what happened after high school. MG: I got a track scholarship to Weber State. ROH: What was your major? MG: My undergraduate was finance and then I went on to get a master's degree in accounting at Weber, which was never the plan. The plan was to go away for a Master's degree in International Business. The NCAA kind of messed that up for me. At that time, you couldn't transfer schools without losing a year of eligibility. When I finished my undergraduate, I wanted to get a Master's but I couldn't transfer. Weber had two graduate degrees, the Masters of Business and the Masters of Accounting. I figured it out with the counselor and I could get four 6 bachelor's degrees or I could get a Master's degree, otherwise I would lose a year of track eligibility. So, I ended up getting a Master's in accounting even though I had no interest in accounting. I got them together and graduated with both degrees in 1995. I started in '88 and had a two-year mission within that time. ROH: Where did you go on your mission? MG: I went to Caracas, Venezuela. It provided a lot of great experiences and learning opportunities. A mission is an amazing amalgamation of experiences. It is extraordinarily difficult physically even though I ran track all through school. In Venezuela, we would walk several miles and then knock on doors all day in the sun. It was hot and humid and you're wet all day long. Continual rejection is something you have to learn to live with. Then you have to learn to live with another person. You don't choose your companion; they're assigned by the mission president. I think I had seventeen companions in twenty-four months. That's unusual. That was good but also hard. I had quite a few companions who were having problems and the president sent them to me—sometimes he told me in advance, but usually he didn't. After the difficult companion transferred the president would say, "Thanks, that's the longest he's ever stayed with anybody." It was a valuable experience to learn to live with somebody you don't know and who is often from another country. Usually you're living with someone with whom you have nothing in common except religion. I really like to get out, work hard and do things. I had companions who wanted to do what was easy, fun and enjoyable. Learning how to resolve those kinds of issues was a good experience and I think great preparation as well. It 7 was neat to see people change their lives as they listened to the Gospel and decided they were going to get baptized. I just got a call last month from a lady I baptized who was here in Utah. It was neat to talk with her and hear what was going on in her life and what she was doing. Those relationships were meaningful and they continue to be very rewarding experiences. I wish I would have kept better track of the people I knew there. It seemed unmanageable at the time, but today with Facebook and email it would be a piece of cake. The postal service is terrible in Venezuela, so I knew most of my letters wouldn't make it through anyway. ROH: What did you think about the contrast in geography? MG: It was very tropical and there was a desert in one area where I served. It's so beautiful and so ugly at the same time. It was fascinating to see how poorly the country was run; they had so much by way of natural resources and amenities of the earth, but they did a poor job of managing it. It was sad to see the poverty. I had heard about poverty, but when you see the depth of the poverty and the pervasiveness of it, you feel overwhelmed by it. It's not like you can help them out of it alone. That was hard. All I could do was share a message that could help their lives get better and hope that over time they could improve their situation. It was a beautiful landscape and I enjoyed the climate knowing I wouldn't choose to live in that kind of humidity. It was fun knowing I was going to be there for two years and then come back to this area. ROH: Did you run on your days off? 8 MG: A handful of times, but my philosophy was that if I put all my effort into serving well on my mission then things would work out with track. ROH: Did you get back into track and school when you got back? Or was it very different when you came back? MG: I got right back to both school and track. I hadn't run for two years, so it took time to get back in shape. I had more injuries after my mission, which could have been from the time off, but I was very poor and didn't change my shoes as often as I should have, so a lot of it I caused myself, I'm sure. I'm fairly bullet-proof with injuries, but I had a few years where I was injured quite a bit. Weber didn't put much money into their track program, even though it was probably the best athletic program they had. We won more championships and had more national recognition, I'm certain, than any other team on campus. It's not exciting when the cross country team places fourth or seventh in the nation. The coach was great and became a very good friend. I learned a lot from him about track and about life. The same with my high school coach—Dick Connelly. He passed away a few years ago. High school is such an impressionable time in your life and I thought I was a really good kid—seminary president, didn't go to parties and always did what I was supposed to be doing— but he pulled me aside several times and told me I needed to be doing better. It was shocking to me because I thought I was too far on the good side and needed to let my hair down a little. I was really grateful to him. He coached me well in running, but also in life. He was a wonderful man. ROH: Once you graduated from Weber, what did you do? 9 MG: I was married in the summer of my junior year of college, which was in 1993. Monica and I were introduced by someone on the track team. I had a freshman who had a locker next to me and from the time he came in he wanted to set me up with somebody that he knew. To be honest, I didn't trust his judgment. He was really fun-loving and kind of goofy, and I didn't know who Monica was but I was certain that she would not be someone I would be interested in. He kept asking and asking, and finally said, "Just meet her." We set something up where we would just pass each other and meet. We did that and she was much better looking than I had expected. We went out on a date—an almost-blind date. It wasn't wonderful. It was a wedding reception for a friend of mine. It was one of the most spectacular storms I've ever seen during my life here—in that six hour period of our date, it snowed probably two feet. We had a heck of a time getting from Ogden up to the valley and we ended up helping cars on the side of the road. It took us two hours to get to my friend's house and it was eleven at night by the time we did. It was still snowing, so we talked about just spending the night at my friend's house. Monica called her parents to ask and they said, "No way, if we have to come get you, we will, but you're not spending the night with a blind date in who-knows-where." After I thought about it, I thought it was probably what I would have said too, as a parent. So we made the trek back. We were married six months later. ROH: That must have been a busy time for you—a Master's program and track and getting married. You had a lot of change going on all at once. What was that like? 10 MG: It was fun and hard, for the reasons that you've stated. I was taking a lot of credit hours. One semester I had either twenty-eight or thirty-one credit hours. It was really hard and I was really busy. I was also adjunct faculty and I taught between one and three classes a semester. I was the evening assistant manager at Godfather's Pizza too. I was doing all of that and newly married and trying to figure out how a marriage works. My parent's relationship and her parent's relationship could not have been more different. I knew that and she recognized that our parents interacted in very different ways. That was hard because I had only seen things one way and she had only seen things one way. We had to figure out those dynamics and the personality of our relationship in a time where there was already a lot going on. ROH: Was she a student? MG: Yes. She ended up getting a degree in communications, which we both regret. She wanted a degree in nursing but her dad talked her out of it. He didn't want her to be a nurse, but said that she should go to school to be a doctor. She wanted to stay at home and raise our children, but that knowledge base would have been very valuable for our family. In one way, it was good because communications was a faster degree and she was able to get her degree quickly. She got pregnant our senior year and we had our first child about six or eight weeks before she graduated. My father would come over to our little house and watch the baby while we were both in school. ROH: Where was your first house? 11 MG: It was 780 32nd Street. It was a tiny little house but we loved it. We were able to buy it because my wife had saved up some money. We drove past it because it was near where we were renting and we talked the owner into selling it to us on contract. We gave him the $2,000 that Monica had saved as a down payment. ROH: What was your first child's name? MG: Natasha was our first. She was born in '95. ROH: My wife stayed home with Natasha and I got a job at Lomega as a financial analyst. I made $28, 500, which was really upsetting. I felt like with the master's degree and good grades—I was second in my class—I had hoped for more. But it was a job and I took it. It was a good experience, but I didn't stay long. I was there for about six months when I got a call from Dutch Belnap who used to be the athletic director at Weber State. He said, "Hey, Matt, I have these guys that are looking for a chief financial officer, are you interested?" I said, "Heck yeah." I talked to them and worked with them for three months. It was a disaster. I won't be disparaging about what went on. It was not what I wanted to do or where I wanted to work. Luckily, I was able to go back to Lomega and they took me back in a position that was better than the one I had left. I ended up being a program manager and supervising the release of new products. Lomega started out with a ditto drive, a tape back-up drive. Later, I moved to the zip drive. It was very challenging and very fast paced. I was laid-off, which is a great story. I was in meetings until 6:30 or 7:00 p.m. one night and my card wouldn't work to get back into my office. Somebody 12 came by and let me in. I went to my computer and my login wasn't working. I called the IT guy and said, "Hey, what's going on? My computer and my card aren't working." Then, all of the sudden, I realized I had been laid-off. We knew there were going to be massive lay-offs, but there were only two of us doing program management for the zip drive in the entire company and we went to our boss and asked, "Should we be worried?" He said, "No, if you guys weren't here, there's no one to do your job. There's no way you could be let go." So we both thought we were safe and yet we both were laid off. That didn't last very long, but they didn't bring me back to the same position. It was about two weeks later that they brought us back and they had me doing something similar but it was in the division in San Diego. I flew out Monday morning and flew home Friday night. I had been called to be a bishop in my church about a year before. I worked that schedule for about six months when I decided I couldn't do it anymore. I had been applying for other jobs but my stake president worked for the city and suggested I apply for a job in neighborhood development with the city. I had been doing some real estate on the side. I applied and didn't hear anything for three months. Then I was called in for an interview and again didn't hear anything for quite a few more months. I left Lomega and worked at the city. I wasn't very excited about that. ROH: What year was that? MG: I think it was the end of 1998. I told the city I couldn't live on the salary they gave me and that I needed to continue to do real estate on the side. They said that would be okay. I basically helped with neighborhood development. I went to city 13 council meetings and presented new projects. I kept thinking that the way the city was being run didn't make any sense. We had huge problems. Downtown was a mess and was continuing to cave, yet it seemed like we were the only ones doing anything to rebuild the town but we were doing it up in these neighborhoods. I said, "Why aren't we doing some mixed-used development downtown?" They laughed at me and said, "That's what we should be doing but the economic development guys aren't going to go for anything like that." I made other suggestions and kept saying, "Why doesn't the city do this?" or "Why doesn't the city do that?" I was brand new. I only worked for the city for six months total. One day, I got a call from the CAO, which is the guy right under the mayor. He said, "I understand you have a lot of ideas about what should happen in the city." He asked me to meet with him. I went to his office and started sharing the ideas. He was mostly listening and from time to time would write things down. Then, I got to crime and I said, "We need to focus on crime. Factual or not, there's a perceived crime issue. People think Ogden is riddled with crime and I think there needs to be a real emphasis on reducing crime." He put down his pen and said, "There is nothing that can be done about crime. Crime is driven by demographics and the economy and there's nothing you can do to change it." I said, "Well, I think we can change it and I think there are cities across the country that have, though it will take a lot of work." He put his pen down and folded his arms and I thought, "Well, this is over." I didn't say that, but I thanked him for his time and left soon thereafter. This was in the spring—in March. 14 I went home that night and thought, "Nothing's going to change." Until there is a vision and somebody who has a desire to make something happen, we're in a vortex and this town isn't going to escape. The guys running the city— the CAO—didn't believe things could change. I was upset by it and asked myself if I really wanted to stay here. I felt like I was on the Titanic. A week later the mayor announced he wasn't going to run for re-election. ROH: Who was the mayor? MG: Mayor Mecham. He was having heart failure. Nobody knew it at the time, but he was getting a heart transplant. He was a nice man, but he had several people in key positions that weren't making anything happen. I said, "Good, hopefully there will be somebody who jumps in the race who will do something." Then Garth Day announced he was going to run. He was just indicted up in Morgan County and sent to prison for fraud. He was on the city council and I had watched him flip-flop on issues until it drove me crazy. One day, I got up and spoke out about an issue because he was pushing an ordinance that had to do with the city yard-care regulations. They were saying, "We have these ordinances that require people to take care of their yard, but people don't." Garth Day was trying to get something passed where you'd put a big billboard, placard-type thing up in the person's yard that said, "This person is not complying with Ogden City regulations." He said, "If we do that, maybe we can shame them into compliance." While I was attending the meeting as a staff member, I figured that since I was also an Ogden resident I could address them as a constituent. I said, "What I think we should do is not embarrass people into 15 doing it, let's just enforce the law. I am certain that if you started enforcing the ordinances, you will change behavior. We just need to give citations and let their pocketbook change their behavior. If you put the signs up, they're just going to tear them down." I got in trouble the next day from my boss who said, "You should not be speaking out at these council meetings." ROH: Who was your boss? MG: Aaron Wolf-Burtling. He said, "I understand, but let wisdom dictate. We need the council to approve our plans." I said, "I know, but it was a dumb idea." He said, "I know, but you still need to be careful." Anyway, I had seen Garth and I thought, "He cannot be the next mayor. He'll destroy this town!" I like Garth; he and I developed a good relationship, but he was not the one to run the city. I kept waiting to hear who else was going to run. I heard there was another guy that everyone acknowledged was kind of a crazy guy. So, it was kind of depressing. There were some great people at the city and I'd rubbed shoulders with a lot of people who were really capable. There were some fantastic people at the city who wanted to do things but had been here for years and maybe just accepted that this was the way it was. I went home one day and said, "Monica, what would you think if I ran for mayor?" Her father was a state senator at the time and had been chair of the Weber County Democratic Party. He was very well known as a physician in town and very well-liked by everybody. Between my father and my father-in-law, you'd think that politics was kind of ingrained in me, but I had never had a desire to run for political office. My wife 16 and I hardly ever talk about politics. She was shocked. She said, "Why would you do that?" I said, "Who's going to run for Ogden City mayor if I don't? The town's in bad shape and it pays $70,000 a year. You're not going to get the capable executive who wants to come because he thinks this would be fun. No one is going to leave their career to be the Ogden City mayor." ROH: Give me some examples of some of the businesses that were leaving at that time. MG: Weber State. They had a downtown campus that they abandoned during that time period. When there was an Ogden City Mall downtown, Weber State had an office there. Weber abandoned that, for safety reasons. Nordstrom left. ATK Thiokol was here and they took off in the late '90s. There were little shops and little stores all around that shut their doors. ROH: Downtown Ogden was the premier place to shop. MG: That was before there were national chains, to be fair, but those slowly closed. It was sad. Generational businesses were going. ATK was a significant and high-paying employer who uprooted. We had salvage yards in what is now our central business district. That was my point to my wife: "There's no one who's going to take this on." We had our own business, a real estate holding and management company, so we decided that we were in a position where we could run for mayor. We talked about it and I talked to some people around town. I talked to my father-in-law and asked what he thought. He liked it. He said Ogden needed somebody with new ideas and new passion. He gave me a list of people to go talk to about it. After about a week of talking to a couple people every day—I still 17 worked at the city—I got called into the city attorney's office. One of the attorneys sat me down across the desk and said, "I understand you're thinking about running for mayor." I said, "How did you hear that?" He said, "Word has gotten back to the mayor that you're talking to people around town. Have you decided?" I said, "No, I haven't, I'm just kind of going through the process of trying to figure it out." He said, "You can't do that and be an employee here. If you're going to work for the city, you have to work for the city and not campaign to try to beat your boss." I said, "I'm pretty sure my constitutional rights give me the right to run for office if I want." He was the nicest guy and I said, "You don't really want to be having this conversation with me, do you?" He said, "No, I don't." I said, "You were sent to do this." He nodded. I said, "Well, I'll tell you what, you can go and tell them I've made up my mind and I'm going to run for mayor. You don't have to fire me, I'll quit." I went home and told Monica. ROH: I don't understand how that could be legal. MG: It wasn't legal and he knew it wasn't. He was sent to talk to me and later I found out why. It was because the mayor had somebody who was running and he didn't want me running against him. I'm sure that the CAO didn't want me running either because it was clear that his ideas and my ideas weren't aligning. I was twenty-eight at the time. I went around and talked to everyone about it. Inevitably, as I went around to people like, John E. Lindquist, and they'd say, "Why don't you run for city council first?" I'd say, "I don't have any interest in a political career and spending time to work up to become mayor because Ogden has problems now. If you and others think that my ideas are good ones and that I 18 can help turn the tide for the city, then great, I'm willing to do it. If not, I'm not going to try for the council." John A. Lindquist said, "How can I help you?" I said, "I need money." He pulled out his checkbook and wrote me a check. I felt like I was on cloud nine because I had the support of John A. Lindquist, who was the patriarch of the city and he'd just endorsed me. That was a real turning point for me. From there it was a lot of campaigning. ROH: Today is December 1, 2011 and we are in the office of Mayor Matthew Godfrey. Present is Matthew Godfrey and Rebecca Ory-Hernandez from Weber State University. We'll pick up today from where you started campaigning for mayor. MG: People started calling me and I had a few surprise phone calls from businessmen who said, "I want you to meet with somebody. He's run political campaigns across the country and he was a political advisor to Ronald Reagan." I met with the gentleman and he was very helpful. His name was Chuck Bailey; he's passed away since. That began the journey of knocking doors and meeting people and trying to win an election where you're virtually unknown in a community. It was probably the end of May when I made the decision and then in June I had my campaign declared. There were a lot of us who ran. My strategy and belief was that I needed to knock on every door in the city. I wasn't sophisticated enough to know that you don't knock on every door—you only knock the doors of those who actually vote. I was fortunate enough to win in the primary in October and then the office in November. ROH: What was a day in the campaign like for you? 19 MG: I had my own real estate holding and management company which I'd been building for several years and was doing full-time. I had three days a week that I would go and run that business. In the evenings, I would knock doors from five until 8:30 or 9:00. During the day, when I wasn't knocking doors or working, I'd organize volunteers and put together materials. There's a whole logistical side of it, with vendors and signs, and I had to organize volunteers for much of that. I knocked on doors Tuesday night through Friday night and then all day on Saturday. I learned that you can't go out at 9:30 a.m. or even 10:00 a.m. on Saturday, which was strange for me but for other people that was still sleeping time. ROH: How many volunteers did you have? MG: It was mainly family and friends. One of the ones who helped me a lot was Brandon Stevenson, who is now a city council member. We'd gone to high school together and I knew who he was but we weren't friends. I was better friends with his little brother. I got a call from Brandon saying he wanted to help and he was extremely helpful. He helped knock on doors and campaigned in his neighborhood. A lot of my family came out and knocked on doors and handed out fliers and put up signs. In the last campaign I had a large group that came to help, but usually it's a small group willing to put in the time to help you out. ROH: How much money were you expected to raise for your first campaign and what was your platform? MG: The most that had ever been raised previously was $14,000 by Mayor Mecham. I figured that if I raised more money than that, then I'd be in good shape. I ended 20 up raising about $28,000, and I was still outspent two-to-one. I think Bob Hunter spent $64,000 or something like that. I had probably as many signs out as Bob did, but I remember all of his four-by-eight signs had pictures of himself placed on top the week before the election. It was like Bob was everywhere. It was discouraging and we thought, "There's no way. He's spent way more money and put out more fliers and more signs. He's inundated the town with Bob Hunter." The platform that I ran on was three very specific things: lowering taxes, economic revitalization, and reducing crime. There were also components of that like getting into neighborhoods and making a difference, but I thought that those three main ideas were what people wanted. I had plans for each and everything mapped out. I still have the brochures—I kept them so I would remember what I told people I would do. We would have meetings with my directors where we would go through and check some of them off. Some of them came off the list because I came into the office and realized it was a bad idea. I should say; I realized it wasn't the right place to put resources. Things changed as I learned more, but we really focused on accomplishing what we told people we were going to do. You naively think that people will remember what you told them you were going to do and when you'd tell them you did it, they would applaud. To this day, when I tell people, "We lowered your property taxes three times." They say, "No, my taxes go up every year." I say, "No, your city property taxes were lowered three times." Nobody remembers and nobody believes it, but it was important to me and, I hope, to our team that we did what we told people we were going to do. 21 ROH: What was your reaction to winning your first campaign? MG: I was surprised. My wife and I worked really hard up until the last day and did everything we knew we could do. Bob Hunter came over to my house the morning of the election. He gave us flowers and said it had been great to run against us. He was a real gentleman. He said, "If you win, I'll be your biggest supporter." I thanked him. After he left, I said to my wife, "Not only has he outspent and he's everywhere, he's now out-classed us!" We went out to breakfast after that and we've actually made it a tradition that every four years on the Tuesday of elections, we go out to breakfast as a family. As you wait, it's a very anxious day. It was a fun evening that night at my house. Bob had rented the Radisson Hotel and had a fancy shindig there across from the city offices. It wasn't as advanced then as it is now—at that time you had to have somebody there at the recorder's office in order to relay information. I had someone down at the office getting the tallies and we were calling him and getting updates. As the results came in precinct by precinct, I think we won every single precinct. There may have been one or two we didn't win, and we only barely won each precinct, but one after another we won almost all of them. I think it was down to the second or third to the last when I did the math and realized we had won, there was no way he could beat us. It was surreal. I don't think anyone in the room thought it was going to happen. That's the moment when you give your wife a hug and kiss and say, "Now what do we do?" We needed to go and shake Bob's hand and thank the community, so when the results were in, we went down to city hall. They were relaying the data 22 from the old council chambers and it couldn't have been a colder reception by everybody. We all felt so awkward when we went in. There were a few token congratulations, but mostly it was really gloomy and we felt like complete outsiders. Bob was gracious and we thanked him. He reiterated his promise to be our biggest supporter. He is a very close friend and ally. I have appreciated that and really respect him. We left soon after because it was so uncomfortable that night. I think most everyone there supported Bob and had expected Bob to win and they were worried about the change of the new guy coming into office. I had to sell my business because I wanted to start working for the city right away. I was coming in and meeting with people and trying to get to know what was going on. They were nice enough to give me an office. It was in a corner by the library and had a lot of old books in it. They put a desk in it for me. The mayor did not support me. He was going to remain neutral in the race, but after I won the primary he came out and supported Bob. He was not cordial to me. I had made no bones about my intent to replace two of his main people. I'm sure if a mayoral candidate were saying that about my people, I'd feel the same way. I started work in that little corner and I worked pretty much every day. I met with people and started to form a budget and a plan. I started figuring out who my team was going to be. I went up to Weber State and met with Mike Vaughn, Dick Richards, and Chuck Bailey, some guys from Iomega and other members of the community that I trusted as good business minds in order to figure out, "What do I do? How to I transition this kind of an organization? Do I come in and take it slow or do I come in and make changes right away?" We had 23 a lot of dialogue as a group and laid out a plan, which was to take things slow— to come in and learn the landscape, let people prove themselves, and make changes as they became necessary. We transitioned quickly between November and January when I was thrown into office. The mayor had one meeting where he met with me and it was fascinating because he didn't have a computer on his desk. When I came in, there was not a single file in his desk. I'd asked for the meeting to have him pass along nuggets of wisdom and projects and whatever else he felt like he should pass on to me. It was a very brief meeting. He gave me a handful of suggestions; there was an individual that he said, "Whatever you do, don't fire this person." He said, "Of all the conferences and conventions you should go to, this one is the most valuable." He said a couple more little things and that was it. It wasn't, "Here's what we're working on, here's our strategy, here's the lay of the land…" We really started from scratch. Luckily, the administration stayed. I was so new. I had been here about two months when Christie, who had been his admin and was mine, came in and said, "So, are you keeping me?" I said, "Of course, why would you think not?" She said, "We didn't know if you were keeping me or if we were leaving." I said, "I'm so sorry. It never even crossed my mind." I had no idea that they often change out administrative assistants. She was a phenomenal assistant. Those kinds of things were all new to me, but luckily Christie was there and helped out a lot. The CAO and the economic director both resigned the day I took office; I had said I would replace both of them. I felt that they were not doing a good job, but 24 my intent was to work with them and if they could step it up. We hired Stuart Reid to be the economic director, and brought Nate Pierce up from within the organization to be the CAO. You're inundated when you're new. Everyone wants to meet you and you have a million new best friends. You go through a process where your just trying to figure out what's going on and what's important while you're building your team. It takes time to figure out how to work together as a team. Mecham's style was very different than mine. There were a lot of changes. We put more resources into the police department and into economic development while we were cutting taxes. We had to make significant changes in the organization while we were making those things happen. We tried to ease into them gradually, but from the city's perspective, it was lightening speed and dramatic organizational changes almost overnight. ROH: How would you describe your style? MG: I am very team-oriented. I believe in having a clear vision of where we are headed and what we want to happen, then establishing clear goals and giving people responsibility to make those components happen. I think my role is to make sure there is that vision and then to push the organization, to make sure that they know that we're going to make these things happen. My role changed over the years, depending on who was there. For example, Stuart Reid was a very strong leader and liked to own everything that was in his box. He did not want anyone meddling in economic development, which was too bad because I loved economic development. He wanted complete control and so I just held him 25 accountable for the outcomes and he would deliver. He had his own way of going about it and he wanted to be left alone. On the other hand, our current economic director wants me to participate and comes to me for help. That's Richard McKonkie, a wonderful man who has been the deputy director of economic development in the city for many years. I'm fine adjusting my role depending on what is needed. Some departments do everything on their own and as long as they're producing their outcomes, that's all I care about. It's been fun to see the changes in the organization and how my work has changed. ROH: How many terms have you been mayor? MG: Three. I'll be finishing up twelve years as mayor. I've been here longer now than anybody except Lorrin Farr, who was the first mayor of Ogden. He didn't actually have elections. He was appointed and once a year at church he was sustained as mayor. He went to serve a mission and another mayor came in and Lorrin Farr came back after his mission and served a few more years. I think he served twenty-three years as mayor. He had quite a different environment. ROH: Who appointed him? The church? MG: Yes, basically. When they settled the territory, people were given assignments to go and settle different areas and fill different roles. ROH: How would you summarize your first term? MG: It was hard. The council relationship was really difficult. I was, obviously, brand new to politics and leading an organization of this size. City government was very different from the private sector. I knew it would be challenging, but in my first meeting with the chair of the city council, he told me that his relationship with 26 Mayor Mecham was terrible, that the council hated Mayor Mecham and Mayor Mecham hated the council until the last two years. He said, "The mayor learned he had to come to us and listen to us and once he figured that out, it was fine." I went back after this meeting and my staff said, "Don't you dare do what that arrogant bugger is telling you to do." I also knew that Mayor Mecham had serious health problems in those last two years and he wasn't working as much, so maybe that made him easier to get along with. I took my staff's advice and tried to be cordial and work with the council, but the chair would chew me out for not going to him about things. I said, "I have advisors and they are the people advising me on things. That is not your role." It was a difficult relationship for a few years. In hindsight, I wonder what would have happened if I'd gone to him and said, "Sure, I'd love to partner with you." If I'd made them feel included and a part of things, I wonder if it would have calmed the waters. I would love a chance to go back and try to change that dynamic. It was really hard to get projects through. It was an ambitious agenda. We wanted to recruit 2,000 jobs to the downtown, 2,000 people living in the downtown area, and the last one I think was 200,000 square feet of new retail, office, and entertainment in the downtown area. That was hard because there hadn't been new housing in the downtown area in over 120 years and the businesses were leaving. From the time I was elected to the time I took office— Nordstrom had already left, J.C. Penny announced they were leaving and Mier Frank announced they were leaving. I thought we were going to be rehabilitating this mall and it emptied out within days of my taking office. That was challenging 27 because the community loved that mall and preferred it to the Newgate Mall. The community wanted Nordstrom and J.C. Penny and Bon Marche back. I can't tell you how many times I heard that. Well, we tried. Nordstrom was livid with Ogden because they had tried to stay and when they had come out for a trip, apparently they had a meeting scheduled with the former mayor and his economic development director and Nordstrom got blown off. The economic development director was skiing and the mayor wasn't available to meet with them—and it was literally one of the Nordstrom family members there for the meeting. After getting blown off, Nordstrom said, "We're done." They wanted their space rehabilitated, they wanted their entrance re-done, and they wanted to know there was a commitment to seeing the mall flourish. Apparently, the owner of the mall had died or gone bankrupt and so Nordstrom was coming to make sure the city was monetarily committed to the mall, but the city blew them off and they said, "We're out of here." That started the chain of events where all the anchor tenants vacated the mall. We met with Mier and Frank several times. We flew back east to see them. It didn't work out. The feeling was, "This mall is never going to work. You're going to have to tear it down." We told the community that all the developers were saying the mall had to be torn down and the universal response from the community was, "It's a beautiful mall and it's only twenty years old, you can't tear it down." We were saying, "Nobody wants it. If we want a unique retail and entertainment center, we're going to have to tear it down." The community was 28 angry, understandably so. They didn't understand why we had to put money into this and why we couldn't just get Nordstrom to come back. We announced the river project, which was a sixty-acre development project on both sides of the Ogden River that we wanted to start. That meant we were going to have to be buying homes. When creating an RDA at that time, we had the ability to use eminent domain to acquire those properties. People were livid. It barely passed in the council. It was very difficult and was controversial. There were always huge groups of opposition when we did these projects. We did several projects on 25th Street, like the five-acre parcel that had been empty for forty years that we wanted to rebuild. Many members of the council and much of the community wanted to do this stuff for free and nobody wanted any risk. It doesn't work that way. It's our town and we need to invest in our own community. It was very challenging. We didn't have any money, so we had to be really creative in how we moved forward whether it was rebuilding the mall, developing the river project, or redeveloping 25th Street. Wall Avenue was a disaster, there were two different salvage yards in that area—our central business district had two salvage yards. We had to get those out of here and buy up property. ROH: How did you manage that? MG: We were very creative in finding little pockets of money. One of them was the IRS building, when we came into office, the IRS was reported to have been looking around for a place to build a new campus; their buildings were old and non-functional. I was thrilled when I heard about it. As soon as I hired Stuart Reid, I said, "Stuart, here's a contact. Our guy has been working on it. Will you 29 call the IRS and tell them that we'd like them to move downtown." They had already looked at downtown and said nothing suited their needs there. Well, Stuart and his guys found two administrative orders signed by the president; one said if there's downtown space available, then they needed to occupy it; the second said that they had to use a historic building if one was available. We found a historic building in downtown and took it to the IRS and said, "You have to come. Here's a site. It's downtown and a historic building we want you to use." They said, "No, we're not going to do it." I wasn't in the meeting, but it was reported back to me that the IRS was told, "You will do it or we will sue you for not following your own rules." Can you imagine doing that to the IRS? So, kicking and screaming they came. We purchased the property and sold it to a developer and we actually made a little money in the deal. Those early projects were critical to revitalizing the downtown area. It gave us a story to take to other people, "Look at this, here's a new development on 25th street and here are these new buildings downtown and all these new jobs coming to the area." Little by little we would build on the success and get people to come. Virtually every time we had to come up with some creative incentive to make these things come together. People will never appreciate how challenging it was. In fact, the development director came in one day and he said, "Do you see my hands?" They were all red. I said, "What's going on?" He said, "I'm losing the skin off of my fingers. This is so stressful. I can't sleep at night because I'm trying to figure out how to bring these things together and now I'm literally losing the skin off my body because of the stress." 30 We had a city council member who sort of had this constant theme of, "I'm supportive of the project. I just don't think we should be funding it. If it's such a great idea, the private sector should do it." It was like, "Where is a decayed downtown where the city just steps aside and the private sector just comes in and solves all the problems? I want to see the economic model where that has ever worked." It hasn't. Cities have to jump in and take part. We heard that all the time and it was like their justification not to participate. One council member had her daughter going around in the river project handing out fliers that told them what they had to do to stop the project from going forward. It included some kind of lawsuit or legal action that they could take against the city. I understood voting against it, but why in the world would a city council be acting against it? She too supported the project; she just didn't think the city should fund it. We kept asking her how to fund it without the city taking the primary role, and of course she had no suggestions. Apparently, it was just that the way we were doing it was wrong and there was surely a better way to do it but she didn't have any idea what it was. The same thing happened with The Junction. The same city council member opposed it. Mary Hall was the biggest opponent to all the things we were trying to do. It took about a year for us to realize we had to tear down the mall—it was about 2001 when we realized we had to take it down. We were talking about it all through 2000 and I think we finally got it down before the Olympics. We had to create some anchors and draws for the Junction. There were three key pieces to make the Junction work. One was the Tree House, 31 which eventually got put together but was so hard. The Tree House was one, the second was the Salomon Center, and the third was the movie theater. I got several phone calls saying the Tree House wasn't going to come, but they hung in there through great difficulty and eventually they did. That piece came together and the next was working with Larry Miller. There's a huge story behind that, but Larry Miller finally decided to build theaters in the downtown area just to help out the community here. Larry asked me if he would make money if he built the theaters in Ogden. I told him I didn't know if he was going to make money but commented, "We need you to come and do it because you have the Midas touch. If you come to downtown Ogden and build this theater, I'm convinced that the rest of the mall will come together and the downtown area will revitalize." That's turned out to be the case and he's made money. He's been very pleased. He told me that before he passed away. They agreed to come in if we got the Salomon Center. Tree House was already moving forward, expecting that we were going to do the rest of it. The Salomon Center was tough because the private sector wasn't going to do it unless the city was committed. We ended up having to be the owner of the property. We got a lease from two different entities that were going to run it. One was the Gold's Gym who also runs the Flow Rider, iRock and iFly. The second was the Fat Cats, which includes Costa Vida and the Pizza Factory. They agreed to lease the building from the city and we were using tax increment to fund about half of the construction cost. Once again, we had people saying, "This is never going to work. You're crazy. You're going to bankrupt the city. If this is such a 32 good idea, why wouldn't the private sector do it on their own?" We heard it over and over. I was sued personally as well as in my capacity as mayor. I had to hire a personal attorney out of my pocket because they sued me as a candidate and the city couldn't cover my attorney costs. ROH: Citizens of Ogden? MG: Some were citizens of Ogden, a lot were not. Dorothy Littral sued me and ended up losing. The judge ordered her to pay my attorney's fees. Those were dark days. There was a petition drive going on to stop the Salomon Center. If they got a certain number of signatures they could get it on the ballot and we knew this was going to be a tough project to explain to voters. This was a blue-collar community and it was not lost on any of us that going out to these sixty and seventy year old retired Hill Field and railroad workers and say, "We need to build a center that has indoor skydiving and it's going to be good for you. You need this." We knew it was a tough sell, but we also knew we needed to do something unique that would have a regional draw. It was going to be impossible to communicate in a way that our demographic was going to grasp. A referendum was going to be challenging. I went home one day and said, "Monica, if they get the signatures, we're done. We won't get the Center, which means we won't get the theater. Nobody is going to come to our town if we've got twenty-acres of city center sitting fallow." We barely had four votes on the council. I asked Monica if it was okay if I used personal money to make fliers and spread them out. The city couldn't use money to tell people not to sign the petition. After work, I would go home and print fliers 33 and deliver them. My wife was so awesome. She would go to the places that were allowing people to set up booths to sign a petition and she would go to the owner of the place with a flier and explain to them why it was so bad to have people signing the petition. She called me one day just sobbing because she'd explained it to a store owner and he was not very nice about it. People in line to sign the petition had been very rude. I felt so terrible—here I am making my wife go out and do the dirty work for what the city needed. ROH: What year was this? MG: It would have been 2005. Those were really dark times. If the Junction didn't happen, the town was done. It was hard to come up with an optimistic vision of what might happen if the Junction didn't get built. Luckily they lost their lawsuits and didn't get enough signatures on their petitions. We barely got enough votes to get it through. One of the former council members came and spoke at the meeting the night of the last vote to get the Salomon Center moving forward. She said to the council, "You know better." I'll never forget her words and her fervor. She said, "You guys are smarter than this and you know better than to approve this." It was a 4-3 vote, barely passing. A couple of them lost their seat because of that vote. That night, there were several that were claiming that Larry Miller wasn't going to build a theater and that it was all a farce and this was all going to collapse like a house of cards and we were indebting our citizens. We knew it was a huge gamble, but we knew that anything less was sure to fail. We needed to do something big enough to show that this was a new Ogden and a new vision 34 for the community. We didn't know if it was going to work. We had done our research, but none of these things had been built in a community our size before. We knew it was a roll of the dice, but we were obviously thrilled a year later when it was successful. Even now, in this recession, they have done remarkably well. ROH: What about the economic development along 25th Street? It's doing so much better. MG: Luckily, we had some great anchored tenants on 25th Street and unlike the rest of downtown, we weren't working from scratch. We had Roosters and Great Harvest that were doing great. MG: [Addition submitted by Matthew Godfrey] I believe the year was 2005. That was a dark time for all of us that were working so hard to turn the city around. It felt like mission impossible and that everything that could go wrong did. The financing was enormously complex and it was challenging to keep all of the players in the project from the private sector engaged because they were taking a big risk and were being bloodied by the CAVE (Citizens Against Virtually Everything) people in the process. I was working long hours and it was highly stressful. What made it bearable were all of the good people that stepped up to help. We had citizens that I hadn't met previously who showed up to support the idea. Dave Hardman from the Chamber of Commerce and Dan Musgrave from Downtown Ogden Inc. rallied their organizations to show up to the city council meetings and show support. I believe the contrast they provided against the negative people helped us get the four votes we needed to move the project forward. We feel gratified that the project worked as we had hoped. The Salomon Center was built, Larry 35 Miller theaters and Boyer built out their portion. The hotel was even completed east of the Salomon Center as we had planned. The Junction has been a catalyst for further redevelopment in downtown and has been the regional attraction we hoped for. I will always be grateful for those people that stepped up when times were hard. My family was always there. My father passed away during my tenure as mayor, I think about him often. My wife has always been and incredible support. I couldn't have asked for anything more than she provided. My parents as well as Monica's parents were equally supportive. My kids took a lot of grief from other kids in school because of the things I did as Mayor and I feel terrible that all these people that I care deeply about had to suffer for what I did at work. Hopefully, we made a difference in the community. We exceeded all of our goals and ended up recruiting over 8,000 jobs, leading the nation in job growth my last year in office. We were also able to recruit over $1.2 billion of private investment, redevelop over 130 acres of downtown with another 80 acres underway. We facilitated the building of well over half a million square feet of office space and in the process lowered crime by over 30 percent. We left Ogden City in a much better financial position then we found it, having established a "rainy day" fund for the first time in the city's history, to my knowledge. We were able to turn the tide on some of the historic housing in downtown that had turned into terrible rentals and recruit home ownership back to the area. We also added significant amounts of open space, new trails, kayak parks and other recreational amenities. We cleaned up the extremely blighted Ogden River 36 and made it the public asset it should have always been. We lowered property taxes three times and never raised them. Along with all of that there were many projects that we weren't able to finish that we really wanted to complete. Connecting Ogden to Snowbasin is a project that needs to happen. It will create the opportunity for Ogden in terms of new high-paying jobs, new tax revenue and retail that wouldn't come in any other way. I'm sure I've studied this issue in more detail than any person on the planet and I'm convinced of the good it will do for Ogden. There were many projects and initiatives we worked on that I regret not being able to finish. The last year or so in office, it felt like the City Council and other members of the community felt like we had done enough. I don't think they understand that if we don't continue to improve our town it will decay. For all of the enormous difficulties of serving as mayor for 12 years, I am grateful for the experience. I hope we have made the Ogden City better for the coming generation.

Issue 24.1 of the Review for Religious, 1965. ; An Instruction'on the Constitution on the Littirgy by the Congregation of Rites 3 Historicity of the Gospels by the Pontifical Biblical Commission 26 The Nature of Religious Authority by Lor~azo Boisvert, O.F.M. 34 Influence of the Superior by Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. 55 Religious .Obedience by J. M. R. Tillard, O.P. 66 Sister Cursillistas by Sitter Elizabeth Ann, O.L.V.M. 87 ~ Administrative Forms by James L O'Connor, S.J. 91 ~ Canadian Religious Conference by Augustine G. Ellard, S.J. 105 Voveo Castitatem by Sister Mary Kieran, S.S.N.D. 112 Survey of Roman Documents 113 ; Views, News, Previews 120 Questions and Answers 131 Book Reviews 143 EDITOR R. F. Smith S.J. ASSOCIATE EDITORS Everett A. Diederich, S.J. Augustine G. Ellard, S.$. ASSISTANT EDITORS Ralph F. Taylor, S.J. William J. Weiler, S.J. DEPARTMENTAL EDITORS Joseph F Gallen, S.J. Woodstock College Woodstock, Maryland 22163 Book Norman Weyand, S.J. Bellarmime School of Theology of Loyola University 230 South Lincoln Way North Aurora, Illinois 60542 Published in January, March, May, July, September, Novem-ber on the fifteenth of the month. REVIEW FOR RELI. GIOUS is indexed in the CATHOLIC PERIODICAL IN-DEX. Volume 24 1965 EDITORIAL OFFICE St. Mary's College St. Marys, Kansas 66536 BUSIlqESS OFFICE 428 E. Preston St. ¯ Baltimore, Maryland 21202 SACRED CONGREGATION OF RITES' An Instruction on the Constitution on the Liturgy AN INSTRUCTION CONCERNING THE CORRECT IMPLEMENTATION bF THE CON-STITUTION ON THE LITURGY~ INTRODUCTION I. The Nature of This Instruction I. Among the first results of the Second Vatican Council there is deservedly included the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy since it regulates the most excellent part of the Church's activity. It will produce more £ruitful results the more profoundly pastors and the faithful grasp its true spirit and the more deeply eager they are to put it into practice. 2. The Committee for the Implementation o[ the Con-stitution on the Sacred Liturgy, established by the present supreme pontiff Paul VI in his apostolic letter Sacram liturgiara, eagerly and at once began the work entrusted to it of care£ully completing the directives of the Consti-tution and the apostolic letter and of providing for the interpretation and implementation of these documents. 3. Since it is of the greatest importance that from the very beginning these documents should be everywhere properly applied and that there should be removed any * This is an English translation of a document entitled Inter Oecumenici Concilii that was the work of the Committee for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Liturgy and that was is-sued by the Sacred Congregation of Rites on September 26, 1964; the translation was made from the Latin text of the document as given in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, v. 56 (1964), pp. 877-900. Titles and enumerations in the translation are taken directly from the Latin text. ÷ ÷ ÷ Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 Congregation o~ Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS doubts about their interpretation, the Committee at the order of the supreme pontiff has drawn up this present Instruction in which the functions of the conferences of bishops are more clearly defined with regard to liturgical matters, in which some principles expressed in the above-mentioned documents in general terms are explained with more precision, and in which finally some matters that can be put into practice at the present time even before the revision of the liturgical books are permitted or pre-scribed. II. Principles to Be Noted 4. The matters that are singled out as those to be put into practice even now have the aim of making the liturgy correspond more completely to the mind of the Council with regard to the promotion of the active participation of the faithful. Moreover, the general renewal of the sacred liturgy will be accepted by the faithful more readily if it proceeds gradually and by stages and if it is proposed and ex-plained to them by their pastors through an appropriate catechesis. 5. Nevertheless, the first thing that is necessary is that all should be convinced that the Constitution of the Sec-ond, Vatican Council concerning the sacred liturgy does not intend merely to change liturgical forms and texts; it rather intends to stimulate that formation of the faith-ful and that pastoral activity which considers the sacred liturgy both as a summit and a fountain (see the Con-stitution, article 10). The changes in the sacred liturgy that have been so far introduced as well as those that will be introduced later are directed toward this goal. 6. The importance of this pastoral activity that is to be centered around the liturgy stems from the fact that there is to be a living expression of the paschal mystery in which the incarnate Son of God, made obedient even to the death of the cross, is so exalted in His Resurrection and Ascension that He shares with the world the divine life by which men, being dead to sin and conformed to Christ, "should no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised to life" (2 Cor 5:15). This takes place through faith and the sacraments of faith; that is, especially through baptism (see the Con-stitution, article 6) and the sacred mystery of the Eucha-rist (see the Constitution, article 47), the focal point of the other sacraments and of the sacramentals (see the Con-stitution, article 61) as well as of the cycle of celebrations by which the paschal mystery of Christ is unfolded in the Church throughout the year (see the Constitution, articles 102-107). 7. Hence, although the litu.¢gy does not exh~iust all the activity of the Church (see the Constitution, article 9), great care should nevertheless be taken that pastoral work be duly linked with the sacred liturgy and that at the same time pastoral-liturgical activity be exercised not as though it were a separate and self-withdrawn thing, but in intimate union with other pastoral work. Moreo;cer, there is special need that a close union should flourish between the liturgy and catechesis, re-ligious education, and preaching. III. The Hoped-for Results 8. Accordingly, bishops and their helpers in the priest-hood should increasingly center their entire pastoral min-istry around the liturgy. In this way through a perfect participation in the sacred celebrations the faithful will derive a fuller share in the divine life; and, havin.g be-come the leaven of Christ and the salt of the earth, they will proclaim this life and communicate it to others. CHAPTER I SOME GENERAL NORMS I. The Application of These Norms 9. Although they are concerned only with the Roman rite, the practical norms found in the Constitution or in this Instruction as well as the matters that are permitted or prescribed by this same Instruction even now before the revision of the liturgical books may be applied to other Latin rites, the provisions of law being observed. 10. The matters that are entrusted in this Instruction to the competent territorial authority can and should be put into effect only by that authority through its legiti-mate decrees. In each individual case, however, the time and circum-stances in which these decrees begin to take effect should be determined with allowance always made for a reason-able period of suspension during which the faithful can be instructed in and prepared for their observance. II. The Liturgical Formation of Clerics (Constitution, articles 15-16 and 18) 11. With regard to the liturgical formation of clerics: a) In theological faculties there should be a chair of liturgy so that all the students may receive a due liturgi-cal formation; in seminaries and religious houses of study local ordinaries and major superiors should see to it that as soon as possible there is a special and properly pre-pared teacher for the course in the liturgy. b) Teacherswho are put in charge of the liturgy course ,4. '4" Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 5 are to be prepared as soon as possible in accord with the norm of article 15 of the Constitution. c) For the further liturgical formation of clerics, es-pecially of those who are already working in the vineyard of the Lord, pastoral-liturgical institutes should be con-ducted as opportunity allows. 12. The liturgy is to be taught for an adequate period of time to be indicated in the curriculum of studies by the competent authority, and the method used in its teaching should be an appropriate one in accord with article 16 of the Constitution. 13. Liturgical services are to be celebrated as perfectly as possible. Accordingly: a) The rubrics are to be carefully observed and the ceremdnies should be performed with dignity under the diligent watchfulness of the superiors and after necessary practices have been had beforehand. b) Clerics should frequently perform the functions of their order; that is, those of de,acon, subdeacon, acolyte, lector, and in addition those of commentator and cantor. c) Churches and o~atories, the sacred furnishings in general, and the sacred vestments should be examples of genuine Christian art, including contemporary Christian art. Congregation ol Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 6 IlI. The Liturgical Formation of the Spiritual Life of Clerics (Constitution, article 17) 14. In order that clerics may be formed to a full par-ticipation in liturgical services and to a spiritual life de-rived from them and able to be later communicated to others, the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy is to be put into full effect according to the norms of the docu-ments of the Apostolic See; and towards this end there should be a unanimous and harmonious collaboration on the part of all superiors and teachers. An adequate intro-duction to the sacred liturgy should be pro;tided for clerics by the recommendation of books on the liturgy, especially those which treat of it under its theological and spiritual dimensions, which books should be available in the li-brary in sufficient quantity; by meditations and confer-ences which are chiefly derived from the source of Sacred Scripture and of the liturgy (see the Constitution, article 35, 2); and by common exercises that are in accord with Christian custom and usage and which fit in with the various seasons of the liturgical year. 15. The Eucharist, which is the center of the entire spiritual life, should be celebrated every day, use being made of the various and appropriate forms that best cor-respond to the condition of the participants (see the Con-stitution, article 19). On Sundays, however, and on other major feast days a sung Mass should be celebrated with the participation of all who are in the house; there should be a Homily and as far as possible there should be the sacramental Communion of those who are not priests. Moreover, after the new rite of concelebration has been authorized for public use, priests may concelebrate, especially on the more solemn feasts, when the welfare of the faithful does not require their individual celebration. It is desirable that at least on the greater feast days the seminarians should participate in the Eucharist assem-bled around the bishop in the cathedral church (see the Constitution, article 41). 16. It is most fitting that clerics, even if they are not yet bound by the Divine Office, should engage in a daily and common recital or singing of Lauds in the morning as morning prayer and at evening of Vespers as evening prayer or of Compline at the end of the day. As far as possible, superiors themselves should participate in this common recitation. Moreover, in the order of the day sufficient time for saying the Divine Office should be pro-vided for clerics in sacred orders. It is desirable that at least on major feast days the seminarians should chant Vespers in the cathedral church when this is opportune. 17. Exercises of piety, regulated by the laws or customs of a given place or institution, should be held in honor. Care should be taken, however, especially if they are done in common, that they are in harmony with the sacred liturgy according to the intention of article 15 of the Constitution and that they take consideration of the seasons of the liturgical year. IV. The Liturgical Formation o] Members o[ the States of Perfection 18. What was said in the preceding articles about the liturgical formation of the spiritual life of clerics should also be applied with due adaptation to the members, whether men or women, of the states of perfection. V. The Liturgical Education o[ the Faithful (Constitu-tion, article 19) 19. Pastors of souls should earnestly and patiently strive to carry out the directives of the Constitution about the liturgical education of the faithful and about the foster-ing of their active participation, internal and external, "in accord with their age, condition, type of life, and degree of religious background" (Constitution, article 19).oThey should be especially concerned with the litur-gical education and the active participation of those who are members of religious associations of the laity since it is the latter's duty to share in the life of the Church in a 4. 4. 4. Instrt~tion on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 ÷ Congregation oJ Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS more intimate xbay and to be of assistance to their pas-tors also in the matter of appropriately fostering the li-turgical life of the parish (see the Constitution, article 42). VI. The Competent Authority in Liturgical Matters 20. The regulation of the sacred liturgy pertains to the authority of the Church; accordingly, no one else should proceed on his own in this matter to the detriment, as often happens, of the sacred liturgy and of its renewal by competent authority. 21. The following pertain to the Apostolic See: to re-vise and approve the general liturgical books; to regulate the sacred liturgy in those things that affect the universal Church; to approve or confirm the transactions and reso-lutions of the territorial authority; and to receive the proposals and petitions of the same territorial authority. 22. It belongs to the bishop to regulate the liturgy within the limits of his diocese in accord with the norms and spirit of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy as well as of the decrees of the Apostolic See and of the competent territorial authority. 23. The various kinds of territorial bodies of bishops to which the regulation of liturgical matters pertains in virtue of article 22, § 2 of the Constitution should be understood for the time being to mean: a) either the body of all the bishops of a given country according to the norms of the apostolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number X; b) or the already lawfully constituted body consisting of bishops or of bishops and other local ordinaries of several countries; c) or the body to be constituted with the permission of the Holy See by bishops or by bishops and other local ordinaries of several countries, especially if in the indi-vidual countries the bishops are so few in number that they more profitably convene together from different countries of the same language and of the same culture. If, however, special local circumstances suggest another type of grouping, the matter is to be proposed to the Apostolic See. 24. The following should be called to the above-men-tioned bodies: a) residential bishops; b) abbots and prelates nullius; c) vicars and prefects apostolic; d) permanently appointed apostolic administrators of dioceses; e) all other local ordinaries except vicars general. Coadjutor and auxiliary bishops can be called by the presiding officer with the consent of the majority of those who take part in the body with a deliberative vote. 25. Unless the law provides otherwise for certain places in view of special circumstances there, the convocation of the body should be made: a) by the respective presiding officer in the case of al-ready established bodies; b) in other cases by the archbishop or bishop who has the right of precedence according to the norms of law. 26. The presiding officer, with the consent of the fathers, determines the order of business and opens, trans-fers, prorogues, and closes the session. 27. A deliberative vote belongs tO all who are men-tioned above in number 24, including coadjutor and auxiliary bishops, unless a different provision is expressly made in the document of convocation. 28. For the lawful enactment of decrees a two-thirds majority of a secret vote is required. 29. The transactions of the competent territorial au-thority that are to be submitted to the Apostolic See for approval or confirmation should contain the following points: a) the names of those present at the session; b) a report of the matters that were discussed; c) the results of the voting for each decree. Two copies of these transactions, signed by the pre-siding officer and the secretary of the conference and with the proper seal, should be sent to the Committee for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Sacred Lit- 30. When, however, it is a question of transactions in which there are decrees concerning the use and extent of the vernacular in the liturgy, besides the matters enu-merated in the preceding number, the following must also be sent according to the norm of the Constitution, article 36, § 3 and of the apostolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number IX: a) an indication of the individual parts of the liturgy that are enacted to be said in the vernacular; b) two copies of the liturgical texts in the vernacular, one of which copies will be returned to the conference of bishops; c) a brief statement of the norms on the basis of which the work of translation was made. 31. Decrees of the territorial authority that require the approval or confirmation of the Apostolic See should be promulgated and put into practice only after they have been approved or confirmed by the Apostolic See. 4. + 4. Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 9 ÷ ÷ ÷ Congregation o~ Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 10 VII. The Office o] Individuals in the Liturgy (Constitu-tion, article 28) 32. Parts which pertain to the schola or the people, if they are sung or recited by them, are not said privately by the celebrant. 33. Likewise, the celebrant does not privately say the Lessons which are read or chanted by the competent min-ister or by the server. VIII. Avoiding Distinction oI Persons (Constitution, ar-ticle 32) 34. Individual bishops or, if it seems opportune, the regional or national conferences of bishops should see to it that in their territories there should be put into prac-tice the 'prescription of the Council that forbids special distinction for private persons or for social classes either in ceremonies or in external display. 35. Moreover, pastors should not neglect to work with prudence and charity to see to it that in liturgical services and especially in the celebration of Mass and the admin-istration of the sacraments and the sacramentals the equality of the faithful is evident even outwardly and further that all appearances of money-making be avoided. IX. Simpli]ication oI Cortain Rites (Constitution, arti-cle 34) 36. In order that liturgical services may be distin-guished for that noble simplicity that is more in harmony with the mentality of our age: a) the bows to the choir b,y the celebrant and the minis-ters should be made only at the beginning and the end of the sacred service; b) the incensation of the clergy, except that of those who have the episcopal character, should be done for all of them together with a triple swing of the censer to each part of the choir; c) the incensation of the altar should be done only at the altar at which the sacred rite is being celebrated; d) the kissing of hands and of objects which are pre-sented or received is to be omitted. X. The Celebration of the Word of God (Constitution, article 35, 4) 37. If in places that have no priest there is no oppor-tunity for the celebration of Mass on Sundays and on holydays of obligation, the celebration of the Word of God should be had according to the judgment of the local ordinary, with a deacon or even a layman, author-ized for this, presiding over the service. The pattern of this celebration should be the same as that of the liturgy of the Word in the Massi ordinarily the Epistle and the Gospel of the Mass of the day should be read in the vernacular with chants, especially from the Psalms, before and between them; if the one who presides is a deacon, there should be a homily; if he is not a deacon, he should read a homily assigned by the bishop or the pastor; and the entire celebration should close with the "common prayer" or the "prayer of the faithful" and the Lord's Prayer. 38. It is fitting, that the celebrations of the Word of God, which are to be encouraged.on the vigils of the more solemn feasts, on some weekdays of Advent and Lent, and on Sundays and feast days, should also resem-ble the pattern of the liturgy of the Word in the Mass, although there is nothing to prevent there being only one Reading. However, when several Readings are to be arranged, in order that the history of salvation may be clearly seen, the Reading from the Old Testament should generally precede the Reading from the New Testament; and the Reading from the Gospel should appear as the climax. 39. In order that these celebrations may be held with dignity and devotion, it will be the responsibility of the liturgical commissions in the individual dioceses to indi-cate and provide suitable aids. XI. Vernacular Translations o[ Liturgical Texts (Con-stitution, article 36, § 3) 40. When vernacular translations of liturgical texts are prepared according to the norm of article 36, § 3, it is expedient that the following be observed: a) Vernacular translations of liturgical texts should be made from the Latin liturgical text. Moreover, the trans-lation of biblical passages should also be in conformity with the Latin liturgical text. although there remains the full possibility of revising the translation, if deemed ad-visable, in the light of the original text or of another clearer translation. b) The preparation of translations of liturgical texts should be entrusted as a special concern to the liturgical commission mentioned in article 44 of the Constitution and in number 44 of this Instruction; and, as far as pos-sible, this commission should be assisted in this by the institute of pastoral liturgy. If, however, such a commis-sion does not exist, the responsibilities for the making of these translations should be given to two or three bishops who should choose persons, including lay persons, expert in Scripture, in liturgy, in biblical languages, in Latin, in the vernacular, and in music; for the perfect vernacular translation of liturgical texts must simultaneously satisfy many conditions. 4. 4. 4- Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 11 ÷ ÷ Congregation o~ Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS c) If the matter requires it, consultation concerning translations should be had with bishops of neighboring regions of the same language. d) In countries with more than one language vernacular translations in each language should be prepared and submitted to the special examination of the bishops con-cerned. e) Provision should be made for the fitting appearance of the books from which the liturgical texts are read to the people in the vernacular so that the very appearance of the book will lead the faithful to a greater reverence for the Word of God and for sacred things. 41. In liturgical services that are celebrated in some places with a congregation of people of another language, especially in the case of a group of emigrants, of members of a personal parish, and of other such instances, it is per-missible with the consent of the local ordinary to use the vernacular language known to these faithful in accord with the extent of use and the translation legitimately approved by a competent territorial ecclesiastical author-ity of that language. 42. New melodies for parts to be sung in the vernacular by the celebrant and the ministers must be approved by the competent territorial ecclesiastical authority. 43. Unless they are opposed to the Constitution, par-ticular liturgical books that were duly approved before the promulgation of the Constitution on the Sacred Lit-urgy as well as indults granted up to that time remain in force until other provision is made by the liturgical re-form as it is completed either in whole or in part. XII. The Liturgical Commission oI the Bishops" Confer-ence (Constitution, article 44) 44. The liturgical commission to be established when opportune by the territorial authority should be chosen, as far as possible, from the bishops themselves; or, at least, it should consist of one or other bishop with the addition of priests who are expert in liturgical and pas-toral matters and who have been specifically named to the commission. It is desirable that the members of this commission should meet several times a year with the consultors of the commission to deal together with the matters at hand. 45. The territorial authority can, if it seems opportune, entrust this commission with the following: a) to conduct research and experimentation according to the norm of article 40, 1) and 2) of the Constitution; b) to promote in the entire territory practical measures by which liturgical matters and the application of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy may be fostered; c) to prepare the studies and aids which become neces- sary as a result of the decrees of the plenary body of bishops; d) to o~cially regulate pastoral-liturgical activity in the entire region, to supervise the application of the de-crees of the plenary body, and to report to this body con-cerning all these matters; e) to have frequent consultations and to promote com-mon undertakings with associations of the same region that are concerned with Scripture, catechetics, pastoral, music, and sacred art, and likewise with every kind of religious association of lay persons. 46. The members of the institute of pastoral liturgy as well as the individual experts who are called to help the liturgical commission should not neglect to freely offer their help to individual bishops for the more effective promotion of pastoral-liturgical activity in their territory. XIII. The Diocesan Liturgical Commission (Constitu-tion, article 45) 47. The following pertain to the diocesan liturgical commission under the direction of the bishop: a) to investigate the status of pastoral-liturgical activity in the diocese; b) to execute with care the liturgical matters that have been proposed by competent authority and to be knowl-edgeable about studies and projects that are being under-taken elsewhere; c) to suggest and promote practical projects of every kind that can contribute to the promotion of liturgical matters, especially those that are helpful to the priests already working in the vineyard of the Lord; d) to suggest opportune and progressive stages of pas-toral- liturgical work for individual cases or even for the entire diocese, to recommend or even call upon compe-tent persons to assist priests on occasion in this matter, and to propose suitable means and helps; e) to see to it that projects begun in the diocese for the promotion of the liturgy proceed with the harmonious and mutual assistance of other associations in a way simi-lar to that described for the commission to be formed within the conference of bishops (number 45, e). CHAPTER II THE MYSTERY OF THE EUCHARIST I. The Mass Rite (Constitution, article 50) 48. Until the entire rite of the Mass has been revised, the following should now be observed: a) The parts of the Proper that are chanted or recited by the schola or the people are not said privately by the celebrant. 4. + + Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 ]3 ÷ Congregation o] Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 14 b) The celebrant can sing or recite the parts of the Ordinary with the people or the schola. c) In the prayers to be said at the foot of the altar at the beginning of Mass, Psalm 42 is omitted. Moreover, all the prayers at the foot of the altar are omitted whenever another liturgical service immediately precedes the Mass. d) At solemn Mass the paten is not held by the sub-deacon but is left on the altar. e) The Secret or the Prayer over the Offerings should be chanted in sung Masses and recited in a loud voice in other Masses. D The doxology at the end of the Canon from the words "Per ipsum" up to "Per omnia saecula saeculorum. R. Amen" inclusively are to be sung.or recited in a loud voice. Moreover, throughout the entire doxology the cele-brant should hold the chalice with the Host in a some-what elevated position, omitting the signs of the cross; and at the end he genuflects only after "Amen" has been answered by the people. g) In low Masses the Our Father may be recited in the vernacular by the people together with the celebrant; in sung Masses it can be sung by the people with the priest in Latin and also, if the territorial ecclesiastical authority shall so decree, in the vernacular to melodies approved by the same authority. h) The embolism after the Lord's Prayer should be sung or recited in a loud voice. i) In the distribution of Holy Communion the formula "Corpus Christi" should be used. While saying these words, the celebrant lifts up the Host a little over the ciborium to show it to the communicant who answers "Amen" and is then given Communion by the celebrant, the sign of the cross with the Host being omitted. I) The Last Gospel is omitted; the Leonine prayers are suppressed. k) It is lawful to celebrate a sung Mass with a deacon only. /) It is lawful for bishops, when necessary, to celebrate a sung Mass in the form used by priests. II. The Lessons and the Chants between the Lessons (Constitution, article 51) 49. In Masses celebrated with the people, the Lessons, the Epistle, and the Gospel are read or sung facing the people: a) during a solemn Mass at the ambo or at the edge of the sanctuary; b) during high Mass and during low Mass, if they are read or chanted by the celebrant, either from the altar or at the ambo or at the edge of the sanctuary as may be more convenient; if, however, they are said or sung by someone else, at the ambo or at the edge of the sanctuary. 50. At non-solemn Masses celebrated with the people, the Lessons and the Epistle together with the chants be-tween them can be read by a qualified lector or server while the celebrant sits and listens; the Gospel can be read by a deacon or by another priest; the one who so reads it says the Munda cot meum, asks for the blessing, and at the end presents the Book of the Gospels for the celebrant to kiss. 51. In sung Masses the Lessons, the Epistle, and the Gospel may be read without chant if they are presented in the vernacular. 52. In reading or singing the Lessons, the Epistle, the chants occurring after these, and the Gospel, the follow-ing procedures are to be followed: a) At solemn Mass the celebrant sits and listens to the Lessons and the Epistle together with the chants between them. After the Epistle has been sung or read, the sub-deacon goes to the celebrant and is blessed by him. Then the celebrant, seated, puts incense in the censer and blesses it; while the Alleluia with its verse is being sung or to-wards the end of other chants that follow the Epistle, he rises to bless the deacon; he listens to the Gospel at his seat, kisses the Book of the Gospels, and, after the Homily, intones~the Creed if it is to be said; when the Creed is finished, he returns to the altar with the ministers unless he is to conduct the "prayer of the faithful." b) In high or low Masses at which the Lessons, the Epistle, the chants that follow these, and the Gospel are sung or read by the minister mentioned in number 50, the celebrant follows the procedure just described. c) In high or low Masses in Which the Gospel is sung or read by the celebrant, while the Alleluia and its verse is being sung or read or towards the end of other chants that follow the Epistle, the celebrant goes to a position in front of the lowest step of the altar and there, bowing pro-foundly, says the Munda cot meum; then he goes to the ambo or to the edge of the sanctuary to sing or read the Gospel. d) If, however, in high and low Masses all the Readings are sung or read by the celebrant at the ambo or at the edge of the sanctuary, then, while standing, he also reads, if necessary, the chants that occur after the Lessons and the Epistle; and he says the Munda cor meum while turned toward the altar. III. The Homily (Constitution, article 52) 53. On Sundays and holydays of obligation a Homily should be had at all Masses celebrated with a congregation 4. 4" 4. InsCruvtion on th~ Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 ]5 ÷ ÷ ÷ Congregation oy Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 16 of people, no exception being made for conventual, sung, and pontifical Masses. On other days a Homily is recommended especially on some of the weekdays of Advent and Lent and on other occasions when the people come to church in greater num-bers. 54. By a Homily made from the sacred text is meant an explanation either of some aspect of the Readings of Sacred Scripture or of some other text from the Ordinary or the Proper of the Mass of the day, consideration being given to the mystery that is being celebrated and the par-ticular needs of the hearers. 55. If for certain periods a program is proposed for the preaching to be had during Mass, an intimate connection is to be harmoniously retained with at least the principal seasons and feasts of the liturgical year (see the Constitu-tion, articles 102-104), that is, with the mystery of 'the redemption; for the Homily is part of the liturgy of the day. IV. The Common Prayer or the Prayer of the Faithful (Constitution, article 53) 56. In places where the custom is already had of having: the common prayer or the prayer of the faithful, it should for the time being take place before the Offertory after the word Oremus and according to the formulas now in use in the individual regions; the celebrant shall conduct the prayer either from his seat or from the altar or from the ambo or from the edge of the sanctuary. The intentions or invocations may be sung by a deacon or by a cantor or other qualified server, though there should be reserved to the celebrant the words of introduc-tion as well as the concluding prayer which ordinarily should be the prayer: Deus, refugium nostrum et virtus (see the Roman Missal, "Orationes diversae," number 20) or some other prayer that better corresponds to a par-ticular need. In places where the common prayer or the prayer of the faithful is not in use, the competent territorial au-thority may decree that it should be done in the way just indicated above with formulas approved for the time be-ing by that authority. V. The Vernacular in the Mass (Constitution, article 54) 57. In Masses, whether sung or low, that are celebrated with the people, the competent territorial ecclesiastical authority, after its provisions have been approved or con-firmed by the. Apostolic See, may allow the vernacular: a) especially in the delivery of the Lessons, the Epistles, and the Gospel, as well as in the common prayer or the 13rayer of the faithful; b) according to local circumstances also in the chants of the Ordinary of the Mass, namely, the Kyrie, the Gloria, the Credo, the" Sanctus-Benedictus, and the Agnus Dei, and in the antiphons atthe Introit, the Offertory, and the Communion, as well as in the chants that occur between the Readings; c) and furthermore in the acclamations, salutations, and dialogue formulas, in the formulas: Ecce Agnus Dei, Domine, non sum dignus, and Corpus Christi at the Communion of the faithful, and in the Our Father with its introduction and embolism. Missals, however, that are employed in Iiturgical use should contain the Latin text in addition to the vernacu-lar translation. 58. It pertains solely to the Apostolic See to allow the vernacular in other parts of the Mass that are sung or said only by the celebrant. 59. Pastors of souls should carefully see to it that the faithful, above all the members of religious associations of lay persons, know how t6 say or sing (especially if simpler melodies are used) together in the Latin language the parts of the Ordinary of the Mass that pertain to them. VI. Receiving Communion Twicd on the Same Day (Con-stitution, article 55) 60. The faithful who go to Communion at the Mass of the Easter Vigil and at midnight Mass on Christmas, may go to Communion again during the second Mass of Easter and during one of the Masses that are celebrated on Christmas during the daytime. CHAPTER III THE OTHER SACRAMENTS AND THE SACRAMENTALS I. The Use o[ the Vernacular (Constitution, article 63) 61. After its provisions have been approved or con-firmed by the Apostolic See, the competent territorial authority can introduce the vernacular: a) into the rites of baptism, coiafirmation, penance, the anointing of the sick, and matrimony, including in all these the essential formula, as well as into the distribu-tion of Holy Communion; b) at the conferral of orders into the allocutions at the beginning of each ordination or consecration and also into the examination of the bishop-elect in episcopal consecration, and into the admonitions; c) into the sacramentals; d) into funeral rites. Whenever a greater use of the vernacular seems to be desirable, the prescription of article 40 of the Constitu-tion should be observed. 4. 4. 4. Instrurtion on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 17 Congregation oy ~t~tes REVIEW FOR REL]G[OUS II. Changes in the Rite lot Supplying Omissions in Bap-tism (Constitution, article 69) 62. In the rite for supplying omissions in the case of a baptized infant as given in the Roman Ritual, Title Chapter 5, theie should be omitted the exorcisms that are found under numbers 6 (Exi ab eo), 10 (Exorcizo te, immunde spiritus . Ergo, maledicte diabole), and 15 (Exorcizo te, omnis spiritus). 63. In the rite for supplying omissions in the case of a baptized adult as given in the Roman Ritual, Title II, Chapter fi, there should be omitted the exorcisms that are found under numbers 5 (Exi ab eo), 15 (Ergo, male-dicte diabole), 17 (dadi, maledicte satana), 19 (Exorcizo te- Ergo, maledicte diabole), 21 (Ergo, maledicte diabole), 23 (Ergo, maledicte diabole), 25 (Exorcizo te - Ergo, male-dicte diabole), 31 (Nec te latet), and 35 (Exi, immunde spiritus). III. Conl~rmation (Constitution, article 71) 64. If confirmation is conferred during Mass, it is fitting that the Mass be celebrated by the bishop, in which case he confers confirmation while wearing the Mass vestments. Moreover, the Mass during which confirmation is con-ferred can be ,said as a II class votive Mass of the Holy Spirit. 65. After the Gospel and the Homily and before the re-ception of confirmation, it is praiseworthy that those to be confirmed should renew their baptismal promises ac-cording to the rite in legitimate use in individual regions, unless this has already been done before Mass. 66. If the Mass is celebrated by another, it is fitting that the bishop should assist at the Mass in the vestments prescribed for the conferral of confirmation; these vest-ments may be either the color of the Mass or white. The bishop, should give the Homily, and the celebrant should resume the Mass only after confirmation has been conferred. 67. Confirmation is conferred according to the rite given in the Roman Pontifical; but only one sign of the cross is made at the words In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti that follow the formula Signo te. IV. Continuous Rite for the Anointing of the Sick and Viaticum (Constitution, article 74) 68. When the anointing of the sick and Viaticum are conferred at the same time, and a continuous rite is not already given in a particular Ritual, the following order should be observed: After the sprinkling and. the prayers to be said when first entering as given in the rite of the anointing, the priest hears, if necessary, the confession of the sick person, then confers the anointing, and finally gives Viaticum, omitting the sprinkling with its formulas as well as the Gonfiteor and the absolution. V. The Imposition of Hands during Episcopal Consecra-tion (Constitution, article 76) 69. All the bishops present in choir dress at an episcopal consecration may impose hands. However, the. words .4ccipe Spiritum Sanctum are to be said only by the consecrating bishop and the two co-consecrating bishops. VI. The Rite of Matrimony (Constitution, article 78) 70. Unless a just cause excuses from the celebration of Mass, matrimony should be celebrated during Mass ter the Gospel and after the Homily, which should never be omitted. 71. Whenever matrimony is celebrated within Mass, the votive nuptial Mass is always said or a commemora-tion made of it, even during the prohibited times. 72. As far as possible, the parish priest or his delegate who assists at the marriage should celebrate the Mass; but if another priest assists at the matrimony, the cele-brant should not continue the Mass until the rite of matrimony has been completed. The priest who assists at the marriage but does not celebrate the Mass should be vested in surplice and white stole and, according to local custom, in white cope; and he should give the Homily. But the blessing after the Pater noster and the one before the Placer should always be given by the priest who celebrates the Mass. 73. The nuptial blessing during Mass is always given, even during the prohibited times and even if one or both of the parties are not entering marriage for the first time. 74. In the celebration of matrimony outside of Mass: a) At the beginning of the rite in accord with the apos-tolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number V, there should be a brief talk that is not a Homily but a simple intro-duction to the celebration of matrimony (see the Con-stitution, article 35, 3); the Sermon or Homily from the sacred text (see the Constitution, article 52) should be given after the reading of the Epistle and the Gospel from the nuptial Mass. Hence the arrangement of the entire rite should be the following: a short talk; the reading of the Epistle and the Gospel in the vernacular; the Homily; the celebration of matrimony; the nuptial blessing. b) With regard to the reading of the Epistle and the Gospel from the nuptial Mass, if there is no vernacular text approved by the competent territorial ecclesiastical + + 4. Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 ]9 + + Congregation oI Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS authority, it is permitted for the time being to use a text approved by the local ordinary. c) Nothing prevents having a chant between the Epistle and the Gospel. Likewise, it is highly recom-mended that after the rite of matrimony and before the nuptial blessing there should be the prayer of the faithful according to a formula approved by the local ordinary in which petitions for the couple are also in-cluded. d) At the end of the rite the blessing should always be given to the spouses even during the prohibited times and even if one or both of the spouses are not entering marriage for the first time; the blessing should follow the formula given in the Roman Ritual, Title VIII, Chapter 3, unless another blessing is given in par-ticular Rituals. 75. If matrimony is celebrated during a prohibited season, the pastor should advise the spouses to take into consideration the special nature of that liturgical season. VII. The Sacramentals (Constitution, article 79) 76. At the blessing of candles on February 2 and of ashes at the beginning of the Lenten fast, one only of the prayers found in the Roman Missal for these blessings may be said. 77. The blessings that up to now have been reserved and that are contained in the Roman Ritual, Title IX, Chapters 9, 10, and 11 may be given by every priest with the exception of the following: the blessing of a bell for the use of a blessed church or oratory (Chapter 9, number 11), the blessing of the first stone for the building of a church (Chapter 9, number 16), the blessing of a new church or a public oratory (Chapter 9, num-ber 17), the blessing of an antimension (Chapter 9, num-ber 21), the blessing of a new cemetery (Chapter 9, number 22); the papal blessings (Chapter 10, numbers 1-3), the blessing and erection of the Way of the Cross (Chapter 11, number 1) since this is reserved to the bishop. CHAPTER IV THE DIVINE OFFICE I. The Celebration of the Divine O~ce by Those Bound to Choir (Constitution, article 95) 78. Until the revision of the Divine Office is com-pleted: a) Communities of canons, monks, and nuns, and of other regulars or religious that are bound by law or their constitutions to choir must daily celebrate the en-tire Divine Office in addition to the conventual Mass. Individual members of these communities who are in major orders or are solemnly professed, with the ex-ception of brothers [conversi], must, even though they are legitimately dispensed from choir, individually re-cite each day the canonical Hours that they do not cele-brate in choir. b) In addition to the conventual Mass, cathedral and collegiate chapters must celebrate in choir those parts of the Office imposed on them by common or particular law. Moreover, individual members of these chapters, in addition to the canonical Hours that all clerics in major orders must say (see the Constitution, articles 96 and 89), must individually recite the Hours which are celebrated by their chapter. c) However, in mission territories, without derogation of the religious or capitular discipline set down by law, religious or capitulars who are legitimately absent from choir for pastoral reasons may with the permission of the local ordinary but not that of the vicar general or delegate make use of the concession granted by the apostolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number VI. II. Dispensing [rom or Commuting the Divine Olfice (Constitution, article 97) 79. The power granted to all ordinaries of dispensing their subjects in individual chses and for a just reason from the obligation of the Divine Office in whole or in part or of commuting it is extended also to major su-periors of non-exempt clerical religious institutes and of societies of clerics living in common without vows. III. Little Olfices (Constitution, article 98) 80. No Little Office is to be regarded as composed after the pattern of the Divine Office if it does not consist of Psalms, Lessons, hymns, and prayers and if it does not take some account of the Hours of the day and of the liturgical seasons. 81. In order to take part in the public prayer of the Church, for the time being those Little Offices can be used that have been legitimately approved up to the present time provided that they are composed in accord with the requirements stated in the preceding number. New Little Offices, however, must be approved by th$ Apostolic See in order that they may be used for the public prayer of the Church. 82. The translation of the text of a Little Office into the vernacular for use as the public prayer of the Church must be approved by the territorial ecclesiastical au-thority with the approbation or confirmation of the Apostolic See. 4" Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 21 4. ÷ Congregation o] Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 83. The competent authority for allowing the use of the vernacular in the recitation of a Little Office to those 9bliged to it by their constitutions and for dis-pensing from or commuting this obligation is the ordi-nary or major superior of each subject. IV. The Common Celebration of the Divine Ol~ce or oI a Little 01rice by Members of the States of Perfec-tion (Constitution, article 99) 84. The obligation of reciting, in common the Divine Office or a Little Office or some part of them imposed on members of the states of perfection by their consti-tutions does not remove the faculty of omitting the Hour of Prime and of choosing that one of the Small Hours that best suits the time of day (see the apostolic letter Sacram liturgiam, number VI). V. The Language to Be Used in the Recitation of the Divine O~ce (Constitution, article 101) 85. In choral celebration of the Divine Office clerics must retain the Latin language. 86. The power granted to the ordinary of permitting the use of the vernacular in individual cases to those clerics to whom the use of the Latin language is a serious impediment to the worthy praying of the Office is ex-tended also to major superiors of non-exempt clerical religious institutes and of societies of clerics living in common without vows. 87. The serious impediment required for the preced-ing permission must be weighed by taking into con-sideration the physical, moral, intellectual, and spiritual condition of the petitioner. Moreover, this faculty, granted as it has been only to make the recitation of the Office easier and more devout, in no way diminishes the obligation by which a priest of the Latin rite is bound to learn the Latin language. 88. The vernacular translation of the Divine Office according to a rite other than the Roman one should be prepared and approved by the respective ordinaries of that language; however, in the parts that are common to both rites, the translation approved by the territorial authority should be used, and afterwards the entire trans-lation should be submitted for the confirmation of the Apostolic See. 89. The Breviaries to be used by clerics to whom the use of the vernacular in the Divine Office has been granted in accord with the norm of article 101, § 1 of the Constitution must contain the Latin text in addi-tion to the vernacular translation. CHAPTER V THE PROPER CONSTRUCTION OF CHURCHES AND ALTARS TO FACILITATE THE ACTIVE PARTICIPATION OF THE FAITHFUL I. The Arrangement oI Churches 90. In the new construction, renovation, or adaptation of churches, great care should be taken that they are made suitable for the celebration of the sacred actions in accord with their true nature and for the securing of the active participation of the faithful (see the Constitu-tion, article 124). II. The Main Altar 91. It is better that the main altar be constructed sepa-rately and away from the wall so that one can go around it easily and so that celebration facing the people can take place at it. Moreover, the place that it occupies in the entire building should be such that it is really the center towards which the attention of the congregation of the faithful spontaneously turns. In the choice of materials for the construction and ornamentation of this altar, the prescriptions of law should be observed. Furthermore, the presbyterium around the altar should be ample enough that the sacred rites can be performed with ease. Ill. The Seat for the Celebrant and the Ministers 92. According to the structure of individual churches, the seat for the celebrant and the ministers should be so placed that it can be easily seen by the faithful and so that the celebrant himself really appears as presiding over the entire community of the faithful. However, if the seat is placed behind the altar, the form of a throne is to be avoided, since this is reserved for the bishop alone. IV. Minor Altars 93. The minor altars should be few in number; and insofar as the structure of the building permits, it is highly fitting that they be placed in chapels somewhat separate from the principal part of the church. V. The Ornamentation of Altars 94. The cross and candles required on the altar for individual liturgical services may also be placed next to the altar in accordance with the judgment of the local ordinary. 4" 4" 4" Instruction on th~ Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 4. 4. Congregation o] Rites REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS VI. The Reservation oI the Blessed Eucharist 95. The Blessed Eucharist should be reserved in a solid and inviolable tabernacle placed in the middle of the main altar or of a minor but distinguished altar; or, according to legitimate custom and in special cases to be approved by the local ordinary, it can be kept in some other part of the Church that is beautifully and properly adorned.- It is lawful to celebrate Mass facing the people even if there is a small but suitable tabernacle on the altar. VII. The Ambo 96. It is fitting that for the sacred Readings there should be an ambo or ambos so situated that the min-isters can be easily seen and heard by the faithful. VIII. The Place of the $chola and the Organ 97. The places for the schola and the organ should be arranged so that the chanters and the organist clearly appear as a part of the congregated community of the faithful and so that they can perform their liturgical functions more easily. IX. The Places .of the Faithful 98. The places for the faithful should be arranged with particular care so that visually and mentally they can have a proper participation in the sacred celebrations. It is desirable that ordinarily there be pews or seats for their use. But the custom of reserving seats for certain private persons is to be reprobated according to the norm of article 32 of the Constitution. Care should also be taken that the faithful can not only see the celebrant and the other ministers but that with the' use of modern technical means they can also easily hear them. X. The Baptistry 99. In the construction and ornamentation of the baptistry, it should be carefully attended to that the dignity of the sacrament of baptism is clearly shown and that the place is suitable for community celebrations (see article 27 of the Constitution). The present Instruction was prepared at the command of His Holiness Paul VI by the Committee for the Implementation of the Constitution on the Sacred Lit-urgy and was presented to him by Giacomo Cardinal Lercaro, chairman oI the Committee. The Holy Father, a[ter duly considering this Instruc- tion with the help of the above mentioned Committee and of the Sacred Congregation of Rites, in an audience granted on September 26, 1964, to Arcadio Maria Cardi-nal Larraona, pre[ect of the Sacred Congregation oI Rites, approved it in a special way in each and all of its parts and ordered it to be published and to be carefully ob-served by all concerned beginning on March 7, 1965, the First Sunday oI Lent. All things to the contrary notwithstanding. Rome, September 26, 1964. GIACOMO CARD. LERCARO Archbishop of Bologna Chairman of the Commit-tee for the Implementa-tion of the Constitution on the Liturgy ARCADIO M. CARD. LARRA-ONA Prefect of the Sacred Con-gregation of Rites ~ Enrico Dante Titular archbishop of Car-pasia Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Rites + 4. 4. Instruction on the Liturgy VOLUME 24, 1965 25 PONTIFICAL BIBLICAL COMMISSION Instruction on the Historicity of the Gospels ÷ ÷ ÷ Biblical ~ommission REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS Holy Mother Church,* which is "the pillar and the foundation of the truth," x has always made use of Sacred Scripture in her work of bringing salvation to souls and has protected it from false explanations of every kind. Because there will never be a lack of problems, the Cath-olic exegete must never lose heart in his work of ex-pounding the Word of God and of solving the difficulties that are alleged against it; rather, relying not merely on his own abilities but having a firm trust chiefly in the help of God and the light coming from the Church, he must work strenuously to disclose the real meaning of Scripture to an ever greater degree. It is a cause of great joy that in the Church today there can be found so many loyal sons of the Church who have the proficiency in biblical matters that our times require and who in response to the insistence of the supreme pontiffs have devoted themselves completely and tirelessly to this important and difficult work. "All the other sons of the Church should keep in mind that the efforts of these hardworking laborers in the Lord's vine-yard should' be judged not only with fairness and justice but also with the greatest charity";2 for even exegetes of great reputation such as Jerome, in attempting to clear up the more difficult questions, have at times produced results that were not at all fortunate,a Care should be ¯ The original Latin text of this Instruction, entitled Sancta Mater Ecclesia, is given in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, v. 66 (1964), pp. 712-8. 1 1 Tim 3:15. ~ Divino affiante Spiritu; Enchiridion biblicum, 4th ed. [here-after referred to as EB], n. 564; Acta Apostolicae Sedis [hereafter re-ferred to as ,,lAb'], v. 35 (1943), p. 319. 8See Spiritus Paraclitus; EB, n. 451; ,'/,,IS, v. 12 (1920), p. 392. taken "that the limits of mutual charity are not trans-gressed in the heat of debate and discussion and that the impression is not given during such discussions that the revealed truths themselves and the divine traditions are being questioned. For unless there is harmony of spirit and the safeguarding of principles, it cannot be expected that notable progress in this branch of learn-ing will result from the various studies of so many schol-ars." 4 The work of exegetes is needed .today in an even more special way since wide circulation is given to many pub-lications in which the truth of the events and .sayings contained in the Gospels is being endangered. For this reason the Pontifical Biblical Commission, in the dis-charge of the duty entrusted to it by the supreme pon-tiffs, has thought it opportune to set forth and emphasize the following points. 1. The Catholic exegete, under the guidance of the Church, should profit from everything which previous interpreters, especially the holy fathers and doctors of the Church, have contributed to the understanding of the sacred text; and he should continue their work by ad-vancing it to a further stage. In order to bring out with all clarity the enduring truth and authority of the Gospels, the exegete, while carefully retaining the norms of reasonable and Catholic hermeneutics, will make an intelligent use of new exegetical helps, particularly those which the historical method has on the whole made available. This method diligently investigates sources, determines their nature and value, and makes use of textual criticism, literary criticism, and language studies. The exegete will follow the advice of Plus XlI of happy memory who enjoined that the exegete "should judi-ciously investigate what the literary form or type used by the sacred writer contributes to a valid and genuine in-terpretation; and he should be convinced that he cannot neglect this aspect of his work without great damage to Catholic exegesis." 5 In giving this advice, Pius XlI of happy memory was formulating a general rule of her-meneutics by the help of which the books of both the Old and the New Testaments are to be explained, since their sacred writers, in composing them, made use of the ways of thinking and writing in use among, their con-temporaries. Finally, the exegete will employ every available means by which he can attain a thorough knowledge of the characteristics of the testimony of the Gospels, of the religious life of the first churches, and of the meaning and value of the apostolic traditions. ~The apostolic letter Vigilantiae; EB, n. 143; Leonis XIII Acta, v. 22, p. 237. ~Divino afftante Spiritu; EB, n. 560; AAS, v. 35 (1943), p. 316. + + + Gospels VOLUME 24, 1965 + ae ae Biblical Commission REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS When it is applicable, the interpreter can investigate what sound elements there are in the "method of form criticism" and can use these for a fuller understanding of the Gospels. In doing this, however, he should pro-ceed with mature deliberation since often there are ad-joined to this method inadmissible philosophical and theological principles that not infrequently vitiate both the method and the literary conclusions that are drawn. Certain exponents of this method, misled by ration-alistic prejudices, refuse to acknowledge the existence of a supernatural order, the intervention into this world of a personal God through revelation in the proper sense of that word, and the possibility and existence of mir-acles and prophecies. Others begin with a false notion of faith, conceiving it as though it has no concern for his-torical truth and indeed is incompatible with it. Still others have a kind of a priori negation of the historical value and nature of the documents of revelation. Others, finally, minimizing the authority of the Apostles as wit-nesses to Christ, their office, and their influence in the primitive community, exaggerate the creative ability of this community. These matters are not only opposed to Catholic doctrine but also are devoid of any scientific basis and are foreign to the genuine principles o[ the historical method. 2. In order that the trustworthiness of what is related in the Gospels may be correctly established, the inter-preter should give careful attention to the three periods of tradition through which the doctrine and life of Jesus have come to us. Christ the Lord attached to Himself chosen disciples6 who followed Him from the beginning,7 observed His actions, and heard His words, thereby becoming qualified to be witnesses of His life and doctrine,s When the Lord gave His oral expositions of His doctrine, He followed the ways of thought and exposition in general use at that time; in this way He adapted Himself to the men-tality of His hearers and made sure that what He taught would be firmly impressed on their minds and could be easily remembered by His disciples. These latter cor-rectly understood that the miracles and the other events in the life of Christ took place or were arranged in such a way that through them men might believe in Christ and accept by faith the doctrine of salvation. The Apostles, when they witnessed to Jesus,° first of all proclaimed the death and the resurrection of the Lord; eSee Mk 3:14; Lk 6:13. See Lk 1:2; Acts 1:21-2. sSee Lk 24:48; Jn 15:27; Acts 1:8; 10:39; 13:31. See Lk 24:44-8; Acts 2:32; 3:15; 5:30-2. and they honestly described His life and doctrine?° tak-ing account in their way of preaching11 of the circum-stances in which their hearers found themselves. After Jesus had arisen from the dead and His divinity was clearly perceived?2 the faith of His followers was far from erasing the memory of what had happened but rather strengthened that memory since their faith was based on what Jesus had done and taught,la Nor was Jesus changed into a "mythical" personage and His doc-trine distorted because of the worship with which the disciples now venerated Him as the Lord and the Son of God. Still, there is no reason why it should be denied that the Apostles, when relating to their audiences what had been really said and done by the Lord, did so with that fuller understanding which, after their instruction by the events of glory in the life of Christ and after their enlightenment by the Spirit of truth,14 was theirs to en-joy. x5 Hence it was that just as Jesus Himself after His Resurrection "interpreted to them" 16 the words both of the Old Testament and of Himself?~ so also the Apostles interpreted His words and actions as the needs of their hearers required. "Being devoted to the ministry of the word," as they did their preaching using such various ways of speaking as were adapted to their own purpose and to the mentality of their hearers; for it was "to Greek and non-Greek, to the learned and the unlearned" x9 that they owed their obligation.2° The following various ways of speaking by which, like so many heralds, they proclaimed Christ must be differentiated and carefully appraised: catecheses, narratives, testimonies, hymns, doxologies, prayers, and other such literary forms that were customarily used in Sacred Scripture and by the people of that time. This earliest teaching which was first given orally and then in writing--for it soon happened that many at-tempted "to draw up an account of the events" 21 which concerned the Lord Jesus--was incorporated by the sacred writers for the benefit of the Church into the four Gospels, each one following the method adapted to the special purpose he had. From the great quantity of tra- See Acts 10:36-~1. See Acts 13:16--41 together with Acts 17:22-31. Acts 2:36; Jn 20:28. ~Acts 2:22; 10:37-9. See Jn 14:26; 16:13. ~Jn 2:22; 12:16; 11:51-2; see also 14:26; 16:12-3; 7:39. Lk 24:27. See Lk 24:44-5; Acts 1:3. Acts 6:4. gom 1:14. 1 Cor 9:19-23. See Lk 1:1. 4- 4- + Historicity o~ the Gospels VOLUME 24, 1965 ~9 4. Biblical Commission REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ~0 ditional materials, they made a selection of some, some they presented in a synthesis, and some they explained in terms of the situation of the churches; and in all this they took every precaution that their readers might real-ize the trustworthiness of the message in which they had been instructed.2z From the matters which they had re-ceived, the sacred authors chose especially those things which were adapted to the various circumstances of the faithful and to the purpose intended by them; and they narrated their selections in a way that was consonant with those circumstances and that purpose. Since the meaning of a statement is also dependent on its place in a given sequence, the evangelists, when they related the words or actions of the Savior, explained them for the benefit of their readers through the context, one evangelist using one. context while another would employ a different context. Accordingly, the exegete should make a close investigation o[ what an evangelist intended when he narrated a saying or action in a given way or placed it in a given context. For the truth of the narra-tive is not at all desiroyed by the fact that the evangelists give the words and actions of the Lord in a different order23 or by the fact that they express His statements in different ways, no~ keeping to the letter but nevertheless relating the sense.24 As St. Augustine points out: "With regard to those matters the different ordering of which does not lessen the authority and truth of the Gospels, it is probable enough that each of the evangelist's thought that he should put his narratives in the order in which God willed to suggest them to his memory. If a person reverently and diligently inquires into the matter, he will be able with the help of God to find out why the Holy Spirit, who distributes His gifts to each as He wishes2~ and who therefore--because of the fact that these books were to be placed at the very summit of authority--without a doubt directed and controlled the minds of the sacred writers as they reflected on what they should write, permitted different writers to arrange their narratives in different ways." 26 Unless the exegete takes into account all the factors involved in the origin and the composition .of the Gospels and makes due use of the legitimate findings of recent research, he will not be performing his duty of ~ See Lk 1:4. ~ See St John Chrysostom, Homiliae 90 in Evangeliura S. Matthaei, I, 3; PG, v. 57, col. 16-7. a See St. Augustine, De consensu evangelistarura libri quatuor, 2, 12, 28; PL, v. 34, col. 1090-1. ~ 1 Cot 12:11. ~St. Augustine, De consensu, 2, 21, 51 f.; PL, v.34, col. 1102. finding out what the sacred writers intended and what they actually said. Since it appears from the findings of recent research that the doctrine and life of Jesus were not related for the sole purpose of retaining them in re-membrance but that they were "proclaimed" in such a way that they might furnish the Church a foundation for faith and morals, the interpreter who is untiring in mak-ing a close study of the testimony of the Gospels will be able to shed a greater light on the enduring theological value of the Gospels and to exhibit in the clearest light the negessity and importance of the Church's interpreta-tion. There still exist many questions of the greatest serious-ness in the discussion and explanation of which the Catholic exegete can and should freely exercise his in-telligence and ability so that each one individually may make his contribution to the benefit of all, to the con-tinued advancement of sacred doctine, to the prepara-tion for and further support of the decisions of the Church's teaching authority, and to the defence and honor of the Church.u7 But they must always be pre-pared to obey the teaching authority of the Church, nor should they forget that the Apostles were filled with the Holy Spirit when they proclaimed the good news and that the Gospels were written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit who preserved their authors from all error. "We came to know the plan of our salvation through no others than those through whom the gospel came to us. This gospel they first proclaimed by mouth, but afterwards by the will of God they passed it on to us in the Scriptures to be the foundation and pillar of our faith. For it is not permissible to say that they preached before they possessed perfect knowledge, as some dare to assert who boast that they are the correctors of the Apos-tles. For after our Lord had arisen from the dead and they had been invested from on high with the power of the Holy Spirit who descended upon them, they were filled with all the gifts and possessed perfect knowledge. They went forth to the ends of the earth preaching the message of the blessings we have from God and pro-claiming heavenly peace to men, each and every one of them equally possessing God's gospel." us 3. Those to whom the duty of teaching in seminaries or in similar institutions has been entrusted "should make it their first concern., that Sacred Scripture is taught in a way that is completely in consonance with ~See Divino a~ante Spiritu; EB, n. 565; AtlS, v.35 (1943), p. 319. ~St. Irenaeus, Adversus haereses, III, 1, 1; in the edition by W. Wigan Harvey, v. 2, p. 2; PG, v. 7, col. 844. ÷ ÷ ÷ Historicity oJ the Gospels VOLUME 24s 1965 31 + ÷ ÷ Biblical ~ommission REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS what the importance of the matter and the needs of the times warrant." 29 Professors should chiefly set forth the theological content so that Sacred Scripture "may become for the future priests of the Church a pure and never failing source of each one's spiritual life as well as a strength-giving food for the role of preaching which they will assume." a0 When they make use of critical tech-niques, especially those of what is known as literary criticism, they should not do so in order to exercise those techniques for their own sake but in order that by their light they may more clearly see the meaning communi-cated by God through the sacred writer. Hence they should not stop halfway and reniain satisfied with just the literary discoveries they have made; over and beyond this they should show how these really help to a clearer understanding of revealed doctrine or, if the case war-rants, to a refutation of erroneous positions. If teachers follow these norms, they will ensure that their students will find in Sacred Scripture that "which raises the mind to God/nourishes the soul, and fosters the interior life." ax 4. Those who instruct the Christian people by sacred preaching have in all truth a need for the greatest prudence. They should chiefly impart doctrine, mindful of St. Paul's warning: "Pay attention t9 yourself and your teaching, and be persistent in this; by doing this, you will further the salvation of yourselves and of those who hear you." ~2 They should refrain entirely from pro-posing matters that are useless novelties or not sufficiently proved. New views, once they are solidly established, may, if necessary, be set forth in a discreet way, account being taken of the nature of the audience. When they narrate biblical events, they should not make fictitious additions that are not conformed to truth. This virtue of prudence should be especially exer-cised by those who publish writings for the faithful at the popular level. They should take care to set forth the supernatural treasures of the Word of God "in order that the faithful., may be moved and incited to order their lives in a correct way." an They should regard it as an inviolable duty never to depart in the slightest from the common teaching and tradition of the Church; they should, to be sure, make use of whatever advances in biblical knowledge have been made by the intelligence of recent scholars, but they should completely avoid the The apostolic letter Quoniam in re biblica; EB, n. 162; Pii X Acta, v. 3, p. 72. ~°Divino a~lante Spiritu; EB, n. 567; AA$, v. 35 (1943), p. 322. ~Divino aOiante Spiritu; EB, n. 552; AA$, v. 35 (1943), p. 311. 1 Tim 4:16. Divino a~tante Spiritu; EB, n. 566; AAS, v. 35 (1943), p. 320. rash fabrications of innovators,a4 They are strictly for-bidden to give in to the destructive itching for novelty by thoughtlessly publicizing without any judicious and serious discrimination any and all attempts to solve dif-ficulties, thus disturbing the faith of many. Earlier, this Pontifical Biblical Commission had al-ready judged it good to recall to mind the fact that books together with magazine and newspaper articles dealing with biblical matters are subject to the authority and jurisdiction of ordinaries, since they are religious publications and are concerned with the religious in-struction of the faithful,a5 Hence the ordinaries are asked to pay the greatest attention to these popular publica-tions. 5. Those in charge of biblical associations should, in-violably obey the laws laid down by the Pontifical Bibli-cal Commission.a6 If all the above points are observed, the study of Sacred Scripture will result in profit to the faithful. There will be no one who does not also experience today what St. Paul described: the Sacred Scriptures "have the power to make you wise and to lead you to salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All scripture, being inspired by God, is useful for teaching, for reproving error, for cor-recting, and for training in right conduct so that the man who is God's may be perfect, equipped for good work of every kind." 37 His Holiness, Paul VI, in an audience graciously granted on April 21, 1964, to the undersigned consultor and secretary, approved this instruction and ordered it to be made public. Rome, April 21, 1964. BENJAMIN N. WAMBACQ, O.Praem., Consultor and Secretary ~' See the apostolic letter Quoniam in re biblica; EB, n. 175; Pii X Acta, v, 3, p. 75. ~ The Instruction to Local Ordinaries of December 15, 1955; EB, n. 626; AAS, v. 48 (1956), p. 63. ~°EB, nn. 622-33; AASo v. 48 (1956), pp. 61--4. ~ 2 Tim 3:15-7. 4- ÷ 4- Gospels VOLUME 24, 1965 33 LORENZO BOISVERT, O.F.M. The Nature. of Religious Authority Father Lorenzo Boisvert, O.F.M., is a member of the Franciscan com-munity looted at 5750, boulevard Rosemont; Mont-real 36, Canada. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS THE TEACHING OF JEsus ON AUTHORITY~ It is sometimes said that superiors talk a great deal about obedience but say little or even nothing at all about authority with the result that subjects know much about the notion of obedience which their superiors have but are ignorant of their idea of authority-~or, if they do know it, they have deduced it from their way of governing. This remark--it does not seem to be without foun-dation- is an expression of the legitimate need of sub-jects for clarification, of their desire to understand the governmental attitude of superiors. This does not pro-ceed from mere curiosity but rather is aimed at finding out what the nature of their obedience should be and how superiors intend to have them cooperate for the good of the community. A given concept of authority necessarily engenders' a corresponding notion of obedi-ence. If a superior conceives authority as a means of domination, his subjects have but one way of obeying, --that of executing his orders; accordingly, their col-, laboration for the common good remains very limited. If, on the other hand, the superior conceives authority' as a service, he is on his way towards achieving the complete collaboration of his subjects not only on the, level of execution but first of all on the level of thought and organization. There is a second reason which leads us to investigate the nature of authority, and this is the existence of a problem of obedience in the greater part of religious communities; this latter problem is one about which it can be asked whether it is not just as much or even ¯ This section originally appeared as a separate article, "L'auto-rit~ d'apr~s l'enseignement de J~sus," in La vie des communautds religi~uses, v. 20 (1962), pp. 271-6. more so a problem of authority.1 What makes obedience so difficult for today's religious is not just the need of a greater independence--fruit of their education--but also the desire for a more evangelical conception and exercise of authority. They cannot endure to have supe-riors form a notion of authority according to their own liking as though they were indifferent whether their notion does or does not square with that of Christ. In the face of this need for evangelical authenticity, supe-riors ought to reconsider their notion of authority, a matter that necessitates knowing the teaching of Christ on the point. Three times on the occasion of three different episodes Christ provided His disciples with clear instruction on the nature of authority. The first two of these episodes are reported for us by the synoptics while the third is told only by St. John. First episode: This episode is told us by St. Matthew and St. Mark in the following way: It was at this time that the disciples came to Jesus and asked him: "Who then is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?" Jesus called a little child and placed him in the midst of them. "I tell you in all seriousness," he said, "that if you do not return to the condition of children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. The man, therefore, who makes himself little like this little child, he is the one who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven" (Mt 18:1-4). When they arrived at Capernaum and had reached their house, he asked them: "What were you arguing about during the trip?" They kept quiet because during the journey they had been arguing about which of them was the greatest. There-upon he sat down and called the Twelve to him. "If any one of you wishes to be first," he said, "he must make himself the last of all and the servant of all" (Mk 9:33-5). On the journey to Capernaum (Mk) the disciples were vain enough to argue about which of them was the greatest and hence the rightful one to occupy the first place. As Father Congar remarks, this was a subject of frequent discussion in Judaism: In Judaism there was a great deal of discussion about the one to take the first place: whether it was a matter of a cultural meeting or of administration or of table arrangement, the ques-tion of precedence was constantly recurring. Perhaps as a re-sult of the promise to Peter o£ the keys .to the kingdom, the disciples themselves argued about who was the greatest? Once they had arrived at Capernaum and had settled down in a house (the owner of which is unknown), Jesus, *This problem of authority in the Church has been emphasized in the cooperative work entitled Probl~mes de l'autoritd (Paris: Cerf, 1962). ~, *Y. Congar, "La hi~rarchie comme service selon le Nouveau Testament et les documents de la tradition," in L'dpiscopat et l'Eglise universelle (Paris: Cerf, 1962), pp. 69-70. VOLUME 24, 1965 4. 4. L. Bo~er~, REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS as St. Matthew tells it, was asked by the disciples to settle the argument. St. Mark, on the other hand, in-forms us that it was Jesus Himself who asked them the searching question: "What were you arguing about dur-ing the trip?" This leads one to suppose either that Christ did not make the trip to Capernaum with them or that the argument had been had by a group of the disciples with whom Christ was not present. But whether the question came from the disciples themselves or from Christ is of little importance; what matters is the instruction by action and by word that Christ gave on this occasion. He called a little child, placed it in the midst of them, and then said to them: "If you do not return to the condition of children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, the man who makes himself little like this little child, he it is who is greatest in the kingdom of heaven." It should be noted that St. Matthew is the only one to speak here of the kingdom of heaven; and it is well known that the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God, and the Church are identified in their terrestrial phase, in their temporal realization. St. Mark, on the other hand, uses words of singular force: "If any man wishes to be the first, he will make himself the last of all and the servant of all." Christ, then, teaches us that to be the greatest in the kingdom a man mustmake himself the smallest, the last, the servant of all. Second episode: This episode is told us by both St. Matthew and St. Mark; but because the passages are long, only the text of St. Matthew will be given here: It was at this point that the mother of the sons of Zebedee, came up to him with her sons and knelt in front of him to ask him a favor. "What is it you want?" he asked. "Promise me," she said, "that in your kingdom these two sons of mine will sit next to you, one on the right and the other on the left." "You do not realize what you are asking," Jesus replied. "Can the two of you drink the cup that I am about to drink? . Yes, we can," they answered. "It is true," he told them, "that you will indeed drink my cup; but as for sitting on my right and on my left, that is not for me to grant; that belongs to the ones for whom my Father has destined it." When the other ten heard about this, they became indignant with the two brothers. Then Jesus called them to him and said: "You know that the ru.lers of the pagans lord it over them and that their mighty ones tyrannize them. But such must not be the case among you. On the contrary, whoever wishes to become great among you must become the servant of all of you; and whoever wishes to be the first among you must be ~our slave-- just as the Son of Man has not come in order to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for men" (Mt 20:20-8), This episode is concerned with a request made of Christ by the mother of the sons of Zebedee, as St. Matthew relates it; though St. Mark puts the request on the lips of the sons of Zebedee themselves. Their desire is nothing less than to sit on the right and left of Christ in His new kingdom; in other words, they wanted to have the chief positions after that of Christ.- After James and John had assured Christ that they could drink His cup, He told them that it was not His prerogative to determine who would sit at His right and His left in the kingdom and that this was a matter that pertained to His Father. Undoubtedly, this response left them as well as their mother a little confused and humiliated. Moreover, they came to realize that their request had been highly audacious and that it was not taken very graciously by the rest of the disciples who were indignant at it. It was precisely this indignation of the disciples which was the occasion not for words of reproach and blame but for the magnificent answer of Christ given in the text cited above. Hence, "as there are in the order of earthly societies, so also in the order of the gospel there exist the great ones, the first ones." ~ But the attitude of the great men in the order of the gospel should be entirely different from the attitude of the great ones of earthly societies. The great ones of the earth make their power felt, they show themselves as masters, they lord it over others. The relationship of inequality that exists between them and their subjects is a relationship of domination from the viewpoint of the former and one of subjection from the viewpoint of the latter. This, precisely, is a conception of authority which Christ cannot admit and which in consequence should not exist among His disciples. According to the gospel the way leading to the rank of first or great.is that of seeking a position or relationship not of power but of service, that of a minister [dial~onos], a servant, a doulos, a slave, a laborer. Throughout the New Testament diakonia--the state, behavior, and activity of a servant--ap-pears as coextensive and concretely identified with the character-istic condition of the disciple, of the person who, having been overwhelmed by Christ, lives in dependence on Him. This comportment of service, not of power, which Christ makes a law for His disciples is explicitly linked by Him with their comportment with regard to Him their Master; for the disciple is not just a pupil receiving instruction but is one who imiuites the Master whose life he shares. But Christ lived out and defined His mission in the Isaiah terms of the Servant of Yahweh. He had not come to lord it over others but to serve as a slave, to live the condition of a slave even to the specific detail of being sold so as to make himself the equivalent of a ransom.' The disciples likewise "ascend only by humbling them-selves, by following Christ on the way of descent, the ' Congar, "La hi~rarchie," p. 71. ' Congar, "La hi~rarchie," pp. 71-2. ÷ ÷ ÷ Religious Authodty VOLUME 24, 1965 ÷ ÷ ,÷ L. Bois~ert, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS way of the gift and loss of self . " 5 The attitude of the servant and the slave should be the normal attitude of one who has been raised to a state of external greatness. Third episode: This episode is found in St. John 13:12-7: When he had washed their feet and had put on his clothes, he resumed his place at table and spoke to them: "Do you realize what I have just done to you? You call me 'Teacher' and 'Master' and you are right in saying this because I am such. But if I, your Master and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought also to wash the feet of each other. I have given you this example so that you may act as I have acted towards you. I tell you with all earnestness that the slave is not greater than his master and that the messenger is not greater than the man who sent him. Once you realize these things, you will find happiness in doing them." The occasion for Christ's action was, no doubt, the discreditable incident that took place during the pas-chal repast and "which was in singular contrast with the solemnity of the occasion";0 as St. Luke puts it: "There arose among them a dispute as to which of them should be regarded as the greatest" (Lk 22:24). Once more it is the question of precedence; Christ must have been saddened and even upset; His teaching about hu-mility had not been understood. Once again, instead of addressing the Apostles with words of lesser or greater harshness, Christ performs an action which constitutes an awesome lesson for them and makes them realize the ridiculousness of their dispute: He washes their feet. It is sufficient here to note the following: "The wash-ing of feet was classed distinctly as the work of slaves. A slave of Jewish descent could not be obligated to do it, but only a slave of another nationality." 7 Christ, since He was Teacher and Master, had the right to lord it over them, to act as a master, to impose His will, to command, to dominate; He renounces this .right to take the attitude of a slave, of a servant. He does this to give His Apostles and all future Christians an example to be imitated so that we who before God are but servants and slaves might learn to give service and 'to minister to each other. The relationship which should exist among Christians is a relationship of service. "St. Luke, who does not record the washing of feet, still gives its moral lesson, precisely with reference to the * Congar, "La hi~rarchie," p. 73. e F. Prat, Jesus Christ: His LiIe, His Teaching, and His Work (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1950), v. 2, p. 264. 7 F. M. Willam, The Life of Jesus Christ (St. Louis: Herder, 1936), p. 380. incident which seems to us to have called it forth." s As Luke puts it: The kings of the heathen lord it over them, and the ones who tyrannize them are called their "benefactors." But it must not be so among you. On the contrary, the greatest among you should behave like the youngest and the chief like the servant. Who is the greater, the one reclining at table or the one serving? Is it not the one who is reclining? And I am in the midst of you as one who serves (Lk 22:25-7). The greatest, then, must make himself the servant; he must be in a state of service with regard to those who are subject to him. According to the teaching of Christ, authority is essen-tially a service; and the person who holds authority is a servant. This comportment of service which defines the condition of the superior likewise constitutes the essen-tial law of the members of the ecclesial community to such an extent that all Christians should serve one an-other. From this it can be seen that the activity of the superior is to be situated as a prolongation of the Christian life and that it is, in short, a special function of service within the community and for the good of the community. AUTHORITY AND COMMUNITYt Our brief analysis of these three gospel episodes has already shown us that according to the teaching of Christ authority is essentially a service and the person who pos-sesses it a servant: The kings of the pagans lord it over them and those who tyran-nize them are called their "benefactors." But it is not to be the same among you. On the contrary, the greatest among you is to act like the least and the chief like a servant (Lk 22:25-6). The aim of the present section of this article is to empha-size this central point of authority-service by specifying the relationship that should normally exist between aft-thority and the threefold community: the human com-munity, the Christian community, and the religious com-munity. Authority and the Human Community The human community is essentially a community of equals since all men are of the same nature. Hence those who command others do not do so by reason of an essen-tial superiority. Neither is it by reason of certain par-s Prat, Jesus Christ, v. 2, p. 267. ~fOriginally a separate article entitled, "Autoritfi et commu-naut.," this section appeared in La vie des communautds religieuses, v. 20 (1962), pp. 309-15. ÷ ÷ 4- Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 196S L. Bols~ert~ O.F.~I. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 40 ticular values (for example, nobility, wealth, power, su-perior degree of intelligence or virtue) that certain ones possess authority since these values, while they engender prestige, do not confer any rights over others. Even though an unlimited number of historical facts show the strong dominating the weak and even reducing them to slavery, still this proves only the existence of a state of disorder, the consequence of original sin, in which man behaves to his fellow man like a wolf (homo homini lupus) instead of like a brother. The only principle which justifies the possession and the exercise of authority within the human community is the good of others, whether of the others taken indi-vidually or as the entire community. Since the raison d'etre of authority is the welfare of others, it has mean-ing and can be understood only if it is considered in relation to the community. The person, then, who possesses authority is situated in a state of service with regard to his brothers, for he possesses it only in the interest of those subordinated to him. If he has a right to remuneration from the com-munity because he is at their service, he nevertheless abuses his power if he uses his authority for his own personal interest at the expense of his subjects. In this latter case authority, instead of being directed toward the good of each and all, is directed to the good of the person who possesses it; in place of being a state of re-sponsibility and of service, it is "an occasion of getting more enjoyment, of permitting oneself everything, and of serving oneself." The welfare of others being the fundamental prin-ciple that justifies the possession of authority, it is like-wise the principle that justifies the imposition of limits on the exercise of this authority. The person who pos-sesses power does not have the right to command what-ever he pleases, abstraction being made from the wel-fare of others. If the object of his command exceeds the range of the authority he has received or if the com-mand is flatly counter to the welfare of the community, the subjects can and even should refrain from obeying since the obligation to obey always supposes the legiti-mate possession and exercise of authority. Hence, already in the human community as such it is true that authority is a service and its holders are servants. The word "minister" which is sometimes used to denote persons in charge of the welfare of particular communities is nothing else than a translation of this fundamental truth. When we speak of the "prime min-ister" of a country or of some other political unit, this should normally mean the person who is most at the servi~e of this country or of this political unit; for degree of service corresponds or should correspond to the de-gree of authority. Authority and the Christian Community Far from constituting a reality apart from .and, as it were, exterior to the human community, the Christian community is actually situated within that community and is its perfective complement. Christ did not send His disciples to the desert to be far away from the world so as to preserve them from contagion; rather it was His wish that His own, united in the ecclesial community, should be present in the world so that they might make truth and love rule where error and discord had domi-nated. This ecclesial community, the Mystical Body of Christ, is not a large organization, a system, a legalistic structure, or a juridical person; neither is it a collectivity consisting only of the members of the hierarchy; rather it is the community of the faithful as they tend to the perfection of love. Since, however, it is the express will of Christ, it must be admitted that in this Church there are lead-ers, a hierarchy, an authority. And since this authority is part of the Church's constitution, a knowledge of its exact nature can be had only by situating it in relation-ship to what we will call the fundamental exigency of the Christian community. According to the teaching of the gospel there is but one Master and but one Lord: Christ, the only source of every supernatural gift. Consequently, whatever con-stitutes the Christian community (for example, its Mys-tical Head, its animating Spirit, its sacraments, its min-istries, and so forth) is a gift of God, a grace from on high. From this there comes the obligation of this com-munity to be at the service of God, to have divine wor-ship as its principal goal, and to have thanksgiving as the central act of this worship. What is true for the ec-clesial community as such is equally true with regard to each of its members: the Christian possesses Christian reality only to the extent that he has received the grace of God. Since everything that makes him a Christian is a gift, he must assume the attitude not of a master and lord but that of a steward and administrator, roles which are essentially an attitude of service. He must be "a man of submission and of gratitude" and not a man of a pos-sessive spirit. When he uses the gifts he has received, he must force himself with the greatest fidelity to acknowl-edge and respect the purposes of his Master and Bene-factor. The purpose of Christ with regard to the gifts that He confers is clearly expressed by St. Paul: ÷ ÷ ÷ Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 1965 41 4. 4. 4. L. Bolsv~t, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS Though there is a variety of spiritual gifts, there is but one and the same Spirit; though there is a variety of ministries, there is but one and the same Lord; and though there is a variety of ways in which God acts, still there is the one and same God acting in all. ~Each man is given his own manifestation of the Spirit Ior the sake o] the common good (1 Cor 12:4-7). He made some to be apostles, some prophets, some mission-aries, some pastors and teachers; he disposed Christians in this way for the sake of the ministry that the body of Christ might be built up (Eph 4:11-2). Hence the gifts which the Christian receives are directed to the building up of the Mystical Body of Christ; they are not given him for himself alone but for all; thus they make him "a means of living and growing for others." But the Christian can benefit others through the gifts he has received only if he takes an attitude of service with regard to his brethren, the way of behaving of a servant who gives himself devotedly. This is the attitude adopted by St. Paul: Though I am a free man in the eyes of all, still I have made myself a slave to all men in order that I might win more of them (1 Cor 9:19). It is not ourselves that we preach but Christ Jesus the Lord; and we are your slaves for the sake of Jesus (2 Cor 4:5). And this same attitude is considered by St. Paul and St. Peter as the normal attitude of every Christian: My brothers, you were called to be free; but do not use this freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love put yourselves at the service of each other (Gal 5:13). In accord with the grace each has received, put yourselves at the service of each other like trustworthy stewards of the mani-fold grace of God (1 Pt 4:10). Hence each member of the Mystical Body ought to be the servant of all. This fundamental exigency of the Christian condition is coextensive with the very state of a Christian, for there is no genuine life in Christ without charity; that is, without a love that gives and serves. There should exist among Christians a constant exchange of services. It is in this general context of service that authority is situated. It is not a primary gift prior to the com-munity and, as it were, independent of it; it is rather a secondary reality which supposes the existence of the primary reality and which cannot be properly under-stood except insofar as it is placed within this primary reality. According to the New Testament, the different words used to designate individual ministries "denote a task or an activity as a stable service within the com-munity." The following are examples of this: apostles, teachers, prophets (1 Cot 12:28); missionaries and teach-ers (Eph 4:11); pastors (Eph 4:11); guardians and over- seers (Acts 20:28; Phil 1:1); elders (Acts 11:30; 14:23); ministers (Phil 1:1; 1 Tim 3:8-9); leaders, rulers (Heb 13:7, 17); president (Kom 12:8); steward, manager (Lk 12:42; 1 Cot 4:1; Tit 1:7).9 This list gives the special titles and degTees of service within the Christian community and shows us that au-thority is not exempt from service but a call to a different and more perfect service. Between ordinary Christians and the members of the hierarchy there can and should exist only a difference in the situation of their service, only different manners of serving Christ and the breth-ren within the Mystical Body. Those who possess author-ity have above all the role of organizing and coordinating the particular services that exist in the Church and also of exercising the ministry of the word and of worship. Once more, this is only one of the forms of what Chris-tians are to do "by and for each other" in view of their common supernatural destiny. The attitude of Christ among men--an attitude that He has summarized in the words: "I have not come to be served but to serve"---ought to be the preeminent attitude of the person who presides in the Church. Thus, for example, St. Paul, who on occasion knew how to vindicate his title of Apostle (Rom 1:1; Gal 1:15) and his apostolic authority (Gal 1:8), after the manner of Christ preferred not to bring his rights and powers into play (I Cor 9:12). He preferred to act like the servant, the slave of his brethren (1 Cor 9:19; 2 Cot 4:5) rather than to rule and to act the master (2 Cor 1:24). He considered the faithful as his masters, and it is their welfare that determines the application of his efforts. When situated in the general context of service which defines Christian existence, authority appears to us less as the right and power of one Christian over other Christians than as a trust, a duty, a responsibility, a serv-ice. To express the nature of this authority it is not suffi-cient to say that it is an ordinary juridical power exer-cised in a spirit of disinterestedness and of service: like Christian existence itself, authority is essentially and intrinsically service. Authority and the Religious Community Just as the Christian community is situated within the human community and is its perfective complement, so also the religious community is so much a part of the Christian community that it is from the latter that the religious community derives its meaning and its life. The nature of the religious community will never be under-stood if it is separated from the Church or if it is 0 Congar, "La hi~rarchie," p. 81. 4- 4. 4. Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 1965 43 L. Boisvert, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 44 regarded as being attached to it like some merely ex-ternal appendage. An individual religious community is formed of baptized persons who have taken a serious attitude towards their baptismal commitments and who have adopted a manner of life more favorable to their accomplishment. Hence a religious community should not be considered as first of all a large organization in which everything runs smoothly when the relations between superiors and subjects are without difficulty; it should rather be con-sidered as a community of baptized peisons who have chosen a particular state of life which allows them a more intimate encounter with Christ and a more inte-gral response to their Christian vocation. Since one of the fundamental exigencies of this voca-tion is that of service [diakonia], it is normal that religious should excel in this, that more perfectly than others they should be at the service of God and of their brethren. Only thus will they be true witnesses to the One who emptied Himself for us by taking on the condition of a slave, of us (Phil 2:6-11). What should distinguish religious from ordinary Christians is not a difference in Christian life but a difference in the situation of their service and even more in the perfection of this service. Religious should live out to their fullness the following words of St. Peter: "Each according to the grace he has received, put yourselves at the service of one another like trustworthy stewards of the manifold grace of God" (1 Pt 4:10). Such an exchange of mutual services supposes, it is true, a great degree of availability, a profound interior freedom, and an effective death to oneself. Are not these indispensable conditions of service included in the very life of religious who by their profession prolong in their daily living the mystical death of their baptism? Their renunciation of the things of this world by poverty, of their own body by chastity, of the free use of their will by obedience puts them in a state of availability and of interior freedom which facilitates their service both of God and of their neighbor. It is in this context of a more perfect Christian service that it is necessary to situate the authority of the reli-gious superior. Just as the service of consecrated religious is distinguished from the service of ordinary Christians by the mode and perfection of its exercise, so also the authority of the religious superior should be distin-guished from Christian authority in general principally by the perfection of its exercise. It is necessary that the superior be at the service of his subjects as integrally as possible since the authority he possesses is essentially service and since he, by the renunciation contained in his religious life, should have acquired the interior free-dom necessary to be a perfect or at least a very good servant of his subjects. To have an effective solicitude for his subjects to the complete forgetfulness of himself should be the normal attitude of the religi6us superior. Only on this condition will he manifest to his sub-jects that he has not accepted au.thority for his own ad-vantage but for their temporal and spiritual welfare. And at the same time he will be a genuine witness to the Christ who came upon earth to serve and who has taught us that authority by its very structm;e is a service. While it is true that authority even in the human community can be regarded as a service since its pos-sessors have received it only for the benefit of others, in the ecclesial community it is only a special application of the common situation of service which characterizes Christian existence. Hence it is not a thing apart in the Church where it is exercised, but it is one way among many others of serving God and men. It is likewise in this general context of service that there is to be situated the authority of the religious superior, with the distinc-tive note, however; that it should be exercised in a more perfect way, given that religious enter a community not to cease serving God and their brethren but to serve them more perfectly. POSITlVE EXIGENCIES OF AUTHORITY-SERvICE~ As we have seen, according to Scripture authority is essentially service and the person who possesses it a serv-ant. The religious superior1° who, as he should, ac-cepts this divine teaching will doubtless abstain from re-garding his authority as an honor and a source of privi-leges or as an end in itself which can be sought for its own sake; likewise he will refrain from "ruling like a lord over his flock as the pagans do" and from making the weight of his authority felt. But this is not enough. It is furthermore necessary that the superior should know the principal positive exigencies of this Christian con-ception of authority and that he should respect these exigencies in his manner of government. The present sec-tion of this article will be concerned with pointing out some of these exigencies and will center its considerations around two fundamental ideas: (1) the superior is at the service of a community of persons (2) who are tending toward the perfection of charity. ++This section was originally entitled, "Exigences positives de l'autorit~-service" and appeared in La vie des communautds reli-gieuses, v. 21 (1963), pp. 5-14. lo When I speak of "religious superior" and of "religious," I in-clude in a generic fashion all men and women superiors of religious communities and all men and women religious. + + 4- Religious Authtrrity VOLUME 24, 1965 L. Boisvert, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 46 At the Service of a Community of Persons Knowing one's subjects: When one wishes to be of service to another person, it is first of all necessary to know him well; for the better one knows another, the more he is in a position to help him. The superior, whose duty it is to serve, should make every effort to acquire a thorough knowledge of his subjects, of their aspira-tions, their aptitudes, their needs. The great means of acquiring this knowledge still remains that of listening to them.--something that implies a great deal more than a more or less distracted hearing of what they say. To listen means to open oneself to another, to put oneself in a state of availability, of total receptivity to the other's words so that what is said can be grasped exactly and totally without exaggeration or diminution. A person is not listening when he continues his own thoughts while the other person is speaking, or when he presents a solu-tion even though the other person has scarcely begun to express his problem, or when he gives a decision-- favorable or unfavorable--before the statement of the case has been finished. Neither is a person listening in a true sense when he gives more attention to the person speaking and the way in which he speaks than to what he says--as though the importance of the communication is measured by the likableness of the person and the finesse of his way of expressing himself. The superior who knows how to listen to his subjects gradually comes to a genuine knowledge of them and in this way becomes more able to serve them. This does not mean that he accepts all their ideas, their tastes, their whims, their enthusiasms; but it does mean that he recog-nizes and respects the immutable truths and values that are in them; and it means that if there are deviations and errors, he searches for the origin of these for the purpose of better rectifying or eliminating them. Act-ing in this way, he will discover in the religious of today--who give the appearance of being of a new and startling nature--a great deal of good will along with uprightness and honor coupled with a sincere desire to advance to perfection. He will also recognize that these religious do not appreciate at all a negative morality where the first place is given to renunciation, abnega-tion, suffering, and pain--to the cross without the halo of the Resurrection. What they prefer is a holiness that will be the free fulfillment of their life, of their courage and generosity, of their love and joy--a holiness that is under the sign of fulfillment rather than that of renun-ciation. Informing one's subjects: This knowledge that the su-perior acquires of his subjects by listening to them per- mits him not only to provide them with individual help but also to promote and organize their collaboration for the common good. It is the duty of all religious to serve the community of which they are members, since in tak-ing the religious habit they ha,~e not denied their particu-lar talents and since in promising obedience they have not made a vow of rigid passivity. And their collabora-tion for the common good should not be limited only to the execution of directives emanating from authority but should extend to every possible and useful level. This, as can be easily seen, can 'take place only if the superior keeps his religious knowledgeable about the problems, difficulties, projects, and so forth which con-cern the community so that they can aid him in tinding solutions and in improving things. Unless he has the charism of ~nspiration and of reve-lation- and perhaps also that of infallibility--the supe-rior cannot by himself find an adequate solution to all the problems involved in his community; nor can he per-ceive all the advantages and disadvantages of a project. Hence if he wants the complement of light which comes from his subjects, he must first of all inform them of the difficulties that need solutions and of the projects that need to be considered. The only person who would neg-lect the collaboration of his religious is one who believes himself wiser than he is, who has greater confidence in himself than is warranted, and who thinks that he is filled with the gifts of knowledge and wisdom. Actually, he, no more than the founder, has not received the gift from God "to speak the last word of wisdom for all time." 11 Promoting public opinion: The purpose of this in-forming of subjects by the superior is not only to com-municate to the religious the principal problems and projects of the community but also and above all to provoke personal reflection and discussions from which will emerge a public opinion. This public opinion is as necessary to the vitality of a religious community as it is to the vitality of the Church herself; and this latter need was affirmed by Pius XII in February of 1950 when he said: Because the Church is a living body, something would be wanting in her life if public opinion were lacking--and the blame for this deficiency would fall back upon the pastors and the faithful.~ This public opinion will become a source of life for ax Archbishop Roberts, S.J., Blacl~ Popes (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1954), p. 40. = Pius XII, "Allocutlon on the Catholic Press and Public Opinion" (February 18, 1950), Catholic Mind, v. 48 (1950), p. 753. ÷ + ÷ Religious Authorit~ VOLUME 24, 1965 the religious community only if the superior recognizes it and takes account of it to the degree that it includes elements of value. Hence it is necessary for him to con-sult his subjects after having informed them of the principal questions which concern them. This consulta-tion should not be considered by him as an act of con-descension on his part but as a duty and, from the side of the subjects, as a privilege and a right. This consulta-tion is so necessary to good government that Archbishop Roberts has not hesitated to affirm: "It is humanly im-possible to exercise authority without consulting the governed. To deny this is to make nonsense of obedi-ence." is This does not mean that the consultation of subjects is essential for the valid exercise of authority, no more than the consultation of the laity, even on questions of vital interest to them, is essential in order that the su-preme pontiff or the ecumenical council can authorita-tively pronounce on such questions. Nevertheless, the sovereign pontiff and the bishops are consulting the laity more and more because they know very well that the latter are more capable to explaining their own problems and 6f finding the most adequate solutions for them. Why should any other way of acting be used by the religious superior who does not have the special assist-ance of the Holy Spirit which Christ has promised the hierarchy in doctrinal matters? If, then, it is necessary for the superior to consult his subjects in order to exercise his authority in a more profitable way and thereby to serve his community bet-ter, it is equally necessary that subjects should present the superior with all the data necessary to judge a given question. When the matter at stake appears to them to be fundamental, subjects should not fear to use all their competence to support their arguments in the discus-sions they may have with the superior. This proves that their concern engrosses them sufficiently "to arouse them to make their needs known by effective presentations." Take, for example, "the apostolic practice of daily Com-munion, in abeyance for so many years"; this was not restored just by a stroke of the papal pen. Effect was given to our Lord's wish because some people expressed de-cisively- yes, at the risk of being hurt--the hunger they felt. The same is true of recent facilities for evening Mass and non-fasting Communion, and indeed of every other reform that has ever been?' L. Boi~vert, O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 48 Public opinion, the purpose of which is to furnish the superior with the complement of information that Roberts, Black Popes, p. 4. Roberts, Black Popes, p. 5. permits him to give a decision with a better knowledge of the matter, should not, however, so influence his de-cision that the superior appears to be but "the resultant or the projection of the forces which are at work in the group." In this way a religious community would be-come a naive democracy where the superior would be only the representative or the voice of his subjects. This would be a complete failure to recognize the nature both of authority and of obedience. If the decision of the su-perior can and even should be illuminated by public opinion, still it must not be considered as the simple logical resultant of it. It pertains to authority, not to subjects, to make definitive decisions. Consequently, when a decision is made by the superior, the subjects should accept and execute it with the great-est loyalty without bringing up, as a sort of riposte, the elements which the superior has not included in his decision. It is even necessary to add that the more vital public opinion is in a community, the more humble and total should be the acceptance of what the superior decides. If this is lacking, public opinion becomes a source of hurtful criticism, of disobedience, of disorder: it kills the religious spirit. On his side, the superior who makes a decision after having taken the best account he could of public opinion should not withdraw the decision except for a reasonable cause of legitimate necessity or great utility. To act "otherwise would be to give proof of levity and incon-stancy, of instability in judgment and command. On the other hand, if he sees that modifying his decision is nec-essary or useful, he should not obstinately keep to his first idea, thus depriving his subjects of an evident good. Delegating his powers: Religious, as we have remarked, have the duty of collaborating for the good of the com-munity. This collaboration should not be limited to the mere execution of directives coming from authority nor even just to the communication of their personal reflec-tions on matters proposed by the superior. Over and be-yond these, the superior must make his subjects share his responsibility by delegating them a part of his powers--a matter which does not at all mean that he renounces his own rights. A person who possesses authority is not under the obligation of making immediate and personal use of it in every case; that is, he does not himself have to regu-late all the details of common life with a great deal of attention to minutiae and a great loss of time. Such a procedure would result in making his subjects mere functionaries, instruments to receive and execute au-thority. The person possessing power can and even should en-trust others with particular tasks in order to develop in + + + Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 1965 49 4, 4, L. Boi~vert~ O.F.M. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS 50 them a sense of responsibility and to promote a better collaboration for the common good. This delegation of power, in addition to obliging subjects to make options that are revelatory to themselves and to others, provides the opportunity for initiative and the occasion for dis-covering and developing unsuspected talents. That this delegation of power includes the risk of error and mis-takes is part of the normal course of events. This risk, however, should not lead the superior to refuse to dele-gate any power since, in using his authority, he himself can commit the same or similar errors. The religious to whom the superior has delegated certain powers should exercise them fully without asking the superior to intervene in areas where they have the power to act themselves. If there are abuses in the area entrusted to them, subjects must learn to eliminate them without waiting for the superior to feel forced to intervene because of their inertia. They should have the courage to take measures that are distasteful to others rather than to throw the responsibility for them back on the superior, and this they should do even though the measures merit them dislike and unpopularity. It is only by paying this cost that delegation of power will develop in them a sense of responsibility and will genuinely con-tribute to the common good. On his side, the superior who has entrusted particular tasks to his subjects should take care to leave them the freedom that is necessary for them to carry out their tasks to the best of their ability. He should avoid con-stantly intervening to judge work already done, to im-pose his own ideas, or to insist on modifications. He should put complete confidence in his subjects, espe-cially in those areas where they have a real competence that he himself does not possess. The strength of the superior'.s authority and the effectiveness of his subjects' work will be in proportion to the frequency with which he acts by means of his subordinates and to the rarity of his personal interventions. The Service oI Persons Tending to the PerIection ol Charity Building up the interior man: Besides the exigencies of authority-service that we have already mentioned, there are others that flow from the fact that the superior is not only at the service of persons but precisely at the service of persons tending in a special way to the per-fection of charity. Without a doubt, the first of these exigencies is the superior's obligation to work for the spiritual welfare of his subjects, for the growth in them of the spiritual man. By the very nature of his office, the head of a religious community is a spiritual father, a pastor of souls, and not primarily an administrator or an organizer. In order to devote himself more completely to this central task of his, he should disengage himself as far as possible from routine matters, administrative tasks, and all affairs that prevent him from successfully fulfilling his primary duty. Hence he should hand over to others the care of matters of lesser importance that would dissipate his efforts; in this way he can devote himself more freely and effectively to the important spiritual function that is proper to him. He should not easily allow himself to succumb to the natural temptation to keep for himself the area of temporalities and to entrust to others the spiritual welfare of the community. Preaching the Word: As a pastor of souls, the superior should first of all nourish the spiritual life of his reli-gious by giving them the substantial food that is the Word of God. A profound interior life is impossible without faith, and there is no faith without meditation on the Word. Always necessary for the spiritual life, this Word is especially so for religious of the present generation among whom there is found a malaise, a dis-content, even a revolt which Father Ir~n~e Hausherr, S.J., considers a crisis of undernourishment, an anxiety of the hungry, a phenomenon of starvation.1~ Having come into the community to be spiritually filled, they re-volt when their entire nourishment consists of rules, reg-ulations, prohibitions, notices, and so forth. They are hungry for the Word of God which will nourish them and lead them to give themselves more fully; this it is that explains their discontent when they do not hear the Word. There can be no doubt that they would make their own the cry of an old gypsy woman in the presence of George Borrow, the English novelist and moralist. As he was passing a camp of gypsies in the vicinity of Chester, they mistook him for a minister of religion because of his ap-pearance and begged him to stop and speak to them of God. "I am neither a priest or a minister," he replied; "may the Lord have mercy on you--more than this I cannot say to you." As he went on his way, throwing some coins to the children, an old woman cried out to him: "We do not need money; give us God." 16 Fostering prayer: Besides nourishing his subjects with÷ the Word, the superior should help them to pray by+ providing them with a method and forms of praye+r which correspond to their religious sensibility. Not all ~ I. Hausherr, s.J., "Fundamentos teol6gicos de la vida religiosa," Seminarios, v. 12 (1960), pp. 7-18. 10 p. Blanchard, Saintetd aujourd'hui (Paris: Descl~e de Brouwer, 1954), p. 72. Religious Authority VOLUME 24, 1965 5] L. Bois~ert~ 0~. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS forms of prayer are equally valuable for all human be-ings at all times. There are forms of prayer that fifty years ago engendered and fostered prayer but that are incapable of producing this effect at the present time. The reason for this is not that present day religious have a bad will, that they want to break ancient structures for the mere pleasure of hearing them crack and fall to pieces. It is not a case of sheer desire for change or mere whim leading them to want to abandon and condemn what their seniors respect; what they want is a legitimate adaptation of forms of prayer, and traditionalism and conformism will not prevent them from refusing to re-tain antiquatedelements which have no other effect than to impede their prayer. Religious, for example, who have grasped the im-portance of the liturgy in the spiritual life, wish to in-tegrate it into their own lives as perfectly as possible and find it difficult to tolerate the imposition of a series of small prayers in addition to meditation, Mass, and the Divine Office. They cannot be reproached for want-ing to pray with and as the Church. Nor can they be blamed if, for the purpose of respecting as well as possi-ble the meaning of the canonical hours, they ask for the suppression of certain devotional prayers which en-cumber the horarium of the community and give the im-pression of having the same importance as canonical prayer. Observing, warning, correcting: Another exigency of authority-service is the painful duty of the superior to observe, warn, and correct his religious. St. Francis ex-presses this exigency at the beginning of Chapter Sixteen of his Second Rule: "The brothers who are ministers and servants of the other brothers should visit and warn their brothers and correct them with humility and charity . " Since the superior has the duty of weighing aptitude for religious life or for the priesthood in the case of those who have not yet taken these definitive steps, he must get a clear idea of their worth by observ-ing their actions. It is by action rather than by wor

Issue 51.2 of the Review for Religious, March/April 1992. ; Review for Religious (ISSN 0034-639X) is published bi-monthly at Saint Louis University, by the Jesuits of the Missouri Province. Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393. Telephone: 314-535-3048. Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor: Review for Religious ¯ 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393. Correspondence about the "Canonical Counsel" department: Elizabeth McDonough OP ¯ 5001 Eastern Avenue ¯ P.O. Box 29260 ~,¥ashington, D.C. 20017. I}OSTMASTER Send address changes to Review for Religious ¯ P.O. Box 6070 ¯ Duluth, MN 55806. Second-class postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri, and additional offices. SUBSCRIPTION RATES Single copy $5.00 includes surface mailing costs. One-year subscription $15.00 plus mailing costs. Two-year subscription $28.00 plus mailing costs. See inside back cover for subscription information and mailing costs. ©1992 Review for Religious for religious Editor Associate Editors Canonical Counsel Editor Assistant Editors Advisory Board David L. Fleming SJ Philip C. Fischer SJ Michael G. Harter sJ Elizabeth McDonough OP Jean Read Mary Ann Foppe David J. Hassel SJ Mary Margaret Johanning SSND Iris Ann Ledden SSND Se;in Sammon FMS Wendy Wright PhD Suzanne Zuercher OSB Christian Heritages and Contemporary Living MARCH / APRIL1992 ¯ VOLUMES1 ¯ NUMBER2 contents 166 182 191 2O6 217 229 236 ministry and ministries The Spiritual Exercises as a Foundation for Educational Ministry Walter J. Burghardt SJ reflects on the vision and values given to educational ministry when it is permeated by the spirituality of Ignatius Loyola's Spiritual Exercises. Going the Distance, Sustaining the Gift Melannie Svoboda SND suggests some concrete ways that people can joyfully exercise their ministry over the long haul. Newman's Living the Oratory Charism Halbert G. Weidner CO explains the Oratory foundation of Philip Neri in order to highlight values significant to John Henry Newman's life. theology and spirituality The Resurrection Kernel Dennis Billy CSSR outlines the basic principle of the doctrine of the resurrection in order to show its influence in our way of living. The Fragile Connection between Prayer and Suffering Matthias Neuman OSB speaks from his own experience of how human suffering affects our prayer. To Choose Jesus for My Heaven Donald Macdonald SMM finds Julian of Norwich's insights into the maternal love of Jesus expressed in the Blessed Sacrament. religious life and renewal Seeing in the Dark Janet Ruffing RSM finds light in John of the Cross's description of the Dark Night for understanding the current turmoil in reli-gious life. 162 Review for Religious 249 260 267 Memories of the Future Thomas McKenna CM shows how eschatology as a style of thinking provides understanding for the renewal efforts in reli-gious life. Integrating Postmodernity and Tradition Reid Perkins OP encourages the greater use of narratives in reli-gious life to connect us to the tradition and at the same time to help us overcome the obliviousness of postmodern life. Religious-Life Issues in a Time of Transition John A. Grindel CM and Sean Peters CSJ summarize the results of various studies of U.S. religious life funded by the Lilly Endowment and point to issues still to be dealt with. living religiously 276 Cultivating Uselessness Rose Hoover RC proposes that in the very experience of useless-ness and foolishness lies the gift of religious life to a pragmatic society. 282 Therapy for Religious: The Troublesome Triangle Joyce Harris OSC offers some suggestions for a collaborative rela-tionship among therapist, the individual religious, and the com-munity and its representative. 289 294 Prenovitiate: Theory and Practice Anthony Steel SSG believes a prenovitiate program can help meet the challenges of contemporary cultural attitudes toward religious life and outlines the plan for his community. report U.S. Hispanic Catholics: Trends and Works 1991 Kenneth Davis OFM Conv reviews the various events and writ-ings in the Catholic Hispanic experience. departments 164 Prisms 303 Canonical Counseh Hermits and Virgins 309 Book Reviews March-April 1992 163 prisms Teilhard de Chardin in The Divine Milieu observes that the larger half of our lives is made up of what happens to us. His observation comes home to us each year as we celebrate the great high holy days of Christianity-- Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday. Paradoxically Jesus accomplishes the work of redemption, his life's purpose, in what happens to him in his suffering, death, and resurrection. We enter into this paradox by our celebration of these days. We cannot change history, we cannot undo what has happened. Our celebration allows us in our own time to enter into what happened to Jesus and to be with him, to stand alongside, to feel com-passion- as helplessly as we listen to someone tell of being tortured by a totalitarian regime or as we sit at the bedside of a dying loved one. No activity of ours changes the event; compassionate presence is the difficult but precious gift we can give. Of course it is also our privilege to share in some-one's joy and happiness, as we do when we celebrate the res-urrection victory of Jesus. Despite the fact that so many of us are spectator-sports people, whether in the stadium or in front of the TV set, we are not comfortable being spectators of an evil we can-not eliminate and sometimes even of a happiness which lit-tle touches our lives. We may find other people's parties empty of fun for ourselves, and we may dread visiting a neighbor in the hospital.We would rather not drive through derelict inner-city neighborhoods, we would brush past the homeless person sleeping over heating grates in our down-towns, or we would switch TV channels if the images of starving Sudanese children with distended stomachs are too graphic. The problems seem too large for our efforts to make a difference. Our activity and our emotions seem 164 Review for Religious frozen. Even though we are members of the Body of Christ, we often choose not to see and not to hear. When hostages return exuberantly to waiting families, when a comatose girl revives to the joy of her parents, when government agencies extend unemployment benefits for those hurting in a reces-sion economy, how often do we feel a thrill and utter a prayer of thanks to God? Too often we keep ourselves emotionally distant even from the joys of others around us, probably because they just "happen" and leave us personally unaffected. St. Paul could state, by analogy with our human bodies, that if one member suffers all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members share its joy. The Easter events challenge us always in what we do and in what happens to us. If God is truly the God of our life, then we find the opportunity of meeting God both in what we set out to do and in what happens to us. Jesus' crucifixion confronts the activist in each of us to question our judgment about our most valued "work." All of our dyings become not the entropy of exhaustive waste, but graced moments of freedom to embrace another givenness of life from our God of life. When St. Paul challenged death--"Where is your sting?"--he did not close his eyes to the evils and losses which all the forms of dying represent. He trumpeted the Easter message that the Christ-redemption event changes not only our attitude but also our ability to value the whole of our life--its successes and accomplishments, its apparent waste matter of sin and failure. As Gospel models, Mary Magdalene (who may have confused sex and love) and Peter (who has grabbed for success and lied for survival) are the first among the evangelizers of this new creation event. Pope John Paul's appeal for a new evangelization takes form in us by our renewed attempt to integrate the active and passive aspects of our daily life. By living faith-lives as "other Christs" we make a dif-ference in what we do and in what we suffer. The call to a new evan-gelization invites us to explore further the struggles of justice and poverty and human living both at our doorstep and in our larger world. Making a difference often seems like planting seeds and hav-ing to wait for things to happen. Easter faith stirs us up in hope, moves us out in action, and integrates us in a compassionate patience. This Easter may the risen Lord embrace us anew with the grace of his passion for life. David L. Fleming sJ March-April 1992 165 WALTER J. BURGHARDT The Spiritual Exercises as a Foundation for Educational Ministry ministry and ministries To speak of basing an educational ministry on the Spiritual Exercises is something of a paradox, an apparent contra-diction. Two things simply do not seem to fit. Are not the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola an experience of the spirit, a thirty-day or eight-day retreat centered on the movement of the Christian soul to heaven, conducted in solitude, far from hustle and bustle, and preferably in silence? And is not a university or college a citadel of the intellect, where the stress is on knowledge, on books, where minds meet in constant conflict, where ideas clash, where noise is in the air, where silence is reserved for a corner of the library? I am not saying that the Spiritual Exercises and the groves of academe are interchangeable terms, that a col-lege or university is a retreat experience, that the class-room is a chapel, that learning is worship. My thesis is that the Spiritual Exercises can be, indeed should be, an exciting foundation for education Jesuit-style. More specif-ically, I see the Spiritual Exercises as a process of conver-sion which in an educational institution aims at altering in students, faculty, and staff (1) their world of learning, the Walter J. Burghardt SJ is director of the Woodstock Theo-logical Center Project Preaching the ffust Word. This article retains the flavor of its original oral presentation made at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska, in April 1991. Father Burghardt's address is Manresa-on-Severn; P.O. Box 9; Annapolis, Maryland 21404. 166 Review for Religious life of the mind; (2) their world of loving, their human and reli-gious imagination and affection; (3) their world of living, the life of social realities. Let me explain what I mean in each of these three cases. First, the Spiritual Exercises should alter your world of learn-ing, that is, the life of your mind. You see, basic to the life of the mind, at the root of a university's existence, is a momentous mono-syllable: Why? Why study art and the arts, physical science or political science, law or business or medicine? Now Ignatius does not ask that question in those terms. But "spiritual exercises" he defines as "every way of preparing and disposing" ourselves to remove "all disordered attachments and, after their removal, of seeking and finding God's will in the way we direct our lives.''1 And there definitely are disordered approaches to the life of the mind, strange reasons why some go to college or university or professional school. I am not thinking of the more superficial reasons--college as a four-year Hammer dance2 interrupted by class. I am thinking of an approach to business education guided by a powerful principle: what makes the world go round is economics, and what makes the economy work is greed, the almighty dollar. I am thinking of gifted music and drama students whose aim is fame, the lust for applause, even the TV laugh machine. I am thinking of political-science students whose primary purpose is political power, the thrill in manipulating other men and women. A heart-rending example in this area is Lee Atwater, the manager of George Bush's 1988 presidential campaign who almost single-handedly turned the tide against Dukakis. Not long before his death at forty from a brain tumor on 29 March, this gifted man~ with an incredible instinct for the jugular made this poignant confession: The '80s were about acquiring--acquiring wealth, power, prestige. I know, I acquired more wealth, power and pres-tige than most. But you can acquire all you want and still feel empty. It took a deadly illness to put me eye to eye with that truth, but it is a truth that the country, caught up in its ruthless ambitions and moral decay, can learn on my dime.3 Not that money, fame, power are immoral in themselves; they are not. Without money a university would have little to offer to anyone. Fame makes it easier for the deprived to know you, to beg for the crumbs that fall from your table. Political power makes March-April 1992 167 Burghardt ¯ The Exercises for Educational Ministry possible not only a Persian Gulf war but legislated housing for the poor. Ignatius forces on the retreatant that insistent mono-syllable: Why? Even more radically, the Spiritual Exercises can keep you from segregating learning into a pigeonhole of its own, divorced from the thrust of the spirit towards God. I do not mean that all of learning becomes a religious enterprise. Vatican II made that quite clear. With Vatican I, it distinguished "'two orders of knowl-edge' which are distinct," declared that "the Church does not indeed forbid that 'when the human arts and sciences are practiced they use their own principles and their proper method, each in its own domain.'" In consequence, the council "affirms the legiti-mate autonomy of human culture and especially of the sciences.''4 My point is, the life of the mind is perilously impoverished if knowledge does not lead to wonder. Not sheer questioning: I wonder if Israel should continue populating the West Bank. In the grasp of wonder I marvel: I am surprised, amazed, delighted, enraptured. It is MaW pregnant by God's Spirit: "My spirit finds delight in God my Savior" (Lk 1:47). It is Magdalen about to touch her risen Jesus: "Master!" (Jn 20:16). It is doubting Thomas discovering his God in the wounds of Jesus. It is Michelangelo striking his sculptured Moses: "Speak!" It is Alexander Fleming fascinated by the very first antibiotic, America thrilling to the first footsteps on the moon. It is Mother Teresa cradling a naked retarded child in the rubble of West Beirut, a crippled old man in the excrement of Calcutta. It is the wonder of a first kiss. Such, sooner or later, should be your reaction to the life of learning, such the wonder that should permeate the life of your mind. Not a new methodology for biology or psychology; simply awe in the presence of a fascinating four-letter reality: life. The multifaceted, myriad miracle of life. Amazement at what breadths and depths there are to being alive--from the architectural artistry of the ant and the grace of a loping panther, through the blind-ing speed of a white marlin and the majestic flight of the bald eagle, to the beating heart of a unique fetus, the inspired imagery of Shakespeare, the fantastic forty-eight measures of Tchaikovsky's "Nutcracker," the transforming insight of Einstein. With such wonder you may hope to touch the pinnacle of knowledge. For, as philosopher Jacques Maritain discovered, the height of human knowing is not conceptual; it is experiential. Man or woman feels God. Yes, feels" God. 168 Review for Religious Am I ignoring Ignatius? Have I been distracted from his Spiritual Exercises? Quite the contrary. The Spiritual Exercises are an adventure in experience, in wonder. With all the power of your mental faculties, you enter the kingdom of contemplation--what contemplative William McNamara called % long loving look at the real." The real: all there is--the things of God, the people of God, God's very self. And the high purpose of all this? To be struck, surprised, stunned by the wonder of it all--from the ecstasy of Eden unspoiled, through sin's rape of the earth and earth's dwellers, to the unique love of God-in-our-flesh pinned to a cross, and our rebirth in his rising from the rock. The net effect? Ignatius's final contemplation, the acme of the Exercises: Learning to Love Like God. Here you touch the heart of Ignatius, his awareness of the ceaseless presence of Christ to our earth--now. "Consider," he counsels, "how [Christ] labors for me in all creatures.''s Not a vague, ultrapious generality. Christ behaves like a worker, a laborer, in each and every creature of his creation. How is it that the Rockies still rise in breathtaking splendor, Venus shines brighter than any star, and oil gushes from the fields of Nebraska? Because a risen Christ gives them being. Not once for all; continuously, day after day. How is it that forsythia can herald the approach of spring, corn turn into hot buttered popcorn for your theater, giant red-woods stalk the California sky? Because an imaginative Christ gives them life. How is it that your Irish setter can smell the game beyond your ken, gulls scavenge your ocean, the shad ascend the waters? Because a sensitive Christ gives them senses. How is it that you, this wondrous wedding of molecules and spirit, can shape an idea or send a skyscraper soaring, unveil mystery in a microscope or telescope, join with another--man or woman or God--in deathless oneness? Because Christ labors in you to give you intelligence and love--intelligence that mimics the mind of God, love that stems from a cross on the outskirts of Jerusalem. A thing of beauty and a joy for ever, this life of the mind. But only if the arts and sciences, if professions like law and medicine and business, that legitimately engross you open you to the still richer reality that surrounds you, invades you, transcends you, gives fresh life to the mind you treasure so rightly, the mind you The life of the mind is perilously impoverished if knowledge does not lead to wonder. March-April 1992 169 Burghardt ¯ The Exercises for Educational Ministry accept so lightly. Ignatius's Spiritual Exercises are not the only "way to go." But for openers in two senses--a beginning and an opening--as a basis, a foundation, for the life of the mind, the Spiritual Exercises are an experience difficult to exceed. Second, the Spiritual Exercises should alter your world of loving, that is, your human and religious imagination and affec-tion. Basic to this affirmation is a realization: The life of the human spirit is not circumscribed by reason, by your ability to grasp ideas, to draw conclusions from facts and premises. If your intellectual existence is simply a model of Cartesian clarity, you are limping along on one leg. What is the lamentable lacuna? Imagination. What is this strange creature we call imagination?6 To begin with, what is imagination not? It is not the same thing as fantasy. Fantasy has come to mean the grotesque, the bizarre. That is fan-tastic which is unreal, irrational, wild, unrestrained. We speak of "pure fantasy": It has no connection with reality. It is imagination run wild, on the loose, unbridled, uncontained.7 What is it, then? Imagination is the capacity we have "to make the material an image of the immaterial or spiritual.''8 It is a cre-ative power. You find it in Rembrandt's self-portraits, in Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, in the odor of a new rose or the flavor of an old wine. You find it in dramatists like Aeschylus and Shakespeare, in poets from Sappho to Gerard Manley Hopkins, in storytellers like C.S. Lewis and Stephen King. Now, when I say "capacity," I do not mean a "faculty" like intellect or will. I mean rather a posture of my whole person towards my experience.9 It is a way of seeing. It is, as with Castaneda, looking for the holes in the world or listening to the space between sounds. It is a breaking through the obvious, the surface, the superficial, to the reality beneath and beyond. It is the world of wonder and intuition, of amazement and delight, of fes-tivity and play. How does imagination come to expression? Let me focus on specifically religious imagination. I sketch five ways. 1. A vision. I mean "the emergence either in dreams, trance, or ecstasy, of a pattern of images, words, or dreamlike dramas which are experienced then, and upon later reflection, as having revelatory significance." 10 Examples? Isaiah's vision of the Lord in the temple (Is 6); Moses and Elijah appearing to Jesus and the disciples on the Mount of Transfiguration (Mt 17:1-9); Joan of Arc's "voices"; St. Margaret Mary's vision of the Sacred Heart. 170 Review for Religious 2. Ritual. The form of ritual is action--public, dramatic, pat-terned. A group enacts the presence of the sacred and partici-pates in that presence, usually through some combination of dance, chant, sacrifice, or sacrament.11 3. Story. I mean a narrative, a constellation of images, that recounts incidents or events. As Sallie TeSelle put it, "We all love a good story because of the basic nar-rative quality of human experience: in a sense any story is about ourselves, and a good story is good precisely because somehow it rings true to human life . We recognize our pilgrimage from here to there in a good story.''12 For the religious imagina-tion, three types of stories are particularly impor-tant: parable, allegory, and myth; the parables of Jesus, Lewis's "Chronicles of Narnia," and the Creation myth.13 4. The fine arts. I mean painting and poetry, sculpture and architecture, music, dancing, and dra-matic art. I mean da Vinci and John Donne, the "PietY" and Chartres, Beethoven's "Missa Solemnis," David whirling and skipping before the Ark of the Covenant, the mystery dramas of the Middle Ages. I mean films. 5. Symbol. What symbol means is not easy to say, for even within theology it does not have a univocal sense. Let me define it, with Avery Dulles, as "an externally perceived sign that works mysteriously on the human consciousness so as to suggest more than it can clearly describe or define." 14 Not every sign is a sym-bol. A mere indicator ("This way to the art museum") is not a symbol. "The symbol is a sign pregnant with a depth of meaning which is evoked rather than explicitly stated.''is It might be an artifact, a person, an event, words, a story--parable, allegory, myth. The importance of symbols, of imagination, in a university? I make three points. First, imagination is not at odds with knowl-edge; imagination is a form of cognition. In Whitehead's words, "Imagination is not to be divorced from the facts; it is a way of illuminating the facts.''16 True, it is not a process of reasoning; it is not abstract thought, conceptual analysis, rational demonstra-tion, syllogistic proof. Notre Dame of Paris is not a thesis in the-ology; Lewis's famous trilogy does not demonstrate the origin of evil; Hopkins is not analyzing God's image in us when he sings Imagination is not at odds with knowledge; imagination is a form of cognition. Marcb-April 1992 171 Burghardt ¯ The Exercises for Educational Ministry that "Christ plays in ten thousand places, / Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his / To the Father through the features of men's faces.''17 And still, imaging and imagining is a work of our intellectual nature; through it our spirit reaches the true, the beautiful, and the good. Second, imagination does not so much teach as evoke; it calls something forth from you. And so it is often ambiguous; the image can be understood in different ways. Do you remember the reporters who asked Martha Graham, "Miss Graham, what does your dance mean?" She replied: "Darlings, if I could tell you, I would not have danced it!" Something is lost when we move from imagining to thinking, from art to conceptual clarity. Not that imagination is arbitrary, that "Swan Lake" or the Infancy Narrative or "Hamlet" or the Transfiguration is whatever anyone wants to make of it, my gut feeling. Hostile to a valid imagina-tion is "the cult of imagination for itself alone; vision, phantasy, ecstasy for their own sakes; creativity, spontaneity on their own, without roots, without tradition, without discipline.''1~ Amos Wilder was right: "Inebriation is no substitute for paideia.''19 And still it is true, the image is more open-ended than the con-cept, less confining, less imprisoning. The image evokes our own imagining. Third, religion itself is a system of symbols. As sociologist Andrew Greeley saw, "religion was symbol and story long before it became theology and philosophy and., the poetry of religion was not inferior to its prose but rather anterior to it and, in terms of the whole human person, in some ways superior to it.''2° Biblical revelation is highly symbolic. Skim the Hebrew Scriptures: a burning bush, the miracles of the Exodus, the theo-phanies of Sinai, the "still small voice" heard by Elijah, the visions of the prophets and seers. Scan the New Testament: the circum-stances surrounding Jesus' conception and birth, the descent of the Spirit in the form of a dove, the transfiguration, Calvary, the res-urrection. Take key themes like the kingdom of God, its expres-sion in Jesus' proverbial sayings, in the Lord's Prayer, in the Gospel parables. The kingdom is not a clear concept with a uni-vocal significance. It is a symbol that "can represent or evoke a whole range or series of conceptions or ideas.''21 Turn from Scripture to the Catholic-Protestant problematic. Greeley's research persuades him that "the fundamental differ-ences between Catholicism and Protestantism are not doctrinal or 172 Review for Religious ethical" but "differing sets of symbols.''22 Take the central symbol: God.23 The classical literature of the Catholic tradition assumes a God who is present in the world, disclosing Himself in and through creation. The world and all its events, objects, and people tend to be somewhat like God. The Protestant classics, on the other hand, assume a God who is radically absent from the world and who discloses Herself only on rare occasions (especially in Jesus Christ and Him cruci-fied). The world and all its events, objects, and people tend to be radically different from God.24 Even more concretely, Greeley insists, their different images of God account for different religious behavior between Catholics and Protestants. In the Protestant imagination God is perceived as distant (father, judge, king, master); in the Catholic imagination God is perceived as present (mother, lover, friend, spouse).2s Another crucial example: two approaches to human society shaped by different imaginative pictures. The Catholic tends to see society as a "sacrament" of God, a set of ordered relationships, governed by both justice and love, that reveal, however imperfectly, the presence of God. Society is "natural" and "good," therefore, for humans and their natural response to God is social. The Protestant, on the other hand, tends to see human society as "God-for-saken" and therefore unnatural and oppressive. The indi-vidual stands over against society and not integrated into it. The human becomes fully human only when he is able to break away from social oppression and relate to the absent God as a completely free individual.26 A final example from Greeley's sociological research: The image that most sharply distinguishes the Catholic tradition from other Christian traditions is Mary the mother of Jesus. No one else has Madonna statues in church. MaW is essen-tial to Catholicism, not perhaps on the level of doctrine but surely on the level of imagination, because she more than any other image blatantly confirms the sacramental instinct: the whole of creation and all its processes, especially its lifegiving and life-nurturing processes, reveal the lurking and passionate love of God.27 Once again, have I been distracted from Ignatius and his Spiritual Exercises? Not really. The Exercises, for all their appeal to the Christian intelligence, are not a head trip. They are first and foremost an experience. An experience of Catholic symbols: Adam and Eve and Eden, angels and Satan, hellfire, a virgin and a crib, March-April 1992 173 Burghardt ¯ The Exercises for Educational Ministry The events of Jesus" earthly existence must be seen as a 'today." Egypt and Jerusalem, the transfiguration, bread and wine, blood and water from the side of Christ, nail marks in risen hands, an ascension into heaven. But the experience is not cold reason. Take the experience of sin's devastating impact on angels and humans, sin's ravishing of God's good earth. When you go through the Spiritual Exercises, you do not simply define sin, recall a traditional definition: any thought, word, or action against God's law. Your senses get into the act: you smell sin's stench. Even more importantly, you see sin's cost, image it, weep over it; for sin's cost is a cross, the pierced hands of a God-man. The God-man. The Exercises are a constant contemplation--contemplation of Christ. Never abstract theology, though theology informs it all. In Bethlehem's cave you are a servant; you not only listen to Mary and Joseph, you "smell the infinite flagrance and taste the infinite sweetness of the divinity.''28 You flee with that unique family into Egypt, feel what it means to be a refugee in the Middle East. In a decisive meditation you not only contrast "two standards," two scenarios for orienting your life. The standards take flesh in two persons: in a Satan who inspires "horror and terror," who makes you lust for riches, for honor, for pride; and in a living Christ who attracts you to poverty, insults, and humil-ity.: 9 It is not only Jesus who is tempted in the wilderness; you wrestle with your personal devils, sweat through the temptations that jolted Jesus: Use your powers, your gifts, your possessions just for your own fantastic self, for the sweet smell of success. Like the sinful woman, you wash our Lord's feet with your tears, feel your sins forgiven because you too have "loved much" (Lk 7:47). And so into Christ's passion, which you no longer study with scholarly detachment, comparing different traditions, reconcil-ing inconsistencies. Ignatius wants you to feel: grief and shame indeed, "because the Lord is going to his suffering for [your] sins,''3° but even, if possible, the kiss that betrayed him, the nails that held him fast. And finally, joy in the risen Christ. Not sim-ply a sense of relief; rather your whole being bursting with new life, his life, as you share his rising with his Mother, try to touch him with Magdalen, munch seafood with him and the Eleven. This is not simply your own picture show, on a level with 174 Review for Religious Kevin Costner "Dancing with !/Volves.''31 Ignatius playing with your capacity to imagine is attempting something terribly signif-icant psychologically and spiritually. This "application of the senses" goes back to a medieval tradition that reached Ignatius through a book he read while convalescing from cannon wounds back at Loyola.32 The unknown Franciscan author had written: If you wish to draw profit from these meditations., make everything that the Lord Jesus said and did present to your-self, just as though you were hearing it with your ears and seeing it with your eyes . And even when it is related in the past tense you should contemplate it all as though pres-ent today. VChy is this highly significant for an intelligent spirituality? Because you are no longer looking at the life of Christ sheerly as history, something that took place in the past. The events of Jesus' earthly existence must be seen as a "today," the historical hap-penings drawn into your own world here and now. That is how you achieve not abstract knowledge but what the medievals called "familiarity with Christ," an understanding that takes hold not only of discursive reasoning but of the whole person. Imagination leads to love--a direct experience of love. Ignatius films in living color what Aquinas phrased in attractive abstraction: There are two ways of desiring knowledge. One way is to desire it as a perfection of one's self; and that is the way philosophers desire it. The other way is to desire it not [merely] as a perfection of one's self but because through this knowledge the one we love becomes present to us; and that is the way saints desire it.34 Third, the Spiritual Exercises should alter your world of liv-ing, that is, the life of social realities. Here three facets call for clarification: social realities, the Exercises, and you. What do I mean by social realities? I mean the life of a soci-ety, the life that moves beyond the individual in isolation to com-munity, people interacting, impacting one on another, human persons depending on one another. How do the Spiritual Exercises touch social realities? After all, did not Ignatius himself describe the Exercises as "every way of preparing and disposing" ourselves to remove "all disordered attachments and, after their removal, of seeking and finding God's will in the way we direct our lives"?3s This sounds rather indi-vidualistic, does it not? Or, at best, quite vague. March-April 1992 175 Burghardt ¯ The Exercises for Educational Ministry I am aware that in 1975 the 32nd General Congregation of Jesuits declared, "The mission of the Society of Jesus today is the service of faith, of which the promotion of justice is an absolute requirement.''36 And it went on to assert a bit later: Every sector of our educational works should be subjected to constant review, so that they will not only continue to form young people and adults able and willing to build a more just social order, but do so ever more effectively. Especially should we help form our Christian students as "men [and women]-for-others" in a mature faith and in per-sonal attachment to Jesus Christ, persons whose lively faith impels them to seek and find Christ in the service of their fellow men [and women]. Thus we shall contribute to form-ing persons who will themselves multiply the work of world-wide education.-~7 But our specific question remains: Granted that our colleges should prepare women and men to construct a more just social order, how do the Spiritual Exercises lay a foundation for the social-justice component of Jesuit education? Almost a half century ago, a young Jesuit who had not yet taken his final vows in the Society was asked by his provincial to direct the annual eight-day retreat for the Jesuit theology stu-dents at Alma in California. In the course of the retreat, director Father George H. Dunne reflected on a number of social issues. Dealing with the Sermon on the Mount, for example, and the two great commandments, he "talked about poverty, peace, war, not in the abstract but in the concrete." He "talked about anti- Semitism, Hitler's holocaust, racial segregation, the rat-infested tenements in New York, the exploitation of migrant farm work-ers, the Spanish Civil War, the anguish of the world's poor . -38 Not long after, he received a letter from the representative of the Jesuit superior general for the American provinces during World War II. Father Zacheus J. Maher charged Father Dunne with substituting for the Spiritual Exercises a series of "brilliant talks on social subjects." "Such subjects," he declared, "have no place in the Spiritual Exercises.''> Let us make an admission: Our neighbor, the wider society, is not explicit in the text of the Exercises.4° Not surprising; for the Exercises "are addressed to individuals, and they seek to enable a person to have the interior freedom to serve God . -41 But if you delve more deeply, you discover how profoundly social, societal, the Exercises are. 176 Review for Religious You see, the Ignatian meditations point you ceaselessly to Christ, to the Christ of the Gospels, in that way to absorb the mind of Christ. And so you focus on the programmatic scene in Nazareth's synagogue, where Jesus makes his own the announce-ment in Isaiah: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me. He has sent me to preach good news to the poor, to proclaim release for pris-oners and sight for the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, and to proclaim the Lord's year of favor" (Lk 4:1 8-1 9).42 Through the Exercises that program ceases to be pecu-liarly Jesus'; it becomes your own. What Second Isaiah announced to the people of his day Jesus announces to the poor and impris-oned, the blind and deprived of his day. And this is what Christians in the mold of Ignatius announce to the downtrodden of their day. With Ignatius in the final Contemplation for Learning to Love Like God, you ponder profoundly how Christ "labors for [you] in all creatures on the face of the earth, that is, he behaves like one who labors. In the heav-ens, the elements, the plants, the fruits, the cattle, [man and woman], he gives being, conserves them in existence, confers life and sensation, and so on.''43 And you ask to labor with Christ as he ceaselessly creates, recreates, redeems a fallen world. Last Easter a Catholic professor of history ended his regular column in a diocesan newspaper with two puzzling sentences: "When Jesus rose from the dead, he did not go about lecturing on the social problems of his day. Instead he manifested himself in glory to his disciples in a manner that empowered them to go forth as his courageous emissaries.''44 But neither did the risen Jesus go about celebrating the Eucharist and fingering his rosary. And what did he empower them to go forth to do? To baptize indeed; to preach what he preached. But did he not preach loving your sisters and brothers as Jesus loved you? Does such loving have nothing to do with war on the womb or war in the Middle East? Nothing to do with inhuman poverty or child abuse? Nothing to do with racism or the rape of the earth? What you should experience through the Exercises is that by God's design and initiative human existence is fundamentally social, societal:4s we are "we" before we are "I" and "thou." This By God's design and initiative human existence is fundamentally social, societal. March-April 1992 177 Burghardt ¯ The Exercises for Educational Ministry is central in Christian revelation and of primary importance for our contemporary culture of individualism, where we think first of self and then how we can join with others in community--as though community did not precede the individual genetically, psychically, socially, and spiritually.46 Even Catholic social teach-ing frequently fails to position this fact front and center, because it lays down as primary in its social ethics the "dignity of the human person, who is made to the image of God." From there the teaching argues to the God-invested rights of the individual which other individuals and institutions must respect. This misses the point of the Genesis story (on which it is often based) that the "Adam" who is given such dignity is not an individual but "the hmnan," our whole race in personification.47 How does all this touch us? Very simply, a university or col-lege ought to be not only the seedbed of learning and imagination; it should be the boot camp of our societal existence. The Jesuit educational ideal is not the intellectual mole who lives almost entirely underground, surfaces occasionally for fresh air and a Big Mac, burrows back down to the earthworms before people can distract him. No. A college is where young men and women who may one day profoundly influence America's way of life touch, some for the first time, the ruptures that sever us from our earth, from our sisters and brothers, from our very selves. Not simply in an antiseptic classroom, for all its high importance for under-standing. Even more importantly, experience of rupture: experi-ence not only of ecology but of an earth irreparably ravaged, not only abstract poverty but the stomach-bloated poor, not only the words "child abuse" but the vacant stare of the child abused, not only a book on racism but the hopelessness or hatred in human hearts. To yearn for such experience, I know no better introduc-tion than experiencing the Christ of the Spiritual Exercises, the conversion consequent on seeing Christ more clearly, loving him more dearly. Can you get a 4.0, be learned, a scholar, without such a con-version? Undoubtedly. Can you make megabucks in business or law, in medicine or government without such a conversion? Undoubtedly. Can you marry well, raise two and a half children, treat them to an Ivy school education without such a conversion? Undoubtedly. Can you be deliriously happy without such a con-version? Undoubtedly. Can you live an integrated human and Christian existence without such a conversion? I doubt it. 178 Review for Religious Notes i Spiritual Exercises 1; translation partially mine. 2 Reference to a type of dancing currently in high favor with the young and involving amazing hyperactivity. 3 Thomas B. Edsall, "GOP Battler Lee Atwater Dies at 40," Washington Post, 30 March 1991, 1 and 7. 4 Second Vatican Council, Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, no. 59. s Spiritual Exercises 236. For Christ as the "creator and Lord" of this contemplation, see Hugo Rahner SJ, Ignatius the Theologian (New York: Herder and Herder, 1968 / San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1991), p. 134. 6 Here I am drawing largely, but not entirely, on material in nay book Preaching: The Art and the Craft (New York/Mahwah: Paulist, 1987), pp. 19-25. 7 I am aware that fantasy does not have to mean the bizarre; I am speaking of a com~non current usage. The development was concisely expressed in l/Vebster's New International Dictionary of the English Language (2nd ed. unabridged; Springfield, Mass.: Merriam, 1958), p. 918: "From the conception of fantasy as the faculty of mentally reproducing sensible objects, the meaning appears to have developed into: first, false or delu-sive mental creation; and second, any senselike representation in the mind, equivalent to the less strict use of imagination and fancy. Later fan-tasy acquired, also, a somewhat distinctive usage, taking over the sense of whimsical, grotesque, or bizarre image making. This latter sense, however, did not attach itself to the variant phantasy, which is used for visionary or phantasmic imagination." See also Urban T. Hohnes III, Ministry and Imagination (New York: Seabury, 1976), pp. 100-103. ~ Holmes, ibid, pp. 97-98. Here Holmes is a&nittedly borrowing from Owen Barfield, Saving the Appearances: A Study in Idolatry (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, n.d.). 9 See Holmes, ibid, p. 88. 10 Theodore W. Jennings Jr., Introduction to Theology: An Invitation to Reflection upon the Christian Mythos (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1976), p. 49. 1~ See ibid, p. 52. 12 Sallie M. TeSelle, cited by Holmes, Ministry and Imagination, p. 166, from the Journal of the American Academy of Religion 42 (1974): 635. ~3 Lest the reader be unduly disturbed, myth is not opposed to fact or to fancy. Its raw material tnay he fact or it may be fancy; in either case it intends "to narrate the fundamental structure of human being in the world. By the concreteness of its imagery, the universality of its intention, its narrative or stoW form, the myth evokes the identification and par-ticipation of those for whom it functions as revelatory" (Jennings, Introduction to Theology, pp. 51-52). ~4 Avery Dulles SJ, "The Symbolic Structure of Revelation," March-April 1992 179 Burghardt ¯ The Exercises for Educational Ministry Theological Studies 41 (1980): 55-56. Dulles studies the five dominant approaches to revelation: the propositional, historical, mystical, dialecti-cal, and symbolic--with greatest stress on the symbolic. He asks how in each theory revelation is mediated and what kind of truth it has. He con-cludes that in Christ the five aspects coalesce in a kind of unity, but insists that the first four are reconciled and held in unity through the symbolic facet. ~s Ibid, p. 56. 16 A. N. Whitehead, The Aims of Education and Other Essays (New York: Macmillan, 1929), p. 139. 17 Gerard Manley Hopkins, "As kingfishers catch fire. ," Poem 57 in W. H. Gardner and N.H. Mackenzie, eds., The Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins (London: Oxford University, 1970), p. 90. ~ Amos Niven Wilder, Theopoetic: Theology and the Religious Imagination (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1976), p. 57. ~') Ibid, p. 67. ~,0 Andrew M. Greeley, The Catholic Myth: The Behavior and Beliefs of American Catholics (New York: Scribner's, 1990), p. 37. 21 Norman Perrin, Jesus and the Language of the Kingdom (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1976), p. 33. ~2 Greeley, The Catholic ~Vlyth, p. 44. 23 Here Greeley (p. 45) admits his dependence on David Tracy's The Analogical Imagination (New York: Crossroad, 1981). 24 Greeley, The C)ttholic Myth, p. 45. ~5 See ibid, p. 55. 26 Ibid, p. 45. Hcre, too, Greeley is indebted to David Tracy. Note Greeley's warning to his readers that the word "tend" is "used advisedly. Zero-sum relationships do not exist in the world of the preconscious" (ibid). -,7 Ibid, p. 253. See p. 254: "I argue., that the obvious functional role of Mary the mother of Jesus in the Catholic tradition is to reflect the mother love of God." For detailed presentation of the origins and func-tion of the Mary symbol, see Greeley's The Mary Myth (New York: Seabury, 1977). 2~ Spiritual Exercises 124; text from Louis J. Puhl sJ, The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius (Chicago: Loyola University, 195 I), p. 55. 29 Spiritual Exercises 140, 146 (Puhl, pp. 60, 62). 30 Spiritual Exercises 193 (Puhl, p. 81). 31 A current fihn that made off with a number of Academy awards. 3~ The book was Meditationes vitae Christi, long attributed to St. Bonaventure but actually composed by an unknown Franciscan of the fourteenth century; see Rahner, Ignatius the Theologian (n. 5 above), pp. 192-193. Quoted from Rahner, ibid, p. 193. 180 Review for Religious 34 1 have not been able as yet to document this text. 3s Spiritual Exercises 1 ; translation partially mine. 36 Documents of the Thirty-second General Congregatio,z of the Society of Jesus, 2 December 1974--7 March 1975 I, 4 (Washington, D.C.: Jesuit Conference, [1975]), p. 17. 37 Ibid, I, 4, pp. 35-36. 38 King's Pawn: The Memoirs of George H. Dunue, s.J. (Chicago: Loyola University, 1990), p. 70. 39 Ibid, pp. 69, 70. q0 See useful material in Dean Brackley SJ, "Downward Mobility: Social Implications of St. Ignatius's Two Standards," Studies in the Spirituality of Jesuits 20, no. 4 (January 1988): 53; also in Thomas E. Clark SJ, "Ignatian Spirituality and Societal Consciousness," ibid, 7, no. 4 (September 1975): 127-150. 4~ Brackley, "Downward Mobility," p. 12. 42 On this episode see Joseph A. Fitzmyer SJ, The Gospel according to Luke (I-IX) (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1981), p. 529: "Luke had deliberately put this story [4:16-30] at the beginning of the public min-istry to encapsulate the entire ministry of Jesus and the reaction to it." 43 Spiritual Exercises 236; translation partially mine. 44james Hitchcock in St. Louis Review, 29 March 1991, p. 11. 4s See Clarke (n. 40 above), pp. 128-129, for the advantages of the adjective "societal" over "social" in reference to apostolate and ministry. "Social" efforts "seek immediately and personally to alleviate the misery of those individuals who are deprived." "Societal" activity "concerns itself immediately with the healing and transformation of those human struc-tures, institutions, processes, and environments which draw persons into misery or make it difficult for them to emerge from it." 46 See Matthew Lamb, "The Social and Political Dimensions of Lonergan's Theology," in Vernon Gregson, ed., The Desires of the Human Heart (New York/Mahwah: Paulist, 1988), p. 270. 471 owe this paragraph to notes of James L. Connor sJ, director of the Woodstock Theological Center, Washington, D.C., prepared for the inau-gural retreat of my project Preaching the Just Word, an effort to move the preaching of social-justice issues more effectively into the Catholic pul-pits of the United States. March-April 1992 181 MELANNIE SVOBODA Going the Distance, Sustaining the Gift an one of her newspaper columns, Ellen Goodman describes pheno~nenon called "compassion fatigue." This occurs when people who are normally sensitive and generous get "tired of caring." Most Americans, Goodman maintains, are very caring in emergencies. She writes: "We are great at performing the one-night stands for causes. Christmas dinner for the poor, collec-tions for victims of fire or flood or famine." But if the emergency situation becomes chronic, many of us find it difficult to sustain our initial level of concern. When compassion fatigue sets in, says Goodman, "A gift can begin to feel like an obligation, generosity can turn into resentment, and sympathy can turn hard." I think Goodman's article has definite implications for those of us involved in ministry in the church. Let us face it: most of us are in ministry not for a one-night stand. We are in it for years, maybe even for life. The problems we deal with every day--igno-rance, poverty, injustice, sickness, violence--will not go away overnight--or even in a matter of a few years. So the question we have to ask ourselves is: How do we keep our compassion alive over the long haul? How do we fan the flame of enthusiasm for a lifetime of service in the church? Before I suggest some ways of doing this, I would like to say a few words about why. For everything I say is based on the premise Melannie Svoboda SND, with whom our readers are well acquainted, resides at Notre Dame Academy; Route One, Box 197; Middleburg, Virginia 22117. 182 Review for Religious that coinpassion and enthusiasm are essential for ministry in the church. Without them, ministry is at best a mere show and at worst a perversion of the very Gospel we claim to proclaim. To illustrate this fact, I tried to come up with an image of ministry as compassionate, generous, and enthusiastic--and not something performed out of a sense of obligation and even with resentment. The image I came up with may appear an unlikely one: feeding chickens! But let me explain. Feeding Chickens I was born and raised on a small goose farm in Willoughby Hills, Ohio. That rural "initial formation" continues to influence my outlook on life. On our farm we had hundreds of white Emden geese. It was my father and brothers who had the job of feeding them. But we also had a couple dozen chickens, and the task of feeding them usually fell to my mother, my sister, or me. Now what is the connection between feeding chickens and ministering in today's church? Simple. The way I see it, there are three essential elements to proper chicken feeding (and, I might add, to proper church ministry). First, there is the feed itself--the corn, the mash, whatever. The feed is the gift we bring to the chickens. More than that, it is their source of nourishment, of life itself. Without too much of a stretch of the imagination, we can say that the chicken feed is the "good news" we bring each day to our chickens. The second element of chicken feeding involves calling the chickens. We have to get their attention, alert them to the feed we have for them. But a good chicken feeder goes beyond merely calling the chickens. He or she establishes a relationship with them. The feeder talks to the chickens, even thanking them for the fine eggs they have been laying. For a good chicken feeder (like a good church minister) is always aware of being a receiver as well as a giver. The third element of chicken feeding (and of ministry) is the actual broadcasting of the feed. How does an experienced chicken feeder broadcast the feed? Eagerly, generously, unsparingly. Now that is an image of ministry at its best, ministry with compassion and enthusiasm. Ministry at its worst would be the person who sets out to feed the chickens grumbling and mum-bling the whole way to the chicken coop. "I have got to feed those March-April 1992 183 Svoboda ¯ Going the Distance stupid chickens--again. I just fed them yesterday. They're never satisfied. All they do is eat, eat, eat. What good are they, any-way?" Such a feeder might not even call the chickens, thinking: "If I don't call them, maybe they won't come, and then I won't have to feed them." But, of course, the chickens do come, called or uncalled. And how does this kind of feeder broadcast the feed? Perhaps sparingly: "A kernel for you, a kernel for you . " Or angrily, throwing handfuls of feed down on the ground in dis-gust. Or hastily, dumping the whole pail of feed in one spot, just to get the job over with. That is an image of ministry when compassion fatigue has set in. I maintain that ministering in such a way is a contradiction of the Gospel. For we are called to proclaim the good news, not the "ho-hum" news, not the "halfway decent" news. We are called to love the people to whom we minister, not "put up with" them or view them as a nuisance. If we can no longer minister with gen-uine compassion or with vibrant enthusiasm, then maybe we should not be ministering. Years ago I had a Scripture teacher who made this point very clear. He said that on a given day we might wake up crabby, dis-couraged, depressed, mad at the whole world and every human being in it. On such a morning, maybe we should call the office, the school, or the parish and say in all honesty and humility, "I won't be in. I cannot in conscience represent the Gospel today." The suggestion, though perhaps a little extreme, does make a salient point: an anti-sign to the Gospel is probably worse than no sign at all. In other words, if our words, attitude, and whole bear-ing contradict the Good News we represent, then maybe we should not be representing it. Compassion and enthusiasm are requisites for effective min-istry. What, then, are some ways we can "go the distance" and "sustain our gift" of ministering? There are, no doubt, many ways. Here, I suggest four. Retaining the Big Picture The first way is to retain the big picture. Sometimes we lose enthusiasm for our ministry because our perspective becomes too narrow, our vision myopic. We lose sight of the big picture and get enmeshed in the near at hand, the petty, the nitty-gritty. In his book The Art of Choosing, Carlos ~Galles SJ reminds us how impor- 184 Review for Reli~4ous rant it is in life to have a sense of direction. He describes "a lovely little habit" that Ignatius had of stopping himself physically in the middle of a hall and asking himself, "Where am I going? And what for?" That habit was one way Ignatius had of connecting a seemingly insignificant action--going to the dining room to eat, heading for chapel to pray, or walking down the hall to a meet-ing-- with the bigger picture of ministering to God's people. The practice is a good one: regularly and consciously to make ourselves see our daily small actions as part of a greater whole. Recently I watched an artist painting a large mural of a sunrise. I noticed how frequently she stepped back from her work to gain a broader perspective. Then she would step forward, add a few more strokes with the paint roller, and step back again for another look. We must do the same thing in our ministry. Sometimes God seems to provide us with opportunities to do this: after a suc-cessful activity, after an apparent failure, at the time of a transfer or change in ministry, or during a serious illness. But we can also do this more regularly: during an annual retreat or a monthly day of recollection, in the morning before we begin our day, or in the evening before we crawl (or fall) into bed. The habit of ask-ing "Where am I going (or where have I been today) and what for?" will put us in touch with the real zvhat and v:hatfor of our ministry, thus enabling us to catch at least a glimpse of how our "daily chores" fit into the big picture of God's grand design. Seeing Babies A second way of retaining our compassion and enthusiasm I call: seeing babies and not diapers. A priest told me once that a young mother came to him very discouraged and worn out. "I'm sick and tired of changing diapers," she cried. The priest thought for a moment and then gently suggested, "Next time don't change the diaper. Change the baby." He was not being "celibately sar-castic." He was pointing out to her a lesson in perspective. We have to see the tasks we do in relation to the individual human beings for whom we do them. During a retreat another priest told this true stoW. A teenage boy was seriously injured in a car accident. When the parish priest was notified, he immediately went to the hospital to see the boy. When the priest walked in, the boy said, "Father, if you've come here for God's sake, then for God's sake, get out! But if you have March-April 1992 185 Svoboda ¯ Going the Distance come here because you think I am worth it, then please stay." The priest stayed. Maybe for too long we overemphasized "All for the greater honor and glory of God." That phrase certainly encapsulates a marvelous truth, but, like most truths, even that one needs another truth to balance it. In our ministry we do not bypass the human beings we serve. We do not overlook them. We do not use them to win God's favor. We must remember, we minister not to parishes, schools, hospitals, or dioceses. We minister to individ-ual human beings--to Vera, Frank, Carlos, Heather--and each of them is worth it. Getting Support A third way we sustain our gift of ministry is: We get sup-port. The venerable tradition of rugged individualism that helped found this great nation will not "cut it" in ministry. The truth is, we cannot "go it alone." Fortunately, our contemporary times, with its emphasis on support groups, reminds us of this truth. I came to appreciate the importance of support groups when I became a flee-lance writer. Before that I had been a full-time high school teacher for many years. As a teacher I had a built-in support group: the other teachers on the faculty. But when I seri-ously began to write as part of my ministry, I suddenly felt terri-bly isolated and alone. It became difficult for me to sit in front of my typewriter (and later tny computer) for two or three hours a day and write, for I would recall working for hours on a piece only to have it fizzle into nothingness. Or I would send out arti-cles and stories enthusiastically only to have them lost, mutilated, or rejected. Finally I knew I needed support in my ministry--and more than the occasional acceptance letter offers. So I attended some writers' conferences and hooked up with a few other people who write for publication. I rely on these friends for the under-standing and encouragement that only a fellow writer can give. In his book The Four Loves, C.S. Lewis writes beautifully about the origin of a friendship. He says a friendship originates when two people, often engaged in a common task, disclose some-thing of their inner selves to each other. They turn to each other in amazement and say, "You, too?" We in church ministry need to experience that "you-too?-ness" with others who are engaged in the same or similar ministry. 186 Review for Religious Being More than a Minister A fourth way we can go the distance in our ministry is to be more than a minister. We probably all agree that we are more than we do, and that we are far more valuable than what we pro-duce. But an effective minister does more than give intellectual assent to that truth. He or she makes decisions based on it. He or she takes time to be more than a minister, knowing how pathetic it is if a minister's identity is restricted to a particular job or title. There is always a danger of turning even church work into an end in itself. Workaholism is alive and well in most business organizations and (we have to admit with sadness) also in our church. The problem is, workaholism, though a real addiction, looks a lot like dedication. If a minister in the church is addicted to alcohol or gambling or food or sex, chances are someone (or someones) sooner or later will intervene to help that person. But if a minister is addicted to work~staying up all hours of the night, never taking time for a break or vacation, never socializing with people in a nonwork setting--we sometimes let him or her go on. Or even worse, we praise that person, thus encouraging the addiction. In this regard, we should recall that the primary biblical image of heaven is not an office, not a school, not a parish. It is a party, a banquet. If all we do our whole life is work, work, work, chances are we are going to feel extremely out of place in heaven. We will not know what to do, how to let go, how to have fun. No, we ministers should learn how to be party people while we are still here on earth--even as we minister. We work hard, yes, knowing full well that our ministry cannot always be restricted to certain office hours. But we also know how to get away, how to enjoy people and have fun. The Cross, the Cost So far we have looked at four ways to help prevent compas-sion fatigue in our ministry. But there is one more word I wish to say about compassion fatigue: sometimes it is the cross we bear, the cost we pay. Our fatigue is not always a sign that we are doing something wrong. Sometimes it is a sign that we are doing some-thing right. Our periodic fatigue and occasional discouragement put us in touch with our limits. And experiencing our limits is vital to effective ministry. Otherwise we run the risk of living in March-April 1992 187 Svoboda ¯ Going the Distance illusion, of beginning to think that we are responsible for the good we do or that we are the "good news" we proclaim--and not Jesus. Our ministry, in order to be authentic, must cost us some-thing-- in time, in energy, in love. I am reminded of that seem-ingly insignificant incident in the story of David at the end of the second book of Samuel. David, nearing the end of his life, goes to a man named Araunah and asks to buy his threshing place in order to build an altar there for the Lord. Araunah tells David, "Take it, Your Majesty." And he offers to give several oxen, too, all free of charge. But David refuses to accept Araunah's gifts. He insists on paying for everything, saying, "I will not offer the Lord my God sacrifices that have cost me nothing." At times we all get weary in our ministry. Our fatigue, loneliness, or discouragement are part of the cost of our love and service of others, part of the sacrifice we make regularly to God for the privilege of serving in the church. The Ministry of Jesus How does all of this relate to the person of Jesus? How did he remain loving and alive throughout his ministry? First of all, Jesus had the big picture. He possessed an amazingly expansive view of reality. He looked at a crude fisherman and saw a great leader. He observed the birds in the air and comprehended God's provident care. He beheld a sinful woman and recognized her as a woman who loved much. Jesus was always ready to adjust his perspective, to align it ever more closely with that of the Father. Nowhere is that more clearly seen than in Gethsemane. Jesus' initial reaction to his impending crucifixion was "Please let this pass!" But by let-ting go of his limited perspective, he could say, "Your will be done"; in other words, "I embrace your point of view." Jesus saw babies and not diapers. That is, he focused on indi-vidual people and not on the immense task he had to perform. The Gospels show Jesus speaking to large crowds, of course, but more often they show him relating to individuals: the twelve apos-tles, the man with a withered hand, a centurion, a demoniac, Simon's mother-in-law, a particular deaf man, a grieving widow, an epileptic, Jairus, Nicodemus, Mary and Martha, and so forth. The clear impression is that Jesus ministered to individuals. Even more important, individuals were his legacy. Jesus did not leave 188 Review for Relig4ous behind a spiral notebook on how to run a church. He did not write a curriculum nor even one encyclical. Instead, he left behind people--individuals--whose lives he touched and radically altered. Maybe we have to ask ourselves: How do we measure the effectiveness of our ministry? By the number of reports we fill out? By the neatness of our office? By the thick-ness of our files? Or by the individuals we have ministered to and with--and those we have allowed to minister to us? Jesus liked support groups. In fact, he even started one: the apostles. He also went outside that group for the kind of support that those dozen men could not give him. He seemed to need and appreciate the feminine encouragement of a Mary and a Martha, the unique devotion of a Mary Magdalene. The Gospels show Jesus enioying people. He was not always preaching or teaching or giving workshops. He was relaxing in the company of his friends and colleagues. Even in his darkest hour in Gethsemane, he did not "go it alone." He took part of his support group with him: Peter, James, and John. They disappointed him, yes, as people sometimes disappoint us, too. But Jesus understood their weakness and forgave them, knowing his ultimate support group was the Father and the Spirit. Lastly, Jesus was more than a minister, much more. Van Gogh supposedly said, "If you want to know God, love many things." One reason Jesus was so close to God was because he loved so many things, so many varied aspects of life. Jesus was perhaps a carpenter. What can we deduce from that simple fact? He had a "good eye," a highly developed aesthetic sense. He had a steady hand and knew and appreciated wood. Jesus was a storyteller, too, and a fine one. His "Good Samaritan" and "Prodigal Son" are masterpieces. 0nly a person in touch with the core of life could have spun such magnificent yarns. Jesus was well acquainted with other components of life: bread baking, barbecuing, wine making, and farming, to name but a few. He was keenly aware of the political situation of his times. He was in touch with the prejudices of his day as well as the hopes and dreams of his people. He was something of a naturalist, too, sen-sitive to the changing seasons and to the flora and fauna of his Our ministry, in order to be authentic, must cost us something.- in time, in energy, in love. March-April 1992 189 Svoboda ¯ Going the Distance immediate environment. Little wonder Jesus was so effective as a minister--for he was so much more than one. He was a person fascinated by life, and thus he became a source of fascination--and salvation--for others. Yes, Van Gogh said it: "If you want to know God, love many things." But Jesus lived it, leaving an example for all of us who would follow in his footsteps: "If you want to minister, love many things!" The Long-Distance Runner When I taught high school in Raleigh, North Carolina, in the late 70s, I had a senior girl who was a top-ranking long-dis-tance runner. Julie taught me that there is a world of difference between the sprinter and the long-distance runner. The training and techinques are vastly different. The sprinter's goal is near, often clearly visible. He or she relies on a quick burst of energy to reach that goal within a matter of seconds. Because the dis-tance is so short, the sprinter runs side by side, neck and neck, with other runners who provide an impetus for the sprinter to run hard and fast. Not so with the long-distance runner. This runner's goal is miles away, not even visible. He or she must take steps all along the way to conserve energy for the long haul. Pacing becoInes critical. Although the runners in a marathon start out together, toward the end of the race they often find themselves running alone and forced to rely on deep inner resources and not the near-ness of fellow runners to keep them going to the end. The image of the long-distance runner is an appropriate one for those of us engaged in ministry. For most of us are in ministry for the long haul. We do not want our loving service to deterio-rate into a stoic sense of duty, but to remain a joyful gift. We do not want resentment to contaminate our pool of selfless giving. Instead we want our generosity to be alive and well, our com-passion tender and strong. And we wish to carry our enthusiasm for the Good News all the way to the finish line. Thank God, we do not run alone: God, our God, goes with us--the whole distance. 190 Review for Religious HALBERT WEIDNER Newman's Living the Oratory Charism As the biographical approach to writers and thinkers pro-liferates, so does the controversy over its historical worth. I am taking a biographical approach to John Henry Newman with some trepidation because of the length of his life, his great contributions to thought, and the complexities of the issues. Still I am encouraged in the enterprise by Newman him-self, who insisted on the validity of personal influence in the pur-suit of truth) I intend in this essay first to introduce readers to the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, which Newman brought to England, and then to discuss the Oratory as important for understanding certain values in Newman's life. Newman arrived at these values and maintained them at some personal cost. That cost represents for this author, another Oratorian, the personal drama of grace and conversion of a founding father among English-speaking Oratories. The Nature of an Oratory of St. Philip Neri The first thing that should be said about an Oratory is what it is not. It is not a religious order. There are no vows, no oaths, no promises of any kind public or private. There is no Rule. You will see a Rule mentioned in the time of Newman, but actually what you have are constitutions representing the practice of the Roman house in the latter part of the sixteenth century.2 Philip Neri was a reluctant founder who refused to write a Rule or con-stitutions. Halbert Weidner CO sends these reflections from the Spiritual Life Center; 2717 Pamoa Road; Honolulu, Hawaii 96822. March-April 1992 191 This irregular founder lived from 1515 until 1595, coming to Rome as a young Florentine in 1533. He was not ordained until he was thirty-six years old. He had been a student, a hermit and mystic, and a member of a reforming confraternity which served sick pilgrims, that is, the poor who became ill while visit-ing Rome. He lived in a set of apartments with other priests as part of a complex named San Girolamo della Carit~. It was in a prayer room at this church that the crowd who could no longer fit into Philip's rooms began to gather daily at the siesta hour for prayer. It was this afternoon gathering of laity which was the first Oratory.3 Perhaps the best description of St. Philip's intent is given by Newman himself in The Idea of a University: He [Philip Neri] was raised up to do a work ahnost peculiar in the church--not to be a Jerome Savonarola, though Philip had a true devotion towards him and a tender mem-ory of his Florentine house; not to be a St. Charles, though in his beaming countenance Philip had recognized the aure-ole of a saint; not to be a St. Ignatius, wrestling with the foe, though Philip was termed the Society~ bell of call, so many subjects did he send to it; not to be a St. Francis Xavier, though Philip had longed to shed his blood for Christ in India with him; not to be a St. Caietan, or hunter of souls, for Philip preferred, as he expressed it, tranquilly to cast in his net to gain them; he preferred to yield to the stream, and direct the current, which he could not stop, of science, literature, art, and fashion, and to sweeten and to sanctify what God had made very good and man had spoilt.4 Those who gathered around Philip found a mystic, a reformer, and a humanist, but they did not find him in a cloister or in any religious order. They found him in his rooms with the doors wide open to the public and surrounded by laity. This is why the Oratory is first and foremost secular. It was this laity that formed the original gathering for prayer in a place of prayer (that is, an oratory) and these same laypersons who preached, led prayers, sang in the vernacular, and studied together each afternoon under Philip's guidance. The Congregation of the Oratory is a secondary group of secular priests and laity which gathered around Philip as the Oratory became less of a movement and more of an institu-tion. But before this, Philip carried on the ministry of prayer and reflection from 1551 until 1575, more or less activating the laity as the leaders. It was in 1575 that a secondary group of priests and brothers had gathered sufficiently to be formally organized 192 Review for Religious with papal approval. But this Congregation was without any con-stitutions and was still primarily organized for the initial group of laity,s Constitutions for the Congregation were not finished until 1612, seventeen years after Philip's death. Later the institution of the congregation became more clericalized as not only the pri-mary group of laity disappeared, but even the brothers were no longer accepted, leaving a congregation of secular priests who lived together in community. While the Oratory is unique within Roman Catholicism, its values represent a mind-set present among many reformers of the early sixteenth century. This reforming spirit is symbolized by the values St. Jerome came to represent within a church loaded down with religious orders heavy on structure and low in spirit. Erasmus had noted that, in the days of St. Jerome, "the profession of a monk consisted in no more than the practice of the original, free, purely Christian life.''6 The summary of Erasmus's thinking about the ideal religious given us in Eugene Rice's St. Jerome in the Renaissance could also be a description of the spirit animating the early Oratory of St. Philip: Monks then were men who wished only to live with willing friends in liberty of spirit close to the teachings of the Gospel. Their lives were sweetly leisured. No ceremonies or man-made regulations fettered them. No single dress was prescribed. No deference was paid to total abstinence. They studied, they fasted, and sang psalms as the spirit moved them. They took no vows.7 This being said, we can note some positive elements in the Congregation of the Oratory: A. It is a center of prayer by nature. The classical form that this prayer takes dates back to the more intimate group that gath-ered in the evening around Philip. This amounts to about a half hour of silent prayer or meditation concluded with vocal prayers. The two-hour prayer sessions led by and for the laity at the time of St. Philip have been the casualty of time. Likewise the primary group of laity called the Oratory has also passed away except for a remnant often called "the Little Oratory." This name is quite ironic since what has become "little" was in fact the biggest and the first of the founder's works, not to say the very reason behind it all. Except for a directive to somehow maintain the secular or "Little Oratory," the ministry of the Congregation is otherwise unspecified and unspecialized. Each house tends to the work at 21/larch-April992 193 The life of an Oratory is said to be built on a deep regard for "well-known faces.' hand, and assignments tend to reflect the talents of the members. Philip Neri was against centralization and so put on its own every house that wished to follow on his general pattern. He believed that duplication was impossible and that each situation called for its own approach. B. Face-to-face association is essential to the Oratory. In a phrase going back to the community's origins, the life of an Oratory is said to be built on a deep regard for "well-known faces.''8 There were no fears to be engendered in an Oratory over friendships, and such a pol-icy militated against large sizes and the anomaly of "communities" of religious who have to resort to books with mem-bers' pictures for help in identification. C. Relative permanence is an ideal even though there are no vows or any-thing else holding a person to an Oratory. Perseverance is a fundamental aspect of the house spirituality and is often prayed for aloud at community prayer. Note that members cannot be transferred from one house to another and that, if they leave a house to go voluntarily to another that has freely accepted them, they must usually transfer membership as well. This means that problems with and among members must be worked out within the house since, obviously, transference cannot be the solution. Dismissal from a house is a rare and difficult pro-cedure. D. Small numbers, then, are the consequence of Oratorian living. The Constitutions of the Congregation go so far as to say that the power of an Oratory resides in such a small membership. Large numbers would weaken a house, which is supposed to be built on interpersonal relationships. When Newman wrote The Present Position of Catholics in England, he was addressing the men of the secular or Little Oratory. Towards the end, he applies this Oratorian principle of strength despite small numbers when he tells them: Your strength lies in your God and your conscience; there-fore it lies not in your number. It lies not in your number any more than in intrigue, or combination, or worldly wisdom. God saves whether by many or by few; you are to aim at 194 Review for Religious showing forth His light, at diffusing "the sweet odor of His knowledge in every place": numbers would not secure this. On the contrary, the more you grew, the more you might be thrown back into yourselves, by the increased animosity and jealousy of your enemies. You are enabled in some mea-sure to mix with them while you are few; you might be thrown back upon yourselves, when you became many? The Oratory, then, exists to embody the ideal of koinonia, liv-ing together as a fruit of the Holy Spirit and a sign of God's rule. The Oratory is very conscious that only the Spirit can keep it together faithful to the charism and that a life of prayer and open-ness is the only way to persevere with any kind of fruitfulness. Community in this context is not a utility, but an end, the pres-ence of each person's final destiny in the communion of saints somehow present now. E. The Oratory is collegial to a unique degree. All major pol-icy decisions are made by the entire congregation of members who have finished six years. Personnel and financial decisions on a smaller scale are decided by a deputed congregation elected by the membership. The provost is the title of the "superior" who holds the office as first among equals. He is chiefly an adminis-trator and his authority rests in moral persuasion. His only clear power is that of proposal since neither the general congregation nor the smaller deputed congregation can discuss or vote on any-thing without this proposal. Since the provost serves only three years, any provost resisting the majority can only hold out for a certain time. E The Congregation of the Oratory is also juridically pon-tifical. Today each house is now part of a very loose confederation, but each is still a complete pontifical congregation. Each superior is a major superior. In Newman's time there was no confederation at all, and so each house was directly involved with the Roman Curia. This gives each small house a double relationship. They are rooted in their diocese and have a special relationship to the local church and the bishop on one hand, and yet on the other look to the Holy See for the preservation of the charism. We shall see how each of the elements of the Oratory Congregation played a role in the life of Newman. Newman and the Oratory I have chosen five aspects of Newman's life where I believe the March-April 1992 195 Oratorian charism was arrived at and purchased at some cost to him. These are: (1) the elasticity of the Oratory and Newman which was tested in his assumption of the rectorship of the Irish Catholic University, (2) the choice he had between a university apostolate and the Oratory during the Irish Catholic University founding, (3) the promotion of the laity in fields rightly theirs that had been co-opted by clericalism, (4) the resistance to foreign cultural aspects of Roman Catholicism in favor of an indigenous English religious life, (5) fidelity to community life in one place and one people. 1. The Elasticity of the Charism I have said that each Oratory has a great deal of elasticity to it as the congregation has no specific work to which its members are bound. This elasticity is from time to time tested within an individual Oratory, and Newman's assumption of the rectorship of a yet-to-be-founded university in Dublin was a very grave exper-iment in just how flexible an Oratory can be. But the flexibility had a true Oratorian origin. First, it was the result of consultation with both Birmingham and the not-yet-independent London house. Father Faber's letter indicates that the London community thought it good for the congregation that Newman assume the rectorship rather than anything less demand-ing, but less powerful.~° Secondly, it took a papal brief confirm-ing the arrangement before the attempt was made to do the impossible, that is, allow Newman to bilocate as provost in Birmingham and rector in Dublin.11 Thirdly, it was specifically for the purpose of starting a Dublin Oratory, and Newman's build-ing plans indicate he gave priority to the Oratory in that the uni-versity church built there was for the sake of a potential foundation.12 But Newman knew how precarious it was for an Oratorian to be away from his house. In a letter to Ambrose St. John he says, "I trust we shall have an Oratory in Dublin--which is the only thing I can bribe St. Philip with for coming here.''13 That it was a disaster emotionally for Newman and a serious drain on the Birmingham Oratory does not make it any less Oratorian for all that. Because of its lack of structure, it is typical of an Oratory to try to do too much rather than too little. It is easy enough to document other Oratories trying to stretch too thin. Thus we have the Oratory of Goa, India, sending Joseph Vaz to Sri Lanka at a time of persecution and in the clothing of a Hindu 196 Review for Religious holy man. There he labors with other Oratorians scattered around the countryside more like clerks regular than sons of St. Philip.14 My own Oratory in South Carolina had members scattered throughout the state during half of its history and only recently and with great difficulty has been able to return all of the mem-bers to a community life.Is During the time of St. Philip, the Oratory took on dependent missions for a while until St. Philip and the community abruptly called a halt to this development.Is So it is Oratorian to push the Oratory to the extreme and perhaps beyond. It is also Oratorian to eventually return to saner limits and the grace of a life closer to the original charism. 2. The Preference for Obscurity If Newman's acceptance of the rectorship pushed the Oratorian charism beyond limits, his fidelity to an Oratorian voca-tion is demonstrated by his resistance to a classic temptation against the life to which he believed God called him. The asceti-cism of the Oratory is a rigorous egalitarianism. Each member has one vote and all are equal and most aspects of the life are governed by the majority when not regulated by the constitu-tions. It was not uncommon among the best and brightest of St. Philip's followers to leave the Oratory, usually under papal "obe-dience," for higher positions in the church. That St. Philip him-self managed to escape or refuse such offers does not seem to be a grace extended to many of his followers. One of St. Philip's aphorisms was "love to be unknown,''17 but it is a hard saying. And it was a grace extended to Newman. Simply put, when presented with a full-time rectorship of the Irish university, Newman chose the small, obscure Oratory of Birmingham, England.I8 He was consistently resistant to any compromise on this point even though the choice seemed impenetrably obscure to both friends and foes. This disregard for the existence, rights, and potential of the Birmingham Oratory was one of Newman's great crosses. Newman complained, "Me they wish to use--me they wish to detach in every way from my own Fathers.''19 Separating an Oratorian from his community has not always been difficult, and there is evidence to indicate that some of these peo-ple thought they were doing Newman a favor by trying to detach him from the Oratory. Another fear of Newman's was the bad effect an absent provost would have on attracting new members to the Birmingham Oratory. This made the arrangement with the March-April 1992 197 university and Archbishop Cullen finally untenable.2° From inside the Oratory, the sacrifice of an outside position seems to be the heart of a vocation that embraces the asceticism of simply being one among many. 3. Maintaining the Preference for Laity The University episode also exemplifies another Oratorian principle, the importance of laicity to church and Oratory. As I have said, in the nineteenth century much of the lay character of the Oratory was atrophied. Only the little Oratory existed in some places and in some forms. Within some of the Congregations there were lay members or "brothers," for want of a better word, but as in most societies defined as congregations of priests, these brothers had no vote and seniority depended on holy orders first and seminary status second; only third came the brothers, who followed the youngest seminarians. But at a time when brothers in clerical communities of priests were treated as second-class members and even much like servants, Newman wrote to the act-ing superior of Birmingham the following directive: I am somewhat pained, my dear Edward, to hear you speak of us as 'Gentlemen--' We are not Gentlemen in con-tradistinction to the Brothers--they are Gentlemen too, by which 1 mean, not only a Catholic, but a polished refined Catholic. The Brothers are our equals . The Father is above the Brothers sacerdotally--but in the Oratory they are equal2~ This is indeed the spirit of St. Philip, whose esteem for the lay members of the congregation as well as of the religious orders was well known. But making this point about equality is still a struggle today within the congregations. In my opinion, if you ask many Oratorians what the Oratory is, they will simply say that it is a community of priests, without communicating at all the possibility of full lay membership and, since the Second Vatican Council, full voting rights. Newman's second contribution as an Oratorian to laicity was his emphasis on the secular Oratory or the Oratory as a lay move-ment. The revival of the secular or Little Oratory was "more important than anything else," at least in his own eyes. He real-ized that this was not a burning isst.e among the other Oratories, but he himself believed that, if the secular Oratory was not estab-lished, then the Congregation of the Oratory should be consid- 198 Review for Religious ered a faih~re.22 It was, as I said, for the secular Oratory that Newman wrote the lectures now called The Present Position of Catholics, and it is this volume I would call Newman's literary con-tribution to laicity. Perhaps Newman would agree with me, as he believed it in his old age to be his "best written book.''23 It is at any rate, in the opinion of Ian Ker, a popular, even Dickens-like piece of wit and rhetoric introducing the grander themes later developed in his explorations of the nature of a university.24 And, finally, it must be noted that for Newman laity meant men and women. Women had not been his-torically part of the secular Oratory, and so he petitioned Rome for a secular Oratory for women. Even though it did not develop, the rescript obtained estab-lished a new precedent.2s It was this regard for laity as essential to the religious enterprise of the Oratory that informs Newman's Idea of a University, where laicity is central to the educational enterprise. In my reckoning, this is his third contribution to laicity, but probably the best-known outside the Oratory. Newman believed that it was his struggle to appoint a lay vice-rector, to define the university as the province of the laity, and to develop self-moti-vated students with a minimum of authority which led to the ruin of the project.26 It was such "dreadful jealousy of the laity," Newman also believed, which led to the rejection of another planned Oratory at another university, this time no less than Oxford itself.27 Secularity and laicity, principles at the heart of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, made it impossible for Newman to spread the congregation when both such principles were feared and rejected by church officials who felt the church to be under siege. That the ability to act and to be respectful of church author-ity were compatible seems to be exemplified in the life of the very independent personality Philip Neri. But, when Newman wished to prove the principle by anecdote, he very cleverly chose the most authoritarian of religious societies, the Jesuits, to make his point: "Nothing great or living can be done except when men are self governed and independent: this is quite consistent with a full maintenance of ecclesiastical supremacy. St. Francis Xavier wrote Regard for the laity as essential to the religious enterprise of the Oratory informs Newman's Idea of a University. March-April 1992 199 to St. Ignatius on his knees; but who will say that St. Francis was not a real center of action?''-'s 4. Preference for the Local Culture Around an Oratory Besides preserving laicity, Newman desired also to preserve English culture within the Roman Catholic Church. St. Philip Neri's emphasis on autonomous houses or congregations was rooted in his belief that each locale had its own culture and that the needs of the place had to be met through this culture. There could be nothing more contrary to the spirit of the Oratory than for any of the congregations to see themselves as the importers of foreign customs. The Italian devotionalism of such an Oratorian figure as the famous Father Frederick Faber of London was really a misguided attempt to re-create not only another culture but also another time. Ironically, the culture and time chosen by Faber was the Baroque era--when the Oratory was spreading through Europe, but a century later than Philip's own time and work. The extravagances of Faber and some other members of the London Oratory would not have been as effective as they were without the backing of the Dublin Review (seen to be the voice of London's Archbishop Manning)29 and W.G. Ward. When Newman had a chance to defend Roman Catholicism against some charges of his old Anglican friend E.B. Pusey, there was also the possibility of distancing that same Catholicism from the foreign enthusiasm of converts like Manning, Ward, and Faber. Newman could declare: "I prefer English habits of belief and devotion to foreign, from the same causes, and by the same right, which jus-tifies foreigners in preferring their own. In following those of my people, I show less singularity, and create less disturbance than if I made a flourish with what is novel and exotic.''3° "What is novel and exotic" to many English Catholics was for the London Oratory the true renewal of Catholicism and of the Congregation of the Oratory at the same time. Father Bernard Dalgairns left the Birmingham Oratory for the London house with a condemnation of Newman and his fellow members who had adopted a position paper which has been called an "Apologia pro vita sua--Oratoriana." 3~ Newman had insisted earlier that an Oratory is "the representative of no distant or foreign interest, but lives a~nong and is contented with its own people.''~-~ The con-troversy with Dalgairns assisted the Birmingham house in defin-ing itself against the London clai~n to be normative)3 200 Review for Religious Birmingham did not issue a counterclaim as the true measure of Oratorian life, but it did insist that its own very English adap-tation to education and culture in its own time and place was cer-tainly an authentic version of Oratorian life. The Idea of a University, with its marvelous panegyric of St. Philip Neri, is the public version of these private Oratory position papers which were worked on at the same time. In short, the Birmingham com-munity saw the idea of the Oratory and the idea of the university as complementary and consistent with each other. That authority within another Oratory, authority in the English Catholic hier-archy, and authority in Rome saw this as dangerous eventually prevented Newman from a university ministry and the founding of two Oratories, the one in Dublin, the other in Oxford. If he had not been thwarted--we can ask not only what effect this would have had on the Catholic Church's presence in higher education, but also what kind of model the Oratory would have become for that presence. ~. Fidelity to One Place and Community If Newman's devotion to the Oratory as a humanistic Christian community making the best of its own time and place cost him considerable loss of influence, it also explains why Newman was always hoisted between the limitations of the local hierarchy and Roman authority. As small as an Oratory usually is, it is nevertheless a community of pontifical right. But, because the members never move out of this small community, it is inti-mately involved in the local church and becomes specially related to the bishop. This arrangement was meant to allow the Oratory to serve both worlds best, but it also means that the Oratory is vulnerable to the worst of both. And it was the worst that Newman often had to suffer. Suffering at the hands of both local officials and Curial bureaucrats was the fate of the Oratory's founder, St. Philip Neri, but it took Newman some time to realize that such was his own unavoidable fate.34 In 1856 he could be sanguine about Roman love of an English house of St. Philip ("Be sure," he wrote, "that, if we are really doing work, Rome will never be hard on us, even if we are informal, imprudent, or arbitrary").35 By the 1860s he had suffered enough to be afraid of Rome calling him to the Curia for trial of his opinions and judgments. He was so afraid that he considered such a prospect as the threat of death.36 The March-April 1992 201 bishop of Birmingham was of no help in the face of Roman threats. Newinan wrote privately in 1867 that Ullathorne "wishes to be kind to me, but to stand well with people at Rome super-sedes in his mind every other wish. So he is a coward.''37 We can be considerably grateful that the insight into the abuses of church power led him to write in 1877 the great preface to the ¼"a Media in which he developed a theology of abuses in the church. He asks us to contemplate the implications of Matthew 13 and to choose the complexities and shortcomings of a world church rather than the narrow confines and perfection of a sect. That is, for the sake of Catholicity, we must realize that sanctity will not always be an equally prominent mark of the church.3s Conclusion The burden of this short paper has been to indicate some areas where Newman cannot be completely understood without a direct reference to the Oratory of St. Philip Neri. I would say several areas have been directly touched on. First, there is the mystery Why Birmingham? Why would such a talented person remain faithful to this city when he had been born in London and had adopted Oxford and its university? If living in Birmingham is of any consequence in understanding the mystery of Newman, then only the Oratory suffices for an explanation. Newman consciously rejected the London option because his absence from Birmingham would have been the death of a community wishing to live around him.39 And it is within the mystery of a providence that settled the Oratory in Birmingham that we have the mystery of Newman's fidelity to St. Philip, a fidelity which certainly shaped the field of Newman's activities which we have now inherited. Secondly, knowing the Oratory helps us understand how Newman was able to function as pastor and theologian. He had no official standing in a seminary or a university, and his membership in the Oratory cut him off from preferments in the diocese. Yet, despite the fragility of the Oratory and Newman's vulnerability to his enemies with real power bases, he was able to accomplish much. As a pastor he was perpetually available to a local people, and as a teacher he could, in the Congregation, exercise his tal-ents and find reinforcement of his values. Thirdly, the prophetic stands which he brought to the Roman 202 Review for Religious Catholic Church found a congenial place within the tradition of Philip Neri and the Oratory. Laicity, education, and culture were not feared in the Oratory, but promoted. Certainly the Oratory could accommodate the interests of such a person as Newman, and this I think says a lot for the Oratory. Finally, the Oratory provided an emotional complementarity for Newman. Newman had written that he had "never liked a large Oratory. Twelve working priests has been the limit of my ambition. One cannot love many at one time; one cannot really have many friends.''4° The rather intimate expression of this is found in the well-known conclusion to the Apologia, but I would beg an indulgence to cite a lesser-known example found in Meriol Trevor's Life. Late in life some parishioners brought Newman a portrait of himself as a gift to the Birmingham Oratory. Newman replied to them in these words: You ask for my blessing and I bless you with all my heart, as I desire to be blessed myself. Each one of us has his own individuality, his separate history, his antecedents and his future, his duties, his responsibilities, his solemn trial, and his eternity. May God's grace, His love, His peace rest on all of you, united as you are in the Oratory of St. Philip, on old and young, on confessors and penitents, on teachers and taught, on living and dead. Apart from that grace, that love, that peace, nothing is stable, all things have an end; but the earth will last its time, and while the earth lasts, Holy Church will last, and while the Church lasts, may the Oratory of Birmingham last also, amid the fortunes of many generations one and the same, faithful to St Philip, strong in the protection of our Lady and all Saints, not losing as time goes on its sympathy with its first fathers, whatever may be the burden and interests of its own day, as we in turn now stretch forth our hands with love and awe towards those, our unborn successors, whom on earth we shall never kFIow.41 From the Oratory of Birmingham, England, Newman gives a blessing because he believed his life as an Oratorian was itself a blessing. For this reason the Oratory might merit a considera-tion when we think of Newman and what it cost him to be a Catholic and what it was like for him to rejoice as an old man after a long time not only in the Catholic Church but in the Oratory of St. Philip Neri. March-April 1992 203 Notes ~ NewInan's classical exposition of this is found in University Sermons, vol. 5, pp. 75-98, and elucidated very well by Stephen Dessain in The Spirituality offfobn Henry Newman (Minneapolis, 1977), pp. 31-55. But see this theme repeated in an Oratorian context in Newman's Oratory Paper No. 6 in Placid Murray, Newman the Oratorian (Leominster, England, 1968), pp. 215-216. -' For the documentation of the constitutional development of the Congregation, see Antonius Cistellini CO, Collectanea Vetustorum ac Fundamentalium Documentorum Congregationis Oratorii Sancti Philippi Nerii (Brescia, 1982). ~ The more detailed history of this development can be found in Louis Ponnelle and Louis Border, St. Philip Neri and the Roman Society of His Times (London, 1932), pp. 166-173. 4 Idea, Discourse 9, no. 9. ~ Ponnelle and Bordet, pp. 287-381. 6 Erasmus, Ep. 164, in Opus epistolarum Des. Erasmii Roterodami, ed. P. S. Allen, H.M. Allen, and H.W. Garrod (Oxford, 1906-08), quoted in Eugene Rice Jr., Saint Jerome in the Renaissance (Baltimore, 1985), p. 133. 7 Rice, p. 133. 8 The 1969 Constitutions of the Congregation read in no. 15: "The Congregation follows the primitive Christian community that its char-acteristic power consists not in the multitude of its members, but rather in mutual knowledge--so that there may be a regard for the well-known faces--and in the true bond of love, by which those of the same family may be bound together through the practice of daily customs." See Newman the Oratorian, p. 329, for Newman's familiarity with the con-cept of well-known faces or countenances. ~ Prepos., p. 388. ~o Autobiographical Vt~ritings (AI/V), p. 281. 11AW, p. 286. ~2 Ian Ker, John Henry Newman (Oxford, 1988), p. 433. 13 Letters and Diaries (LD), vol. 14, p. 377. ~4 See S.G. Perera SJ, Life of the Venerable Father Joseph Uaz, Apostle of Ceylon (Galle, 1953). Newman indicates a long-standing knowledge of this special case in a letter written in 1867. ~s There is no history written of this first of the Oratories in the United States, and the archives of the house are very sketchy. There is no written rationale of the house for the scattering of the members, but some effort was made to rotate them back to Rock Hill if they were some distance away. There is an article describing the Rock Hill house written by Edward YVahl, one of the earlier members, in Oratorium, Ann. III, S.I-N. 1, Ian-Iun. 1972, pp. 23-32. ~' Ponnelle and Bordet, pp. 471-474. 204 Review for Religious 17 E A. Agnelli, The Excellencies of the Congregation of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri (Venice, 1825), translated and abridged by F.A. Antrobus, London 1881, chapter 1, section V. is LD, vol. 18, pp. 478,483. 19 LD, vol. 17, p. 447. '-OLD, vol. 18, pp. 114-115. z1 LD, vol. 16, p. 267. 22 LD, vol. 14, p. 274. ,~3 LD, vol. 26, p. 115. 24 Ker, pp. 365-372. 25 LD, vol. 17, p. 137. See Newman the Oratorian, p. 311, for his appre-ciation of the Oratory and women. 26 A~17~ p. 327. 27 LD, vol. 21, p. 327. 28LD, vol. 21, p. 331. ~'9 Ker, p. 579. 3o DiffT, ii, pp. 20-21. 31 Placid Murphy calls these papers another apologia (Newman the Oratoria~l, p. 299). -~'~ Newman the Oratorian, p. 196. 33 Newman the Oratorian, p. 358. 34 The 1848 paper in Newman the Oratorian lists the persecutions Philip suffered (see p. 163). In 1862 he can compare his troubles to the founder's (see AW, pp. 256-257). 35 LD, vol. 17, p. 151. 36 LD, vol. 20, pp. 445-448. ~7 LD, vol. 23, p. 296. 38 See R. Bergeron, LesAbus de L'~glise d'apr& Newman (Paris, 1971), and the annotated edition of Newman's ~a Media (Oxford, 1990), ed. H.D. Weidner. 39 LD, vol. 13, pp. 51-52. 40 Newman the Oratorian. p. 387. 4~ Meriol Trevor, Newman, Light in I:Vinter (New York, 1962), p. 582. March-April 1992 205 DENNIS J. BILLY The Resurrection Kernel theology and spirituality Is there a fundamental principle of the resurrection? The answer to this question depends on the way in which one understands the relationship of history to the reality of the risen Christ. This relationship, in turn, depends on the stance one takes towards the possibility of a transhistorical event and the type of impact it would have on the continuities and discontinuities of historical change. However understood, the impact itself would have vast ramifications for the whole of theology. Resurrection: Distinguishing Idea from Reality At the outset, it may be helpful to distinguish between resurrection (1) as a particular item in the history of ideas and (2) as the reality experienced among the earliest fol-lowers of Christ. The former may be separated from the viewpoint of faith, compared with other ideas about the nature of the afterlife, and evaluated on a rational basis for its various strengths and weaknesses as a viable expla-nation of the nature of life after death. As a transhistori-cal event with historical consequences, the latter is intricately bound to the faith of the primitive Christian community and cannot be studied in such a detached, ana- Dennis J. Billy CSSR continues his reflections on various cen-tral tenets of our faith and their relationship to the vowed life of religious. His address is Accademia Alfonsiana; Via Merulana, 31; C.P. 2458; 00100 Rome, Italy. 206 Review for Religious lyrical manner. Any effort to formulate a fundamental principle of the resurrection must be careful to take both sides of this dis-tinction into account. The Idea of Resurrection. A well-grounded discussion of an idea should begin with an attempt to identify its most distinctive char-acteristics. With respect to its general mean-ing, one could accurately describe the term "resurrection" as a belief common among Christians that, at some point after death, an individual is transformed by the power of the Divinity on every level of his or her anthro-pological makeup--the corporeal, the psy-chological, the spiritual, and the social--and thus raised to a higher level of human exis-tence in a way that always remains in funda-mental continuity with his or her historical, earthly life. The most distinctive marks in this short yet exact account of the idea of resurrection include: (1) personal life after death, (2) in a The idea of resurrection alone safeguards the inviolate dignity of each human being on every level of existence. transformed state, (3) embracing all the anthropological factors of human existence, and (4) in a way continuous with an individual's concrete, earthly life. Each of these elements is essential to the idea of resurrection as it is used in this essay and as it exists in the major Christian traditions. These characteristics also set the idea of resurrection apart from the related idea of bodily resuscitation (for example, the raising of Lazarus, Jn 11:44), as well as from the other major philosophical and religious explanations of the nature of life in the hereafter (for example, the immortality of the soul, reincar-nation, nirvana). When these are compared, the idea of resur-rection distinguishes itselfi (1) from bodily resuscitation, in its emphasis on a transformed existence in life after death; (2) from the immortality of the soul, in its inclusion of all of humanity's anthropological factors in the nature of that existence; (3) from reincarnation, in its rupture of the cycle of time and its insistence on the fundamental continuity of life in the hereafter with a per-son's earthly existence; and (4) from nirvana, in its avowal that final beatitude does not involve the extinction of individual con-sciousness. The greatest strength of the idea of resurrection is March-April 1992 207 that, of all of the ideas about the nature of life after death, it alone safeguards the inviolate dignity of each human being on every level of his or her existence. That is to say that it alone keeps human nature eternally intact while, at the same time, saving the individual from ultimate personal extinction. Its greatest weak-ness is that, in representing the fulfillment of one of the deepest and most profound hopes of the human heart, it seems almost too good to be true, an attractive but highly unlikely possibility. For this reason, of all the ideas of life in the hereafter, resurrec-tion is the one most difficult to accept on the simple basis of faith. The Reality of the Resurrection. Rooted in the hopes of Jewish apoc-alypticism during the centuries just prior to the appearance of Christ, and promulgated during Jesus' own lifetime by the reli-gious elite known as the Pharisees, the idea of resurrection devel-oped to its present form as a result of theological reflection on the nature of the Christ event, most especially in the primitive Christian community's interpretation of the meaning of the apos-tolic experience of the risen Lord. This reflection is intimately tied to the trust that community placed in the validity of the apos-tolic witness and to the experience of faith upon which it rested. It is also the context within which one may speak of the resur-rection not as an idea, but as a reality and a hope. \Vhat precisely happened on the first Easter morning remains shrouded by the subjective awareness of the earliest followers of Jesus. That awareness probably ran the gamut of several emo-tional states--from depression and fear, to suspicion and isola-tion, to incipient faith and the lingering yearning for the retrieval of lost expectations--and most likely varied in each of the persons involved. That is not to say that the event had no basis outside the experience of Jesus' followers, but only that there is no way to determine what it is with any accuracy. It is for this reason that, down through the centuries, the Easter event remains primarily an experience of faith in the lives of Jesus' followers. A distinction must still be made, however, between the faith of those who witnessed the Easter event personally and those whose faith relies on the testimony of the apostles. The procla-mation of the church rests upon the eyewitness accounts of the apostles, that is, on those who made the startling claim to have experienced for themselves the reality of the risen Lord. Their experience of faith remains qualitatively different from that of 208 Review for Religious the believer in the pew, for they claim to have experienced a real-ity outside of themselves, rooted in the objective order, distinct from their own subjectivity, and identified with the person of their Master, Jesus of Nazareth. Without the unprecedented bold-ness and resiliency of these claims, the Christian project would have nothing distinctive in its message and probably would never have gotten off the ground. These apostolic claims emerge from one of two possibilities: the experience of the risen Christ was with or without a basis in the person of Jesus in the external order. That is to say that the experience of the apostles corresponds to a reality outside of themselves or remains entirely subjective in all respects. If the former is true, then the further question must be asked regarding the nature of this basis in the external order. If the latter be true, then the only conclusion to be drawn is that the apostles suffered from self-delusion, that their testimony is false, as is the religion to which it gave rise. The fact that neither of these possibilities can be proven highlights the underlying quality of faith inherent in the conclusions of both the believer and non-believer alike. Still more can be said about the position of the believer. If the apostolic experience of the risen Christ does have an external basis in the person of Jesus, then this affirmation, when combined with the idea of resurrection developed earlier in this essay, nec-essarily points to an event of singular historical significance. Indeed, this event could be measured by the instruments of his-torical observation only by its effects (for example, a missing body) and, for this reason, must be placed in a category unique to itself and understood as a transhistorical event with historical conse-quences. This is so precisely because the risen Christ, existing in a transformed state but in a way continuous with his earthly life, does not lead "a historical existence" in the way in which the phrase is commonly used. That is to say that space and time no longer set the limits for his physical existence. In his resurrected state, Christ is the Alpha and the Omega, a singular dimension unique unto himself, who recapitulates, both now and forever, all The Easter event remains primarily an experience of faith in the lives of lesus" followers. March-April 1992 209 of creation within himself, into the love of the Father and the joy of their Spirit. The Resurrection Kernel From all that has been said, a sound formulation of the fun-damental principle of the resurrection (the resurrection kernel) would consist in the affirmation of faith that the idea of resur-rection has become a reality in the risen Christ. This reality is rooted in the transhistorical nature of the Christ event, whose historical consequences linger even to this day in the ongoing proclamation of the church. Based on the testimony of its apos-tolic forebears, the church has, in its ministry down through the centuries, kept alive for humanity the fervent hope that the deep-est yearnings of the human heart will one day be fully realized. That is to say that the transformation wrought by God in Christ promises to extend itself to all who are incorporated into his body, the church. In this respect, a sharing in the life of the risen Lord may be looked upon as the ultimate destiny of all of humankind and will be impeded only by a stubborn individual or corporate persistence in the life of sin. Given the above formulation, a number of important obser-vations arise: (1) To affirm that an idea has become a reality is to utilize the well-known philosophical distinction between the internal (that is, subjective) and external (that is, objective) orders. The limitations of this distinction are well known, and care must be taken not to stretch the analogy beyond its avowed usefulness. Indeed, special care must be taken not to project the concerns of the so-called critical problem back to a time before its signifi-cance was entirely known. (2) God the Father is the primary agent in bringing about this realization in Christ. Since idea and reality are intimately connected in the Divinity's vision of itself, the resurrection of Christ may be viewed as a providential movement on the part of the Father to bring the plan of redemption in accord with the working of the Divine Mind, that is, the Logos. In this respect, Christ's resurrection is that event which, touching upon history but transcending time, initiates the ultimate return of all created things back to God. (3) This view of Christ's resurrection also sheds light upon 210 Review for Religious the development in the early church of the doctrine of the incar-nation. If it is true that, in Christ's resurrection, flesh has been divinized and lifted up into the reality of the Word, it follows that, at some point prior to this momentous occasion, the Word itself had descended into the reality of human flesh and had become a human person. Putting aside for the moment the vari-ous intricacies involved in discussing the Christological contro-versies in the early centuries of the church, it seems quite appropriate to say that the doctrines of Christ's incarnation and resurrection form two aspects of a single salvific event which, if one were to borrow the Neoplatonic exitus/reditus structure adopted by Aquinas, represents the recreatio,z of all things going out of (exitus) and going back (reditus) to God. It is in this sense that all things are recapitulated in Christ, the New Adam. (4) As described above, the resurrection is not merely the state of Christ's postmortem existence, but an intricate part of the whole process of redemption. If Christ's exitu} from the Father reaches its furthest extension in his passion and death on the cross (described in the Creed as his descent into hell), his reditus is ush-ered in by the events of Easter morning, and his Spirit is the prin-ciple by which all things continue to be gathered into his body and thus into the presence of the Father. (5) As a transhistorical event with historical consequences, the resurrection of Christ exists outside of but in relation to the realm of historical inquiry. In this regard, it lies beyond the realm of scientific investigation and can be affirmed only through faith in the testimony of those claiming to have actually experienced Jesus after his death. That is not to say that the apostles did not experience outside of themselves in the exter-nal order, but only that the basis for their experience cannot be verified. (6) Indeed, probably the only historical consequence of mea-surable scientific value would have been the disappearance of Jesus' body at the actual moment of his resurrection. Since the precise whereabouts of the body was a point of contention even in the initial aftermath of the Easter proclamation (Mt 28:13), one must conclude that, although its disappearance could have been verified, if not scientifically, then at least through pagan eyewitness accounts, it obviously was not. (7) On all other points, the detached observer would not be able to separate the subjective experience of the apostles from March-April 1992 211 the reality of the risen Christ. There would, in other words, have been no way of determining whether or not they were actually experiencing anything beyond their own intensified inner aware-ness. The singularity of this experience would be expected if a transhistorical event were to occur and be experienced in its his-torical consequences. (8) To the extent that it is not based on direct experience but on the testimony of others, the faith of the church is qualitatively different from the faith of the apostles. Not only does it point to the conviction of those who claimed to have experienced the risen Lord, but, in one respect, it is even a purer experience of faith: "Happy are those who have not seen and yet believe" (Jn 20:29). (9) Belief in the risen Christ keeps alive in people the hope that, after death, their lives will not end, but merely change. Because of Christ's resurrection, they look forward to a trans-formed existence in the hereafter, one in continuity with their own lives on earth. Sustained by a believer's prayerful response to the contetnporary challenges of Christian discipleship, this hope forms the basis upon which life in the resurrection is anticipated even in the present. (10) Through their participation in the ministry and life of the church, people receive a foretaste of this transformed exis-tence, especially when they partake of the sacraments around the table of the Lord. It was at the Eucharist where Jesus' disciples recognized him in the breaking of the bread (Lk 24:30). It is there where Christians, even to this day, gather to do the same. This is especially true for those who dedicate their lives to Christ through the following of the evangelical counsels. Religious and the Resurrection In their vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, religious strive to center their lives upon the reality of the risen Christ. They seek to do so by virtue of their firtn conviction that they are called to share in the life of the resurrection by making the idea of the vows a lived reality in their day-to-day existence. Christ, who exhibited both before and after his resurrection a life dedicated to the Father through the eschatological signs of the evangelical counsels, asks religious to do the same. The strength to do so comes from Christ and is mediated by his Spirit through his church and its ministry of the sacraments. While such dedi- 212 Review for Religious cation is never fully realized in the present, religious are called to imitate Christ throughout their entire lives. It is for this reason that, at the end of their earthly lives, they hope to share in the full-ness of his transformed existence. In their vowed life in common, religious pledge to give them-selves over entirely to the life of the risen Lord. In their vow of poverty, they seek both physical and spiritual detachment from material goods, doing so not out of a suspicion about the fundamental good-ness of creation, but from the convic-tion that it too will undergo a transformation in the fullness of Christ's kingdom. In their vow of chastity, they promise to forgo the goods of marriage, children, and sexual pleasure, thereby accepting Christ's Gospel declaration that there will be neither husband nor wife in the life to come (Lk 20:35) and that, even in the realm of relationships, all who abide in him will live a trans-formed existence. In their vow of obe-dience, they promise to accept the will of their superiors as a manifestation of God's plan for their lives, thus hoping to estab-lish within themselves a continual movement of accord between their own wills and that of the their risen Lord. Finally, in their communal existence, they hold each other accountable for the way of life they have chosen and seek to reflect in their mutual relations that dignity and care appropriate to those who are called to be members of Christ's body. By means of their individual and communal dedication to the evangelical counsels, it is clear that religious seek, even in this present life, a deeper share in the life of the resurrection. Through their vowed life in community, religious thus provide a faithful witness for themselves, the rest of the church, and the entire world that the idea of resurrection has not only been made a reality in Christ but that it is striving, at this very moment, to be realized in the lives of those who believe. In this respect, their witness affirms the movement of Christ's Spirit in the life of the church and provides a foretaste of the life to come. That is not to say that religious embody this charismatic dimension of the church better or more faithfully than any of the other vocations within the Belief in the risen Christ keeps alive in people the hope that, after death, their lives will not end, but merely change. March-April 1992 213 church (for example: single, married, priestly states), but only that their way of life is especially suited to it. Of its very nature, the religious life forIns a part of the charismatic dimension of the church. Indeed, to the extent that religious communities do not manifest to both others and themselves the gentle yet challenging presence of the Spirit, they fall short of the explicit nature of their call to center their lives entirely around the reality of the risen Christ. He it was who first imparted the Holy Spirit to his body, the church. He it is who continues to do so even to the present day. Through their faithfulness to the vows, lived in community and in the Spirit, religious seek mainly to nourish their relation-ship with the risen Christ. This personal relationship to the Lord motivates all of their activity for the establishment of God's king-dom; it is also what draws others to follow their particular way of life. Indeed, the care with which they tend this relationship is itself a sign that the reality of Christ's resurrection is meant for all to share and experience in all its fullness. In this respect, reli-gious must be ever conscious that their vowed life in common has little meaning if it is separated from life in the Spirit of the risen Christ and seen as an end in itself. To be sure, there is noth-ing sadder in the life of the church than to see individual reli-gious and, at times, entire communities lose sight of the meaning of their vocation. When people of such great promise and poten-tial compromise themselves and begin to believe that the Spirit is no longer active in their lives and that things will never change for the better, when men and women, who are called to be signs of hope, begin to believe in the voices of hopelessness, then the time is ripe for a prophet to arise within their midst to challenge them to come back to the Lord and to live the life to which they have been called. At the same time, there is nothing more joyful in the life of the church than to see men and women who, out of love for their Lord, renounce the very things for which they most actually strive during their sojourn on earth. To live in poverty, without children or spouse, and without full personal liberty provides oth-ers with the constantly needed reminder that the fullness of riches, family life, and freedom is ultimately found only in one's rela-tionship to him whom the apostles acclaimed to be truly risen. 214 Review for Religious Conclusion This essay has sought to outline the basic, underlying principle of the Christian doctrine of the resurrection. It has done so, on the one hand, by describing in as precise detail as possible the mean-ing of the idea of resurrection as under-stood in the church's teaching and, on the other hand, by looking into some of the fundamental presuppositions regarding the resurrection of Christ as experienced by his earliest followers. Bringing these two currents of inquiry together, the funda-mental principle of the resurrection (the resurrection kernel) was described as the affirmation of faith that the idea of resur-rection has become a reality in the risen Christ. Seen as a transhistorical event with historical consequences, the acclaimed res-urrection of Jesus of Nazareth lies, for all practical purposes, beyond the scope of scientific verification and remains inti- Through their faithfulness to the vows, lived in community and in the Spirit, religious seek mainly to nourish their relationship with the risen Christ. mately tied to the internal, subjective event of faith to which it gave life. That is not to say that Jesus' resurrection has no ground in the external order, but only that it ultimately lies beyond the scope of controlled observation. In this respect, the faith experi-ence of those who experienced the risen Lord is qualitatively dif-ferent from that of those whose faith rests upon their testimony. Blessed precisely because they believe without seeing, today's believers share in the hope of their own transformed existence which, through their experience of the Spirit in the church com-munity of the faithful, may be experienced even now in the quiet anticipation of the fullness of a reality yet to come. They bring their hearts' deepest yearning for the fullest presence of the risen Christ to the table of the Lord, where they are blessed with a glimpse of

Issue 50.3 of the Review for Religious, May/June 1991. ; Review for Religious Volume 50 Number 3 May/June 1991 Paradigms for Ministry ,Religious Life and Modernity Mary, Woman for Peacemakers Atheism in Our Prayer ANNIVERSARY VOLUME Rt~vmw vo~ R~.:t,tc~ous (ISSN 0034-639X) is published bi-monthly at St. Louis University by the Missouri Province Educational Institute of the Society of Jesus: Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard, Room 428: St. Louis. MO 63108-3393. Telephone: 314-535-3048. Second-class postage paid at St. Louis. MO. POSTMASTER: Send address changes In Rr:v~:w ~'ou R~:~,l~;,ms: P.O. Bnx 6070: Duluth, MN 55806. Subscription rates: Single copy $3.50 plus mailing costs. One-year subscription $15.00 plus mailing costs: two-year subscription $28.00 plus mailing costs. See inside back cover for subscription informa-tion and mailing costs. © 1991 R~:w~:w David L. Fleming, S.J. Philip C. Fischer, S.J. Michael G. Harter, S.J. Elizabeth McDonough, O.P. Jean Read Mary Ann Foppe Editor Associate Editors Canonical Counsel Editor Assistant Editors David J. Hassel, S.J. Iris Ann Ledden, S.S.N.D. Wendy Wright, Ph.D. Advisory Board Mary Margaret Johanning, S.S.N.D. Sean Sammon, F.M.S. Suzanne Zuercher, O.S.B. May/June 1991 Volume 50 Number 3 Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor should be sent to R~:vl~:w ~'on R~:Lt{;tot~s; 3601 Lindell Boulevard; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Correspondence about the department "Cannnical Counsel" should be addressed to Elizabeth McDonough, O.P.; 5001 Eastern Avenue: P.O. Box 29260; Washingtnn, D.C. 20017. Back issues should be ordered from Rt~vt~:w vo~ RELI(;IOUS; 3601 Lindell Boulevard; St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. "Out of Print" issues are available from University Microfilms International; 300 N. Zeeb Road; Ann Arbor, MI 48106. A major portion of each issue is available on cassette recordings as a service for the visually impaired. Write to: Xavier Society for the Blind; 154 East 23rd Street; New York, NY 10010. PRISMS. Struggle marks these first few months of 1991. The struggle in the Middle East, whatever the good and bad results, has made even more evident in our time the futility of modern warfare as a way of solving human problems. Violent warfare breeds only further injustice in a down-ward spiral for humankind. Pope John Paul II, along with leaders in the other Christian churches, left no doubt that "just" wars (much less "holy" wars) are concepts with no meaning for our technological world. How painful a struggle it is for people of different races or ethnic origins to work together to form a single nation becomes daily more ap-parent in Africa, in India, in the Eastern European countries, and in North, Central, and South America. Poverty and wealth present another face of struggle---evident perhaps as close as our urban neighborhood and writ as large as the consumer societies of the northern hemisphere in relation to the debt-ridden nations of the southern hemisphere. And differences in religious belief and traditions still mix in with other fac-tors to stir up the seemingly endless struggle in situations as far apart as Northern Ireland, Lebanon, and Sri Lanka. In comparison with these world-situated struggles, our local strug-gles in parish life, in our religious communities, in family, and in our various ministry situations pale in significance. But local struggles still cause real pain and leave wounds that cripple our efforts, make us less faith-filled and less human, and ultimately tend to arouse in us the war-monger desires we decry "out there" in the bigger world. In the venerable tradition of the Catholic Church, Mary mother of the Lord, appears to take prominence in our faith lives at times of greater struggle. With reflections particularly appropriate to our present-day con-text, Patricia McCarthy, C.N.D., turns our focus to Mary as a woman for peacemakers. In a similar way, Jeffrey Gros, F.S.C., suggests that Mary may well play an integrating role in ecumenical relations rather than the divisive one that is traditionally projected. Perhaps with our hearts more attuned to the peacemaking role of Mary we can enter more reflectively into the struggle of our Christian and religious community lives and of our various ministries. James J. McEnroe explores new meanings for the images we use in regard to Chris-tian ministry as a way of presenting some reconciling paradigms. "The Ministry of BEing" represents Charleen Hug's attempt to bring balance to the interior struggle which people face in'the midst of their work. For his part, William Hogan, C.S.C., underscores mission as central to life together as well as to a vocational appeal. Dennis J. Billy, C.SS.R., 321 Review for Religious, May-June 1991 brings together some traditional and modern approaches taken to moral theology and the special symbol role of religious life within this disci-pline. Perhaps he points a way to understanding how religious life and peacemaking are meant necessarily to be congruent. Other writers turn our attention to some alleviating factors in the strug-gle areas of our community lives--whatever form community may take for us. Mary Carboy, S.S.J., stresses hospitality, Donald Macdonald, S.M.M., considers courtesy, and Melannie Svoboda, S.N.D., imagina-tively suggests various lubricants for community living. With a specific focus on the life of women and men religious, Albert Dilanni, S.M., pre-sents some insightful reflections to situate the current struggles about re-ligious- life identity. Gerald Arbuckle, S.M., looks at leadership and its organic role in the struggle of refounding. The area of formation in the light of structural sin and structural conversion is the concern of David Couturier, O.F.M.Cap. Doris Gottemoeller, R.S.M., gives us further food for thought about the confused issue of membership as new ways of associating people into religious organizations and activities are be-ing explored. Our ultimate struggle, of course, is our relationship with God. One very important aspect of that struggle is caught in the paradoxical title of David J. Hassel's "Atheism in Our Prayer." Just as the biblical ac-count of Jacob's wrestling with an angel mirrors at times our own strug-gles to respond to the continuing conversion calls from the Lord, so Has-sel tries to shed light into the areas of darkness and apparent absence of God that are often a part of developing faith life. In prayer, in community, and in mission we look to Mary to intro-duce us ever more deeply into the ways of her Son, the Son of peace. Perhaps the Marian mantra for our times is captured in the traditional "Mary, queen of peace, pray for us." David L. Fleming, S.J. Paradigms for Ministry: Old Images, New Meanings James J. McEnroe, Th.D. Father McEnroe, of the St. Louis archdiocese, teaches pastoral theology at Kenrick Seminary and has helped facilitate some programs for the archdiocesan Office of Min-istry. His address is Kenrick Seminary; 5200 Glennon Drive; St. Louis, Missouri 63119. Recently, during a class session in which the topic "Paradigms for Min-istry" was being discussed, a student observed that it is difficult to find meaning in some of the traditional paradigms for ministry, especially those derived from another culture and another time. ~ The paradigms that the student was referring to are some of the more traditional in Christian theology and in the Bible. These paradigms are pilgrim, servant, prophet, and shepherd.2 Each of them, if they are to be meaningful, must be retrieved and reinterpreted in the light of a contemporary understand-ing of ministry, including the skills necessary to live out those paradigms in ministry. In this article each paradigm will be discussed, with special consideration given to its biblical roots, its contemporary meaning, and the skills required to live it out in ministry. Finally, some conclusions will be drawn concerning ministry today, especially the demands placed on persons who are engaged in or preparing for ministry, in the church or in the marketplace. Paradigm (paradeigmatizo) means "to make an example of." Para-digms emerge from an attempt to think about something from within our own experience. Paradigms are by their very nature incomplete; that is, they are helpful constructs with which to speak about a particular reality but which always fall short of that reality. If paradigms are to make sense, therefore, they must resonate with our experience in ministry. 323 324 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 And, if we are to put those paradigms into practice in ministry, we must gain the skills necessary to do so. Pilgrim The paradigm of pilgrim evokes the image of a journey. The Greek word (anabaino) means "to go up to." In the New Testament the fol-lowers of Christ are called nonresident aliens (para-epi-demos), because they were on a pilgrimage to their true homeland, which is connected in-timately with the reign of God. The first epistle of Peter (1:1) is ad-dressed to "those who live as strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Gala-tia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.' ,3 The image conveyed in the para-digm, at least as it is found in the Christian Bible, is that of persons who know where they are going, but who need to travel through some un-known territory in order to get there. In the Bible these pilgrims are pre-sumed to be traveling on foot, taking one step at a time, and in a rather systematic, that is, orderly, way.4 As with any travelers, pilgrims must possess certain skills, which be-come tools of their trade. Pilgrims are confronted with the need to read road maps, recognize the meaning of signposts, and investigate the proper means of conveyance in order to reach their destination. Those traveling to areas with which they are unfamiliar, for example, soon dis-cover that, unless one of their party possesses a sense of direction and is skilled in the art of map reading, the journey can become inconven-ient, even treacherous. C.S. Lewis, in his Pilgrim's Regress, says that pilgrims must pos-sess the ability to use certain instrumentation on their journey. One of Lewis's characters, a young man named John, is being instructed in the ways of the world by his elders. He cannot understand their suggestions, however. The elders are supposed tO be his guides. Yet, as Lewis points out, if John does not learn to navigate on his own he will be forever at the mercy of other would-be guides.5 At one point in the story, a stew-ard slips a card containing some rules into John's hand, at which point a question is posed. "What use are rules to people who cannot read?''6 If those engaged in or preparing for ministry cannot use the tools of their trade and do not possess practical knowledge, they will be forever at the mercy of other, perhaps less competent, guides. The skills that are required for putting the paradigm of pilgrim into practice in ministry are called instrumental skills. They are the skills of the mind and of the hands: of cognition, of artisanship, and of one's min-istry. The origin of instrumental skills relates to the development of tools in the history of the human community, and to the personal dexterity re- Pardigms for Ministry quired to use them.7 It is difficult to imagine someone ministering in today's Church who is unable to use a computer, which is really an advanced form of the quill or pen. It is equally difficult to imagine someone ministering who is un-able to express himself or herself clearly and effectively, either in pub-lic speaking or in writing. Since ministry today requires both planning and evaluation, it is essential also for those engaged in it to be able to plan programs effectively and to evaluate them when they are completed. There is also a body of practical knowledge, for example, theology, Scrip-ture, and Church history, that is essential for ministry today. It is common to hear persons engaged in ministry complain about be-ing required to attend computer training courses, time-management and stress-management classes, or opportunities for continuing theological education. When asked why they are complaining, persons in ministry may say, "Because I am too busy and tired." Which perhaps demon-strates that time management and stress management are necessary in-strumental skills for today's ministers. While they may complain, min-isters are doing themselves, as well as those with whom and for whom they work, a great service by acquiring the necessary instrumental skills for their work. If we are going to be pilgrim people, we must possess the skills re-quired to be the best of pilgrims. We must, with God's help, be able to chart our course and read the signposts and thereby successfully negoti-ate the journey. Servant The second paradigm, that of servant, evokes an image of one who assists others. In the New Testament the word servant (doulos) is actu-ally a title of honor, which was claimed by Paul and by the disciples of Jesus. In the letter to the Romans (1:1), Paul refers to himself as a "ser-vant of Christ Jesus." The servant paradigm, at least among the early Christians, had lost its pejorative meaning. In fact, those who assisted others in the community were called servants (douleo) because that was their ministry.8 In the Church today there are many ministries that are ministries of service: for example, spiritual direction, pastoral counseling, evangeli-zation, and youth ministry. These,'and other ministries of service, re-quire certain skills that allow the ministers to walk with those with whom they minister and to whom they are sent. Karl Rahner, in his Servants of the Lord, says that ministry is by its very nature service, not status. He adds that service must be seen always 326 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 in reference to the community. Service requires ministers to be with and to walk with others who are on their own journeys in life.9 The skills necessary for serving others are called interpersonal skills. They bring about human cooperation, they enhance human interaction. ~0 In fact, the Church, in its traditional understanding of ministry, equates it with service. Ann Wilson Schaef, in her book The Addictive Organi-zation, points out that we live in a world of codependents, rather than in an interdependent world. Dysfunctions in the family of origin makes it very difficult for an incr.easingly large number of persons to work ef-fectively in cooperative and collaborative settings.t~ Since those preparing for or engaged in ministry are products of their environment, both familial and societal, and since environment deter-mines to a large extent the strengths as well as the weaknesses which per-sons bring to ministry, today's ministers must work especially hard to develop and maintain their interpersonal skills. In the Church today there is a clear call for collaborative ministry, that is, for teams of women and men working together for the good of the Church. Ironically, for some of the aforementioned reasons, many of those choosing ministry as their vocation would rather work alone. They are not team players, perhaps because they have not learned the skills necessary for cooperation and for successful human interaction. ~2 For a significant number of persons preparing for or engaged in min-istry, there are several interpersonal skills that are difficult to put into practice in their lives and in their ministries. One of those skills is con-frontation. Perhaps the difficulty lies in the assumption that confronta-tion, which requires the honest expression of emotion and assertiveness, is not the Christian thing to do. When those engaged in ministry experi-ence conflicts between themselves and others, they must confront the per-son or persons with whom there is a conflict--which is perhaps the only Christian thing to do. Confrontation is the ability to name and express one's inner reaction, usu-ally emotional, to an external event, especially but not exclusively when it involves an unpleasant encounter. Confrontation is like holding up a mir-ror so that others can see themselves. Confrontation should be used with honesty and care to address another person's behavior, when that behav-ior is appropriate and when it is inappropriate. It is essential, both for life and for ministry, to skillfully confront problematic situations so that com-munication and understanding can lead to more successful ministry. Instrumental and interpersonal skills, therefore, are basic skills for anyone engaged in or preparing for ministry. And, more often than not, Paradigms for Ministry / 327 instrumental and interpersonal skills are acquired at the same time. In fact, they are complementary. They enhance the minister's ability to meet the technical demands of ministry and to communicate more effec-tively with others on a daily basis. Perhaps a concrete example of the interaction and interdependence of instrumental and interpersonal skills will be helpful. The ministry of spiritual direction, which more and more persons are requesting, requires directors to possess certain instrumental skills. Directors must know the techniques of direction and be versed in spiritual theology and sacred Scripture. They must also possess certain interpersonal skills. They must hear accurately the issues presented by directees and reflect back to them what they hear. Instrumental skills, for the most part, must be acquired. Interpersonal skills, on the other hand, can be innate. But more often than not they need to be acquired. Perhaps, at meetings with technically competent per-sons, we have seen the participants "sharing" insights with one another and yet not hearing one another, or at least not reflecting back to the speak-ers what they heard. The purpose of such reflecting back, of course, is to give the speakers a sense of being heard and the listeners a chance to check out what the speakers are saying. Formation programs for minis-try, as well as many professional schools, teach and foster not only the instrumental skills necessary for their professions, but also the interper-sonal skills necessary for cooperation and collaboration. This is both en~ couraging and timely. Persons engaged in or preparing for ministry today face the challenge of acquiring the instrumental and interpersonal skills that are necessary for their vocation. Skilled helpers are not only good pilgrims, but they are also more effective servants, offering companionship, guidance, and support. Prophet The third paradigm is that of prophet, which all too often evokes the image of a wild-eyed eccentric ranting and raving against someone or something. In the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, the prophets (nevi' im) are seers, interpreters of God's activity in the midst of the peo-ple. 13 The prophets see things that others have not seen, cannot see, or refuse to see. Because the prophets are persons of extraordinary faith and commitment to the community, they name the action of God in the midst of the community. In Luke's gospel (2:36-38), for example, the prophet Anna brings the news of the Messiah to those who wait for his coming. She sees, be- ~121~ / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 cause she is a woman of prayer and self-denial, what others have not seen. Like other prophet.s in the Bible, she possesses extraordinary vi-sion. In the Acts of the Apostles (2:4, 17-18; 19:6) and in the Book of Revelation (10:11 and 18:20), we are reminded that on Pentecost the gift of prophetic imagination was renewed by the Holy Spirit and the gift of prophetic vision was given to the community of faith. The disciples saw and heard. And they announced to others the Good News of salvation. More importantly, they exhorted the community to live in the light of the redemption, and they consoled those who were frightened or weary. Their prophetic vision was .their ministry and their gift to the commu-nity of faith, the Church. 14 Gerald Arbuckle says that the refounding of religious life, and per-haps of the Church itself, will be accomplished by persons who possess a charismatically inspired and well-developed imagination. 15 The proph-ets will be those who seek out new ways of doing things. They will be inspired by a prophetic imagination and by the Spirit of God. 16 They will be both intuitive and imaginative. And, at times, they will be misunder-stood by their contemporaries and even by their colleagues, sometimes simply because they will find it difficult to communicate their insights to others, for whom the insights will seem outrageous and ill-advised. 17 Walter Brueggemann, in his book The Prophetic Imagination, points out that the task of prophetic persons, like that of their forebears whose lives are recounted in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, is to nurture and to nourish their communities by evoking a consciousness and a per-ception of reality that is often different from that of the dominant cul-ture. 18 Prophetic persons challenge those within the dominant culture, who are unwilling to go beyond the scope of common sense or the pre-vailing wisdom and who say, "This is the way that we have always done things" or "If it is not broke then do not fix it." The key to cultivating a prophetic vision is to learn and to enhance imaginal skills. Those wanting to develop their imagination must engage in projects and educational experiences that encourage them to search for possibly better ways of doing things than the way they have always been done--even improvements on "common sense." Imaginal skills enable one to generate new ideas and alternative so-lutions. 19 Imaginal skills arise in the interaction between fantasy, emo-tions, and the reflective intellect. These skills allow persons to miniatur-ize, to organize, and to reflect accurately on data gathered from their en-vironment and from the five senses.2° Imaginal skills are acquired some-what differently than instrumental and interpersonal skills. To acquire or Paradigms for Ministry / 329 to develop imaginal skills, women and men must associate and work with other imaginative and creative persons. This, however, requires that cer-tain instrumental and interpersonal skills are firmly in place. Imagina-tion is developed also through attentiveness to, participating in, or ap-preciating the arts. For some, especially for those whose imaginal skills are less well developed, imaginative and creative persons often appear to be flying by the seat of their pants. And in some ways they are. Pro-phetic persons often find little support in their communities because their suggestions seem distant and even frightening to the less imaginative.2~ People commonly criticize persons in their community who are "pains." In reality, those "pains" may be creative and imaginative, but they may lack the necessary skills (instrumental and interpersonal) to communicate with others. Imaginal skills that are necessary for anyone attempting to live out the paradigm of prophet are resourcefulness and experimentation. These skills facilitate progress---even if their attempts sometimes lead to fail-ure. 22 At such times imaginative and creative persons may appear flighty and irresponsible. To prevent avoidable failure, they need to select from the imagined alternatives not only concrete but practical and construc-tive solutions to the problems with which their communities are faced.23 People usually acquire imaginal skills after acquiring instrumental and interpersonal skills because, with instrumental and interpersonal skills, they begin to experience and appreciate their autonomy while still rec-ognizing their connectedness to the community of faith.24 If persons are going to live out the paradigm of prophet, they must possess a prophetic imagination, as well as certain instrumental and in-terpersonal skills. Communities of faith need the gift of prophetic imagi-nation just as much today as at the time of the prophets of old. Shepherd Finally, there is the paradigm of shepherd, which evokes the rustic image of a person with staff in hand leading the sheep down a treacher-ous hillside. The paradigm may seem even more problematic if one re-alizes how dumb sheep really are. Yet in Luke's gospel it was the shep-herds who were among the first to be informed of the Messiah's birth (2:8-20). And in the epistle to the Ephesians (4:1 l) the apostles and their successors, who exercised a ministry of leadership in the community of faith, are referred to as shepherd-leaders ~n the Christian commumty. Gerald Arbuckle notes that leaders in religious congregations, and by analogy in the Church itself, are called to be problem solvers. They must be highly rational and organized persons. They must be able to Iogi- 330 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 cally analyze problems, to take the advice and counsel of others, and to implement the likely solutions.25 Leaders in ministry are called, there-fore, to help create and to share a vision with others, often in consulta-tion and in collaboration with prophetic persons, with servants, and with the great mass of those along their pilgrim way. Leadership in the Church today requires the development of system skills. Leadership requires both an acute sense of the direction in which commu-nities are headed and the ability to help them to get where they should be headed. Yet many persons with these system skills are frustrated. Their psychic and spiritual energies are drained because they face enormous fi-nancial problems and ever increasing personnel issues. Leaders today are expected to keep their communities financially stable and to meet the emo-tional and spiritual needs of the community members. Many leaders spend so much time maintaining the community and its members that they have little time or energy to help create the long-term solutions to the problems. As a friend said recently, "Anyone who yearns for or covets leadership in the Church today deserves to be a leader!" In light of the aforementioned demands, it is reasonable to assume that leaders do not have to be the prophetic or imaginative persons in the community, although a healthy dose of prophetic imagination helps. Lead-ership does require, however, the ability to recognize imaginative and creative solutions to problems and to coordinate the various gifts and skills of the community. System skills require a blend of imagination (imaginal skill), inter-personal sensitivity (interpersonal skill), and instrumental competence (in-strumental skill). System skills enable those who possess them to see how the parts of a community (diocese, religious congregation, parish, or organization) relate to the whole. System skills are not necessarily man-agement skills, although leadership may require a person to be a good manager, to make sound financial decisions (instrumental skill) and to relate well to persons within the system (interpersonal skill). System skills do, however, allow one to plan for change, especially when a change of direction is necessary for the health of the system in question. As Brian Hall says, persons who possess system skills see "the simple unity of it all."26 Shepherd-leaders see the big picture. And they are willing to take the necessary risks that will allow their communities to grow and to pros-per. Shepherd-leaders, because they possess system skills, seldom get trapped by shortsighted and wrongheaded solutions to complex prob-lems. While the solutions they endorse may sound extremely simple, Paradigms for Ministry / 331 even naive, they often embody an inherent wisdom and even God's will and desire for the community itself. An example of a system skill is system recognition, the ability to read the present and future needs of the community.27 At a deeper level, system recognition allows shepherd-leaders to read the signs of the times as they are significant for the community itself. Of course, the challenge to "read the signs of the times" was enunciated at the Second Vatican Council. Pope John XXIII possessed the skills necessary for his pro-phetic and imaginative shepherd-leadership. There is a picture, actually an icon, of Pope John holding a scroll on which the following verse ap-pears: "We are not on earth to guard a museum, but to cultivate a flour-ishing garden of life." The attitude behind that quotation summarizes the attitude with which shepherd-leaders carry out their task. Of course, shepherd-leaders must be able to distinguish between myth and reality, between a bright idea and a right idea.28 System skills allow those who possess them to discern more easily whether the direc-tion in which the system (diocese, congregation, parish, or organization) is headed is in accord with God's will and desire. Persons preparing for or engaged in leadership ministry must learn or develop system skills in order to be shepherd-leaders within their com-munities of faith. It has been said that the paradigm of the shepherd is both outdated and irrelevant. Perhaps, as we put the paradigm into a new context, namely into a system perspective, we can appreciate it in a new way by retrieving its original meaning and beauty, even within a largely nonagrarian culture. Through the Bible and through theology, the Church has been blessed with some very rich paradigms for life and for ministry. These paradigms (pilgrim, servant, prophet, and shepherd), if they are to be lived out in ministry, require the development of certain skills. Practical Conclusions There are some practical conclusions that flow from an understand-ing of the paradigms for ministry that were discussed in this article. First, skill development is sequential. Second, effective ministry requires that skills be identified in and shared among the members of a community. Third, as persons reach a certain level of skill development, they are con-fronted with the need to acquire higher levels of skills in the four skill areas (instrumental, interpersonal, imaginal, and system). Finally, life-long learning and continuing education are required for anyone engaged in ministry today. First, skill development is sequential. Instrumental and interpersonal 3~12 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 skills are developed conjointly. One learns to think and to perform man-ual tasks while learning to relate to other persons in the environment. Dur-ing childhood, for example, we learned to read and write while we learned to relate to others. The process is the same in adulthood, except that the reading, writing, and relating require a higher level of skill de-velopment. Formation programs for ministry in the Church are, hope-fully, teaching those who participate in them theology and the traditions of the Church and of the communities to which they will be sent. They are teaching the participants also to pray. All of these are instrumental skills. Formation programs teach people how to relate to others more ef-fectively and to integrate their lifestyle (married, single, or celibate) into their ministry; these are interpersonal skills. As persons acquire instrumental and interpersonal skills, through for-mal education their energies are directed toward convergent thinking, that is, toward remembering and reproducing what is already known. It is necessary, therefore, to develop within those preparing for ministry the capacity for divergent thinking, which is a requirement for prophetic ministry. 29 Divergent thinking leads to new ideas and new ways of doing things. Gerald Arbuckle describes divergent thinkers as "intrapreneurs," whose task is to revitalize existing corporate cultures (dioceses, congregations, parishes, or religious communities). He describes entrepreneurs as those whose task is to establish new ventures outside the existing corporate struc-ture, yet who have close ties to that structure.3° Intrapreneurs must pos-sess high levels of system skills, and entrepreneurs must possess high lev-els of imaginal skills. In order to be effective, ministers must continue to develop skills in the areas that are appropriate for the ministries in which they are engaged. Second, skills for ministry are most effective when they are shared among a group of persons working cooperatively and collaboratively. As St. Paul said in l Corinthians 12:4-7, "There are different gifts but the same Spirit; there are different ministries but the same Lord." While very few individuals possess notable skill in all of the skill areas, a team of persons may possess all those skills to a notable degree. The more gifted and skilled the collaborators, the more effective their ministry will be. One person, within a group of persons working together, may pos-sess the ability to commit the group's wisdom to paper or even to do some-thing as practical as writing a proposal or a request for a grant. Another person may possess the ability to relate to others in the group and in so Paradigms for Ministry ! 333 doing make the entire team more efficient and effective. Another team member may be imaginative, dreaming up solutions to problems facing the group. Another member may be able to see how the group's activi-ties fit into the overall scheme of the larger community's (diocese, par-ish, or religious congregation) life and mission. The more diverse the skills of the collaborators or coministers, the more efficient and effec-tive their ministry will be. Third, as ministers reach a certain level of skill development, they discover a need to acquire skills at higher levels in order to meet the in-creased demands of their life and ministry. Perhaps some examples will be helpful. Many persons in ministry today find themselves spending time and energy writing talks and proposals. They are learning, there-fore, to use computers and other high-tech communication equipment-- which, of course, requires them to develop more sophisticated instrumen-tal skills. It is also necessary today, especially for those engaged in ministry or in religious life, to become more skilled participants in meetings and in other group endeavors. This requires the development of better inter-personal skills. As ministers plan for their own corporate ministry and for ministering within their communities, there is an increasing need for persons with imaginal and system skills to be working with their col-leagues in ministry. Persons in ministry today must, then, bring to their cooperative en-deavors their own skills and talents. With those skills and talents, the ef-forts of the ministering community will be successful; without them those efforts may be in vain. Finally, if the skills needed to meet the inc.reasing demands of min-istry are to be developed, persons engaged in or preparing for ministry must make a commitment to lifelong learning. Perhaps congregations of men and women religious were the first to recognize this fact and to de-velop continuing-education programs for their members. Today dioceses are developing programs for the continuing education of priests and dea-cons, as well as formation programs and continuing-education programs for nonordained persons in ministry. Persons in ministry do value and use the continuing-education and formation programs at their disposal in order to meet the demands made upon them in the Church in particular and in society at large. Our theological and biblical heritage contains a wealth of paradigms for life and for ministry. We are pilgrims on a journey of faith. We are called to care for one another along that journey. We are invited to dis- 334/Review for Religious, May-June 1991 cern the movement of God's Spirit in our midst as we journey. Finally, we are commissioned to be shepherd-leaders. May our communities of faith be blessed with pilgrims, servants, prophets, and shepherd-leaders skilled enough to build up the body, the Church, and to usher in the reign of God. NOTES I Michael T. Winstanley's article "The Shepherd Image in the Scriptures: A Para-digm for Ministry" (Clergy Review 71 [June 1986]: 197-206), which focuses on the paradigm of shepherd from a biblical perspective, was an inspiration for the class presentation that elicited the student's observation. Winstanley's presentation of the shepherding image invited reflection on the skills that are necessary in order to put that image into practice. That reflection raised the issue of the need to put other equally helpful paradigms into a contemporary context. 2 I am using both prophet and shepherd as gender-inclusive words. 3 The biblical quotations in this article are from the New American Bible. 4 Xavier L6on-Dufour, Dictionary of the New Testament, trans. Terrence Prender-gast (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1980), p. 324. 5 C.S. Lewis, The Pilgrim's Regress (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1944), pp. 15f. 6 lbid, p. 193. 7 Brian P. Hall, The Genesis Effect (New York: Paulist Press, 1986), pp. 99f. 8 L6on-Dufour, p. 368. 9 Karl Rahner, Servants of the Lord (Montreal: Palm Publishers, 1968), p. 6. 10 Hall, p. 100. 11 Anne Wilson Schaef, The Addictive Organization (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1988), p. 96. 12 lbid, p. 100. 13 John E. Steinmueller and Kathryn Sullivan, R.S.C.J., Catholic Biblical Encyclo-pedia (New York: Joseph F. Wagner, 1950), p. 527. i,~ L~on-Dufour, p. 338. 15 Gerald A. Arbuckle, S.M. Out of Chaos: Refounding Religious Congregations (New York: Paulist Press, 1988), p: 1. 16 lbid, p. 14. 17 Ibid, pp. 30f. 18 Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1978), p. 13. 19 Hall, p. 100. 20 Janet Kalven, Larry Rosen, and Bruce Taylor, Value Development: A Practical Guide (New York: Paulist Press, 1982), p. 23. 2~ Arbuckle, pp. 30f. 26 Hall, p. 147. 22 Kalven et al., p. 26. 27 Kalven et al., p. 31. 23 Ibid. 28 Ibid. 24 Hall, p. 143. 29 Kalven et al., p. 125. 25 Arbuckle, p. 31. 30 Arbuckle, p. 33. The Ministry of BEing M. Charleen Hug, S.N.D. Sister Mary Charleen Hug, S.N.D., wrote "Celibacy: Gift of a Woman's Love" for our issue of September/October 1988. Her address is 3837 Secor Road; Toledo, Ohio 43623. What an exciting age for apostolic women religious! Never before in the history of the Church have there been so many diverse ministries open to them. My people are homeless, shelter them. My people are starving, feed them. My people are oppressed, unshackle them. My people are ignorant, teach them. The lure is there. The challenge is there. The need is there. Called and sent, committed and dedicated to the cause for peace and justice, women religious now head health clinics, retreat centers. They serve in parish ministry, as pastoral associates. They are found in class-rooms, in the mission fields, in hospices for the terminally ill. They are chairpersons on national committees and help staff diocesan offices. They are participants in marches for the plight of the homeless and in protest against nuclear buildup. They take their stand against abortion, racism, and the arms race. They are engaged in all of these ministries and more. More, because there will always be the more. With the two talents I give you, says Jesus in a parable, go and make two more; with five barley loaves and two fish, feed the five thousand; all that I have done, so will you do---all this and even more! In return for the more I will reward even a cup of cold water given in my name, says Jesus. Our present age takes this more seriously, for it is the age of minis- 335 336 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 try. One more act of service to perform, one more cause to support, one more lesson to prepare, one more meeting to attend. The global village is shrinking. Impersonal people "out there" have become our brothers and sisters with very real needs that we can no longer ignore. Address-ing these needs in Jesus' name in view of the gifts and abilities with which we have been blessed is what Christian ministry is all about. For the deeply committed religious it would seem at times that this very min-istry sustains, as though that were part of the hundredfold promised. This is indeed a very blessing because experience soon proves that no matter how many ministries we take on, no matter how effectively and effi-ciently we labor, there will always be the more that is needed--more that cries out to us for fulfillment. Without great vigilance on our part we can all too readily fall into the do-list trap of evaluating the seeming "suc-cess" and "failure" of any given day by the number of items we have managed to cross off our daily list come nightfall. Because continuous do-ing drains, our present age calls apostolic women religious just as loudly to the ministry basic to all ministries, the ministry without which all do-ing becomes meaningless, empty, namely the ministry of be-ing. This ministry will be neither underwritten nor ig-nored without serious consequences not only to do-ing, but also to all that we are. Is it because the ministry of be-ing is so basic to who we are in essence that we rarely take heed of it? Do we take it so for granted that we fail to provide the time and solitude necessary to cultivate, nour-ish, and cherish it? How often, amidst all of our do-ing, do we set aside time to praise and thank God for this ministry for which each person quali-fies, in which each person can excel? In solitude the truth of "what you do flows from who you are" takes in-depth meaning. In solitude we look to Jesus, for whom, to whom, through whom we minister. In the beginning was the Word: the Word was with God and the Word was God . Through him all things came to be, not one thing had its be-ing but through him .The Word was made flesh and lived among us. (John 1:1, 14). The Word had so brief a time in which to perform the greatest min-istry this world would ever know. In the span of just thirty-three years Jesus had to be the fulfillment of the entire Old Testament, make his Fa-ther known and loved, and secure the redemption of every soul his Fa-ther would love into life. Given this ministry Jesus chose to devote the first thirty of these years to the ministry of be-ing God-made-man. When his active apostolic ministry did commence, "I AM!" identified who he was and why he "dwelt among us." He showed himself to be bread for The Ministry of BEing the hungry, drink for the thirsty, comfort for the sorrowing, compassion for the sinner, friend of simple souls, rest for the weary, light in the dark-ness, perfect image of the Father, I AM the way, the truth, the life. That Jesus' mission of be-ing was misunderstood by those to whom he minis-tered is evidenced by those who jeered. What good are you doing hanging there! Come down from the cross and do! There are still illnesses that need to be healed, sins that need to be forgiven, lessons that need to be taught, so much that we still do not un-derstand. Come down from the cross and do! By remaining on the cross Jesus became the supreme example of the relationship between be-ing and do-ing. It was in be-ing the sacrifical Lamb of God that all do-ing for all time would take on eternal value. By be-ing Resurrection and the Life he gave to each person (as inheritance!) eternal be-ing with the Father! Each of us is a be-ing created in the im-age of the Father! To remain true to this essence it is paramount that, in the midst of and because of all the ministries that demand our do-ing, we spend ample time daily in solitude. Then, while "surrounded on all sides by the crowds," as 'Jesus was, we, too, will know when someone has "touched us." We, too, will experience that "something has gone forth from [us]." Someone has called forth from "who we are" the very reason "that we are." We will discover why we are there: why we are there; why we are there amidst that particular crowd of people. In soli-tude we come to see that it is not sufficient that we praise God through our ministry; we long to be his praise. It is not sufficient that we thank God; we long to be his thanksgiving. We are not content to spread his goodness; we desire to be his goodness. It is not enough that we speak to others of his beauty; we long to be a tiny part of that beauty--and of that peace, that joy, that love! Such subtleties are not gleaned in the mar-ketplace. When it comes time for the belt that Jesus said would be tied around our waist leading us to where we would rather not go (see Jn 21 : 18), thus perhaps ending our ministry of do-ing, even if temporarily, we will em-brace that "belt." In the midst of our do-ing we will have sensitized our-selves to hear a Voice beckoning us: Be daughter of the Father, special possession of the Son, bride of the Spirit. Be she in whom the Father delights, she for whom the heavens were made. Be home of the Trinity, safekeeping for the kept secrets of the King. Be she whom the Father surrounds with his presence, enfolds with his tender love. Be faithful daughter of holy Mother the Church. Be an altar for the offering of a sacrifice of pure love, praise, and Review for Religious, May-June 1991 reverence to God. Be the dove sheltered in the clefts of the rocks, long-ing to see the face of God. Be garden enclosed, the fountain sealed. Be the fire set ablaze that Christ came to cast upon the earth. The Voice beckons further extending our parameters: My people are victims of injustice, be their righteousness. My people are suffering from painful diseases, be their relief. My people are lonely and without a shepherd, be their friend. My people are killing each other, be the peace between them. Be the missionary you always longed to be, spreading the joyful mes-sage that the kingdom of God is here, now. Be witness of the fidelity of a merciful God who loves jealously, passionately, infinitely. Be a bea-con of hope to those whose light has grown dim. Be a wounded healer by gathering up the pain of the world and offering it to the Father. Be a caring, compassionate, companion on the journey. Be for those en-trusted to you, those who depend on your be-ing. Be all things to all peo-ple. As in the case of the ministry of do-ing the ministry of be-ing like-wise demands the more, the infinitely more. More joy, more love, more peace, more patience . The more we embrace this ministry, the more it will embrace us. The more perceptive we become to living this minis-try, the more fully alive we become. The more we treasure this minis-try, the more it becomes our priceless treasure. It is an inexhaustible min-istry with inexhaustible fringe benefits just waiting to be claimed. The ministry of be-ing can be the pledge, the promise, and the prized pos-session of every apostolic woman religious. It is this reality that makes the present age an exciting one indeed in which to minister! Religious Life and Modernity Albert Dilanni, S.M. Father Dilanni taught philosophy for thirteen years, served as provincial of the North-east Province (U.S.A.) for six years, and has been vicar general of the Marist Fa-thers since 1985. His address is: Padri Maristi; Via Alessandro Poerio, 63; 00152 Roma, Italy. There are many ways of describing what has happened in the last twenty-five years since Vatican II. Historians say that there has been a shakeout after each ecumenical council and that approximately twenty-five years are required for the spirit of a council to take root and bear its best fruit. Commentators on the development of religious life since Vatican II seem to concur in this. They now present this development in three stages: (1) the rigidity prior to Vatican II, (2) the immediate chaos after Vatican II, and (3) the current period of sober reassessment with its talk of refoun-dation. Some CARA consultants name these stages Paradigms I, II, and III. Vatican II was an effort in openness and aggiornamento. Its changes were radical. The council recognized the ecclesial reality of other Chris-tian religions, opened the way to dialogue with non-Christian religions, took a radically new position on religious freedom, realized the independ-ent goodness of the secular world, called for a renewal of the liturgy and of religious life, recognizing that through baptism the laity are called to the same degree of holiness as priests and religious. All very heady at the time, exhilarating and in many ways very posi-tive and productive. Vatican II brought the Church face-to-face with the world and urged it to view it in its glory as well as its weakness. I do not think anyone really wants to go back. But even Vatican II had its shadow side. One of its results was that Catholicism in general and re-ligious life in particular seemed less important. When personal con- 339 ~141~ / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 science was exalted, when sin and hell were deemphasized in favor of love and heaven, when the great enemies of Protestant theology were quoted side by side with Rahner and Lonergan, when many distinctions were blurred and the Catholic ghetto vanished--there was no longer a dragon to kill. Now, while enemies, distinctions, ghettos, and dragons are not always eminently desirable, they did provide one thing: identity. Their removal was a major r.ea.son why the principal question exercising the Church and religious congregations since Vatican II has been ad nau-seam the question of identity. What does it mean to be a Catholic, a re-ligious, a Jesuit, a Carmelite, a Marist? But the identity question had other nonecclesiastical sources. The post-Vatican II world found itself engulfed in a cultural upheaval which it did not cause. Religious congregations were not simply surrounded by a materialistic and skeptical culture, they were immersed in it. It had in-filtrated the convent walls. Tillard says that the failure of enthusiasm, passion, and wholeheartedness apparent in religious is rooted in a shift in belief, a hesitancy of faith. Walter Kasper has remarked that what we combat today is not only an external atheism, but an atheism within our own hearts. Cultural modernity has been analyzed and reanalyzed as the on-slaught of secularization. ~ It was as if in the second half of our century the Enlightenment had reached the masses. What up to the present were ideas of intellectuals, philosophers, and cranky atheists, now, due to bet-ter communication and general education, became the fabric of culture at large. The well-documentated cultural revolution which has been play-ing itself out since the 1960s seemed to be a quantitative expansion of ideas which had been around since the eighteenth century. But Paul Ricoeur underlines that the Enlightenment has passed through two distinct stages. We might even speak of a first and second Enlightenment, that of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and the different one which began in the nineteenth and flowered in the twenti-eth century. Both began with doubt, methodic doubt, but the first went back to consciousness and found certitude, while the second in returning to con-sciousness found only suspicion. Descartes began by doubting everything methodically, but banished doubt because he believed we could find a place of certitude in consciousness. Even doubting was a form of think-ing, and the one thing I could .not doubt was that "I think." Cogito, ergo sum. At the center of consciousness was a source of clarity and dis-tinctness (les idles claires et distinctes), a way of banishing skepticism Religious Life and Modernity about the existence of the world or the truth of morality. Thus the first Enlightenment was characterized by an exaltation of the human subject and an overconfidence in a certain type of reason. Its champion was Kant, for whom the subject in the act of knowing became a partial crea-tor of the object known. But the second Enlightenment, grounded in Marx, Freud, and Nietzsche, was quite different. Commencing similarly with scientific me-thodical doubt, these thinkers also turned to the conscious and thinking subject but found there not a place of certitude but another ground for suspicion. For them human consciousness turned out to be a creator of illusions, the fabricator of masks, the great pretender. Consciousness it-self was in need of unmasking. This is the case especially when it con-cocts religions. Religion was the deception par excellence. It was an opium creating lassitude among oppressed peoples (Marx), it was a col-lective obsessive neurosis (Freud), it was a cover for a will to power pres-ent in the hearts of the weak and envious (Nietzsche). Leaving aside the fine nuance present in their systems, we can say that for these thinkers consciousness spins illusory language about God to hide what men and women really desire: sexual gratification, wealth, and power. This modern atheism, the atheism of consciousness as pretender, has with legitimacy been called a "beautiful" atheism. It has an ethical side and bears a moral, attraction. It is born of the desire to avoid masks and pretensions. The modem atheist is an atheist because he does not want to remain in a false consciousness. He wants to be honest; he does not want to tell a lie. The great modern drive, the drive of the second En-lightenment is to be authentic, not to worship an idol. For this reason, too, its geniuses Freud, Marx, and Nietzsche can present themselves as moralists. This is why Sartre can present belief in God as bad faith. Con-sciousness, in the second Enlightenment, is the escape artist, the artful dodger. Consciousness reaches salvation when it strives to catch itself at its own artifices. In light of this we can explain two moral phenomena which have oc-curred in our lifetime. First, the fact that, for many people of the twen-tieth century, hypocrisy became the great sin and sincerity the great vir-tue. (This has been documented by Lionel Trilling.) It was hypocrisy not to admit who and what you were. If you were gay, you must say it. If you were committing adultery, you must admit it. Being moral meant coming out of various closets. But unfortunately many people failed to ask the question whether acting out according to the instincts of these closets was good or bad. Some decided that anything was allowed as :342 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 long as you owned up to it. Others, plagued by a secret guilt, tried to have everyone approve whht they were doing privately; they wanted their private morality publicly sanctioned. The other phenomenon characteristic of the second Enlightenment was that contemporary thinkers were more interested in meaning than in truth. This explains the death of apologetics in the last twenty-five years. Hugo Meynell bemoans the fact that the last real apologist was C.S. Le-wis. Today, he complains, theologians are more concerned to show that Christianity is relevant. What floods the market is writing on the social and political implications of Christianity, or on its power to lead us to a fuller and more authentic personal life. Admitting the importance of such writing, he believes, nevertheless, that a serious apologetic which looks beyond meaning to truth is absolutely indispensable for the Church and that many of its present ills are due to a neglect of it. Without a proper apologetics, says Meynell, "the unbeliever is apt to infer that edu-cated Christians have really grasped the fact that social reform, political action, and psychic hygiene are that to which religious aspiration ought to be directed."2 Related to this move from truth to meaning is the fact that for the last twenty years seminarians, both religious and diocesan, have unchar-acteristically manifested a distaste for intellectual argument. Even some of the most intelligent tended to shun involvement in debates about the truth and falsity of moral positions or thorny dogmatic issues like the in-terpretation of the Resurrection, and were satisfied if they were con-vinced that a particular doctrine of the Church held some meaning for people. More and more religious showed up on the Myers-Briggs test as feelers and not thinkers. Brought up in an Enlightenment of suspicion, they suspected intestinally that the search for truth is impossible and that the different philosophies are simply a parade of ideologies with no cri-terion for discerning which is right and which is wrong. This is prob-ably the deep side of the vocation crisis among the youth of the second Enlightenment. If consciousness suspects its very self and its powers, how can it commit itself to anything for a long-term future? Ricoeur believes that we must face head-on what he calls the "her-meneutics of suspicion." We must take seriously its originators and think-ers and recognize their contribution. We cannot return to a primitive naivet6. But he also insists that we cannot remain in a state of denial, in a vacuum of truth, in mere negation; we must move to a second naivet6, we must move to a new place of affirmation. In order to do this we must not only respect the creators of suspicion but also question Religious Life and Modernity them. We must suspect the suspicioners and put them to the test. We must transcend the Enlightenment in both its phases. We will not achieve this by attempting to return to a consciousness conceived of as pure thought, to a thinking self which is sufficient unto itself apart from the world. For contemporary philosophy such a move is impossible. Consciousness can only be encountered as already in and of the world. The only way to discover what the human mind or human consciousness is like is through an examination of the works it has strewn in the world down the centuries, that is, through an examination of the institutions and documents of culture. Ricoeur bets that after such a re-flection the scandal of the cross will remain as much a scandal for mod-ern consciousness as it was for an earlier consciousness. He bets that the scandal of the cross will be discovered to be transcultural, a scandal not merely for humans in one stage of history, but for the human condition as such. For the modern age, theology's method has itself changed. We do not go immediately to the transcendent, to God, to the sacred and then try to relate God to the world. We find God through the world; we dis-cover the transcendent as the depth of the world. We seek an incarna-tional approach to eschatology and transcendence. We try to find God within the world as the Creative Moment therein, as the source without which justice and equality, as absolute moral imperatives, lack motiva-tion and a rational ground. The Enlightenment andthe Redefinition of Religious Life Whether we consider it in its first or second phase, the Enlighten-ment is marked by the same ideals, the dethroning of authority and tra-dition in favor of reason, free thought, and humanistic brotherhood. The ideals of both Enlightenments can be summarized most easily in the slo-gan of the French Revolution whose 200th anniversary we celebrated in 1989: liberty, fraternity, and equality. It was onto these very three ideals that religious life fastened almost in sequence after Vatican II in an effort to redefine itself, to forge a new identity. It had to deal with them as reinforced by the genius of Nietzsche, Freud, and Marx. Note that these ideals are mirror-imaged in the three vows and are in a sense the concern of the vows: (liberty) obe-dience, (fraternity) chastity, and (equality) poverty. The first of the Enlightenment ideals to make dramatic entrance into our culture and religious life was the ideal of personal or individual free-dom (its hero, Nietzsche). Never in a general culture had the notion "I want x" enjoyed such power as a reason for morally justifying an ac- ~144 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 tion. In an earlier climate of opinion, the fact that someone strongly de-sired something rendered suspect his or her opinion about it. In this ear-lier climate it was because an issue like abortion was so important that it could not be decided principally by the person who was subjectively involved. She could hardly have an objective viewpoint. But now it was precisely because an issue was so important that it must be left up to in-dividual choice. Major books have been written documenting and decry-ing this shift to individualistic freedom: Mclntyre's After Virtue, Allan Bloom's The Closing of the American Mind, and Robert Bellah's Habits of the Heart. Some of its critics distinguish between a liberal spirit which is admirable in its pursuit of discussion and exchange of ideas, and a lib-eral dogma which in its exaggerations is pernicious because it has not allowed us to build a community upon agreed societal values. Enlightenment freedom and its individualism invaded religious life in the 60s and early 70s. The major concern of seminarians and religious of that era was self-fulfillment and the idea that they could not be ful-filled unless they made their own choices about lifestyle and ministry. This was also the age when many seminarians refused to kneel down in chapel and to acknowledge any difference between themselves and their professors. Their slogan was that of the youth culture of the sixties: "Don't trust anyone over thirty!" Articles on religious obedience ap-pearing in REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS at the time had less to do with the su-perior's authority as representing God or as the leader of a group engaged in a religious cause, than with how he or she should be a caring person or a listener attentive to the needs of community members. The second Enlightenment ideal used in the attempted redefinition of religious life was the ideal of fraternity interpreted as intimacy (its hero, Freud; its favorite book, Fromm's The Art of Loving). In the 70s fraternity came to the fore in the form of the need for intimacy and com-munity. Some felt that religion itself was a projection of affective needs. Everyone seemed sure that, without at least psychological sexual rela-tions, you could not really develop as a person. A good number left re-ligious life while they were still nubile in the conviction that the Church would soon wake up and change the rules. Others adopted what for a brief time was called the "third way," that is, remaining somewhat celi-bate while dating. All of this was later exacerbated by the gay movement and the inability of some to realize that, whatever one might think of ho-moerotic relations in general, all religious, whether homosexually or heterosexually oriented, had taken the same vow. Those who chose to remain and to keep the vows fought for a more Religious Life and Modernity / 345 fraternal and intimate form of community life and began using the word "sharing" as an intransitive verb. "Sharing" went on till the wee hours of the morning. "Thanks for sharing" and a big hug seemed to end every conversation, even a conversation in which a provincial had in no uncertain terms said, "No.t'' For all its positive aspects, this age of individualistic freedom and of fraternity/intimacy/community was "the era of the divided heart." It was a time, not entirely past, in which many of us, ~11 of us to some degree, were sidetracked, distracted, not completely present to the task, unhappy. For many religious, life became not so much a vocation as an avocation. They did good work and were not completely disinterested in the religious community, but their treasure, their compelling interest seemed to be elsewhere. They did not realize it at the time and cannot be blamed, but absorbed in themselves, jettisoning traditional practices without replacing them with new communal structures, they were sap-ping the energy of the group. It was in subconscious reaction to this drift that there appeared in re-ligious- life circles the talk about the need for a shared vision or a com-mon sense of mission. Much effort went into writing mission statements which everyone signed and accepted mutteringly in paraliturgical cere-monies. But there was an unexamined assumption in writing such mis-sion declarations, the assumption that everyone wanted a common vi-sion. Though there has always been a degree of pluralism and confusion in the Church, what seemed different now was that some religious seemed almost to welcome the confusion. They gave up the search for a shared vision not simply because it is hard to attain, but because in a deep sense they did not want one. It may be a hard saying, but I believe it is true that many of us, all of us to some degree, did not desire a true unity of mind and vision, at least not one which was set down in great detail, one which invaded and interfered with our life. The third ideal of the French Revolution and Enlightenment to enter religious life in the time of attempted redefinition was that of equality (its hero, Marx). It was the same ideal which gave rise to liberation the-ology and to the preferential option for the poor. It came strongly to the fore in the 80s. Beginning with the 33rd General Congregation of Jesu-its it thundered into religious life under the title of faith and justice. So-cial analysis and peace-and-justice committees soon became the vogue. Religious, male and female, left long-standing apostolates in education and hospitals and went to work among the poor and oppressed of both the third and first worlds. Soon the movement became involved with jus- 346 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 tice questions within the Church as well as the world, in the first as well as the third world. Now suddenly every question was interpreted princi-pally in terms of the power-equality schema. Everywhere there was talk of the need for assertiveness, the tactics of confrontation, the evil of pa-triarchy, the lucha de clases. Not just politics but a liberal politics was brought to the center of religion and religious life. At Boston College in 1984 the Jesuit historian John Padberg said, "It must be admitted that from a historical point of view many of the changes which have taken place in feminine religious communities do not derive from Vatican II, but from the secular feminist movement." I believe that these attempted redefinitions of religious life have all failed because religious have remained at a superficial level in thinking about freedom, fraternity, and equality. In their general thrust these new values are wonderful and exhilarating and are here to stay. But they must be retrieved in their Christian depth and meaning. Secularization and the Return of Religion We are in a polarization situation in the Church today, liberals against conservatives. This can be documented by reading any theologi-cal review or religious newspaper. Avery Dulles, in fact, discerns four quasi-ideologies in the Church, liberal, traditionalist, neoconservative, and radical.3 Signs of the resistance appear not only in a growing funda-mentalism in Church practice, but in the "postliberal" or "postmod-ern" stances in academic theology championed by men like Lindbeck, Huston Smith, and Stanley Hauerwas. The resistance is also apparent in the area of religious and priestly vocations. In the entire industrialized world it is the progressive orders which continue to experience a decline, while conservative congregations enjoy substantial increases. But what is not understood is that the very fact of the polarization has a religious meaning. It means that modernity cannot be understood as a single phenomenon of ongoing secularization. There is something else occurring. The evident resistance to a liberal secularism hints at the possibility of a great reversal, a move to a higher synthesis. Many have been willing to see a religious significance in seculariza-tion. They interpret it as the desire to be authentic, to be rid of idols, to avoid at all costs the telling of a lie. But is there not also a deep mean-ing to the liberal/conservative split and the rise of fundamentalism and neoconservatism? Is this not also a sign of the times? It seems simplistic to view the resistance to tendencies which have been the vogue since Vati-can II as a mere knee-jerk reaction, a neurotic flight to security in the face of a secularized world. The very fact of these countermovements Religious Life and Modernity / 347 has a religious sense. It reveals, among other things, that modern men and women still recognize the presence of mystery and transcendence and feel that without it liberty, fraternity, and equality remain superfi-cial and, in the end, stifling. In an article entitled "Can the West be Converted?" Leslie Newbigin, the famous Anglican missionary to India, asks: Can there be an effective missionary encounter with this culture--this so powerful, per-suasive, and confident culture which (at least until very recently) simply regarded itself as "the coming world civilization"? He bemoans as excessive the criticism of the nineteenth-century mis-sionary on the part of socially-minded Christians, and disagrees with drop-ping the term "foreign missions" in favor of "overseas ministries" or "cross-cultural ministry." Says Newbigin: "The contemporary embar~ rassment about the missionary movement of the previous century is not, as we like to think, evidence that we have become more humble. It is, I fear, much more clearly evidence of shift in belief. It is evidence that we are less ready to affirm the uniqueness, the centrality, the decisive-ness of Jesus Christ as universal Lord and Savior, the Way by following whom the world is to find its true goal, the Truth by which every other claim to truth is to be tested, the Life in whom alone life in its fullness is to be found."4 Instead of weighing the Christian religious experience in the scale of reason as our culture understands reason, let us suppose, says Newbigin, that the Gospel is true; that, in the story of the Bible and in the life and death and resurrection of Jesus, the Creator and Lord of the universe has actually manifested himself to declare and effect his pur-pose; and that, therefore, everything else, including all the actions and assumptions of our culture, has to be assessed and can only be validly assessed in the scales which this revelation provides. What would it mean if, instead of trying to understand the gospel from the point of view of our culture, we tried to understand our culture from the point of view of the gospel? Rabbi Abraham Heschel said something similar when addressing theo-logians at a conference on the future of theology: "It has always seemed puzzling to me how greatly attached to the Bible you seem to be and yet how much like pagans you handle it. The great challenge to those of us who wish to take the Bible seriously is to let it teach us its own essential categories; and then for us to think with them, instead of just about them."5 Something new is stirring, something new striving to be born. A sig- 3411 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 nificant group of theologia.ns is reaching for a postliberal stance which might feed the hunger for truth and a deeper meaning which exists in America. Professor Huston Smith puts it as follows: "While the West's 'brain,' which for present purposes we can equate with the modern uni-versity, rolls ever further down the reductionistic path, other centers of society--our emotions, for example, as they find expression through our artists and our wills. --protest. These other centers of ourselves feel they are being dragged, kicking and screaming, down an ever-darken-ing tunnel."6 The first world turns to suicide, drugs, and hooliganism because of a lack of meaning in the lives of its members. Culture is the meaning system of society. According to some sociologists, religion is the deep-est aspect of that meaning system. But the religion which remains in West-ern society is impoverished. The religion of our secularized cultures is highly intellectualized, pared down, devoid of mystery and passion. Mys-teries are embarrassments and explained away reductively. Modern churches look like banks. In many Catholic churches statues of saints are either banished or shrunken to stand sheepishly in shadowy corners. Lit-tle remains of the sense of an invisible reality beyond the material one, of a grand communion of saints, of Blake's "infinity in a grain of sand" and "eternity in an hour." And what has sprung up in the desert of modernity? The so-called "pipeline religion" of charismatics and Pentecostals, a revival of an emo-tional type of prayer with a need for a personal attachment to Jesus ex-pressed emotionally and publicly, the ministry of healing in sum, the desire for a backdrop to life, a deeper dimension, an invisible world; the need once again to feel that God is near and that we are able to commune with him; the need for a God who is transcendent as well as immanent. We desire the divine face of Jesus as well as the human face of God. The pendulum swings of the Christological debates of the early Church are again in evidence. The third redefinition of religious life in terms of equality and jus-tice is an improvement over the first two redefinitions in terms of liberty and fraternity, especially where these are interpreted as individualistic freedom and a sentimentalized intimacy/community. Individualism can-not form community. Nor can we religious be merely intimiste in our spiri-tuality. We cannot be satisfied with simply voicing our affections of love toward others or even for the Lord. Love must be active, social, and even political. Christians cannot concentrate solely on their own salvation whether earthly or celestial. "What would the Lord say," asked Char- Religious Life and Modernity / 349 les P6guy, "if we go to him without all the others?" On the other hand, this third effort to redefine ourselves and discover a lost identity was (is) in some ways more seductive, more liable to be-come an idol, for in itself it is strongly rooted in the Gospel and demands great sacrifice. The quest for social justice is "a constitutive part" of the Gospel, says an oft-quoted text of the 1971 Synod of Bishops. But it, too, has its shadow side. It was an improvement because it took the focus off of the individual subject, the I, but it was not sufficient because it replaced the individual subject with another earthly subject, the spe-cies subject, Marx's Gattungswesen, or with a part of society, the poor, the oppressed of the human species. To define religious life principally in terms of social justice is to make the Marxian move of replacing re-ligion with the need to foster a truly socialized man and woman. While fear of idolatry caused men of earlier ages to set God above the world and beyond all images, the danger of idolatry returns a hun-dredfold when we look for him within the bowels of the world. Some will call this double-talk and say they will have nothing to do with liberation, equality, compassion, and the betterment of people. But such a conclusion does not follow from what I am saying. Just the oppo-site is true. Unless we live in light of the truth that the world belongs to God and that its primary duty is to praise him in gratitude for what has been given, we cannot even begin to construct a world of justice. Unless we see that God is first and creator and that the human is second and created, we cannot find any basis for human equality or for treating everyone with justice and care. Evolutionists turned philosophers say that humans are equal only by the accident that a group of beings with about the same size brain flow-ered at a certain period of time. As a result these thinkers can find no ground for the moral imperative of justice. Such an imperative appears only when and if we view humans as having a relationship to an Abso-lute whose essence is Love. Humans have a dignity not because they hap-pen to have a complex brain which gives them a kind of free will, but because they are loved and because the very meaning of their being is to love as the Father loves. As Martin Buber has said, whoever makes freedom the primary characteristic of humans is blind to the real nature of human existence which is "being sent and a being commissioned."7 It is because God's love for us does not rise out of a personal need but is gratuitous, that the universe has meaning and that social justice is an imperative. In this discovery we will find true freedom. For the God of the absolute future is a God of plenitude who does not enslave nor ~150 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 brook enslavement. Contemporary thinkers are obsessed by the thought that dualisms must be overcome at all cost, that all distinctions must be leveled, the natural and the supernatural, laity and clergy, Church and world. In this same vein, because of the doctrine that all are called to the same degree of holiness in baptism, they tend to believe that the distinction between laity and religious cannot ultimately be maintained. But in counteract-ing dualisms we must be careful not to submerge certain important dis-tinctions. There may be other distinctions between religious life and lay life which are .not connected with the call to holiness shared in baptism. Religious, I believe, are called to a different kind of separation from the world. Religious must be not above or beyond the world, nor seek to escape its toils. BUt yes, their life must be distinct and separate by tak-ing up the very different lifestyle of a pilgrim as did the apostles, not remaining at home but accompanying Jesus on the way. Again, if a religious must be a prophet, as many commentators urge, then he or she must be different from others in the way that a prophet is different from those to whom he or she prophesies. The prophet is one who shows the way. Religious must teach by their life that all Christians must be in the world but not of the world, that their greatness will not spring from surrender to the values of the world. Without a distinction between religious and laity the significance and identity of a truly Chris-tian laity may also be in danger of being lost. Something new is being born: a higher synthesis. It will consist es-sentially in a rewinning for human consciousness the sense of the tran-scendent and a new understanding of what is meant by a separation from the world. The problem of the third world is poverty; the problem of the first world is paganism. The third world retains the sense of the transcen-dent, though the embrace may at times be cluttered with emotion and su-perstitions and not translate into social action. The first world has in many cases simply given up the embrace. And in doing so it finds no adequate ground for love of neighbor, enemy, or stranger. Earlier spirituality taught that only in recognizing God's sovereignty can we avoid pride. It is through the same recognition that we will be-come compassionate and work for justice. True kenosis lies in the reali-zation that all humans--poor or rich, woman or man, ourselves or oth-ers- are of secondary importance. What is of prime importance is be-yond. But the God beyond sends us back to the world whose inhabitants he loves unconditionally as individual persons and as societies. He places upon us the moral imperative of justice and the command of love. Religious Life and Modernity Through a relationship with the Lord established in prayer, the extent of our task as Christians will be revealed. In transcendence we will redis-cover immanence. Modernity and its religious need again to ponder the words of the psalmist: "In your light we shall see light." NOTES I In support of a minority dissenting position, see Andrew Greeley and Michael Hout, "The secularisation myth," The Tablet, June 10, 1989, pp. 665-667. 2 "Faith and Reason," The Tablet, March I 1, 1989, p. 276. 3 See "Catholicism and American Culture," America, January 27, 1990, pp. 54- 59. 4 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, April 1988, p. 51. 5 Quoted by Prof. Albert Outler, "Toward a Post-liberal Hermeneutics," Theology Today, October 1985, p. 290. 6 Toward the Post-Modern Mind (Crossroad, 1982), p. 25. 7 Martin Buber, The Eclipse of God (Harper and Row, 1962), p. 69. A Celibate Dialogues with God I asked God: "Must I be my last and only word? Will this who-I-am be heard no more when I am dead? Who will know what I have said? Who will weave my melody into their song or hum at least my harmonies along with theirs? Who will? Who will?" And God said: "Peace. Be still." Irene Zimmerman, S.S.S.F. 3601 South 41 Street Milwaukee, Wl 53221 Focus: The Mission William F. Hogan, C.S.C. Father William Hogan, C.S.C., wrote "Chapters and Structures" for our issue of January/February 1989. His address remains Fratelli Cristiani; Via della Maglian-ella 375; 00166 Roma, Italy. Mission is the most written about concept in religious institutes and it sets the tone of most revised constitutions. Furthering the mission of Jesus in today's world has provided the framework for renewal programs and processes in communities of the consecrated life. The concerns that pre-occupy us affect our lives in many ways, providing an overall orienta-tion for judgments, the determination of choices, the perception of life and reality, the measurement of problems. And yet, all too often con-cern for the mission is not carried over into the nitty-gritty of daily life; we can find in ourselves a gap between the intellectual approach to mis-sion and what motivates our actual responses in concrete situations. Con-tradictions can abound in our human persons! The morale of many religious today is deeply affected by dwindling numbers, aging, and the lack of new members to carry on the life and work. Some give in to discouragement and the tendency to pull in on self; survival looms as a major concern and the scope of vision becomes quite narrow. Surely the Lord does not want a yielding to inclinations along this line because they are contrary to the tenor of the Gospel, which would focus our attention with largeness of heart and vision on the mis-sion of Jesus and the call to live, be, and do in response to the mission today, no matter what. The Christian must be an apostolic person in all the phases and situations of life with their ups and downs. It is understandable that there be a human reaction of preoccupation with self-preservation and self-survival, given the innate drive for the self 352 Focus: The Mission / 353 to live on and the desire to continue a form of life in which one believes. At the same time we must confront within ourselves some very real is-sues, the most basic of which centers around whose mission it is we are called to serve. This is the struggle of God and the "me," the struggle with which we have to cope in one way or another all through life, the struggle of sinfulness. "Your thoughts are not my thoughts, nor my ways your ways" (Is 55:8). What does our God seem to be asking of religious today, especially in institutes that appear to be dying? It surely is not pious platitudes: "God's will"; "God will provide"; "History will repeat itself"; "It happened before." While it may be hard to read what is happening, we can surmise a few points about basic attitudes to which the Lord may be calling us. Most basic of these is to expand our vision beyond our own religious institutes to see how the Spirit is active in the birthing of so many new forms of consecration for mission. Despite secularism and other "isms"--perhaps because of them--our times are seeing all kinds of new Christian community foundations with a variety of time-tested and new elements. We are living in an era as rich as the nineteenth cen-tury, as far as new religious ventures are concerned, although the em-phasis on some aspects of consecration may differ. In many parts of the world the Spirit is pouring forth founding charisms on individuals to wit-ness to Christ in discipleship in new ways. In some instances there are blends of various long-standing spiritual traditions; others are different combinations of the monastic and actively apostolic; still others would appear to be revivals of forms that have passed out of existence over the centuries; some are entirely new. One can look at the community movements springing up and won-der why these people do not simply join already existing religious con-gregations that are in need of new members in order to continue. And we just cannot find adequate answers on a human level. It is not enough to say that today's individuals want less structure because some of the emerging groups are very highly structured. Nor can one merely explain that people want to be unencumbered, free of age-old traditions and in-stitutionalism, since many are deeply rooted in traditions and some have picked up practices that religious congregations have laid aside. Is it the attraction of the new? Who knows? What is important is to have a vi-sion that embraces what the Spirit of God is doing to further the mission of Jesus in our age. If all disciples of Christ are people of mission, the challenge is to keep one's attention on the accomplishment of the mis-sion and not just one's own particular part in it. The glory of God Review for Religious, May-June 1991 through the restoration of creation in Christ is what matters and not how we think we are glorifying God. We are face-to-face with the issue of whose mission this is, God's or ours, and whether we have fallen into the trap of overestimating the importance of our own role in the mission. A breadth of vision is needed, with the focal point being Christ and the continuation of Christ's message and work. We share in that work; we witness to Christ's person and message. The continuation of the mission is what counts, not so much who accomplishes it. Religious today may find themselves in a situation somewhat analo-gous to some incidents described in the Bible: Now two men, one named Eldad and the other Medad, were not in the gathering but had been left in the camp. They too had been on the list, but had not gone out to the tent; yet the spirit came to rest on them also, and they prophesied in the camp. So, when a young man quickly told Moses, "Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp," Joshua, son of Nun, who from his youth had been Moses' aide, said, "Moses, my lord, stop them." But Moses answered him, "Are you jea.lous for my sake? Would that all the people of the Lord were prophets! Would that the Lord might bestow his spirit on them all!" (Nb 11:26-29). John said to him, "Master, we saw a man who is not one of us cast-ing out devils in your name; and because he was not one of us we tried to stop him." But Jesus said, "You must not stop him: no one who works a miracle in my name is likely to speak evil of me. Anyone who is not against us is for us" (Mk 9:38-40). If God was giving them the same gift he gave us when we first be-lieved in the Lord Jesus Christ, who am I to impede the action of God? (Ac 11:17). Perhaps individuals experience pain when they see others in search of values in new groups and it appears that the ideals are the same that they themselves are trying to live. Yet the attention must be on Christ and ful-fillment of his plan now, what is needed for the mission now, and not on one's own pain. Granted that this is easier said than done, but we must keep trying to be conscious of the mission that is the very reason for our being. Our faith would tell us that the Lord is very much present in the cur-rent situation, though not necessarily in the way that we would like the Lord to be present, that is, according to our desires and plans. And that is another aspect of what God is asking of religious today: to find him present in the decline as much as in the previous rise in religious life. This entails hope, defined in the dictionary as desire joined with the ex- Focus: The Mission pectation of getting what is desired. The "what is desired," however, constitutes a problem area. Most religious say that they hope there will be a resurgence of vocations to their institutes and they frequently wit-ness to their words through intense prayer for vocations, both in personal prayer and in petitions during the Prayers of the Faithful at Eucharistic celebrations and the liturgy of the hours. Christian hope must be founded on the person of Jesus Christ, whose power gives us the basis for expectations to be fulfilled. Jesus' mission/ kingdom are inseparable from his person and to hope in him touches upon his mission and his ways of bringing it about rather than our own projections of what the mission demands according to our viewpoints-- in particular, the preservation of our particular religious institutes. We hope, but in what way'?. In total openness to God's ways? Genuine hope involves a finding of the Lord present in situations that may lead to a cer-tain type of dying; hope in the Lord may mean a letting go of some of our desires and false hopes, and even of any panicky types of prayer for vocations. Now is a time for deep inner calm founded on the Lord Jesus who is at work among his people, accomplishing the mission, though our vision be obscured through personal suffering over the decline of reli-gious life. Not resignation, but a lively hope in the Lord! How frequently the Word of God calls us to wait on the Lord in a spirit of peace, "singing the favors of the Lord" even when we feel weighed down with concerns. The Lord's time and way so often are not our times, ways, and vision; thus he challenges us to a patient engaging trust in him, as he did Habakkuk of old: Write down the vision clearly upon the tablets, so that one can read it readily. For the vision still has its time, presses on to fulfillment, and will not disappoint; if it delays, wait for it, it will surely come, it will not be late (Hab 2:2-3). This waiting in patience is not passive, for it demands a struggle for faith in and openness to God's ways in the accomplishment .of the mission. And it charges us to keep on going in what we are living, giving, and doing and not to pull into self, overwhelmed by feelings of discourage-ment. The blindness of faith and surrender to the Lord's way are invoked by waiting on the Lord. St. Therese of Lisieux described herself as a little ball: "You [God] throw me to someplace in a corner; maybe ten years later you pick me up again." Catherine de Hueck Doherty mentions in her writings a starets who said that we should be like rag dolls that can be picked up 356 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 by the hand, foot, or head, thrown in the bushes, hugged, thrown in the toy box. These figures of speech point to the self-emptying at the heart of waiting on the Lord--the painful surrenders to go the Lord's way and not our own, holding on in faith as we try to let go of our ways and yield to the divine ways. It is a movement to selflessness with conviction that God knows what he is doing, even when it is beyond our comprehen-sion. Human solutions to problems and techniques for attracting possible vocations are important, but none are miraculous. There is no mystical, magical solution for the vocational crisis in religious institutes. No mat-ter what human avenues and approaches are pursued, we must look to the basic point of attitudes our God wants of us now: faith; largeness of vision of the mission and how it is being realized today and by whom it is being promoted; and awareness that the Lord is calling us to a kenosis beyond what we have experienced in the recent past. And all of this would appear to be part of the divine plan for greater growth in open-ness to God's ways. The alternative prayer for the fourth Sunday of Eas-ter expresses it powerfully: God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, though your people walk in the valley of darkness, no evil should they fear; for they follow in faith the call of the shepherd whom you have sent for their hope and strength. Attune our minds to the sound of his voice, lead our steps in the path he has shown, that we may know the strength of his outstretched arm and enjoy the light of your presence for ever. We ask this in the name of Jesus the Lord. Participative Leadership for Refounding: Reflections Gerald A. Arbuckle, S.M. Father Arbuckle is well known to many of our readers around the world for his arti-cles, books, and workshops. His address: Catholic Theological Union; ! Mary Street; Hunters Hill, Sydney, N.S.W.; Australia 2110. Refounding is the process whereby an apostolic congregation, under the inspiration and leadership of creatively pastoral people, relates the Gos-pel message to the critically challenging problems within contemporary cultures (for example, secularism and injustice) according to the spirit of the original founding vision. ~ These imaginative people cannot emerge and act, however, if their officially appointed congregational leadership team fails to realize its primary function: to foster an atmosphere condu-cive to pastoral creativity within the religious community. I believe that the decision-making processes of the leadership team that aim to facilitate refounding must be based on the principles of parti-cipative (or collaborative) leadership. However, considerable confusion can exist about precisely what is meant by participative government. In this article I seek to clarify what is meant by "participative lead-ership for refounding." I concentrate on the dynamics of participative leadership within the officially appointed congregational leadership teams at the provincial and general levels. By extension, what I say of the participative process within these teams will apply mutatis mutandis to all other congregational leadership groups. Leadership for Refounding: Clarifying the Model Two relevant models of administrative style can be distinguished-- the "mechanistic" and the "organic"; they differ according to the pur- 357 Review for Religious, May-June 1991 pose for which an organization exists.2 In the mechanistic style, the tasks of the organization are considered predictable or unchanging. The organi-zation is characterized by many rules and regulations; the leadership's role is to make sure that these long-established and neatly set-out rules of operation are being followed. Creativity is discouraged because it threatens a predictable way of acting. Thus, the mechanistic style of lead-ership is totally unsuited to a world of change. Within the Church, the methods of evangelization and pastoral care changed little over several centuries prior to Vatican II. The world had to adapt to the Church, not vice versa. The administrative style of the ecclesiastical and religious congregations had become mechanistic. Re-cently I reviewed the provincial-chapter decrees of an apostolic male cleri-cal congregation from 1894 to 1956. Never at any point is there refer-ence to the need for pastoral creativity; instead the emphasis is on con-trol through the maintenance of detailed discipline rules. For example, in the decrees of 1900, phrases like "the present Chapter reasserts the prohibition against." are commonplace. Little wonder that our pastoral administrators failed to take note of the emergence of the urban/factory working class in the nineteenth cen-tury. Pastoral care remained predictably and "pleasantly" rural in ori-entation. Not surprisingly, the vast majority of this often oppressed class became alienated from the Church and continue to remain so. The second style of administration is organic. There are few rules and regulations in the organization. The emphasis is on constant inno-vation, creativity, and evaluative feedback because the marketplace de-mands an ever-increasing variety of new products, devices, and designs. The leadership fosters in the organization a participative atmosphere in which people feel they can create and be supported by other members in the group. Decision making is primarily proactive rather than reactive or crisis solving. By this we mean that organic administrations are "an-ticipative people," that is, they see change coming and then begin to plan and discuss different ways to adapt to it. They begin to create and control change rather than succumb to it.3 Organic-oriented leadership is founded on six assumptions. First, the process of creativity and innovation is a generally very messy one, be-cause it is a human activity that "involves the personalities, emotions, and quirks of many creative people. It does not always work cleanly; it does not always work well; it certainly does not usually work effi-ciently.' ,4 Second, leadership teams need space and time in which to ponder Participative Leadership / 359 over the implications of the information coming .to them. If leaders do not have this sacred space and time, they will, without realizing it, re-gress to an authoritarian style of leadership. Today congregational lead-ership, especially at the provincial level, must carry unprecedented bur-dens. For example, as a consequence of the inevitable contemporary "re-ligious- life chaos," congregational leadership must be involved in press-ing maintenance issues, such as the closing of houses because of the de-cline in membership and the development of new ministries, the pastoral care of religious who are confused by the chaos within and outside re-ligious life, and the finding of finances to cover health and retirement costs. At the same time they must be giving priority to the future of the congregation, its mission, new and creative responses. If congregational leadership is not ruthlessly careful, it will be exhausted with maintenance demands. Creativity space will be choked out. Third, because the organization exists to respond to the needs of a rapidly changing world, the communication about these needs and the creative responses to them must be fast, two-way, and accurate. The lead-ership team is concerned to get the right information at the right time and to pass it on to the people who need it, to get the message understood and acted upon. Fourth, the temptation to spend an excessive amount of time on analy-sis of the information being received must be resisted. Organizations can become so caught up in more and more analysis and information gather-ing that they become paralyzed. On the other hand, paralysis can also develop if organizations are consistently rushing into decision making without sufficient research and information. Creative risk takers become deenergized not only with excessive, introverted meetings and analysis, but also by having to interact with groups that constantly fail to listen to reality.5 In whatever way group paralysis occurs, we have a recipe for organizational suicide. Fifth, even the most creative leadership teams can develop middle-life weariness. They can lose their drive and enthusiasm and adopt a mechanistic leadership style; they fall victim to the deadly temptation to spend their time solving the problems of yesterday rather than anticipat-ing the challenges of tomorrow. Bureaucracy, red tape, and complacency are the symptoms of this mortal disease.6 Sixth, organizations that have become bureaucratic, inward-looking, or unresponsive to changing needs can only be refounded if their leadership is prepared to adopt the organic style. The resistance to change and to creative persons, however, could be so great that the pro- 3130 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 cess of refounding is impossible. The leadership team is powerless. But the team should not lightly surrender to resistance---on the other hand, ,the real obstacles to refounding may well be within the leadership group itself. Seventh, every leadership team needs skills for interpreting what is happening within its own group and within the wider society it seeks to serve. If a team is unable to be honest and courageous enough to reflect on the strengths and weaknesses of its own interrelationships, it will re-main insensitive to what is taking place within the wider organizational culture.7 Organic Leadership Style and Religious Life Apostolic religious congregations exist to minister to the changing pastoral needs of people and cultures.8 An essential reason for their ex-istence is that they be bold in apostolic initiatives.9 This ministry de-mands an organic leadership style in congregational administrations. 10 The Ignatian discernment method of coming to decisions is a form of the organic leadership style. The organic style finds support in the approach of St. Paul to evangel-ization. While there must be respect for the unchanging values of the teaching of Jesus Christ, there must be an openness to the use of the di-verse girls of people in preaching the Good News: "Now Christ's body is yourselves, each of you with a part to play in the whole" (1 Co 12:27). Paul lists the girls in order of importance. After the apostles (and their successors) came prophets (v.28). The prophets, whose distinguishing qualities are spelled out by Paul in writing to the Galatians (5:22), are the imaginative and creative persons within the Church (and religious con-gregations). Their role is to challenge Gospel communities constantly to develop new ways to preach the Good News to the world of today. Paul assumes that leaders of Christian communities must allow authentic proph-ets and pastorally creative persons to emerge and function. There is nothing nonincarnational, stuffy, bureaucratic, or mecha-nistic about Paul's thinking. Achieving Organic Leadership: Practical Guidelines If religious leadership teams are to have an organic leadership style, they must: 1. Formulate a clear team vision of goals and strategies. If a team does not know what it is aiming for, it will be equally fuzzy about what it should be doing; personal and group energy will dissipate Participative Leadership / 361 on minutiae or nonessential issues. The forming of a vision of realistic goals and the strategies to achieve them is at first sight deceptively simple. The formulation of practical strategies, for example, demands precise thinking and forecasting as well as making commitments involving others; most superiors are not accus-tomed to viewing the process in this way. ~ 2. Be aware of differing forms of participative leadership. The participative approach means that all team members share in the decision-making process. They do this in various ways, for example: dis-cussion leads to consensus or a majority vote or after consultation of mem-bers or their free offer of advice, the team leader or a delegated member decides. The preference is the first option: full involvement in decision mak-ing through consensus. However, there must be flexibility. The group should learn what option is the most appropriate at a given time. For ex-ample, the urgency for decision and action may allow only the last op-tion, that is, a decision made by the one with the most authority. Deci-sion making through consensus normally takes considerable time. Canon law and congregational constitutions do prescribe that some matters be decided, for example, by the major superior with the consent or advice of other members of the leadership team. If lengthy or wide consultation or majority voting is made the unchanging rule, then decisions may never be made and the urgent apostolic needs are left unattended. The conse-quence is that an organic style of leadership is turned into an oppressive mechanistic one. Decision making through consensus needs to be carefully under-stood. By consensus is meant that all parties agree what the decision should be and feel that they have been thoroughly involved at all stages. However, if consensus decision making is pursued at all costs, that is, if it is made into a rigid ideology, then points of conflict and disagree-ment are forced underground. If these issues remain unattended to, then all kinds of unresolved negative feelings or hurts will haunt the group and threaten to split it apart. The same danger exists if the majority vot-ing option is pushed through too quickly, because then disagreements and differences of opinion also remain unresolved. Pseudoconsultation is to be ruthlessly avoided; this involves the il-lusion of participation without the substance. Decisions have already been made by leaders, but other team members are then "consulted to keep them happy." There is no intention of changing the original deci-sions. This leads to disillusionment, disaffection, and cynicism. 362 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 I find that major superiors can unwittingly raise false expectations within their leadership teams (and within their province or congregation) simply by failing to specify the particular form of participation they ex-pect at a particular time. Sometimes the word "collegiality" is used interchangeably with "participative government," but this can also cause needless confusion. Strictly speaking, collegiality connotes a particular relationship between the college of bishops and the pope. The term can be applied to religious life only with extreme care. Collegiality has come to be synonymous with "participatory democracy," which assumes that in all decisions every member of a team o.r province must be fully acquainted with every detail and that decision making must be always according to the major-ity vote. 12 Collegial government in religious life, that is, where all mem-bers have equal rights in decision making by law, exists only at general and provincial chapters. 3. Adhere to subsidiarity. Whatever individuals or committees of councilors are able to do for themselves ought not to be removed from their competence and taken over by other people, for example, major superiors. Canon law or. the constitution will set out precisely those decisions that must be made by the major superior with the consent or consultation of the council. In other matters he or she can lawfully delegate authority to congregational team members. I find, however, that subsidiarity fails to work whenever team mem-bers are unsure precisely who has the delegated authority or authoriza-tion. Team members and the province or congregation as a whole must know who has the right to make decisions and takes responsibility for them. Secondly, when the major superior attempts to take back the author-ity without justification or when other team members try to interfere, un-necessary frustration occurs. Team members feel used, irrelevant, and deenergized as persons and leaders within the community. One practical consequence of adhering to the principle of subsidiarity is that great care must be taken to see that the agendas for congregational team meetings be carefully screened. No matter should come to team meetings that can and should be dealt with at lower levels. If this screen-ing does not take place, the team is back to the limitations of participa-tory- democracy procedures. They become bogged down by irrelevant mi-nutiae, and the critically important issues for team consideration become crowded out. Participative Leadership 4. Delegate maintenance tasks. Remember that the primary role of congregational leadership teams is to challenge their religious communities to face the realities of the fu-ture. They cannot even begin this task if they are constantly burdened at meetings with maintenance and personnel issues. This is not to deny the pastoral importance of such issues, but merely to highlight the key function of leadership teams. As far as possible, the maintenance requirements of congregations must be delegated to others. This will demand of leaders a ruthless self-discipline to prevent them from becoming smothered in maintenance prob-lems. Without such self-discipline there can be no congregational fu-ture. ~ 3 5. Be accountable. Every team member must be accountable for his or her performance to the group and through the majo.r superior and team to the whole prov-ince or congregation. But a warning: If delegation is working effectively, then the amount of material being made available to other members of the council or team for the sake of accountability should be controlled; otherwise they will again be swamped within a paper jungle. Leadership teams must be alert to the fact that they can easily be-come trapped in their own busyness so that they have no idea where they are going or what is really important, and end up experiencing rather than inventing the future. Busyness is apt to lull leaders into thinking that their decisions are relevant when in fact the opposite is the reality. 6. Understand and use power. Though power is a commonly used word, it is nonetheless frequently misunderstood. However, it is critically important to grasp its meaning and its various types because the failure to do so can frustrate the work of a congregational team's involvement in the refounding process. Power is the ability to influence the values and behavior of the or-ganizations or cultures in which we find ourselves. Structural power de-rives from the roles that we officially hold in an organization, for exam-ple, congregational leader or team member. Functional power derives from the skill we use within a group, for example, the skill of animation or coriamunication; personal power derives from our personality.14 Again recall that the primary task of a congregational team commit-ted to the refounding process is that of finding, empowering, and sup-porting the right people. On their own team and in the province or con-gregation they serve, these persons must be enabled tO create, not made 364 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 to devise elaborate controls to make less creative or resilient persons do what they should be doing. This requires that the congregational team, first, use its functional and personal power to find the right people and empower them to act and, second, use its structural power to open up the congregational struc-tures to allow the creative persons to operate without unnecessary inter-ference from other sections of the leadership team or the congregation or province as a whole. In brief, a creative team allows for and fosters the "pastorally in-novative eccentric." This may even mean applying the axiom "The new belongs elsewhere," which I have described at length in a recent book. ~5 That is, through the application of structural power, the team establishes structures that permit the "innovative eccentrics" to act without having to be accountable to a large number of people for what they are doing. The leadership team assumes the initiative of explaining to others the na-ture and progress of the creative pastoral project, thus allowing the in-novative people to concentrate on their new apostolic ventures. 7. Foster team trust. Congregational leadership groups must learn to see themselves as teams, not as a set of individuals. On a team, members are aware of each other's strengths and weaknesses; they aim to act in a manner which uses their individual diversity to serve the group. The group needs to ask itself three questions if it is to assess the qual-ity of its teamwork: (1) Does the group have the necessary skills and struc-tures to work together cooperatively and effectively? (2) If the team has not the necessary skills, can it develop them or should it seek them from outsiders? (3) Does the group have the attitudes, values, and norms that foster the required skills and support the required structures? If members do not trust one another, they will communicate inadequately. They will hold back information, thus weakening the quality of the team's deci-sion making. Maybe such lack of trust comes from conflict or the fear of it. Yet conflict is unavoidable even on the best teams. Members should npt try to hide it, but should try to recognize its causes and develop methods of resolving it. Robert Bolton distinguishes between the emotional and the substantive dimensions of conflict. The former include anger, distrust, defensiveness, fear, and resentment. Substantive dimensions involve con-flicting needs, disagreements over policies and practices, and divergent views of roles and the uses of resources. These substantive issues can-not be resolved until the emotional aspects are faced up to; the team may Participative Leadership / 365 require an outside facilitator for this to take place. 16 Members need to realize that the primary concern of team building is not the individual needs of the group's members, but the welfare of the congregation and the Church it serves. Members can become so con° cerned to achieve collaboration and cohesion that these qualities become not a means but an end in themselves. The team style then changes from an organic to a mechanistic one, and a rigid conformity to rules of unity predominates. The creativity of individual team members is then stifled or crushed. This is what William G. Dyer means when he writes: "Crea-tivity is often at odds with the conditions that foster collaboration. It is possible to increase team work while inhibiting creativity, which seems to stem from the less fettered individual.''~7 8. Nurture group life humanly and spiritually. A task-oriented congregational team expends considerable energy. Unless individuals and the group have space and time to restore this en-ergy, problems develop: bickering, excessive tiredness, poor concentra-tion, and individual and group burnout. Organizational and leadership culture must, then, be cared for if ap-ostolic effectiveness is to be maintained and grow. The group can revi-talize its own energies in a variety of ways. The options chosen will de-pend on what the group enjoys doing. One team, for example, may en-joy a regular meal together well away from their place of meeting; an-other team may receive energy through open-ended discussion on par-ticular topics. A group that has fun together is more likely to be a group that can stay and work together.18 As a top priority the spiritual life of the group needs nurturing. When the members are unable to share in prayer their faith experiences, they will lack the inner freedom for honesty and openness. I have seen the energy of individuals and groups rise with extraordinary rapidity as a con-sequence of members sharing their reflections on scriptural passages. Shar-ing cannot be pushed; it grows under the power of the Holy Spirit as mem-bers become more comfortable with one another and with the presence o~ the Lord in their midst. 9. Be flexible with meeting styles. Meetings need variety. Formal meetings, namely, regular team gath-erings that have agendas in advance, are essential. But, since these gen-erally are not the occasions for inspiration and energy-creating interac-tion, from time to time there should be team meetings with no detailed and set agendas. At these informal meetings the group could benefit from 366 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 a clear and simple process of critical self-reflection. Questions like the following could be used: How do you think the team is working together? Are our objectives being realized? Do the objectives need sharpening? Do individual members want to share the major concerns of their depart-ments? These gatherings become a mixture of sharing worries and suc-cesses, of.dreaming about the future of the province or congregation, of brainstorming about strategies. lO. Implement reality-testing sessions. A congregational team, like any human group, can lose touch with reality--for many reasons. For example, the group may become so anx-ious about the difficulties it faces in its leadership task that it uncon-sciously denies and represses much reality and so ignores it in its deci-sion making. To forestall such an eventuality, the team desperately needs regular reality-testing sessions: Are the usual staying-in-touch methods still working? Have they outlived their usefulness? Are they blocking the flow of information in and out of the group? Are members of the team continuing to listen to and communicate with one another? Have barri-ers developed between members? This can be a thoroughly uncomfort-able exercise, but without it much well-intentioned apostolic energy can dissipate. 19 Conclusion We read that the early Christian communities were "united, heart and soul; no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, as ev-erything they owned was held in common" (Ac 4:32). This aptly de-scribes what congregational leadership teams should strive to be like, plac-ing their possessions--their talents and their skills--at the service of the team and the congregation, making that effort even if it be painful. Such unity is achievable only if the efforts of the team members are earthed in the power of Christ's resurrection (see Ac 4:33). It is only through resurrection love that members can learn to find "joy in the truth., to make allowances, to trust, to hope, and to endure whatever comes" (1 Co 13:7). Then there will be an organic, flexible style of lead-ership within congregational teams, and it will be apostolically energiz-ing for all who experience it.2° NOTES ~ See G.A. Arbuckle, Out of Chaos: Refounding Religious Congregations (New York: Paulist Press, 1988), pp. 88-135, and Earthing the Gospel: An Inculturation Participative Leadership / 367 Handbook for the Pastoral Worker (London: Geoffrey Chapman; Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1990), chap. 12. 2 See T. Burns and G.M. Stalker, The Management oflnnovation (Chicago: Quad-rangle Books), passim. 3 See C.R. Hickman and M.A. Silva, Creating Excellence: Managing Corporate Cul-ture (New York: New American Library, 1984), p. 191. 4 K. Albrecht, The Creative Corporation (Homewood, I11.: Dow Jones-Irwin, 1987), pp. 46f. 5 See G. Pinchot, lntrapreneuring (New York: Harper & Row, 1985), pp. 224f.; see also the helpful insights of I. Briggs Myers, Gifts Differing (Palo Alto, Calif.: Con-sulting Psychologists Press, 1980), pp. 69-75. 6 See P. Drucker, Innovation and Entrepreneurship: Practice and Principles (New York: Harper & Row, 1986), p. 149. 7 See E.H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership: A Dynamic View (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1987), pp. 137-147,270-296, and D. Graves, Corporate Cul-ture: Diagnosis and Change (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1986), pp. 120-144. 8 See J. O'Malley, "Priesthood, Ministry, and Religious Life: Some Historical and Historiographical Considerations," Theological Studies 49 (1988): 223-257. 9 See Congregations for Religious and Bishops, Directives for the Mutual Relations between Bishops and Religious in the Church (Sydney: St. Paul Publications, 1978), para. 12. 10 See comments on the New Code of Canon Law in G.A. Arb'uckle, Strategies for Growth in Religious Life (New York: Alba House, 1986), p. 137. i~ See G.A. Arbuckle, Out of Chaos, pp. 30-33, 105f. 12 See L. Schaller, The Change Agent: The Strategy of Innovative Leadership (Nash-ville: Abingdon Press, 1972), pp. 14, 152-154. ~3 See K. Albrecht, Successful Management by Objectives: An Action Manual (Engle-wood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1978), pp. 176f. ~4 Definitions and clarifications on power are provided by Jane Blaxland. See als6 " G.A. Arbuckle, Strategies for Growth in Religious Life (New York: Alba House, 1987), pp. 134-139. 15 See G.A. Arbuckle, Out of Chaos, pp. 112-135. 16 See R. Bolton People Skills (Brookvale: Simon & Schuster, 1987), p. 217; see also J.F. Benson, Working More Creatively with Groups (London: Tavistock, ! 987), pp. 130-145, l19f. 17 W.G. Dyer, Strategies for Managing Change (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1984), p. 176. 18 See J.F. Benson, Working More Creatively, pp. 184-186. 19 See the helpful insights of M.F. Kets de Vries and D. Miller, The Neurotic Or-ganization: Diagnosing and Changing Counterproductive Styles of Management (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1985), pp. 15-45, 133-205; and E.H. Schein, Organizational Culture, pp. 185-208, 311-327. 2°I am grateful for the help of Jane Blaxland and Michael A. Mullins, S.M., in the preparation of this article. Mary, Woman for Peacemakers Patricia McCarthy, C.N.D. Sister Patricia McCarthy, C.N.D., may be addressed at Congregation of Notre Dame; 41 Cole Street; East Providence, Rhode Island 02914. Before much time in the field has elapsed, a worker for peace usually dis-covers, by need, the meaning behind Gandhi's claim that mute prayer was his greatest weapon. Fidelity to truth and perseverance in justice are fruits that can only be produced if prayer is the seed. Such prayer begins with a choice--a choice to respond to the call from God, a choice to take the first commandment seriously and to kneel before God. The choice is to hear and acknowledge the call to worship, to invest time, effort, and attention to this call. The choice is to be there listening day after day, to be there loving hour after hour, and to be there receiving love moment by moment. It is when we make that move from listening and loving to the realization of being loved that prayer becomes relationship. Out of this relationship, we no longer see ourselves as only workers for peace, we become united with Jesus Christ the one peace-maker. From union with his heart, we understand the work of peace to-day and embrace the call to share in it. If we have felt the call to enter into this prayer-love relationship with Christ, our first step is to turn to Mary. Our reasons for this are many. We come to Mary as to an intimate friend, we come asking to know her, to love her, and to realize her love for us. We come to Mary because she is the virgin Mother of God. We come to Mary because she was the most faithful disciple of Christ during her time on earth. We come to Mary because Christ gave her to us from the cross. We come to her be-cause we believe she is our loyal advocate from heaven. We come to Mary because she passionately offered herself to God for the sake of his 368 Mary, Woman for Peacemakers people at the Annunciation. God blessed and accepted that offering two thousand years ago, impregnated her with the seed of God so she could give birth in flesh and blood to Jesus. Finally, we come to Mary because she was faithfully present when Jesus abandoned himself to his Father. Mary was the Mother of God in Bethlehem when the Word of God became flesh to be among us; and Mary was the Mother of God on Calvary when the Word of God surren-dered his flesh to redeem us. Mary was mother and companion to the Son of Peace while he walked this fragile earth. Let us ask her to accompany us as we journey toward peace. For the sake of clarity, let us consider three specific as-pects of our life with her: prayer, mission, and prophecy. Prayer Why Mary with regard to prayer? Devotion to Mary does not come out of some private practice covered with sentimentality. Devotion to Mary comes from the heart of the mysteries of redemption and salvation. From the time angels chose not to worship God and refused to ac-knowledge God as God, evil has existed. It entered into humanity through our ancestors who also chose a created good over the Creator. Along with the existence of sin, however, was the promise of redemp-tion. God never left us without hope even when we did not know enough to care. For years, God formed covenants with us and reformed them af-ter we broke them. God spoke to us to admonish us, to encourage us, to instruct us; God spoke through generations of holy men and women. And, finally, when the fullness of time had arrived God chose to speak through Jesus Christ. With the greate.st risk, God let this divine intervention wait upon the word of a virgin daughter of Israel. Mary. had been chosen and prepared, kept free of any remnant of our ancestral tendency to sin. She had been formed in the covenants of Yahweh, desirous of the coming of the Mes-siah. She had learned to kneel before Yahweh, to worship, to find her joy and hope in her God. Mary understood the angels who were beings of praise, and she knew there were also angels who had chosen differ-ently. She knew the history of her people, the faithful and the unfaith-ful. Her whole being grew in anticipation for Yahweh to come again. Mary's receptivity to the Word of God was the essence of her virginity. She became the virgin Mother of.God because she allowed the power of God to overshadow her. This is also our model for virginity: To understand the yes Mary said at the Annunciation, we have to see her clearly as virgin. Before we can 370 / Review for Religious, May-June 1991 say yes, we have to see ourselves just as clearly as virgins. Virginity is a reality today that is poorly understood at best. Virginity, in its narrow-est sense, can be applied to a person, male or female, who has not had sexual intercourse. The virginity of Mary calls us to far more than that. In her virginity, Mary gives us the model for our own. Virginity is receptivity and openness to God's working with us and through us. It is total surrender to the loved one, the abandonment of all defenses and re-serves in the presence of the beloved. It is the willingness to take on a destiny utterly contrary to the culture of the day. It is the commitment to accept the seed of God in order to give the life of Christ to the world. Once we accept the seed we are committed to nourish it. The child will grow and be born of us and we will be responsible for him from that mo-ment on. This is the grace of virginity we received with our baptism, the grace to open ourselves to Christ, the grace that we can choose to coop-erate with whether we are male or female, married or single, religious or lay. This is the grace of virginity that calls us to a passionate chas-tity. This is the grace of virginity that Mary embraced. Mary has also shown us the call to motherhood, the call to bring Christ into the world. To the beauty of virginity God offered mother-hood, an inconceivable reality that Mary freely assented to. With that sin-gle yes, the Savior and Redeemer of the world was conceived. As no one else ever could, Mary in the ecstasy of her surrendered virginity em-bodied the Word of God. "The one whom the universe cannot contain is contained within your womb." She gave flesh to the good news, she brought forth the Prince of Peace. We owe Mary love, because it is through her tha

Issue 33.2 of the Review for Religious, 1974. ; Review ]or Religious is edited by faculty members of the School of Divinity of St. Louis University, the editorial offices being located at 612 Humboldt Building; 539 North Grand Boulevard; St. Louis, Missouri 63103. It is owned by the Missouri Province Educational Institute; St. Louis, Missouri. Published bimonthly and copy-right (~) 1974 by Review ]or Religious. Composed, printed, and manufactured in U.S.A. Second class postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri. Single copies: $1.75. Sub-scription U.S.A. and Canada: $6.00 a year; $11.00 for two years; other countries, $7.00 a year, $13.00 for two years. Orders should indicate whether they are for new or renewal subscriptions and should be accompanied by check or money order payable to Review ]or Religious in U.S.A. currency only. Pay no money to persons claiming to represent Review Jor Religious. Change of address requests should include former address. R. F. Smith, S.J. Everett A. Diederich, S.J. Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. Editor Associate Editor Questions and Answers Editor March 1974 Volume 33 Number 2 Renewals, new subscriptions, and changes of address should be sent to Review for Religious; P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, Minnesota 55802. Correspondence with the editor and the associate editor together with manuscripts, books for review, and materials for "Subject Bibliography for Religious" should be sent to Review for Religious; 612 Humboldt Building; 539 North Grand Boulevard; St. Louis, Missouri 63103. Questions for answering should be sent to Joseph F. Gallen, S.J.; St. Joseph's Church; 321 Willings Alley; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19106. Directed Prayer and the Founding Charism Norbert Brockman, S.M. Father Norbert Brockman is a staff member of the Marianist Center; 4435 East Patterson Road; Dayton, Ohio 45430. Among the growing movements among American religious in the past few years has been the directed retreat. In increasing numbers, religious have placed themselves under a director who has guided their meditation for periods as long as thirty days.1 The movement owes much to the Jesuits, who have taken leadership throughout the countr~ in reviving an approach to the retreat that is closely linked with their own renewal and spirituality.2 There have been spinooffs from the directed retreat movement that sug-gest that directed retreats are much more than a passing fad, although for some they will take on that character. The first of the side benefits of the directed retreat movement has been that religious of a number of congregations, especially women, are being trained in the method and approach of directing prayer. The Jesuits have established centers for this purpose, and programs for training, using the Ignatian retreat, are well patronized. A congequence of this is the flowering of directed retreats among women religious,, and the better training of for-mation personnel capable of working with mature nuns. Secondly, the directed retreat seems to bring many religious to long-term spiritual direction. Foi" the first time, for many religious, ~it has been possible--in a directed retreat--to consider spiritual direction as some- 1See, for example, Margaret Baker, H.V.M., "My Experience of a Directed Retreat," Review for Religious, v. 31 (1972), pp. 573-7; Sister Christine Freed, R.G.S., "I Feel like Singing Forever," Review ]or Religious, v. 32 (1973), pp. 1379-1384. '-'Thomas E. Clarke, SJ., "The Ignatian Exercises---Contemplation and Discernment," Review ]or Religious, v. 31 (1972), pp. 62-9. 257 258 / Review ]or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 thing other than crisis intervention. While one can comment only impres-sionistically, it seems that a real phenomenon of the past three years has been the increased desire among religious for spiritual direction.:' While the pattern is not so clear as to the expectations.of the religious seeking direction, the question of growth in prayer is always a serious considera-tion. The direction of prayer itself has an ancient and honorable tradition in the Church. From the earliest days of Christianity, the spiritual novice submitted himself or herself to a spiritual guide under whose direction growth in the life of prayer was undertaken. The stories of the fathers of the desert reinforce this strongly, and direction in prayer was for them an all-important issue in the relationship between novice and adept Chris-tian. The origins of this are obscure, but it would seem that the earliest forms of direction in prayer come from the baptismal catechesis, where the person responsible for the conversion of a neophyte not only helped in the education of the candidate for baptism, but particularly assumed the task of.teaching them the spiritual life. Together the two shared a period of prayer and 'fasting before the administration of the sacrament." In modern times, with the structure of the annual or other periodic retreat, various forms or styles of retreats came to the fore. The Ignatian r~treat has always had, in this period, a special place. It has been widely used b~, religious whose congregations are not Ignatian in spirituality, and its very basic Christian themes have made it equally.popular among lay-people. Although the preached retreat had become the predominant form, the notion of the directed retreat never died out, and its revival on such a large scale is in reality a return to an earlier Ignatian tradition. The Notion of the Directed Retreat The focus in the directed retreat is on the notion of "directed." It is a retreat in which the pfirticipant works with the retreat master in the man-ner of a s~iritual director. There is normally an hour-long interview each day, during which the retreatant's prayer is evaluated, directions and themes are~ given for further meditations, and the quality of the retreatant's prayer' is developed? As indicated above, although the nature of the directed retreat has ancient roots in the Church, it has been most characteristic o~ Jesuit re-aSee Sandra Marie Schneiders, I.H.M., "The 'Return' to Spiritual Direction," Spiritual Lile, v. 18 (1972), pp. 263-78. 4Michel Dujarier, Le parrainage des adultes aux trois premiers siO(les de l'Eglise (Paris: 1962), p. 377. 5Herbert F. Smith, S.J., "The Nature and Value of a Directed Retreat," Review ]or Religious;,v. 32 (1973), pp. 490-7. This article is available from Review ]or Religious as a separate reprint. Directed Prayer and the Founding Charism / ~259 treats in recent years. The point needs to be made that the nature of this retreat is simply the direction of prayer itself, adapted to the peculiar de-sign of a retreat, a period of time in which a person withdraws from ordi-nary pursuits to develop more consciously and deliberately in the spiritual life. Admittedly, among American religious other values have also entered in,, but this has always been understood as the essential purpose of retreat. For, a religious working far from the center of his province~ in a small community, the value of fellowship is a real one, for example. Some province retreats resemble a tribal gathering in this regard, and others use a workshop model rather than the traditional one of withdrawal for prayer. The comments that follow will be placed in the context of directed re-treats, but they might as easily apply to much of the real work of spiritual direction. Direction in prayer, even the special, concentrated form of di-rected meditation used in directed retreats, is the heart of spiritual direc-tion. An aspect of regular ~direction, even if relatively infrequent, is sug-gestions for prayer, the joint evaluation of movements in prayer, the dis-cernment of these movements, and help in heeding the call to new levels of prayer. The purpose of this article, however, is not to explore the nature and values, of the directed retreat, but to discuss its use to inculcate the values from the founding charism of a particular ~religious congregation. The question of the nature of th~ directed retreat has been explored in depth elsewhere." What has not been investigated at any point is how the tech-nique of the directed retreat can contribute to the deepening of the ~ommit-ment of a religious to his/her °founding charism. Because non-Ignatian development of the directed retreat has been so°limited, the paucity of in-formation on the topic is understandable. What follows here is based on the author's study within the documents of his own order, as well as at-tempts to work with sisters of two other,groups attempting to find better means for developing their own spirituality within their members. The Founding Charism .In recent attempts among religious to heed the directives of Vatican II that they renew .themselves in the spirit of'their founders and foundresses, the emphasis has been placed upon research and the question of teaching the proper spirit of the order to cb.ndidates,r Along with this has gone the concern for finding newer expressions for the origina! teaching of the founder, while remaining faithful to his/her intent. This has produced some valuable materials in some groups, some false starts in others; there ~William A. Barry, ~S.J., "The Experience of the First and Second Weeks of the Spiritual Exercises," Review ]or Religious, v. 32 (1973), pp. 102'-9. See also the same author's "Silence and tl~e Directed Retreat," Review ]or Religious, v. 32 (1973), pp. 347-51; and Smith, "The Nature and Value of a Directed Retreat." rVatican Council II, The Renewal o/Religious LiIe, no. 2. Review [or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 have been elements of both renewal and deception in the experience of getting in touch with one's roots. In the directed retreat, the issue changes somewhat. The purpose of the retreat is not to analyze, speculate, or study. It is to experience the meaning of the life of the Lord in a renewed sense. It is to deepen one's prayer, and to deal with issues that affect the spiritual life. When we speak of a directed retreat designed to inculcate the values of the spirituality of a religious congregation, therefore, the point is that the important elements of that spirituality must be assembled in what may be new ways, intended to move the soul through prayer more than grouped in perfectly logical structures. The experiential dimension, and the very goal of the directed re-treat according to one's own charism, is to bring the retreatant to the ex-perience that the founder had in founding the congregation. One must experience the foundation within oneself as a truly authentic, congruent integration of the spiritual life. It should make sense, bring an interior peace, and strongly confirm one's commitment to this congregation at this time in history. Few religious have taken themselves, or been taken, through the experience of the founder or foundress.'By this is not meant that the privations or sufferings of the founder--the more dramatic ele-ments of his/her life--need be reproduced in some sort of role playing. Indeed, the point is the reproduction of the insight and inspiration of the founding charism itself. What elements of the Christian experience brought about the development that the religious knows as his/her spiritual legacy? How were the evangelical counsels and the gospel message ex-perienced by the founder in such a way that the foundation of this group became a means of incarnating these values? If the congregation is the incarnation of the values of the founder--an extension of his/her charism into history--how is it to be experienced, personally by the members and corporately by the community as a whole? The questions above zero in on the issues that the directed retreat can deal with, in terms of the founding charism of a congregation. What is ob-vious, then, is that the design of the retreat must be developmental, and that might well be, as stated above, quite different from the design used to teach the ideas of the charism, or to study them. Critical Elements of a Founding Charism What, then, are the elements of a founding charism that must be con-sidered in designing such a retreat experience? The Spiritual Exercises are a brilliant example and deserve to be studied, even by those whose spiritual tradition differs sharply from that of the Jesuits. The themes, from the "Two Standards" to the last consideration, are highly developmental. Each builds on what precedes, not so much intellectually, but in the context of faith. It is possible to find all the elements of the Christian life from conversion Directed Prayer and the Founding Charism / 261 to union with God. In short, a spiritual path is described. At the same time, the style of the retreat is congruent with the highly personal emphasis on decision and discernment. The Ignatian directed retreat is characterized (usually, although there are exceptions) by lone meditation, usually at some length, by minimal communal aspects, and by minimal liturgical life. The focus is on the individual coming to grips with his/her personal relationships with the Lord, with an acceptance of that Lordship in one's life, and in the development of a prayer life that nourishes and defines that relationship. What then are the elements of a founding charism that are critical to the development of directed prayer in this ~evelopmental sense? Four ele-ments surface in any investigation of this question: method of prayer, ascetical and/or devotional practices, a spiritual system, and theological concepts. These are the elements that the designer of the retreat prayer experiences needs to coordinate. The study that makes this possible should be on the part of the retreat director, and the retreatant should not be called o'n to do other than move immediately into the prayer experience. .Let us, then, briefly look at each of these elements of the founding charism in turn. Method of Prayer The first critical question is whether the founder taught a method of prayer, particularly a method of meditation. In many cases, what will be discovered is that the founder/foundress did .use a currently popular method of meditation, but that it was a matter of convenience in instruct-ing novices, and not an important element of the spirituality of the con-gregation. Here some communal discernment is necessary. In reading the founder's letters of direction, for example, or instructions on prayer, it is necessary to discover the significance of any proper method to the totality of his/her founding charism. If a distinct approach, emphasis, or technique is present, it should be integrated in the directed prayer of the retreat experience, For instance, a congregation consecrated to Mary might well have developed a receptive approach to prayer based on an understanding of Our Lady's fiat, a disposition of total availabi!ity to the Lord. It would hardly be congruent in such a case to suggest.an aggressive, intellectual type of mental prayer. It would surely conflict with many of the themes that the founding charism will c6ntain. Ascetical and/or Devotional Practices This area, like the last, deserves careful work to determine the con-tinuing value of the ascetical and/.or devotional practices of the founder. Things which are merely characteristic of the nationality or culture of the founder may be safely set aside, and tangential devotions may also be ex-cluded. After all, even founders and foundresses are entitled to devotional 262 / Review 1or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 expressions which are uniquely personal, and without having these pro-jected onto their religious foundations! In what sense is the devotion in-volved in the direction that the founder gave his/her early members? What is its theological content? A founder or foundress with a great de-votion to the cross, who writes and speaks of the cross in such a way that it permeates the spirituality of the order, is teaching something of greater import than a founder with a great personal devotion to a. patron saint or to a shrine. Similarly, the practice of taking names in religion may have been merely the religious convention of the time of foundation, or it may have had specific meaning~ Other ascetical practices are.to be similarly evalu-ated. In one tradition, the regulations of the founder about the diet may have been a simple indication of poverty within his .cultural context; in another tradition, the manner in which the question is treated might indi-cate that the retreat should include some fasting, if possible, and with cerr tain goals in mind. A Spiritual System The most obvious element is the spiritual system of the foundation. Did the founder have an approach to spirituality which he taught to the early members? What virtues did he consider important, especially, what aspects of the Christian life did he consider characteristic of his founda-tion? What were his interpretation and understanding of evangelical chastity, poverty, and obedience, and did this differ from the prevailing understand-ings of his time? Did the foundation include any other vows besides the three traditional ones, even though these may no longer exist in the con-gregation? What was the value that the founder/foundress was stressing by having additional vows? What was his/her notion of common life and community experience? What is the role of the apostolate in fostering the spiritual life? All these are part of the questions that must be asked in the process of constructing the spiritual system of the founder or foundress, as, usually in most cases, active founders have not written out the spiritual system in clear fashion. Besides exploring the documents of the congregation, however, the living experience of the early foundation is itself of importance. The story of the life of the founder is often of great value in determining what he meant by a certain teaching. Religious orders are, after all, not only com-munities, but a special modality of community--witness communities that show forth the transcendent dimension of Christian life. The witness of the early foundation, therefore, is of great importance as a form of teach-ing. Theological Concepts Usually, theological concepts do not appear in a founding charism as Directed Prayer and the Founding Charism / 263 such. Founders and foundresses are rarely interested in theology except as it reveals the person :of Jesus Or underlies a religious value. Nevertheless, founders are usually very concerned about fidelity to the deposit of faith. A renewed understanding of theological concepts in recent years may make it possible to enrich the understanding of the founder. The founding charism does not really change, but the religious order is called to fidelity to it, not to literal acceptance in the language, cultural norms, and symbols of the early society. As the Church grows in its understanding, of herself and her divine mission, so 'a religious congregation should show signs of growth in its self-understanding.'To utilize a theological concept such as the Eucharist without integrating the better insights coming from a renewed liturgy of celebration would be more than unfortunate. It would be .a denial of the fidelity'of the founder to the Church's teaching, because as he was faithful to ~the Church's expression of eternal truth in his time and culture, so the congregation, today must reproduce that fidelity. Again, renewed Biblical scholarship has made possible far greater sophistication in understanding the gospel message than heretofore. That cannot be ignored in studying the founding charism, merely because it has happened since the founder died! The °emphasis laid upon the experiential above is not to be interpreted as demeaning the importance of the intellectual as preparation for prayer. Anti-intellectualism is not a mark of the Christian, Quite the contrary, and the directed prayer experience will be the richer for the .hours spent by both ~director and retreatant in studying the basic teaching ,of the Church, especially in those areas that touch upon the founding charism. ~Fhe Retreat ~s Reflection of the Founding Charism The first of the elements of a founding charism was stated as the method of meditation or mental prayer. The idea of the importance of the ,congruence of this with~the total spirituality of the founder or foundress was stressed, but this idea can also be expanded~. The entire style of the directed retreat should reflect the founding.charism. The import/race of this cannot easily be exaggerated because of ~he'experiential nature of:the directed retreat. There" is a profound difference between the directed re-treat., as desert experien.ce (silence, lone meditation at great length, and so forth) and the directed retreat as communal',experience (common liturgi-cal celebrations,' some group discussion, and so forth). In among these contrasts are many modalities of directed retreat, of course. The point is that it is important to include those aspects which will most effectively help the retreatant to gro~w into the values which are the subjects of the prayer experiences. The spirituality that emphasizes a deeply communitarian-or service value will not come through successfully in a desert experience. This i~ not to say that the desert experience is not of value for religious f~'om adtive commui~ities~(far from it!), but only that a limited aspect of their spirituality is likqly to emerge in such a context. Review for Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 Similarly, methods of discernment should be congruent with the found-ing charism itself. What was the method for discerning the will of God used by the founder or foundress? Was it a communal means, or one based on authority? Discernment itself has become an issue, both within the directed retreat movement and in other contexts? It is an integral part of the Spiritual Exercises, and would seem to be an integral part of the work of the director of prayer. Within a given tradition, the method of dis-cernment might well be prophetic or charismatic. More likely it will reflect an authoritarian tone, which would translate into the directed retreat as a form of obedience to the spiritual guide. This type of obedience itself needs to be understood, as it isnot the same as the obedience owed a superior under the evangelical vow. In some traditions, the means of discernment might be very communal, in such a way that group direction might be a compatible style for certain congregations using the directed retreat. This would be alongside the pri-vate interview, which is essential to the directed retreat. A final word should be added on the place of resolutions. Many re-ligious feel strongly that they should come home from retreat with clear resolutions for the future--a battle plan, so to speak. The presumption is so strong with many that it is an issue that should be frankly discussed with the director. It is certainly not necessary for the directed retreat; it is enough that there be an interior renewal and deepened commitment to the spirit of the foundation. Whether there are "results" or decisions on con-crete action for the future should flow from the needs of the person him-self/ herself. Too often it is merely another expression of a workaholic personality. Conclusion This has been a simple and sketchy view of the development of a directed retreat from the point of view of the goal of growth in the spirit of one's own order. As such, directed prayer is a powerful means of growth toward incarnating in oneself the values of the founding charism. It is a means of renewal that not only affirms one's commitment to religious life, but also goes far toward building and renewing the community through renewed religious, standing firmly in the tradition of the one who brought the order into being under God's grace. 8Criticism has been recently expressed by W. Peters, S.J., "Discernment: Doubts," Review ]or Religious, v. 32 (1973), pp. 814-7. See also James V. Gau, S.J., "Dis-cernment and the Vow of Obedience," Review for Religious, v. 32 (1973), pp. 569-74; David T. Asselin, S.J., "Christian Maturity and Spiritual Discernment," Review ]or Religious, v. 27 (1968), pp. 581-95; and John R. Sheets, S.J., "Profile of the Spirit: A Theology of the Discernment of Spirits," Review ]or Religious, v. 30 (1971), pp. 363-76. The last article (that of Father Sheets) is available from Review ]or Religious as a separate reprint. Prayer: The Context of Discernment Charles J. Healey, S.J. Father Charles J. Healey, S.J., is a faculty member of the Department of Theology; Boston College; Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts 02167. Discernment Today In our attempts to seek and find God in our lives and to live out our Chris-tian lives of faith, hope, and love, we are often involved in a process of rediscovery. There is not that much that is new for us in the sense of dis-covering something for the first time. But often the conditions of the times in which we live and our own felt needs combine to lead us to focus on a particular aspect of the spiritual life. Such, I would suggest, is the case in the area of discernment. It is certainly a term that has deep roots in the history of Christian spirituality. But ours is a period that has seized upon the process of discernment--perhaps too quickly and too glibly at times-- in the hopes that it might aid us in our efforts to love and serve God both as individuals and as communities, and to seek and respond more gener-ously to His will in our lives. This renewed interest in discernment should come as no surprise. First of all, there is the very visible desire of many to deepen their own union with God, to establish or reestablish what they consider the essentials and priorities in their lives, and to make any required decisions in a context of faith and prayer. In a time of great change, many are seeking to find strength and unity within themselves not only to cope effectively with their lives and all their responsibilities, but also. to maintain themselves as lov-ing and productive persons. Secondly, many communities are turning to the process of discernment as a method of helping them in their attempts at renewal as a community and as a basis for group decisions. But whether 265 266 / Review for Religious, ~olume 33, 197.4/2 it is a case of individual discernment or corporate discernment, it is impor-tant to stress over and over that the basis of any discernment has to be the deep and intense prayer of the persons involved in the process. The context of any true discernment is prayer. The purpose of this article, then, is to offer some reflections on discernment, using the word in the broadest sense here and focusing on the intimate connection between discernment and prayer. ontex! Is Prayer Discernment really makes sense only when it is situated in the context of prayer. Unless there is a corresponding desire to seek and find God continually in our lives and to deepen our awareness of His reality and presence, discernment can end up just being talk. The seeking and yearn-ing attitude of the Psalmist must penetrate our own lives deeply: "To you, my heart speaks; you my glance seeks, your presence, O Lord, I seek. Hide not your face from me" (Ps 27:8-9). There is, of course, a renewed in-terest and even a hunger on the part of many today in the area of per-sonal prayer; and this accounts in part for the renewed interest in the area of discernment. There are many indications of this all around us at the present time; and many are definitely expressing a desire for praye~r which springs from a felt human need and the presence of the Spirit in our midst, ever renewing, ever arousing. Recently I was listening to a taped conference on prayer by Thomas Merton in which he mentioned at the beginning that he ~did not like to talk a great deal about prayer. This was certainly not from any disinterest, for if there is any constant preoccupation and interest that emerges in his life and writings, it would be with the value and priority he constantly gives to prayer. But he wanted to stress the point that pr~yer for us should be something simple and natural, something as simple and natiaral as breath-ing. It is hard for us to talk about breathing since it is such a normal process of our lives and one wfiich we can easily take for granted. So, too, he feels should be the case with prayer. At times we can complicate it and make an issue or a cause out of it. But usually when we make a~ca~]se or an issue out of something, we oppose it to something else: "This is.prayer, this isn't. This is something sacred, this isn't." The f~us could then shift to the issue rather than the reality, and prayer could then be viewed as something complicated and artificial. Perhaps we can best consider prayer as the simple, natural, continual response of one who is,. convinced he be-longs to God and seeks to grow in union with Him, and the response of one who realizes he is a person possessed by a loving God. And it is in this climate, this atmosphere of prayer tl~at the whole process of discern-ment should be placed. The context is a very normal, full, and serious seek-ing after God. Pray'~r." The Context o[ Discernment / 267 The Process of Discernment ' Discernment, then, should not be considered a cause or an issue nor ev~en' a method in itself. It is a process in prayer by which one seeks seri-ously to know and follow God's will, to hear His call and faithfully and generously respond in the very real life situation of the person concerned. If l~ra~er should be a very human and ordinary experience, so too should b6 discernment. In this sense, it is a very simple process; and yet, on the other hand, it can be difficult in the sense that it presupposes constant efforts at'a deep and continuous union with God through prayer. This re-quires perseverance, patience, and willingness to expend time and energy. It' cannot be turned off and on like a water faucet if it is to be effective; it presupposes a firm basis of faith and the continuous seeking of the presence of the Lord. ~Alth0ugh discernment is a word that can come easily to the lips, it can still remain a rather elusive concept. Perhaps this is because it pre-soppos~ so much else. At any rate, we might recall Father Futrellrs defi-nition that discernment "involves choosing the way of the light of Christ instead of the way of the darkness of the Evil One and living out the con-sequences of this choice through discerning what specific decisions and ac-tions a~e, demanded to follow Christ here and now.''1 Thus discernment focuses on the ongoing attempts to clarify and ascertain God's will in our lives and seeks to specify what actions and decisions are required in the life of "on'e who wishes to follow Christ tothlly. The process presupposes an int'eflse desire, hunger, and willingness to seek God's will and to embrace it generously once one has come to a reasonable certitude regarding it. W~ might say it all comes down to our attempts to hear and respond to:the wo~'d of God in our own unique lives. But. if we are to be sensitive t~lGod speaking to us in the many ways He does.in our liv6s, we must first hear His call; we must listen quietly and give Him frequent opportuni-ties to speak to us. If we fire to b~ sensitive to God's presence and attentive to His touch, there must be an element of stillness and listening. Since this listening~aspect is so important for discernment, we should not be surprised to find this aspect of prayer being re-e~mphasized today.2 Many are ex-periencing the need today to. take time out from all their activities in order to turn within and seek God's presence within, to contemplate Him and to listen to Him in the stillness of their hearts. It is a kind of active receptivity as we let the radical truth of God shine forth with its own life within us. We seek to make the words of the P~almist our own: "In your light we see light." It is in this atmosphere .of stillness and presence that one can best determine God's call, God's touch, God's will. ~John C. Futrell, S.J., "Ignatian Discernment," Studies in the Spirituality o] Jesuits, v. 2, no. 2, p. 47. '-'See, for example, W. Norris Clarke, S.J., "Be Still and Contemplate,"~ New Catholic World, November-December 1972, pp. 246 ft. 2611 / Review [or Religious, l/'olume 33, 1974/2 Building on the Past As we seek to see clearly where God is touching us at a given time and where He is leading us and asking us to respond and follow, it is very help-ful to grow in the awareness of where God has touched us and nourished us0 in the past. Each of us has his or her own unique history in the hands of a loving God, that is, significant events, persons, books, Scripture pas-sages, and so forth, that have been a source of great strength and help. All of this constitutes our own faith experience of God; and the more it is brought to our conscious awareness, the more it becomes our own. Often in discernment workshops or faith sharing experiences, methods and oppor-tunities are presented to help individuals grasp more explicitly what they uniquely possess of God in their lives. One can call this by various names: one's core experience of God, one's beauty within, one's name of grace, and so forth. But it all comes down to the same reality: we seek to realize what we already possess, what is uniquely ours, and where God has touched us and loved us significantly. Once we are more aware of how God has acted in our lives in the past, we can more easily return in a spirit of prayer to be nourished and strengthened and sustained. What has sustained us in ~the past and what has touched us before, can sustain us and touch us again. This conscious awareness also helps us to be more responsive and sensitive to where God is touching us now, where He is leading us. We can begin to see a pattern and a continuity in our lives of faith. Above all, we be-come more aware of the profoundest reality of our lives, namely that which we possess of the power and love of God that has worked within us in the past and continues to be operative in the present. Discernment in prayer, then, is an ongoing process that seeks to find God and His will in our lives; it involves a constant seeking of God and an awaren(ss of His presence in our lives. Through discernment one seeks to hear God's continuous call, to recognize it as clearly as possible in order to follow it as faithfully and generously as possible. It seeks to answer the question: How can I best love and serve God in the present circumstances of my life. It is an ongoing process because our lives, our experience, our work, our relationship with God is an ongoing process. His Word does not come to us in a vacuum but in the concrete circumstances of our everyday lives. As Thomas Merton says in one of my favorite passages from his writings: Every moment and every event of every man's life on earth plants some-thing in his soul. For just as the wind carries thousands of winged seeds, so each moment brings with it germs of spiritual vitality that come to rest im-perceptibly in the minds and wills of men. Most of these unnumbered seeds perish and are lost, because men are not prepared to receive them; for such seeds as these cannot spring up anywhere except in the good soil of freedom and love.3 aThomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation (New York: New Directions, 1961), p. 14. Prayer: The Context of Discernment / 269 In a very true sense, it is only the faith-filled person, the contemplating person that is acutely sensitive to these seeds of God in his or her life. And for the soil of freedom and love to flourish in our own lives, we must con-stantly open ourselves to the Spirit of God through an abiding spirit of prayer. Not only must we seek to grow sensitive to God's speaking to us in the external events of our lives, but we must seek to grow in an awareness and sensitivity to the movements within ourselves as we react personally to the signs of His will and presence. How do my present reactions corre-spond to the felt experience of God that has been so much a part of my life in the past? Are my present movements in resonance with that source of peace, that sense of oneness and wholeness before God that I have ex-perienced before, that sense of belonging to God that has been so nourish-ing and sustaining in my life? Are they consistent with the normal signs of the Spirit working within us, the signs of "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility and self-control" (Gal. 5:22-3)? These are some of the questions one seeks to clarify in order to fulfill the desire to seek and find the Lord and His will. The spiritual director can play an important role in assisting here, for at times we can be too close to ourselves to have the needed objectivity. The director can aid us in clarifying and objectifying our own experiences and interior movements and aid us to see where God is touching us, loving us, and indicating His presence and His will. A Sense of Freedom In addition to a deep and constant spirit of prayer, discernment also requires an attitude of freedom and detachment. The attitude of freedom I refer to is that which allows a person to give to God and His will the central place in one's life;, it is a freedom and detachment from all other things that would either prevent or hinder one's striving to focus On God. It is the sense of freedom that allows God to become and remain the cen-tral reality in one's life. The Psalmist speaks of this centrality with the words: "As the eyes of the servant are on the hands of the Master, so my eyes are on you, O Lord." It is the freedom that allows one to respond generously to Jesus' invitation to Matthew, "Come, follow me," and His words to the disciples of John the Baptist, "Come and see." Come and see and taste the goodness of the Lord. It is the freedom expressed in the words of the prophet Samuel, "Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening" (1 Sam 3:10), and the words of the Psalmist, "Here am I, Lord, I come to do your will" (Ps 40:7-8). We might note in passing that there can be an intimate connection between this spirit of freedom and a lifestyle that is marked by a spirit of simplicity. How does one grow in this spirit of freedom? Ultimately it is through a cooperation with the power of God's grace and love working within us. 270 / Review for Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 But one important way is through a deepening realization that one is a loved sinner, that one has been touched and healed. A profound convic-tion of God's steadfast love and fidelity can be a very liberating force that enables one to turn to God and seek Him alone and His service in a spirit of simplicity and joy. This freedom grows in a context of lively faith and is nourished in prayerful reflection on God's goodness, mercy, love, and providence. Conclusion In general, discernment in prayer is an inward looking process; the focus is mainly on the movements and experiences of God within us. But the process must never stop here for there should also be an outward dimension of discernment. First of all, as in so many areas of the spiritual life of man, a healthy norm is: "By their fruits you shall know them." There is a confirmatory aspect of all discernment in the external fruits that are in evidence and the good works that are produced. Secondly, the great commandment,of love must always be kept in perspective, and a deepening union with God should lead to a deepening union with one's fellow man. An increasing sense of compassion for one's fellow man and his needs should flow from one's union with God. Finally, the process should lead to an increasing sensitivity to life and all its mysteries, to an increasing awareness of.God's presence in all things, and to our own growth as-con-templatives in action. A Norwegian Outpost: Maria Einscete M. Basil Pennington, O.C.S.O. Father M. Basil Pennington, O.C.S.O., is a Cistercian monk of St. Joseph's Abbey; Spencer, Massachusetts 01562. Our plane put down at Oslo and I soon bungled my way through customs, only .to find--no one. Communications had gotten a bit confus(d and now there was no one there. But everyone I asked seemed t6 know of him: "Brother Robert, yes, the hermit. He lives up in the mountains near Lake Tinn." And so I began my pilgrimage. Ten o'clock the next night I stepped down from a bus in the pouring rain and made bold to ask the young lady who alighted with me the oft repeated question: "Where is Brother Robert? . That way," she answered with a bold sweep of the arm as her hand pointed up a dark rise of conifers. I turned in the opposite direction to the friendly lights of an inn. It was a good choice. There among the youths gathered around the blazing fire was Jan. A couple years earlier he had been up to see the hermit with his pastor. He offered to be my guide. Good to his word, Jan arrived early the next morning with his little Volkswagen which took us as far as it could. Then we began to climb on foot. I was a bit embarrassed when Jan took my bag, but soon I was very grateful that he had--for otherwise I probably would never have made it. We must have climbed steadily, along an old logging trail, for forty-five minutes or more when Jan sudde.nly stopped and pointed back into the woods. We had actually passed our goal: Maria Einscete--Mary's Hermit-age. Maria Einscete was just a simple log cabin, one just like so many others in those forests. Larid in Norway belongs to the owner by hereditary right. It cannot be "definitively alienated. Most families living in the villages or on the lowland farms own stretches of woodland up on the mountains. 272 / Review ]or Religious, l,'olume 33, 197/.'-/2 In better times they kept men up there ,to care for the woods, but now most of these lumberjack's cabins are empty. One of these landlords, a kindly man, let Brother Robert use his abandoned cabin, plant some vege-tables, and dig a well. From the United States to Chile and to Norway Brother Robert, Father Robert Kevin Anderson, is a monk of St. Joseph's Abbey, Spencer, Massachusetts. He entered the Cistercian Order at the Abbey of Our Lady of the Valley back in 1949 when he was 17. He was one of the first choir novices professed after the community trans-ferred to Spencer. Frater Kevin, as he was called in those days, cared for the newly planted orchards and, after his ordination to the priesthood, for the newly planted brothers--as father master of the lay novices. But he had always experienced an attraction toward a more simple and radical form of monasticism. He went on to pursue this, first at St. Benedict's Monastery in the Colorado Rockies, then at the Monastery of Las Condes in the Chilean Andes. It was at the latter monastery that he first embarked on the eremitical life which he found to be his true calling. Later Father Robert sought deeper solitude in southern Chile; but the bishop there had some ideas of his own about how Father was to lead the eremitical life. So Father moved on to the land of his family's origins, Sweden. Here again, a hard-pressed bishop with few priests had his own ideas how a hermit-priest should live. And again Father moved, this time across the border to the diocese of the sympathetic and understanding Cistercian bishop, John Gran of Oslo. Until he could find a suitable site, Father Robert lived in a distant parish. Soon he found what seemed like an ideal place for a hermit: an island on Lake Tinn. But appearances can be deceiving. Living on an island meant dependence on others for all supplies, or keeping a boat for summer and an ice sleigh for winter. Then, too, the fine summer weather brought traffic to the lake. Father lifted up his eyes to the mountains, and soon ascended to Maria Einscete. The Hermit Life o| Father Robert Although feature articles and TV presentations have made Father Robert known throughout Norway and even throughout Scandinavia, he yet receives few visitors. The Norwegians respect and are inspired by his life of prayer and presence to God. They do not want to intrude. Besides, the ascent is difficult and the way known to few. The Catholic pastor, whose parish extends for several hundred miles, calls in from time to time. And of course, the good sisters find their way there at times; also, the search-ing young--from as far away as south France or America. Priests have occasionally come for retreat. And a pious convert lives not far from Father's mailbox and enjoys having him in to say Mass in her front room. A Norwegian Outpost: Maria Einscete / 273 But usually Bror Robert (as the Norwegians call him) is alone with his goats and his God. He goes down to the road to the mailbox every few days--and the owner of the neighboring box watches to see that the mail is collected, a sign that all is well with their hermit. Once a week or so, on skis in winter and a motor bike in summer, Father will go to the village for supplies. All the villagers know and love their hermit. They expressed real joy when "Brother Robert's brother" came to visit him. From time to time Father goes to Oslo to speak to the Dominican nuns, the only con-templative community in Norway. And once a year he goes south to the French Abbey of Mont-des-Cats to see his spiritual father. This was one of the conditions the bishop placed on his presence in the diocese as a hermit: that once a year he would spend some time in a monastery. Father Robert's life is very simple. He prays the hours quite as they always have been celebrated in the monastery, and offers Mass for all man-kind. He does some wood carving, mounts ikons, and practices the ancient Norwegian craft of weaving baskets from birch roots. He also translates books. He is a gifted linguist and has mastered both new and old Nor-wegian, as well as the local dialect. These occupations, along with Mass stipends, help him to keep body and soul together. At the time of my first visit Father Robert had been living in his log cabin for about a year. The only facilities were the woods. He had dug a well nearby and so had plenty of good water. But he confessed to me that he spent most of his time during that first winter chopping firewood--for his cabin had no inner walls and was very difficult to heat. The Spencer community helped him then to get a logger's caravan, which is not only much more snug and easier to heat, but which Father was able to locate higher up on the mountain where he can benefit from much more sunshine. The view from the new location, looking out across Lake Tinn to Mount Gaustaf, one of the highest peaks in southern Norway, is simply magnifi-cent. As the rays of the sun play on clouds, mountains, lake, and forest one is ceaselessly awed. This is indeed a Godly place--an ideal place for a hermit. The Monastic Presence of Father Robert This extension of Spencer Abbey and of the American Cistercian Re--' gion, this foothold of Cistercian life in Norway, is certainly something for which we should be most grateful and praise the Lord. The effectiveness of Father's monastic presence cannot be fully evalu-ated but it is certainly significant. This is rather surprising in a country where most are at best nominal members of a state church, and the few, very scattered Catholics tax the handful of devouted priests and religious who seek to minister to them. The latter, without exception, seemed to ad-mire and respect Father and find inspiration in his fidelity to his particular calling. But the Lutherans, too, revere him and seem to be grateful and 274 / Review for Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 happy .that this man of God is in their midst. They relate stories of her-mits and monks who lived in this land before the Reformation and the Danish oppression, even of a particular hermit in the area of Lake Tinn. Even for these apparently religiously indifferent, ,the man of prayer living alone on the mountain is a sign of hope, of something better, higher, tran-scendent. And when the final option comes, hopefully, with perhaps only a vague and confused idea of what he stands for in their minds, and the grace flowing from his prayer in their hearts, they will reach out for that Transcendent Reality. Blessed be the Lord God . . . he has raised up a horn of salvation for Norway. Now that there is a Cistercian bishop and hermit, in Norway may we not soon have a regular cenobitic foundation? It is time the Cistercians returned. The Cistercians first directed their steps to Norway back in the twelfth century, in the Golden Age of the Order. And there are still significant remains ~of their presence. On the Island of HoevedCya in the Oslo Fjord, just a short ferryboat ride from the capital, are the ruins of an abbey founded in 1147 from Kirkstall,. The whole outiine of the regular build-ings is there. The walls of .the church reach up ten and fifteen feet, and higher at the comer tower. Through the insisterice of 'Bishop Gran the government now preserves this site as a national monument. It is a very beautiful site indeed. But historical sites, no matter how beautiful, are not enough. The Church of Norway, like every other, needs for its fullness the presence of living and thriving contemplative communities. Guided by the Lord, Brother Robert has made a beginning. May the Lord prosper what he has begun. Reflections on Bangalore Sister Mary-John Mananzan, O.S.B. From October 14-22, 1973, the Second Asian Monastic Congress was held in Banga-lore, India. Sister Mary-John Mananzan, O.S.B., attended the meeting and gives here her impressions of the Congress. Sister Mary-John is Dean; St. Scholastica's College; P.O. Box 3153; Manila, Philippines. This will not be a report on the Bangalore Congress in the usual sense, but rather a reliving of significant experiences and a sharing of insights gained. No amount of faithful reporting can capture the atmosphere of such a meeting. But .perhaps the sharing of one's impressions can give a glimpse into the dynamics of the ievent much more than a complete but detached description 9f the proceedings. Personalities Let me begin with the significant people who made an impression on me. Among the observers to the Congress were two Tibetan monks who rePr, ds.ehted thee Dalai Lama. They were Lama Sherpa Tulku and Lama Samdong Tulku. The one word that ke'eps coming to my mind to describe them is "genuine." I was struck by their authenticity, their trueness to them-selves, their utter lack of pretense. They went about with serene dignity, quiet friendliness~ and unfailing self-mast6ry. They talked with perfect frankness about the problems of their people in exile with feeling but with-out the slightest rancor againsl~ the invading Chinese. And with disarming simplicity, one of them asked in our small group discussions: "Please ex-plain to us what you mean by a personal God." The theological jar~gon did not seem to satisfy them, so during the coffee break I ventured an explana-tion which ran something like this: "Lama Sherpa, do you sometimes talk to the Absolute Reality?" 275 276 / Review [or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 "Yes," he replied. "Do you think he understands you?" "Yes." "Well, that is more or less what we mean when we say that God is a person." He seemed to be more satisfied with this explanation. The lamas had a way of expressing their ideas in an unusually effective way. During the discussion on prayer Lama Samdong Tulku made the following remark: "I.got the impression that when you pray, you send your words to the Absolute Reality. We, we push ourselves to It." Another personality which, for me, stood out, was Abbot Primate Rem-bert Weakland himself. He was a most excellent presiding officer; more-over, his introductory and concluding talks showed his keen intelligence, his versatile scholarship, and his sobriety of judgment. He was most human. He joked with the seminarians of the Kristu Jyoti College where we stayed as though he were one of them but without losing his dignity. In fact I ob-served in him something I seldom observe in many superiors today--an unembarrassdd awareness of his authority and an unapologetic reference to it when he considered it useful to do so. Among the non-Asians who had adopted the Eastern way of monastic life, the one I considered most credible was Father Bede Griffiths. He went about in a most unobtrusive, unostentatious way without the slightest effort to edify or to preach. I find this significant because I felt that there can be a tendency among non-Asians who have insights about the indigenization of monastic life and liturgy which are in themselves authentic, to be over-zealous and therefore tactless in their efforts to conscienticize the people whose culture they have studied and adopted. I believe that there can be a very naive, uncritical adaptation to indigenous culture which, if cohpled with a lack of delicacy in strategy, could alienate the people because it ap-pears to them to be another and a subtler form of paternalism. When this is further accompanied by efforts to edify, then the people are positively repelled. Then one provokes reactions which may sound extreme and de-fensive, but are not wholly unjustified like: "Why do they give themselves to be more Eastern than the Easterns?" The adaptation of the Eastern forms of monasticism by monks and nuns in Asia is an important venture; but this must be undertaken with utmost delicacy, tactful strategy, and with what perhaps for Westerners will amount to an almost intolerable amount of patience. I was enriched by the friendship with Vietnamese monks and nuns who shared with me their spiritual adventures. They have left their b!g monas-teries in the hillsides and have come to live among the poor in the center of the city of Saigon. The nuns take in laundry and typing work to support themselves and the monks take turns in tricycle driving. Reflections on Bangalore / 277 The Theme of the Congress The theme of the Congress was: "The Experience of God." This was divided into subtopics .such as: Monastic Experience of God in Christianity and Other Religions; The Experience of God: Methods of Realization; The Experience of God in Community Life; The Influence of Asiatic Religious on Monastic Structure; The Experience of God and Social Responsibility; and The Contribution of Christian Monasticism of Asia to the Universal Church. These were discussed in small groups as well as in the general assemblies. Again I will not make an effort to summarize the discussions but rather pick out those which had an impact on me. First of all, I regained my respect for the word "monastic." Due to certain historical factors, the word "monastic" in certain circles had come to mean deportment, a pattern of behavior and a fuga mundi attitude. In the Congress, the main emphasis was on the single-minded search for God. There is a monastic dimension to every human being. For those who have come to an awareness orbit and who wish to fulfill this dimension of their being, there should be monastic communities whose structures are flexible enough to share their way of life even on a temporary basis. At this point, it is good to mention.what Bishop D'Souza expressed as the petition of the Indian hierarchy. The Indian hierarchy, he said, is asking the monastic communities to be: 1. eschatological signs (monks and nuns should primarily be men and women of God) 2. centers of liturgy 3. havens of serenity 4. examples Of simplicity of life and refinement 5. model communities for Christian living 6. houses of undiscriminating hospitality One thing that was realized in the Congress was the contribution that the non-Christian form of monasticism can give to the traditional Christian monastic" life. There are several elements of the Eastern form of monasti-cism which have been forgotten or not emphasized enough in the Western tradition. There is, for example, the importance of the techniques and meth-ods in the search for the Absolute. The role of the body in prayer that is very much emphasized in Yoga and Zen could'be given the same impor-tance by Christian monks and nuns. The existential view of the Absolute and the unified view of reality of the East could balance the more con-ceptual and dualistic view of the West. The importance of the guru in Eastern spirituality can likewise revitalize the role of the spiritual director. Father Raymond Pannikar summarizes the unique role of the East thus: "Just as Africa's contribution to the Church is sensitivity to creation and that of the West,. the discovery of the value of history; so the unique con-tribution of the Asian is to develop the dimension o] the spirit." 278 / Review ]or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 Shared Prayer The Congress was not just a series of intellectual discugsions on the experience of God: It was for many participants something of a spiritual experience in itself. Contributing tO these was, first, the shared liturgy which the different regional groups prepared, giving the ~vhole community an ex-perience of a variety of. indigenous liturgy "Indian, Vietnamese, Korean, Chinese. There were likewise opportunities to meditate in the, Zen' way, the Yoga way, the Tibetan Buddhist way, and in Christian shared prayers. Amid the variety of methods, ceremonies, symbols, °and gestures there was the unity of hearts in worship.~And then there were the interpersonal en-counters which occasioned the sharing of spiritual experiences, the creating oLbonds which gave the promise of lasting friendships.~There was thus the wonder of discovery of the other in each other. There were no resolutions, conclusions, or statements at the end of the Congress. As Father Abbot Primate said, Bangalore was more humble in its tone than the Bangkok Congress. Its open-endedness is a challenge to further reflection and to further action. And this challenge was expressed in the delegates' message to their communities which reads as follows: Message to Our Communities Together with Father Abbot Primate, Rembert Weakland, we, , gathered here at Bangalore for the Second Asian Monastic Congress, salute you with an Indian greeting:which echoes in our liturgy, SHANTI, PEACEF ,~ We would like to share with you the atmosphere of joy, openness and fraternity that prevails in this community, which grow out of peoples of dif-ferent backgrounds, not only of race and culture, but also of religious tradi-tion. We are fortunate to have at our meeting Cl~ri~tia'n monks and sisters of various countries, Tibetan lamas, Buddhist and Jain mdnks and Hindu swamis and sanyasis. We lived together, 'praying and discussing in mutual enrichment. We are amazed to realize that, amid very real differences of opinions and experiences, there is an overwhelming convergence of concern: THE SINGLEMINDED SEARCH FOR GOD. It is in this conce.rn ~that we experience a strong bond of unity. We consider it our task as monks to commit ourselves wholehea.rtedly to this search, and it is in this context that we accept the world around us and feel h sense o.f sol!darity with it. We have a role in bt~iiding up the city of man. This consigts in pointing out to man the path to God. In particular, we are to share with the poor in theii-°striving for human dignity and liberty. It has become clear to us that to realise these goals i.n our times calls for a radical openness.and flexibility in our religious life and structures. We are in a moment of challenge. If we fail to respond, we lose our right to exigt as monasteries. Your delegates will bring home to:you reports of the proceedihgs of the Congress. Understandably, these will kive but a glimpse into what really happened here. But, for many of us, this Congress has been a: real spiritual experience. ,.Your delegates can communicate this experience more effectively than any written .report. It is our earnest prayer that all the communities scattered throughout Asia will put into effect the insights gained during this Congress. Tliis may mean breaking away from fixed patterns, settink out like Abraham ihto ff new land. Reflecffon~ on Bangalore / 279 We strongly recommend openness to our brothers of other religious traditions who, as we have experienced here, have so much to offer us. We urge the rethinking of our way of life so that as many people as possible may have the opportunity of sharing with us our experience of God within the content of living and vital communities. Let us maintain the bonds of unity which have been established among us through our delegates. During these days we have thought of you and prayed for you. May our continued unity in prayer be fostered by renewed contacts with one another. Toward a More Authentic Sharing in Community Laurent Boisvert, O.F.M. Father Laurent Boisvert, O.F.M., is the editor of the excellent Canadian magazine for religious, La vie des corntnunaut~s religieuses and lives at 5750, boulevard Rose-mont; Montreal 410, Quebec; Canada. The article originally appeared in the March 1973 issue of La vie des communaut~s religieuses and is printed in translation here with the authorization of that magazine. The translation was made by Sister Clarisse Marie, S.N.J.M.; General Administration of the Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary; 187 Chemin de Cap-St.-Jacques; Pierrefonds 940, P.Q.; Canada. The sharing of material goods, based on the needs of each individual or moral person, tends to express and intensify the fraternal bond which unites us as religious. However, in everyday living this sharing meets with ob-stacles which compromise, in varying degrees, its fraternal character. A review of them will help us to become more conscious of them and so favor, I hope, the building of that community of justice, peace, and love which all of us desire and which alone can tnaly be called "fraternal." It is not rare to hear religious ask themselves: How does it happen that our lives are so little changed by the many conferences, sessions, and work-shops in which we participate? These same religious insist that we present them not so much the fundamental values of religious life which they say they already know, but rather a way of integrating them into their lives. The reflections which follow relate to this first step: the "how" of living a more genuine fraternal community life, a step which consists in over-coming in oneself the chief obstacles to its realization. False Mental Attitudes When we insist, before community groups, that a distribution of goods 2110 Authentic Sharing in Community / 2111 be made according to the needs of each, some religious express amazement. It seems useless to them that we should come back to so fundamental an issue, and one that everyone accepts. No one can deny, however, that in spite .of acceptance in theory, certain religio.us, and a number sufficiently large to warrant the mentioning of it again, demand for themselves the use of all kinds of things, basing these requests, not on real need, but rather on the fact that other religious have and enjoy the use of. them. If someone has such and such a thing for his work, goes out so many times during the week, or wears clothing of such and such a quality, etc., others use the example of such religious to justify having the same things and acting in like manner. If one group needs two cars, another group made up of the same number of people will perhaps demand one, just because the first group has two, How can we explain this dichotomy between the theory of sharing goods according to need, and the contrary practice illustrated by the examples just given? The reason is, it seems to me, that the criterion for the distribution of goods, recognized at the intellectual level, has not yet penetrated the mentality of all religious nor modified their attitudes and their conduct. Certain religious accept the idea of pluralism in the forms of sharing, but their reactions are those of people accustomed to a uniform type of sharing. They still lack that which, for all of us, is most difficult to realize, namely a change of attitude. No modification of structures, how-ever radical, can dispense a religious from the effort required to bring.about this conversion. It is easier and faster to set up pluralistic structures for sharing than it is to transform a person accustomed to uniformity so that he becomes capable of understanding, of respecting and of favoring diversity on the level of persons and their needs, and of making the necessary applications. All of which helps us to understand that if, in our congregations, the adaptation of structures has in large measure been accomplished, the con-version of our ways of thinking has not. Some years of effort will still be necessary, years of patience and of tolerance, before the transformation of mental attitudes and of conduct becomes a reality. In spite of everything, some people will never know such a transformation, because they believe that such a change is an evil and not a benefit to be pursued. Charity re-quires that we respect them, and that we learn to live with them, in the wis-dom and great-heartedness of compromise which, under its° positive forms, is love. Inability to Estimate One's Needs Accurately It is not sufficient to want to share a community of goods according to the real needs of each one. For the actual realization of this principle one must be able to evaluate tfiese needs honestly and accurately. Some religious are more or less incapable of making such an evaluation. For some, the reason lies in the formation they received as young religious and the long 2112 / Review ]or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 practice of a poverty based on dependence. They had only to ask and to leave ,to ,authority to judge the legitimacy of their request. Once the su-perior had given an affirmative answer, they never questioned themselves again about their use of the things granted. -This dependence,, judged in our day excessive, has atrophied the sense of responsibility"of some and made them quite unable to determine their own needs: Today, when au-thority leaves them free to choose such and such a thing,, to do or not do such and such an. action, to go or not to go to such and such a place, they prefer no action at all rather then assume responsibility for it. Long and difficult will be,the liberating process which will one day enable them to judge their own needs, if~ such will ever be possible. ~ C-Certain religious, coming from poor families and having, lacked some of the basic necessities during their childhood, make up,for lost time and accumulate without reason a surplus of goods. They:even admit that they ask for things to make up for the lack of them experienced in the past.And so they fill their closets with items.for, which they have,no real need, but which give them a sort of psychological security. In this Way they com-pensate for the time when they sutIeredreal want. ~ ,, For other religious, the practice of a poverty consisting of going with-out, of detailed restriction for use; of meticulous control and uniformity, has brought ab6ut another ,excessive reaction in that they,are constantly asking .for things they don't really need and of which they never .seem to have enough. At the other extreme are those who considered this former practice of poverty the ideal one, and so refuse to accept any form of com-munal sharing based on a pluralism of real needs. Using False Criteria Again, for some religious, the relative incapacity of identifying their real needs results from the use of false criteria. They will say, in, order to justify a trip: all my brothers and,sisters went to such aoplace, though an-other might say~ with just as much truth: I cannot make that .trip since none of my brothers and sisters have ever been there. Can the single fact :that one's relatives have visited Europe constitute a ,valid reason for asking for a trip overseas? Or again, can the simple fact that one's parents have never taken:~some scenic trip within the province or state:~be sufficient reason for denying oneself ,such an outing? In both cases, the use .of the "family" norm, instead of helping, hinders the discovery of real needs. That one consider the situation of one's family is certainly not wrong, but to use it as the sole means of defining orie's Own needs and the ~type of relaxation one has a right to seek is certainly without justification. These .conclusions apply .likewise .to one's social and professional posi-tion. There are people who count on the life style of ~this double milieu to determine personal needs. If they: live inca neighborhood where~each family averages one or two color-television~, sets, a summer cottage', a snowmobile Authentic Sharing in Community / 2113 or~ two, etc., they think that they too have a right to these same things and wi!l use them, under the illusion that they are living their commitment to po~verty.,lf th~ey work in the.~schools or hospitals and if the majority~of their companions go to Florida every year, wear a new outfit every day, etc., they come to believe that such is Lequired of them too, and in their minds these things become necessities that must be satisfied. The fallacy .of such ~rea.soning comes,from the setting up of one's .social or professional sur-roundings as an absolute ~in determining personal needs. It ought to be evi-dent that even if all the teachers of the school have a car, and if all the families in the area have two television sets, I do not necessarily need the same things. It also ha.ppens that this met.hod of evaluating needs ac.cord-ing to a social or professi0nal milieu soon involves various forms of dis-crimination, ail.harmf.ul to .the ,building of a fraternal community. Let us add that economy, valid as it may be, often prejudices one?s judgment of personal needs. To know how to economize is a quality that most people of average means acquire through° force of circumstances, That religious should possess, it is nother surprising nor embarrassing.;Waste-fulness and .extravagance, as well as carelessness, have always been,.con-sidered faults. The error, in the case of the religious, is to purchase things, not because ~one may need them, but because they are on sale and that per-haps one day they will be useful. It is also true that this intention of econo-mizing has a way of multiplying needs. The Influence of Numbers ,, In visiting a number of local commu~nities I ~have ~liscovered that re-ligious in small groups have their real needs satisfied much more easily than do religious in.larger gr.oups: Although not universal, this situation is repre-sentativ, e of a number of congregations. Of course, there are many cases in which it is reasonable and necessary ¯ to take numbers, into consideration. For example, if the local authority in a community of one hundred persons is planning an outing which includes transportation and lunch~ it is obvious that one must consider the number of those who wish to participate. The influence of numbers can, however, become harmful to community sharing when., a particular type .of logic prevails as sometimes happens in larg~ groups, though it. may also be found in more restricted ones, too. For example, two or three religious.desire to obtain skis in order to satisfy.a real need for relaxation, so they go to the local authority with their req.uest only to receive this answer: I cannot authorize such an expenditure; just think of the money involved if the sixty religious of the house were to come asking for skis! This reasoning characterizes a mentality which cerl~ainly is not pluralistic ,'and which fails to respect personal needs. That two or three religious desire some skis in no way implies that all the others need or even wish them. The falseness of this reasoning is even more evident Review ]or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 when we realize that the community is made up for the most part of older people or of those who are ill. On pushing this kind of logic to the extreme, one ought to refuse a wheelchair to a sick person who really needs one because everyone else might want one too. This type of reasoning may also exist among some members of the community group. They refrain from asking for what they really need be-cause they say: If everybody were to ask for such a thing, the community could not afford it. However, it is nowhere written that all the religious of a house must have the same needs at the same time, and that to satisfy them one must buy sixty canes or sixty wigs at the same time! Why, then, should we suppose this uniformity and always act in view of the total num-ber? Wherever this kind of logic dominates, whether on the part of the superior or of the members of the group matters little, it makes impossible the practice of community sharing according to need. The Moral Weight of Salaries The religious earning a high salary seems to have a special facility for getting what he needs and often more than he needs, while the one who makes no financial contribution is sometimes too embarrassed to make known real needs. Other variants of this phenomenon are these: The re-ligious in a salaried service who works overtime may think it his right to keep and to use as he pleases at least a part of the extra money so earned; the one who has won a grant or money award will not fail to exploit his chance of obtaining favors; the religious who receives an "old-age pension" and the one who regularly draws some form of income may also use these to obtain personal advantages. The moral weight of money earned by a religious' likewise risks in-fluencing the decisions of the superior. Does he feel as free and no more obligated in evaluating the requests of the one who hands in a substantial check than he does in judging those requests made by members who make no such contribution? It would not be surprising if, in the first case, he finds a particular facility in saying "yes" at once and with a smile, while in the second case, he has a tendency to ask questions about the necessity of the items requested and to multiply his reflections on the observance of poverty. In allowing a lapse of time between turning in one's check and making a request for what one judges useful or necessary, the religious can help those in authority to avoid showing favor and granting to him as to the others only what he really needs. At the provincial level we occasionally see this tendency in operation in those cases in which authority tends to discriminate between local groups of varying incomes. Groups with significant revenues sometimes receive more easily the authorization for extra expenditures than another poorer group, though the actual needs of the two groups may be identical. If such is the case, it is evident that discrimination is practiced in dealing with local Authentic Sharing in Community / 285 groups, a situation very detrimental in the realization of a truly fraternal community. The Matter o~ Gi~ts It also happens that the reception of gifts sometimes prevents sharing according to need. The religious, benefiting from the generosity of family or friends, is often better provided for than the one who must depend solely on the community. In order to justify the keeping or the use of things received, the religious reasons that he got them gratuitously when he ought rather to be motivated by real need. If our poverty permits us to accept gifts, they must nevertheless be used for all without discrimina-tion. This means that the religious may not have more because he receives more, but that all needs be judged by the same standard and that all be treated in the same manner. Whether the .goods to satisfy our needs comes from within or from outside the community is of lesser consequence. Two other observations must be made here in regard to gifts. Certain religious still declare that the refusal of anything offered to them by their parents, friends, or others, always constitutes a failure against poverty, indeed an injustice to the congregation. As it stands, this statement is inaccurate. The refusal of certain goods offered is sometimes required by our commitment to poverty. Such is the case when an individual or moral person does not need that which is offered, and in addition, the donor re-fuses any transfer of his gift. Such is likewise the case when, in response to a real need, a religious is offered something which can in no way be justified by the norms of simplicity. The second observation bears on the "intention of the donor." The intention clearly expressed by the donor does not suppress or replace the authorization required for the keeping and the use of goods. A religious cannot go to Europe simply because his parents have given him~the money for the trip. If competent authority refuses him" the permission and if the intention of the parents about the destination of their gift remains fixed, there is nothing left for the religious to do but to refuse or to return the money. However, in the majority of cases, it is not necessary to be scrupulous about respecting the intention of the donor. Many people offer us small gifts (the notion of "small" varies considerably, of course) and say to us: This is for you, for your personal needs, clothing, recreation, etc. If we took the time to explain our way of life to them as a community sharing a common fund, they would probably be quite happy to allow one of our companions to benefit from their generosity.Though we rarely explain this to them, we can ordinarily, without any qualms of conscience, pre-sume their understanding acceptance and put in the common fund what-ever we receive. 2116 / Revie.w for Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 On the contrary, the intention of the °donor must be respected when the gift is made in the form of an inheritance or legacy. Let us make clear, however, that the religious to whom these goods have been offered alway~ has the right to refuse them. He even has the duty to do so in a case in which the, acceptance of an inheritance or legacy, involves obligations ~otaily or partially in violation of his religious 9ommitments. We must also understand that. authority does sometimes have a word to say in our ac-ceptance or refusal of such goods. The Moral Weight of Competence, Position, and Conduct In this matter of sharing, the professional status of religious some-times operates in his favor. Experience shows that in certain cases the religious~ ,possessing special qualifications obtains what he needs more easily than does his confrere who lacks such competence; he may even receive a ~urplu~ while the other is deprived of basic necessities. We have no intention of condemning competence; but under pain of closing our eyes to reality, we must acknowledge that this competence does sometimes exercise a moral influence on those presenting their needs, inclining them to ask for more than they really need. It may also influence those whose role is to insure .a just distribution of material resources in their application of the principle of real need. Experience0shows us that a past office may become another pretext for keeping and us_ing certain goods. The religious whose work required a specialized library, for example, may have a strong inclina.tion to keep it even after he no longer occupies the position which once required it. The one who needed a car for his work will be tempted to continue to keep it even after he is transferred to another office which in no way requires its use. Certain personal itnd marginal benefits connected with having a car make it very .painful for him to give it up. Again it may happen that one's present position Fay serve as an oc-casion for the granting or obtaining.of favors either for self or for others. Thus a superior, as soon as he is named,.,may ask for a ~'oom with a bath attached. Is this to help him fulfill his office"moi'e efffctively? Is such an installation really needed for his work? If not, how can he justify requesting it for himself while refusing it to others. It is no more justifiabl~ for a superior to use the pretext of his office to receive and to keep as long as he wishes all the magazines that come to the house. How can one approve such action? If he were in charge of formation and if, with the consent of the community or of authority, he had a prior right or even exclusive right to the use of a magazine published for formation personnel, nobody would complain. But no one can accept, and with reason, that an individual in virtue of his office, keep for himself as long as he likes the newspapers and magazines :meant for the use of all. Such practice is an obstacle to fraternal sharing. The one whose function Authentic Sharing in Community is to build community ought to be the first to ~remove from his own life anything that might compromise it. Let me add as a last moral influence a particular type of conduct in which a few religious indulge when making a request to authority. Their tone, gestures, and manner in general can be so high-handed that it be-comes almost impossible for the superior to refuse, even when he judges superfluous the object requested. When dealing with such persons he per-haps says to himself: It is easier to grant them what they want at once than to put up with the endless scenes and references to the matter that they will make if it is denied them. The superior may even justify his action by saying that he consented in "order to avoid a greater evil. All the same, that will not prevent those in the community from believing that at times a dif-ficult disposition does get results. While we understand the delicate posi-tion of authority in these instances, we must also recognize that such con-duct on the part of a member of the group can be an obstacle to fraternal sharing as it prevents the application of the principle: each according to need. The Influence of Social Convention According to current styles and in varying degrees, social convention may also influence both the religious in determining his needs, and the su-perior whose role is to assure that fraternal dimension of communal shar-ing proper to a religious household. Ordinarily we find it easier to ask for those things~ accepted by social convention than for those outside it. The superior in turn has a tendency to authorize more quickly those things it approves than those which are indifferent or contrary, to it. In this way social convention sometimes exerts a destructive influence on the charitable quality which ought to characterize our sharing from a common fund ac-cording to individual needs. . In considering the influence of social convention on religious, it cer-tainly explains at least in. part their attitude toward smoking, for example. The religious who smokes normally receives the necessary tobacco even though the expense occasioned ma~, be as high as two or three hundred dollars a year. The need to smoke, createdand developed by him, no longer requires critical evaluation but is taken for granted; and when the com-munity budget is prepared, there is no hesitation about'setting aside im-portant sums for it. ~ : It is not at all,certain, on the other h~nd, that the philatelist would so easily be allotted a similar sum for the purchas.e of new stamps. How does it happen that we consent so easily to satisfy the needs of the one who smokes but refuse those of the stamp collector? The pressure of social con-vention would seem to be the exp!anation. Under pain of being considered out of step with the times, religious cannot ignore social convention completelyi but by conforming to it with- 2811 / Review for Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 out discrimination they can create needs the satisfaction of which amounts to real slavery and causes surprise and even scandal to others. Religious ought to be free enough, for example, in the matter of dress to avoid mak-ing an absolute of an outmoded costume and to consider relative those fashions which social convention seeks to impose on them everyday. This relativity can be expressed in one's choice of classic styles, simple and few in number, and much less subject to frequent and costly change than those passing fads which are here today and forgotten tomorrow. If it is normal for religious to be aware of social usage and to observe it when in their exterior relations they judge it necessary or useful, they must make the necessary effort to prevent it from entering so deeply into their lives as to create an endless chain of new needs. Let it suffice to men-tion the use of alcoholic drinks. Rare are those social functions, meals, and evenings from Which these are absent. If the religious is not on his guard, in multiplying his social relationships, he risks developing an acute need for alcohol. In this case, satisfaction can never be regarded as liberation, but rather a most insidious form of personal slavery. A Lack of Empathy Lack of empathy is particularly noticeable on those occasions when a religious must submit to a superior or to other members of his group his personal needs in view of an evaluation or control. It may happen that one's first reaction is to make comparisons with one's own needs, forgetting that each one is unique and therefore different; And so the superior says: I don't understand why you want to buy this secular outfit; I don'~ wear one and I've never suffered from not doing so. Or again: I never went to hear such and such a singer; I don't see what advantage you can get out of an evening so spent. Such a person never tries to put himself in the position of the one asking in order to be better able to understand his needs. He seeks rather to impose his own values on the other person or again to convince him that he does not have such a need because as superior he himself never experienced it. Without exactly realizing it, the superior may set himself up as a sort of prototype whom the others would profit by imitating. In following this sort of logic, ought he not require others to be hungry at the same time he is and with the same intensity, to be sleepy when he is, and to require the same number of hours of sleep? People incapable of this empathy are quite unable to evaluate the needs of others. We might as well say at the same time that they do not know how to exercise the service of authority, since they will never be able to understand those whom they are supposed to help. They may think they understand others, but as a matter of fact they understand only that which they can project on others. In general the person with little empathy is intolerant, not through ill will, but through his inability to put himself Authentic Sharing in Community / 2119 in the position of others. In wishing them well, he may even impose on them things that may cause them serious harm. Exclusive or Prior Right to Use The use of certain equipment may be necessary for a religious in the fulfillment of his office. It is considered essential for his work and he could not give it up without compromising the task confided to him. Such usage is valid and his confreres readily accept his use of what is neces-sary; but if they see that he has reserved for his exclusive use things for which he has no real need, at least at certain times, feelings of discontent-ment and a sense of injustice are not slow in surfacing. An example will help to make my point clear. Let us suppose that my work requires the use of a car quite regularly. On the days when I don't have to make any trips, those times when I travel by plane, am I going to lock up the car when I could just as well let others use it? If I put the car in the garage and the keys in my pocket, and if I force my com-panions to take the bus for their trips when the use of a car would be much appreciated and a real convenience for them, can I say sincerely that I am living the principle of fraternal sharing? In order to justify my conduct, I can no doubt find many reasons: A car is something one doesn't lend to just anybody; I must keep the things I need for my work in good condition; no one knows how to take care of them as I do; it is often a costly business to lend one's equipment; thb community has other cars for general use; etc. Underneath these reasons, all of which contain some element of truth, there is perhaps another which I won't admit: an undue attachment which makes me a slave of this thing. Deep down I prefer its safekeeping to communion with my brothers. In fact, my refusal to put the car at their disposition, far from favoring inter-personal relations, risks destroying them altogether and setting up barriers which are difficult to break down. If, after such conduct, I dare to repeat that goods should be oriented toward the well-being of the group and the strengthening of mutual relations, I must admit that in practice I sub-ordinate persons to things. If in my work, instead of this exclusive right to the use of equipment, I exercise what may be called a prior right to its use, I will quickly come to realize to what degree this type of use and the mentality which it de-velops favor fraternal union. Nobody denies that there are certain incon-veniences in this kind of sharing, that one risks finding one's things out of order, not in the same condition as one left them, etc. However, be-fore committing myself to sharing, ought I wait until no such risks are involved? If so, I mi~ght just as well say categorically that I refuse to share. Of course, everyone recognizes the existence of an occasional case when it would be better to keep one's tools exclusively for personal use. Such exceptions, however, do not modify the general rule according to 290 / Review ]or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 which the religious ought to exercise a prior right rather than an exclusive one to the use of those things necessary for the accomplishment of his duties. The first recognizes and favors fraternal sharing, while the second usually cuts it off abruptly. The Proprietor's Mentality Every religious making use of community goods can say, and he has reason: This property belongs to me; it has been put at my disposition by a moral person called the "province" or "institute." He may be inclined per-haps, in ~order to justify his poverty before those who do not believe in it anymore, to exaggerate the inconveniences of such a situation and to keep silent about the advantages which it affords. Sometimes he will even cover up his possessive attitude with regard to certain things saying that they do not belong to him and therefore he cannot lend them. Under pain of deny-ing the evidence, we must admit that some religious seem to have a pro-prietor's mentality with regard to goods belonging to the province or in-stitute. Such a mentality is an obstacle to fraternal sharing. If, in order to illustrate my idea, I use the community treasurer as an example, it is not that this mentality is more widespread among them than among other religious, but because frequent reference is made to them when this topic is discussed. In fact, it often happens that the treasurer acts as if he were the proprietor of the community's goods. He feels free to ask ques-tions, even indiscreet ones, about the sums of money requested, while actu-ally it is his business simply to hand over what has been authorized. He scolds others for expenditures which he has no right to judge. He may even insist on an itemized account which normally is given to the superior. When he gives out money, his gesture is marked by a pained expression as if part-ing with it hurt him physicallly. If we describe it at its worst, we might say that in keeping the purse-strings, he seems to keep the whole community on a,.leash. This caricature, although rough!y drawn, is not entirely the fruit of the imagination. If I have exaggerated some situations, I have reproduced others with an accuracy that no one can deny. It is not surprising if religious, subjected to caprices of this kind, no longer dare ask the community even for what is necessary, but arrange to obtain it outside, or keep a part of their salary or gifts received, in order to satisfy their needs. The changing of the name "procurator" to "economist," "treasurer," "controller," or whatever, does not remedy the evil. The real problem is not one of vocabulary, but of one's way of thinking, and it is this that must be changed. The bursar must recognize, in theory and in practice, that the property confided to his administration belongs to the community., that his task consists in managing it with competence, and in distributing it amiably to religious whose needs have been approved by authority. His office must not be the scene of daily contention, but rather a place where love operates under the guise of both gift and welcome. Authentic Sharing in Commitnity / Let me express sincere appreciation to all those religious who fill their post as treasurer with competency, interior detachment, and in a spirit of service. Everyone knows that theirs is often a thankless task, and one we could not do without. In accomplishing it with that joy and tact which love knows how to exercise, they can do much towards the realization of the ideal of fraternal sharing according to the real needs of each one. Fear, Embarrassment, Shame, Scruples in Regard to Asking Strange as it may appear, there are still some religious who are unable to express their real needs, who prefer to deprive themselves of what they need rather than ask for it. These religious, either by temperament or for-mation, have developed in themselves a fear, an embarrassment, shame, or even scruples about asking. Among them are those who are not earning, and on this account dare not mention their needs. Some of them think of themselves as a burden to the community. While helping these religious to free themselves from whatever prevents them" from asking for what they need, authority must take the initiative, offering them and even giving them whatever they may need. If this is considered an exaggeration, it is better to fail on the side of kindness and attention than on that of indifference and privation. It is always easier to notice the people who abuse than those whom we abuse. There also exists on the part of some a certain shame and embarrass-ment about asking which may be the result of our manner of community living and sharing in the past. I understand the uneasiness of those of thirty, forty, fifty, and more who still ask local authority or the treasurer for stamps, letter-paper, tooth-paste, soap, etc., but such a practice of com, munity sharing can no longer be justified in the name of poverty. Though long since outmoded, it has not yet totally disappeared. In my opinion it would be so much simpler, so much more adult and reas6nable, to put all these things for common use in a place where each one could take what he needs as he needs it. It is useless to complain of possible abuse in order to refuse such an elementary practice. The existence of such abuse is inevitable, whatever the manner of living the principle of common sharing. Would it not be better that the abuses accompany an adult practice of sharing instead of a childish and embarrassing one? In conclusion on this point let me say that one of the gravest abuses of the practice of religious poverty is that form of dependence which encourages and even develops personal irresponsi-bility. The Application of Various Formulas for Sharing Though there are several formulas for the sharing of go~ds, I do not in-tend here to present the advantages and inconveniences of each. I wish only to point out that the manner of applying any valid formula is able to trans-form it into an obstacle to fraternal sharing. Take for example the individual 292 / Review ]or Religious, F'olume 33, 1974/2 budget. It is, for religious in general, a practical manner for determining needs and when approved, of receiving whatever is necessary to meet them. This does not mean, however, that such a formula is best for all the religious of an institute, or of a province, or of a local community. There are some people who find a personal budget more of a useless bother than a help in practicing religious poverty. Why impose it on them then? On the other hand, why forbid it to the rest of the community just because some do not find it helpful? In ~. word, fraternal sharing is not free when the individual budget is refused or imposed on all alike. In those communities in which, in order to respect personal needs, the community budget is made obligatory and the individual budget optional, uniformity may compromise the quality of fraternal sharing. As regards the community budget it is rare, thanks be to God, to hear people use the argu-ment of uniformity to obtain more, to grant or to refuse permission. Wherever uniformity is the sole criterion for making requests or granting authorization, fraternal charity in the treatment of local groups is often ignored. Though two communities may be made up of the same number of persons, it does not follow that the needs of one be identical to the needs of the other. To respect each group in its uniqueness requires ordinarily both diversity and plurality in the manner of treatment. It is the same for individuals. How can anyone justify uniformity in the amount of money granted annually to religious who make use of a budget? Let us take the matter of clothing, for example. The one who is small and well-built will surely have an advantage over another less well-proportioned, with bulges here and there, not to mention fiat feet! Some would remedy this situation by asking that the first person hand in what he has left over, and that the second ask for what he still needs. However, one must admit that the latter remains in an awkward position as it is always harder to ex-tend the hand to receive than to turn in a surplus. In the end, would it not be simpler and more charitable to leave each one free to evaluate his cloth-ing needs and to ask for the money necessary to take care of them. The individual budget plan by which a uniform lump sum is given to all religious also presents, in actual practice, certain facets detrimental to fraternal sharing. Let us suppose that each religious of a local community receives $2500 annually, and that it is left to him to allocate this sum as he sees fit. Such procedure risks creating unjustifiable inequality. Religious whose parents live a few miles away will spend very little to goto see them regularly, while another having parents living at a distance, can visit them only rarely and under pain of seriously jeopardizing his budget. Isn't this a form of discrimination? Another weakness inherent in this plan is that the religious who can economize will manage to procure all sorts of valuable objects (record-play-ers, tape-recorders, etc.) and will have the clear impression, even the con- Authentic Sharing in Community / 293 viction, that these belong to h, im. Of course, he will feel free to take them with him on changing residenc~. As a last obstacle to fraternal sharing, let me add the refusal a priori of approving several different plains and allowing them to be used within the local community as the memlSers judge best. One would respect individual needs more surely if some wer~ permitted to use an individual budget, while others were given an allowan+e for expenses, and still others received the money necessary as the need arose. There are some very deserving religious who do not have any use for a~ individual budget or for a regular allowance and who desire to continue to~ practice poverty by asking for things as they need them. We violate the fraternal quality of our sharing if we impose on them a plan which burdens rather than frees them in their service of God. Conclusion The practice of fraternal sfiaring to which we are bound bestows on our I . community of goods its evangehcal and religious significance. Indeed, it is in order to strengthen the fraiernal bond which unites us and to express it before the world that we have chosen to put all our possessions into a com-mon fund, and to share them according to the real needs of each one. The obstacles that this sharing mebts in practice prove that it is difficult for all of us, because of our sinful condition, to observe perfectly that which we desire with all our hearts. However, the rehg~ous who recognizes the diffi-culties and makes an effort to leliminate them from his life, demonstrates his faith in those values for whic~ the fraternal community stands and his de-sire to collaborate construct~ve, ly in building it, depending on the support of Jesus Christ, thecenter of oui" lives, for a more perfect realization of it. The General Chapter of Affairs Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. Joseph F. Gallen, S.J., a specialist !n canon law for religious, writes from St. Joseph'.s Church: 321 Willing's Alley; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19106. Pre-chapter Preparation : Pre-chapter preparation, despite its evident need, was almost univer-sally unknown before post-Vatican II general and provincial chapters. The delegates'to the general chapter should be elected hbout a year before the assehably of the chapter. This will make it possible to have the pre-chapter committees constituted predominantly of chapter members from the begin-ning. The superior general and his council, or a committee appointed by him, could have already inaugurated the work by securing the proposals from the members of the institute and having them arranged according to subject matter. These could be given almost immediately to the pre-chapter committees. The delegates may be elected earlier than a date determined in the constitutions, e.g., six months before the assembly of the chapter. This determination of time is a very accidental aspect of the law, and a rea-sonable cause excuses from it. The more fundamental content of such a law is to elect the delegates at a time that will give the best possible preparation for the chapter. I think myself that a committee of more than five is gener-ally less efficient. If the quantity of the work so demands, several parallel or sub-committees can be designated. As many as possible of those on a com-mittee should be competent in the field of the committee. Each institute should know from its experience of recent chapters and from the problems now facing it just what committees are needed. There should be a steering or co-ordinating committee. Other committees have been on the religious life, vows, constitutions, government, liturgy, formation, apostolate, finances, 294 The General Chapter o] Affairs / 295 retirement, and habit. Canon law has no legislation on committees. There-fore, it depends on the particular institute to determine the committees and their work; the members and chairpersons may be elected or appointed or be designated partially by both election and appointment; the chairpersons may be elected by the members of the particular committee. Manner of Pre-chapter Committee Preparation The one directing the pre-chapter preparation gives the proposals or chapter matter to the chairpersons of the pertinent committees, who in turn distribute them to the individual members of the committees to ~work up, dividing the matter as evenly as possible. Let us suppose that the following proposal has been assigned to an individual of the government committee: the term of office of the superior general should be reduced from six to five (four) years, with only one immediate re-election permitted. The committee member is to work up a report on this proposal in the manner of a secretary, an objective researcher, not as a supporter or antag-onist of the proposal or as a policy maker. The chapter makes the decision on enactments and policy, not the committee. The first thing the committee member does is to write down the number of the proposal, if these are num-bered. Identical and almost identical proposals are to be treated together on the same report. The committee member therefore next notes on the report the number that submitted it, for:example: 36 handed in this proposal for a five and 15 for a four year term. He then expresses the proposal in one statement or in parts but both in such a way as to permit a yes-no discussion and a yes-no decision. He next, under the heading~of sense, gives any ex-planations of the proposal, always being complete throughout the report but as ~clear and brief as possible. Submitted proposals, are almost, always wordier and more obscure than the example given above, but the term "im-mediate" in the example above could be briefly explained. He could well conclude the section on sense by a statement such as the following: The pi'oposal contains two ideas, a five (four) instead o1~ a"six year term andonly one immediate re-election. The heart of his report is in the following sec-tion, in which he gives all~ the reasons for and then all the reasons against the proposal, noting when any of these reasons has greater weight for or against the four than the five year term. He ends the report with his recom-mended decision: to be accepted, to be rejected, to be accepted with modi-fications. It is evident that the reasons for the acceptance or rejection are the favorable or unfavorable reasons he has already listed. He should add his reasons for suggesting modifications. Copies of this report are distributed to all the committee members. They are to be given adequate time for its study. When a sufficient number of reports are ready, they are to be dis-cussed in a committee meeting. The committee confirms, rejects in whole or in part, and corrects the report of the individual member, which thus becomes the committee report. The committee vote on the report and its :296 / Review for Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 distinct parts should be included on it, e.g., 3 for, 2 against. Reports for all the proposals to be discussed in any period of sessions should be ready be-fore that period begins. These should be distributed to the capitulars at least on their arrival so that they can be properly studied. The failure to have such reports is a primary cause for the many unreflecting, inefficient, and slow general chapters we have had in the post-Vatican II years. Any religious experienced in chapters should see the need of reports of the type described above. They are demanded by evident facts. The primary such fact is that a chapter should make its decisions from convictions based on solid reasons. This will certainly not be attained unless there is a thorough investigation and study of the facts and reasons. It is also a sufficiently evident and most pertinent fact that many of the capitulars will not study the proposals beforehand. The reports will help to lessen their uninformed voting. Many capitulars will not be able to understand some proposals with-out such a report, for example, those who have had no experience in han-dling large sums of money can find financial proposals difficult to understand, and a religious who has not been in the novitiate since he left it thirty years ago will find. many ideas on formation most difficult to grasp. Proposals handed in by chapter members during the chapter should be processed through the pertinent committee in the manner described above. Subject Matter of the General Chapter of Affairs The norm of the practice of the Holy See for this has been the more im-portant matters that concern the entire institute. If the matter is not more important or does not concern the entire institute, it appertains to the ordi-nary government of the general, provincial, or local superiors. In the con-crete this matter has consisted of the proposals submitted by the members, provincial chapters, and the general capitulars during the time of the general chapter. The first observation is that the proposals under one aspect can readily be insufficient. Almost universally the proposals on a particular matter do not touch, at least adequately, all the more important aspects, difficulties, and problems of the particular field. Quite often they are concerned only with its accidental and lesser aspects. Very frequently also the admittance of a proposal will demand as a consequence or antecedently presume another proposal which has not been submitted. In all such cases, the pertinent com-mittee should add the required proposals, noting on each its committee source and the reasons why it was submitted by the committee. It is not very intelligent to have the submitted proposals as the subject matter, with-out designating anyone to point out and supply for the omissions and the lack of balance. In such a system, it can be almost a mere accident that the general chapter faces all the real problems of the institute. There has to be a way of rejecting very expeditiously the proposals that are less important and general or otherwise evidently inadmissible. Each The General Chapter of Affairs / 297 committee should list all such proposals submitted to it, and very early sub-mit this list to the co-ordinating committee. The latter should go over the lists and have them duplicated and distributed to the chapter members. Sufficient time should be granted for the proper study of the lists, and the chapter is then to be asked to reject all of them in the one vote. The per-mitted recourse against rejection should be of the following type. If a capitu-lar, not the one who submitted the proposal as such, believes that any such rejected proposal is worthy of a committee report and chapter discussion, he should hand in this proposal with his reasons for its repeated presenta-tion. The verdict on confirming or rescinding the rejection should not be made by the original rejecting committee but by the co-ordinating com-mittee. This will avoid having the same committee as both judge and de-fendant in the recourse. Greater Reduction of Matter Is Necessary The reduction of the work of the general chapter has to be much greater than the mere immediate rejection of proposals considered less important, less general, or otherwise evidently inadmissible in the past. No general chapter can s.atisfactorily handle a thousand or two thousand proposals. This is true even if the pre-chapter prepa.ration is most thorough and com-plete, The number of proposals that confronted very many post-Vatican II general chapters was prostrating. Nor is it sensible to think of more fre-quent general chapters; we have too many now. Not a great number of them have been religiously effective, and there is nothing in multiplication that augurs greater effectiveness. Perhaps the remedy is to cut down very severely the work of the general chapter to the particular matters that are very highly important and urgent and to give much greater attention to policies than to enactments and changes of enactments and laws in particular matters. Present Mentality Few will now even question the statement that we are faced by a crisis of authority. Pope Paul VI has often spoken~ of this crisis, for example: To mention another: there is the excessive emphasis on the right of the indi-vidual to do as he pleases, which leads to the rejection of any and all limits imposed from without and of any and all authority, however legitimate it may be (May 25, 1968, The Pope Speaks, 13 [1968], 222). In this way a mentality is spread which would like to claim that dis-obedience is legitimate and justified in order to protect the freedom that the sons of God should enjoy (January 29, 1970, ibid., 15 [1970], 54). Since therefore it is a visible society, the Church must necessarily have the power and function of making laws and seeing to it that they are obeyed. The Church's members in turn are obliged in conscience to observe these laws (December 13, 1972, ibid., 17 [1973], 376). This mentality of hostility tO authority and law is one of the very im-portant and urgent matters that a general chapter must face and strive to 2911 / Review ]or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 change, but it is also a fact that makes one question the enactment of many laws at present. Matters Excluded from the Competence of General Chapters Possessing Experimental Authority These chapters obviously cannot change ( 1 ) divine law, whether natural or revealed; (2) and without the previous appro'~al of the Sacred Congrega-tion for Religious and Secular Institutes these chapters may not put into effect anything that is contrary to the common law (canonical prescriptions, laws of Vatican II, and other laws and decrees of the Holy See); nor (3) make any change in the purpose, nature, and characteristics of any institute or in the Rule of an institute (Ecclesiae sanctae, n6. 6). Proposals These are made by the members of the institute and by provincial chap-ters. All are to be encouraged to make proposals; all are equally to be counseled to make only good proposals, and this means good for the entire institute. A proposal is to be judged by its content, but an obscure and un-duly long proposal is a certain indication of insufficient thought. The insuffi-ciency in this: case frequently extends to the content of the proposal. To find l~roposals a religious, should go over the life of the individual members and of,the community immediately with God, the community life, and the life of work. He should go through all pertinent books, e.g., the constitutions. He is to evaluate and to find ways to correct and improve the life of sanc-tity, the apostolate, the present policies and trends of the institute, its public image in the Church and in.general. He should evaluate, all innovations of the post-Vatican II years. Have they succeeded, failed, and in each case to what extent? Have the members of the institute become better religious, better participants in the community life, better apostles? What are the big problems facing the institute today? What is their solution? What is the re-ligious' effectiveness of superiors, their councilors, those in charge of forma-tion, of the works of the al:iOstolate? Is the tenor and style of life in the houses conducive to the religious life, the apostolate, a religiously satisfy-ing community life? Are your proposals solid, progressive without being im-prudent? Do they all propose freedom from something that is difficult and demands sacrifice? Proposals must be signed only and to the extent that this is com-manded by the law of the institute. A final day, well ahead of the opening of the general chapter, must be determined for the handing in of proposals. All, including general capitulars, should hand in their proposals during this tim& The general capitulars retain the right of making proposals during the chapter: Toward the close of the chapter, a date is to be determined be-yond which no proposal will be accepted. All of these provisions are to enable the committees to process the proposals properly and in due time. The General Chapter o/ Affairs / 299. The right to make proposals is determined by the law or practice of the particular institute. Those who do not have this right may suggest proposals, preferably in writing, to ~those who do enjoy the right. The latter may but are .not obliged to accept merely suggested proposals (see Review ]or Re-ligious, 23 [1964], 359-64). Position Papers and Questionnaires These were the high hurdle and wide stream obstacles in the procedure of. so many special general chapters, and few of these chapters landed fully on the opposite bank. Position papers were also at times a means on the part of committees of appropriating to themselves the policy making func-tion of the chapter. Questionnaires were frequently the substitution of a none too reasonable head count for a vote given because of convincing reasons. A background paper or questionnaire is only rarely necessary or advisable, e.g, an intelligent vote, for or against a particular proposal can demand a brief historical description. If so, the background paper should be prepared.~ Authority of the Superior General in Pre-chapter Preparation The superior general, assisted by his council, has authority over the entire pre-chapter preparation. This is evident from the fact that, outside of the general chapter, there is no one else on the general level of authority and from canon 502, which places the institute under his authority (see Ecclesiae sanctae, no. 4). Frequently at least a superior general gives ample delegation to. another religious to direct and supervise this preparation, e.g., to the Chairperson, of the steering or co-ordinating committee. However, the superior general can always lessen or~'withdraw such authority, lie may also always step in to correct and guide particular matters, individuals, or committees. Post-Vatican II general and provinc, ial chapters have often been vanquished in the pre-chapter preparation. The game was lost before it began. The superior general is not arbitrarily to interfere in or hamper the, work of the committees, but he should be completely aware of what is going on in all committees. He should be very sensitive to a too conservative or a too leftist~ approach and, even more practically, ~to a group that is unduly and wrongly influencing the pre-chapter preparation. ' Attaining a:Universal Voice in Chapters Especially since about 1965 we have had a constant clamor that the religious of temporary vows or other commitment be permitted to be dele-gates to the general and provincial chapters. This has been an outstandingly unreal issue of recent years.The clear fact has been that the young were talking in the chapters and pre-chapter preparation. The voice that was not being heard was that of the older and of many middle-aged religious and chapter members. This has been true also in other discussion groups, for example, local community discussions. Our need and problem of the-mo- 300 / Review ]or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 ment is to hear the older and the middle-aged religious. I doubt that this can be attained at this time except by having the chapter discussions start with small discussion groups. Each group should be composed of religious of all ages. This system would demand a sufficiently competent chairperson and secretary in each group, the report by the secretary of the group, and the distribution of copies of the reports of each group and of the composite report of all the groups before the common discussion of the matter in the whole chapter. The attainment of the most accurate and efficient procedure in this matter demands a very thorough study. Discussion groups are a time consuming means. They could be employed only for the more serious mat-ters. My own sincere judgment, based on the observation of chapters, is that such a means is necessary to hear the voice of the older and of many mid-dle- aged religious, especially of sisters. Part of the factual basis of this judg-ment is the lack of the older and middle-aged voice manifested very gen-erally in post-Vatican II chapters, that is, the effects that.revealed an inex-perienced, imprudent, and exaggerated origin. As far back as 1901, the Roman Congregations governing religious have refused to approve those of temporary vows or other commitment as dele-gates in the general and provincial chapters. Chapter Principles The preceding section on proposals lists fairly adequately the aspects and fields that can give rise to proposals. Proposals can also be drawn from the principles that should guide chapters, communities, and individuals, which we shall give in this section. The supreme principle is that all should seek the greater good of the Church and of the whole institute, not merely of some part of it or of some group in it. Seek the good not merely of the young, but also of the middle-aged and the aged. A high degree of differ-ence in some aspect of life that is verified in any particular country or re-gion should receive its proper consideration. This is to be true not merely of the United States but of any other country, of Germany, France, Italy, England, Japan. Differences do not exist in all aspects of life. The American has no less need of prayer and mortification than the Italian. Obviously no nation is to give the impression of being superior to all other nations. All should retain all the good of the past and be willing to accept all good ideas of the present and of the future. It is equally the duty of all to oppose anything that is useless or harmful to the institute or its members. Any false principle such as disobedience, especially if public, to the govern-ing or teaching authority of the Church should be immediately rejected. The goal in prayer is not freedom but a more universal life of constant prayer. The Holy Spirit guides practically all of us by the ordinary way, and this implies that our problems, difficulties and their solution are at least gen-erally ordinary. Little will be gained from a study of oriental mysticism or concentration or from emphasizing the charismatic. Much will be gained to The General Chapter o] Affairs / 301 the extent that it is realized that the difficulties in prayer are the very ordi-nary things of the lack of desire for sanctity of life, the unwillingness to make the sacrifices that such a life demands, the lack of a realization that prayer demands a constant effort, an impersonal spirituality, a poor introduction to mental prayer, a complicated system or machinery of mental prayer, a neglect of spiritual reading, a life that is merely activist, natural, secular, and similar ordinary things. If a chapter accepts open placement, how can the institute staff missions, colleges, hospitals, schools, homes for the aged? Can there be a generally satisfying community life when there is unlimited home visiting and unlimited going out for diversion? W.hy always leap to the new, the youthful, the leftist? Certainly sometimes the old, the moderate, the conservative is the true, the relevant, the practical. Why run to manage-ment consultants before you have tried a thorough investigation, study, and planning on your own? If any advisers gave false and imprudent advice, this advice can be the perfect mirror of what was wanted. List everything that your institute has adopted in renewal and adaptation. How many of these have helped the members to become better religious, better apostles, better Catholics? It is certainly not easy to start all over; neither is it any too comfortable to be on a plane that is speeding to certain extinction. The dominant thought of any chapter has to be the spiritual, the su-pernatural, the eternal not only with regard to the personal lives of the in-dividual religious but also to the apostolate and community life. Natural development and fulfillment and social work are important but not primary, nor are they the soul of the religious life or of its apostolate. Reject ideas and proposals that are disproportionately expensive. All experimentation in the Church and much more its worship should be carried out in a manner that is adult, mature, dignified, restrained rather than undisciplined and reckless, and not marred by the extremes of either the right or the left. The common saying is that religious dress is not an important question. This is true of religious dress in the abstract and considered merely in itself. In its effects and ramifications, religious dress, especially of women, is certainly an important question. In the past the error was to identify the old with the true, the good, and the relevant; the same error is verified now with regard to the new. Re-evaluate every post-Vatican II experiment and change. In-vestigate every question and adopt the solution that the facts demand or counsel; do not start off with a new structure or theory. The goal is only secondarily to renew and adapt the institute; the primary purpose must be to influence the religious to renew and adapt themselves. The thrust is pri-marily personal, not institutional. There is one essential test of past, present, and future experimentation. Does it produce greater sanctity of life, a deeper and wider community life, a greater spiritual effect in the apostolate? One of the most important qualities demanded in superiors and chapters today is the courage to stand with the wise and oppose the foolish. How many of your schools, colleges, and other institutions are very secular? Can you 302 / Review ]or Religious, Volume 33, 1974/2 justifiably allow this to continue and progress? Take anything and every-thing that is good and helpful from psychology and sociology, but never forget that they are no substitute for revelation, morality, or spiritual theol-ogy. How many factual studies were made that proved the later difficulties and defections of religious were found especially in those who entered im-mediately after high school? Honestly face the vocation problem and any of its causes that may exist in the individual and collective lives of your re-ligious. It is possible to emphasize the dignity of the married life without denigrating the religious life. Is the life style of your religious in conformity with the deep totality of the religious consecration? Do all things conduce to greater sanctity, better community life, and a more spiritual apostolate? Are we complaining about the lack of inspiration in the religious life after we buried it in selfishness, materialism, and naturalism? Adopt only what gives at least solid probability of success; otherwise your conduct is at least ordinarily imprudent or even rash. Procedure in lhe Chapter The chapter procedure should be kept as simple and uncomplicated as possible. The need of recourse to parliamentary procedure should be infre-quent, and each institute is now in a position to list the few parliamentary rules that are practical. The secretary of the chapter is to post the agenda for the sessions of a day at least on the preceding evening. It can be the understanding that the proposals or matters are to be taken in the order of the reports distributed to

Issue 18.6 of the Review for Religious, 1959. ; Review Religious Ecclesiastical Formation by The Congregation.of Seminaries A Fuller Sense of Literature by Father Aidan, C.P. ~Examen on Renovation and Adaptation by Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. St. Lawrence of Brindisi by R. F. Smith, S.J. Current Spiritual Writing by Thomas G. O'Callaghan, S.J. Survey of Roman .Documents Views, News, Previews Questions and Answers Book Reviews and Notices Index to Volume 18 321 328 333 346 353 36O 365 367 370 381 Volume 18 November 15, 1959 Number 6 OUR CONTRIBUTORS FATHER AIDAN is stationed at St. Gabriel's College, Blythe Hall, Ormskirk, Lancs., England, JOSEPH F. GALLEN, the editor of our Question and Answer Department, is professor of canon law at Woodstock College, Woodstock, Maryland. R. F. SMITH, editor of the REVIEW, is professor of apologetics at St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas. THOMAS G. O'CALLAGHAN is professor of ascetical and mystical theology at Weston College, Weston 93, Massachusetts. ~, REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, Nov., 1959. VOI. 18, No. 6, Published bi-monthly by The Queen's Work, 3115 South Grand Boulevard, St. Louis 18, Missouri. Edited by the Jesuit Fathers of St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas, with ec-clesiastical approval. Second class mail privilege authorized at St. Louis, Mis-souri. Copyright, 1959, by TKe Queen's Work. Subscription price in U. S. A. and Canada: 3 dollars a year; 50 cents a copy. Printed in U. S. A. Editor: R. F. Smith, S.J. Associate Editors: Augustine G. Ellard, S.J.; Gerald Kelly, S.J.; Henry Willmering, S.J. Assistant Editors: John E. Becker, S.J.; Robert F. Weiss, S.J. Departmental Editors: Joseph F. Gallen, S.J.; Ehrl A. Weis, S.J.' Please send all renewals, new subscriptions, and business correspondence to: Review for Religious, 3115 South Grand Boulevard, St. Louis 18, Missouri. Please send all manuscripts and editorial correspondence to: Review for Religious, St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas. Ecclesiastical Formation SACRED CONGREGATION OF SEMINARIES AND UNIVERSITIES Prot. N. 541/59 CIRCULAR LETTER ADDRESSED TO BISHOPS ON THE OCCASION OF THE FIRST CENTENARY Of THE DEATH OF THE CURI~ OF ARS CONCERNING CERTAIN PROBLEMS OF ECCLESIASTICAL FORMATION. Your Excellency, Not long ago pilgrims of every race and tongue Were gathered at the grotto of Massabielle to commemorate the centenary of the apparitions of Lourdes. And now, before the echo of these solemn celebrations has died awdy, our minds and hearts turn once more towards France, to a small village of that lalid which was the scene of the apostolic labors of a humble parish priest in whom our Lord saw fit to renew, with copious. 9utpourings .of grace, the portents of His public life. This Sacred Congregation of ~eminaries and Universities does not wish to let this year pass without recalling the attention of future priests to this humble son of the soil. For he, by corres-ponding faithfully with the grace of vocation, became in the hands of God a powerful instrument for the renewal and the deepening of the Christian life in many souls. The life of St. John Mary Vianney has many valuable lessons for the young levite of our own times. In fact, we may say that his message, implemented now by the lustre of his heavenly glory, carries a greater significance than ever before. I. First of all, he shines as an example of fidelity to the inspirations of grace. Once he had come to know the divine will in his regard, he pursued the priestly ideal with a tenacity of purpose that has rarely been equaled. He never allowed himself to be discouraged by the many obstacles which seemed to bar his way towards the goal he so ardently, yet so humbly desired. Rather was he guided always by a most profound appreciation of the greatness of the priesthood. Contemplating that greatness .he would exclaim in ecstasy, "Oh how wonderful is the priest! His greatness will only be seen in heaven. If a priest in this life 321 ECCLESIASTICAL FORMATION Review for Religious were to comprehend his real dignity, he would die -- not of fear but of love." It is this appreciation, this tenacity of purpose, this spirit of dedication which the Church wishes to bring home to the ecclesiastical youth of our time to urge them to cherish the ideal to which the Lord has called them. The present scarcity of voca-tions is a well known fact while the spiritual needs of the faithful are daily on the increase. It is not that the Lord scatters less abundantly the seed of the divine call. Alas! it is the fewness of those who gather it; and even of these, how many put their hand to the plough and then turn back, abandoning the work they have begun. The example of the Cur~ of Ars should urge all who have received a divine vocation to the priesthood to treasure it as a priceless gift. If there is a lack of generosity on their .part, the wiles of the evil one may well rob them of this hidden pearl. To safeguard it, everything should be willingly sacrificed. Clerics, as the very name implies, are the portion of the Lord and have been called by Him to a special destiny. They should, therefore, for their own encouragement and perseverance, be always mindful of the tender goodness and munificent kindness which has singled them out. If "the Apostle, reminding the early Christians of their redemption, could charge these laymen to live as children of light and heedless of the works of the flesh, how much more grave is such an obligation for clerics who are called not merely to share in the grace of Redemption but to follow in the footsteps of the Divine Master as its dispensers and ministers. Let them, therefore, give thought constantly to the gift of God and let them strive to make themsebfes more worthy of the divine choice, making a daffy offering of their youth to the Church for their own salvation and the salvation of their brethren. II. If we look at the figure of the saintly Cur~ of Ars, we will recognize in his shining virtue a supreme model of priestly excellence. He knew that the priesthood had, in some mysterious way, identified him with the one Eternal Priest, the Word incar-nate. It was such knowledge which inspired him to repeat phrases like these: "When you see the priest, think of our Lord Jesus Christ" or "The priesthood is the love of the Heart of Jesus." But even these sentiments, however beautiful and expressive of divine realities, were of secondary importance. For him the essential was to live the priegthood which the Lord exercised through him. Behold him, therefore, the holy Cur~, in the rSle outlined by the Apostle, a mediator for his people, devoted to a life of adoration, 322 November, 1959 ECCLESIASTICAL FORMATION of intercession, of total sacrifice; he too a victim like his Redeemer, ready day and night to implore "with unspeakable groans" the remission of sins, ready always to fill up in his body what is wanting in the Passion of Christ. This closeness to God and perfect conformity to the Eternal Priest inspired in him a deep appreciation of prayer and of the interior life, and were besides the secret of his "extraordinary success. He knew perfectly well that the: efficacy of his work for souls depended above all on prayer and on union with God. Conscious of his rSle as an instrument of divine grace, it was to grace alone that he looked for the success of his ministry. Not without reason, therefore, did the Supreme Pontiff Pius XI name St. John Mary Vianney the special patron of parish priests and those entrusted with the care of souls, wishing thereby to emphasize that the efficacy of all pastoral endeavor is directly dependent on the personal holiness and interior life of the priest. The Sacred Congregation of Seminaries is convinced that in this matter much is left to be done in institutes for clerical train-ing. In view of the attitude of young priests, particularly towards the problems of the ministry, the question arises whether the traditional principles of formation are not being overlooked. In most cases, it is true, there is no lack of zeal for the external works of the ministry; but such zeal, unsupported by prayer and morti-fication, issues only in vanity and disillusionment. The fact is that without the interior life there can be no true apostle. Apart from it the most elaborate and spectacular techniques of organization will achieve little of permanent value. The true apostle, conscious that he is but an instrument in the hands of God, knows that he has other and less fallible means at his disposal. He is aware that a spiritual edifice may be raised only by prayer and the power of grace. His labors will be successful in the measure of his reliance not on himself but on these God-given aids. "Therefore neither he who plants ~or he who waters is anything, but God who gives the increase . For we are God's helpers" (1 Cot 3:7-9). The Supreme Pontiff, Pope Pius XI says clearly: "It would be a very grave and dangerous error should the priest, carried away by a false zeal, become completely immersed in the external works of the ministry to the neglect of his own sanctification . Without piety, the holiest of actions, even the most solemn rites of the sacred ministry will be performed in a mechanical and routine manner, devoid of spirit, of unction and of life" (Ad catholici 323 ECCLESIASTICAL FORMATION Review for Religious sacerdotii [December 20, 1935] in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 28 [1936], 23-24). Later, Pope Pius XII, in his apostolic exhortation Menti nostrae vigorously reiterated the same teaching. "An ardent spirit of prayer," he says, "is necessary today as never before, when so-called 'naturalism' has taken hold of men's minds and virtue is beset by dangers of every kind -- dangers which, at times, assail even those engaged in the sacred ministry. What more effective means can there be of avoiding these snares, what more apt to raise the mind to higher things and preserve its union with God than constant prayer and invocation of the divine assistance?" (Menti nostrae [September 23, 1950] in Acta Apos-tolicae Sedis, 42 [1950], 673). More recently still, Our Holy Father Pope John XXIII, happily reigning, has insisted on the need for an efficacious pastoral apostolate. In his discourse to the Apostolic Union of the Clergy (March 12, 1959), proposing the holy Cur~ of Ars as an apt model for the members, he addressed to them the following solemn considerations: "How is it that in the ministry so much labour frequently yields but meagre fruit? How is it that priests who seemingly neglect no weapon of the apostolate fail to bring back so many lapsed children of the Church who are dead to the life of grace? Perhaps it is because they are not single-minded in their ministry; perhaps because they do not always seek exclusively the good of souls; perhaps also, they place too much reliance on means that are human and therefore frail without giving due attention to prayer and sacrifice." We must insist therefore that teachers in seminaries, and particularly the rectors and spiritual fathers shall give adequate and timely instruction, especially to students approaching sacred orders, on the true nature of the priesthood, its mission, and the means to be relied on in the apostolate. Furthermore they shall be careful to base this in'struction on the traditional principles that are to be found in revelation and have been authoritatively interpreted by the Fathers and the magisterium of the Church. They shall not permit the introduction of any novelty which could undermine or alter the teaching of the Church in so delicate a matter. These instructions must be regarded as of the highest importance because upon the ideas instilled in them during semi-nary years will depend the future conduct of priests in the ministry. III. The loyalty of St. John Mary Vianney to the Church is well known. He had a most tender love for the Holy Mother 324 November, 1959 ECCLESIASTICAL FORMATION of all the faithful. Whenever he spoke about her his face appeared transfigured and his voice thrilled with emotioh. His love, it is true, embraced all the faithful and was not confined to the narrow circle of Ars -- in fact, people came from all over the world to lay siege to his pulpit and his confessional--but it was especially directed towards the visible head of the Church, the Pope, whom he venerated. It is clear from the process of canonization that he sought out every opportunity to testify his supreme devotion to the Roman Pontiff. He could not conceal his emotion when he spoke about the Mother and Teacher of all the Churches or heard her spoken about. He showed respect, love and obedience to his own Bishop "as to the Lord." And what obedience! Everyone knows that he was bent on withdrawing from the public eye to weep over what he called the emptiness of his life. For he was conscious of his unworthiness and dispirited by his increasing responsibility. But obedience, manifested in the will of his supe-riors, wished him at Ars; and at Ars he remained in a spirit of sub-mission and sacrifice. Those responsible for clerical education have here a matter for serious reflection. The virtue of obedience is absolutely funda-mental in the process of forming sacred ministers. It is necessary to engender in them a habit of obedience which reaches to the very fibre of their being. And this is particularly true in times like ours when the demon of pride bids everyone throw off restraint and indulge in unlimited liberty of thought and action. Such a norm of behaviour, hailed as progress, has crept into educational methods and threatens the very foundations of Catholic teaching on the principles of pedagogy. Cases are sometimes met with even in ecclesiastical colleges -- indeed this Sacred Congregation has had to intervene -- where attempts are made to exploit the methods of "self-education" with too great concession to individual caprice and too little thought for the frailty of human nature. To strive to develop in their charges a sense of responsibility, initiative~ and judgment is indeed the legitimate and necessary work of educators. But what must be deplored is the attitude of teachers who are afraid to command lest they invade the sanctuary of another man's mind and do violence to his personality. Such a teacher abdicates his position as superior and renders the very concept of discipline meaningless. It is a false approach; for it is only by discipline that one achieves a strong personality, endowed with that spirit of sacrifice which is required of all those who would follow in the footsteps of the Lord Jesus Christ. By means of this 325 ECCLESIASTICAL FORMATION Review for Religious discipline alone are formed genuine apostles bent on doing the will of God, as indicated by their superiors, rather than following their own c.apricious inclinations. Let discipline, therefore, joy-ously embraced, be the touchstone by which superiors test the vocation of their students. Let them demand an obedience, not merely theoretical, but effective, single-minded, and complete in all things, great and small, contained in the seminary rule. In requiring this obedience and in putting it before the students, let them recall the supernatural motives which are its justification and its supreme model, Jesus Christ, who had only one purpose on earth: "To do thy will, O God" (Heb 10:7). Let them always remember that obedience primarily involves "obsequium," that. is, a total submission of mind and heart which makes our actions pleasing to God. If superiors can achieve this much they can be assured that their students will also acquire the other virtues proper to a priest, especially those, like chastity, which require manly will-power and perfect self-control. For the members of all pious institutes, therefore, the prin-ciple must hold that the rule is the will of God manifested in their regard and consequently of obligation as a necessary means of their formation. The vigilant presence of a superior must not be regarded as something injurious to personality but rather as a help towards securing that spiritual development which is re- 'quired of a priest and is his glory: "All things are yours; you are Christ's; and Christ is God's" (1 Cor 3:22-23). Addressing our beloved seminarians we would exhort them to keep before their minds the repeated teaching of the Church which compares the clergy to an army, carefully chosen and proper-ly trained, ~in object 6f terror to enemies because of its disciplined might. During the long and arduous period of training let them cultivate a spirit of discipline, sound convictions, and an un-questioning obedience to those placed over them. Thus will they acquire that perfect "thinking with the Church" which will enable them. at a later stage, to fight the battles of the Kingdom of God "prepared to act and to endure bravely for the salvation of all" (Leo XIII, Alacritas ista [January 18, 1885] in Enchiridion Cleri-corurn [Rome: Vatican Polyglot Press, 1938], n. 458). However arduous the preparation for the priesthood may be and however toilsome and full of sacrifice the life of the future priest, the reward for valiant service under the banner of the Lord is very great indeed. St. Augustine, who was called to the apostolate in times as difficult as our own, affirms: "Nothing in 326 November, 1959 ECCLESIASTICAL FORMATION this life and especially at this time is more difficult, laborious, and dangerous than the work of a bishop, priest, or deacon; but God's view nothing is more blessed, provided one conducts one-self in the way our King orders" (Letters 21:1). Your Excellency, much more might be said in pursuance of the example of the holy Cur~ of Ars; relevant to the right formation of candidates for the priesthood and therefore helpful to the better administration of seminaries. We have confined our attention however to those matters which have come to our notice through the reports of apostolic visitators and which seem peculiarly related to the needs of our time. We wish to emphasize the need for a deepening of the sense of responsibili~ty in relation to the grace of vocation, to insist on the primacy of the interior life as an essential condition for the pastoral ministry, and finally to establish the formative value of a discipline which is accepted willingly and conscientiously. In this way, the truly priestly life will be protected and developed and it will be able to meet the needs of the time and adapt itself to the pastoral circumstances of the moment, never forgetting the sources from which its super-natural fecundity and its truly noble character derive. We are convinced that these principles added to the essential requirement of knowledge -- which, let us remember, was not wanting in the case of the Cur~ of Ars, for God enriched him won-derfully with the gifts of His Spirit -- are the solid foundation on which future apostles must raise the structure of their priest-hood. Only with this foundation may they go forth, the able workers of the Lord's vineyard "trained to do all good works" as heralded by St. Paul, and the good shepherds described by St. Peter as "from the heart a pattern to the flock" (2 Tim 3:17; 1 Pet 5:3). While we beg Your Excellency to ensure tha~ the contents of this letter are brought to the notice of your students with what-ever comments you consider opportune, we take the occasion to express to you the sentiments of our profound esteem and remain, Yours devotedly in Our Lord, Given at Rome on the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, June 5th, 1959, JOSEPH Cardinal PIZZARDO, Prefect DINO STAFFA, Secretary. 327 A Fuller Sense of I_iterature Father Aidan, C. P. AMONG THE MANY hardships incident to the student state, the writing of essays was one that could rarely be evaded. Of course, as one realizes -- later -- the correction of these'effusions must have been' an even more Herculean labour. It is only when we face an exercise-book armed with red ink in-stead of blue that we realize that sufferance is the badge of all our tribe. But all the same, we were rather surprised when one long-suffering student once plaintively, complained that we were always giving a religious turn to the development of our thought. "Isn't that a happy fault?" we replied. "Surely you should be pleased that we are so spiritually minded?" and so on ran the ready answers. And I think that, as the unspeakable vernacular has it, we'd got something there; a thought that has often recurred to me when the study of literature is discussed. I think it was Sir Roger de Coverley who preferred his parson rather to deliver the solid sermons of accredited authors than to drone out his own efforts; and while we would not perhaps care to descend to such utter conservatism, we ought not to despise learning aspects of truth, often brilliant and revealing, from the great minds of past ages. "A good book is the precious life-blood of a master spirit," and our own minds cannot fail to be improved by such a blood ~transfusion. Again, it strikes me very forcibly at times when "doing" (horrible word) literature in class that a statement in the texi is a very brilliant facet of a perhaps vaguely realized spiritual truth. One realizes that such and such a remark is capable of application on a plane of thought other than what the author intended. Its significance can be extended to shed a grateful ray of light on some spiritual principle whose full expres-siveness has perhaps been obscured by familiarity or neglect. What the author has said is perfectly true in its context, but it is also more profoundly true in a higher sense. In studying the acknowledged classics of English literature, we are surely not being disloyal to our author if we read with our ear attuned to the deeper harmonies that perhaps underlie the 328 A FULLER SENSE OF LITERATURE chord he strikes. If he has seized and expresse.d some truth for our benefit and we enlarge and enrich that truth on another plane of though't, we do him no disservice; in fact, we remember his phrase with greater gratitude and appreciation. He has l~ointed out the way, and we have followed out his directions with profit. My c]ass--I dare not say my audience--are often politely amused when I mention that such and such a poem, rightly taken, could be used for spiritual reading, and that several class periods could profitably be expended in exploiting its deeper treasures. A poem is a poem is a poem, their looks warn me; the life of a saint is a very different kettle of fish; and never the: twain shall meet. They are good enough to admit, however, when it is pointed out, that there is literally more than meets the eye. Wordsworth, for instance, has written much admirable poetry as well as much abominable verse; "Tintern Abbey" is as good an example of his vein of William the Conqueror as "We are Seven"--that playground of parodists--is of his unfortunate tendency to be merely Silly Billy. Of the joys of nhture he knew in childhood, he writes soberly: That time is past, And all its aching joys are now no more, And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur; other gifts Have followed; for such loss, I would believe, Abundant recompense. This is clear enough certainly. Yet we may need to remind ourselveg that such a Clear-sighted attitude should also be ours in spiritual matters. What if we were mo~e obedient as novices, or more fervent as students? "That time is past." Our present duties are urgent, and we should know how to adapt ourselves to them, without sacrificing one whit of our essential obedience or fervour. With the passing of the years, our charity ought to become less natural, and our obedience more positively vigorous. There should be no sentimental looking back on those early days, no echoing Vaughan: Happy those early days, when I Shined in my Angel-infancy! . How I long to travel back, And tread again that ancient track! for "that time is past." We ought not depreciate the present in desiring again the past. We might as well face the facts: obedience, 329 FATHER AIDAN Review for Religious charity, patience, and the rest in those earlier days, with all their zest and novelty, came easier to us. But we should not "mourn nor murmur" that we have to put forth sterner effort now; still less should we "faint" and, discouraged, relax our exertions. We can surely say that "other gifts have followed," no less real for being less memorable; and, remembering the graces of the Mass and vocation, we should with all our heart believe "fer such loss, abundant recompense." The grace of God, too, has its seasons; to yearn for a perpetual spring is to show bad husbandry. Much Ado About Nothing is one of the most appropriately named plays that Shakespeare ever wrote. Yet amid all the bustle and much ado, there is much of permanent value that we can reflect on. Familiarity~ especially with spiritual things, may breed, if not contempt, at least insensibility. And we who grow accustomed to the daily miracle of the Mass and Holy Communion can learn from the remark of the Friar: What we have, we prize not to the worth Whiles it is ours; ~ut being lacked and lost, Why, then we rack the value; then we find The virtue that possession would not show us Whiles it was ours. Routine can be ruthless, if we allow it to become so; ~ind sheer regularity may prove a mere placebo if we are spiritually run-down. There is a false sense of security against which George Eliot warns us, which "more frequently springs from habit than from conviction," and which consequently persists even after warning signs should have alerted the victim. Our appreciation of God's gifts is a m£tter of conviction, not custom, a conviction which we ,try to make even deeper; to abandon ourselves to mere habit is to run the risk of undervaluing those gifts, even to ultimate ingratitude.: We should try to "find the virtue that possessio.n would not show us" even while we thankfully retain possession. No less than amuse, the elegant irony of Jane Austen can also instruct. Elizabeth Bennet's arch rebuke to Darcy is an example. Darcy admits that he has not the talent of easy conversation with those whom he has never met before, and appears to think that this handsome admission exonerates him completely from any charge of superciliousness. Elizabeth gently points out that her lack Of "masterly manner" in playing the piano is due to her own fault; she has not taken the trouble of practising. Possibly our own shortcomings, especially in the matter of charity, are capable 330 November, 1959 FULLER SENSE OF LITERATURE of similar diagnosis, Perhaps we too do not take the trouble of practising. It is easier to conclude that we have not the talent of a ready, friendly interest in others than to make the effort neces-sary to acquire it. As Jerome K. Jerome well said, "Don't bother yourself about how much nicer people might be; think how nice they are." A search for another's good points can be more profitable .than a murky exhumation of his less taking characteristics. Practice does make perfect, and if we h~ive not attained perfection --and who has?--perhaps the fault lies in our insufficient practice. Again, it seems to me that truths ~cquired in reading can sometimes reinforce by their very humour or poetry some point of. more specifically religious, life; or better still, the life of religious. There are many illuminating remarks scattered about in various places which may give rise to an uneasy searching of conscience, and may even enable ourselves to see ourselves as others see~us. Sheridan was--surely--not thinking of religious obedience when, in The Rivals, he put the following remark into thb mouth of Sir Anthony Absolute. Young Absolute has just affirmed, "I cannot obey you";'and his exasperated parent is led to lament, "You know I am compliance itself--when I am not thwarted; no one more easily led--when I have my own way; but don't put me in a frenzy." (I like that phrase; a religious frenzy is put in quite a novel perspective.) Dickens, I think, holds a mirror up to religious life when the delightful Mrs. Gamp is moved to declare her motto in life. No-one would accuse Dickens of interest in religious, still less of interest in religious poverty; and he has growled in approved Victorian fashion about processions of dirty ragged monks. Nevertheless, Mrs. Gamp's motto does warn us of the danger of too great com-placency in our vow, and indicates--malgrd elle--a practical way in which we can keep it better. "I'm easy pleased," she primly says. "It is but little as I wants; but I must have that little of the best, and to the minute." Indeed, earth has not anything to show more fair than that; but, it is to be hoped, a religious house has. Shakespeare, as might well have been expected, is a fertile source of inspiration. In the matter of chastity, we know, our natural obligation is reinforced by vow; yet, as a modern spiritual author has said, "There is nothing fireproof or asbestos-like about the cassock"--or, for that matter, about the religious habit. Our vow is no vaccine, no injection, to render us immune to attack. 331 FATHER AIDAN And well does Shakespeare understand this when in a powerful metaphor Prospero warns Ferdinand, lately engaged to Miranda: Do not give dalliance Too much the rein: the strongest oaths are straw To the fire i' the blood: be more abstemious, Or else, good night your vow! Finally, there is one very thought-provoking remark--again by Shakespeare--which, by shedding a dramatic light on the great mystery of Redemption, may help us to a richer estimation of its depths. Measure for Measure is often referred to as a gloomy comedy, but it abounds in brilliant lines. Isabella pleads with the inexorable Angelo for her brother's life, only to be told that he is ¯ . . a forfeit of the law And you but waste your words. "Alas!" she replies. "Why, all the souls that were were forfeit once; And He that might the vantage best have took Found out the remedy." Surely even theology would be hard put to it to find a o more succinct reference to the reconhiliation of the outraged Justice of God with the infinite Mercy of the redeeming Christ in His Sacred Passion. Why not a religious turn to our serious and literary reading? And why should not a religious turn to serious and literary reading? 332 Examen on Renovation and Adaptation Joseph F. Gallen, S. J. THE IMPLEMENTATION of renovation and adaptation depends primarily on higher superiors; but they are also the religious whose numerous duties can have impeded or pre-vented the reading, study, and attendance at courses and institutes that are necessary even for an understanding of this subject. The following questions and principles should make such a superior realize whether he or she is sufficiently conversant with the move-ment, These brief questions and principles are at least intended as a sufficiently complete and balanced picture of the nature, men-tality, and purposes of the movement. They should therefore be useful to all religious. The success of renovation and" adaptation depends on the intelligent and willing cooperation of all superiors and subjects. I. General Principles Is my principle rigorously what the founder did and said or also what the founder would now do and say? Do I adapt my institute to the present age as much as the founder did to his own age? Isn't resistance to intelligent and prudent adaptation opposi-tion to the will of the Holy See? Any adaptation should conform to expressed norms of the Holy See; but it is not to be thought that the Holy See will define exactly, impose, or even suggest every necessary or profitable adaptation. A fundamental purpose of renovation and adapta-tion is to quicken the life, energy, and self-initiative of all institutes. Do I understand that the purpose of adaptation is a more ¯ effective use of the means of self-~anctification and of the apos-tolate? Do I realize that everything in the religious life is only a means to its purpose? Am I choosing effective .means? Changing the ineffective? Do I understand that all human institutions ~ are capable of. change? that no human being could foresee all possible circum-stances of all ages? 333 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious Do I realize that any idea decreases in universality of place and age in the degree that it is particular and determined? Do I admit in fact and practice that there are different customs, manners, and demands in different countries, nations, and ages? that all ideas, works, and practices of the past may not be suitable for the present? Am I holding on to any thing that was introduced only be-cause of particular circumstances of the past? Any artificial or affected practice or observance is repugnant to the doctrine and example of Christ. Do I prevent or impede adaptation by the rationalization that it is laxity, self-indulgence, and worldliness? Do I blind myself to the good in adaptation by concentration on its extremists? This is as much lacking in intelligence as it would be to seek the truth of Christianity in religious fanaticism. The greatest enemies of renovation and adaptation are those who hold that its purpose is to eliminate or diminish religious discipline. A regulated life, solidly productive of the virtues dis-tinctive of the religious state, is necessary for complete Christian perfection. Adaptation seeks to retain but to revivify the discipline that is good, to remove the idle and useless, to substitute the better for the less efficacious, and to effect the realization that an oppres-sive, merely annoying, and too minut~ religious discipline is self-destructive. "All counsels by which we are influenced to perfection are reduced .to this: that we be detached from affection for temporal things in order that the soul may more freely tend to God." This maxim of St. Thomas is eternally valid. Renovation does not seek to weaken or destroy but to animate the total dedication by which the religious renounces any earthly affection that could impede the greater love of God. Adaptation cannot and does not deny or enfeeble the complete detachment, mortification, and abnegation demanded by this purpose of the religious life. It strives to find, intensify, and promote the most suitable and efficacious means for this purpose. Renovation is not worldliness but greater sanctity; adaptation is not self-indulgence but more intelligent and appropriate mortification. Am I aware only of the old? suspicious of the new? Do I discourage or prevent talk and discussion on the new by subjects? It is not difficult to discern the blind conservative and the rash innovator. Adaptation is prudent progress. Its purpose is to 334 November, 1959 RENOVATION AND ADAPTATION preserve, protect, and improve the good, to change or remove only what is harmful, obstructive, or useless. There are consecrated immutables in the religious life. Only the religious nihilist attacks these. There are also many mutables, and only the blind conservative or religious zealot elevates these to the order of immutables. You are true to renovation and adaptation when your maxim in all aspects of the religious life is: hold on to the good but always seek the better. Do I discourage and repress new ideas in the general chapter, sessions of the council, in superiors and officials? Do I refuse my subjects publications that contain new ideas? Do my subjects understand that renovation and adaptation are to proceed slowly, by study, discussion, and persuasion, not by agitation? The superiors who do nothing are those most apt to have agitated subjects. Do I, a higher superior, read books, periodicals, and articles on renovation and adaptation? attend gatherings or courses that include this subject? Have I, on the. constant excuse of work, cut myself apart from this movement? I should lead the way, and nothing will be accomplished in fact without me. Am I willing to accept anything ~hat will lead the religious of today to greater sanctity or a more effective, ministry? Am I willing to consider any good idea, no matter what its source? Am I searching for or hiding from new ideas? Has our institute contributed any idea to the movement of renovation and adaptation? Do I favor or accept the new merely because it is new? Do I abandon the old only when I am convinced that it is useless, harm-ful, or that something better can be substituted? Do I readily adapt in hospital work, with difficulty in schools, but with much greater diffi5ulty or not ht all in religious and community,life? Why? Is our institute distinguished by a granite inflexibility or a living elasticity? Since the authoritative beginning of adaptation in 1950, what have we changed in our constitutions, customs, observances and practices, prayers, community life, formation, work, religious habit? Can I say that all of these are in all respects fully adapted to the present age? 335 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review [or Religious Is my attachment to my institute so blindingly intense that I believe it admits of'no greater perfection in spirituality, govern-ment, formation, or external works? Love of my institute is a virtue, but not the love that smothers life and progress. Do I grasp the paradox that my institute will remain the same only if it changes? only if it receives the nourishment of new ideas? that otherwise it deteriorates to feebleness and senility? The only one who cannot progress but in whom all others should progress is God, and He is the God not only of infinite sanctity but also of infinite knowledge and truth. We may object that change is not always progres.s, but we are "certain that doing everything exactly as it was done in the past is not progress. Is my principle in fact that the good is what was done in the past and that the new is a synonym for the dangerous or evil? How would I prove that a good idea is better b~cause it arose in the sixteenth or nineteenth rather than in the twentieth century? It is true that to be modern is not necessarily to be spiritual. It is equally true that traditionalism is not necessarily sanctity. Do I realize that only the aged mentality lives completely in the past? Am I not immature to the degree that I refuse to face the present? Do I talk about adaptation but do nothing? Do I consider adaptation an unwelcome guest and hope to effect its speedy departure by my coldness and ~neglect? Are we cooperative and helpful to other religious institutes? Do I think that renovation and adaptation are only for religious women? Nothing is more blind.ing than our own customary and routine conduct. An efficacious way of learning what I should adapt is to go over everything we do daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly with an intelligent and spiritual religious Of another institute. II. Sanctity of Life How many and to what degree do our local superiors have a spiritual influence on their communities? Am I convinced that the holiness of our institute must always be measured by the extent, intensity, hnd constancy of its prayer an~" self-denial? Is conformity with the holy rule the ultimate norm of our life or is the rule a means to conformity with Christ? 336 November, 1959 RENOVATION AND ADAPTATION Rule, regulation, and regularity are important, but is our spirituality nothing but rule, regulation, and regularity? Have we little consciousness 0f the interior life? of the richness of the fatherhood of God? of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit? of the person of Christ? of the mystical body? of the life of grace? of the doctrine of Christ? of the motherhood of Mary? Am I disturbed at violations of silence, promptness, and regularity in my subjects but never think of their correspondence to grace, interior prayer, or interior virtue? Is the actual purpose of our institute the devout life, not the saintly life? What proportion of the members of my institute have a low idea of the purpose of the religious life? Is the actual tenor' of the spiritual .life of our institute a challenge to generous souls or the canonization, of little souls? Is our spirituality purely negative or positive? Do we always define humility as the lowering of self, never as the enthronement of God? mortification as the denial of self or preference for and love of God and of the things lof God? Do we curb ou2 passions for self-control or to grow into the fulness of Christ? Do we make God or self the center of our spiritual lives? .Do we love God or self-perfection? Are penance and mortification practiced? Are those who can and do fast thought peculiar? Are voluntary works of penance and mortification found in only a very few individuals? Is the atmosphere of my community spiritually inspiring? depressing? debilitating? . Are the influential members of our institute exemplary or mediocre religious? Do I realize that the fertile mother of mediocrity and tepidity in the religious life is bad example and that conspicuous reasons for this fact are that our religious have not been led to a convinced spirituality and have not been trained.to think for themselves? Spiritual direction should evidently have its proper place, but are the majority of those receiving spiritual direction in our institute religious from whom .no' proportionate profit can be expected? Is our library stiflingly sweet with pietistic books? Are the religi.ou~ allowed to choose their own book? Must spiritu.al reading be in common? Do we ever take Sacred Scripture as our spiritual reading? Do we realize that mental prayer is often weak and 337 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious difficult because it is famished for proper and constant spiritual reading? III. Poverty Do I emphasize interior detachment from material things? Do I understand that moral uniformity in material things is necessary for community peace and fraternal charity? Do I give subjects permission because they get the money or the object from externs? Do many of our religious procure material things or the money for them from externs? Am I permitting or tolerating any custom or practice that is clearly opposed to poverty or that excludes its perfection? Do too many of our religious constantly ask for the newest and best? Do our religious understand that luxury is not a necessity but an obstacle to good work? Am I generous with material things to externs but not to our own religious? Do our buildings, the furnishings of our religious houses, and the personal lives of our subjects manifest to lay people the nothingness of material things in themselves? Do I accept modern inventions and improvements in so far as they increase efficiency but reject those that lead only to self-indulgence and luxury? Am I sensitive to the fact that the multiplication and constant increase of material improvements and conveniences tend to produce softness of character? Do I realize that the emphasis on interior mortification must be proportionately intensified? Is our life simple and poor? Do too many of our religious live an unmortified and soft life? Do we work for, attract, love and are loved by the poor and the working class? IV. Chastity Is chastity for too many of our religious merely obligatory celibacy or is it in fact their quickest means for attainment of unworldliness, of love of God, for clear vision of spiritual realities and values, a life of delicate familiarity with God in prayer and of pure love for others in zeal? 338 November, 1959 RENOVATION AND ADAPTATION Do our religious understand that marriage is not sinful or ugly but a good? that they renounce this good for a higher good, the attainment and perfection of the love of God? Are our postulants, novices, and junior professed properly and sufficiently instructed in chastity? V. Obedience and Government My subjects must obey me as manifesting to them the will of God. Is my government so elevated and enlightened as to reflect infinite sanctity, truth, knowledge, and widsom? Do I lead and govern or follow my community? Do I govern according to the lowest level of my community? Renovation is a quickening of the religious life. Have I, the superior, given up all effort to accomplish any-thing? "What's the use?" If I fail, will the community succeed? When I no longer have the vision, energy: or courage to try anything new, it is time to inform higher authorities that I should no longer be a superior. Am I more interested in housekeeping than in the intellectual life or sanctity of my subjects? Are the permissions we prescribe intelligent, reasonable, productive of solid religious virtue? What, how many, and how great are the purely secular norms of conduct that have taken root in my community? Do the ordinances of the general chapter, the exhortations, circular letters, regulations, and general corrections of superiors produce any effect? Do I enforce them? Do I realize that there is a hierarchy of values or does every-thing in the religious life have the same value for me? Could I give an average Catholic layman a readily intelli-gible reason for all our customs, practices, and observances? Are our written and unwritten customs, observances, and practices too numerous? too detailed? too minute? too insistent on everything being done in common? oppressive? Are we retaining customs, observances, and practices that are peculiar? antiquated? formalistic? externalistic? not productive of religious virtues? Is our horarium intelligently adapted to the demands of prayer? work? sufficient preparation for class and study? proper rest? When did we last change the horarium? Do we chart out every moment of the day for our subjects? 339 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious Do I trust only the dlassroom, the chapel, the stove, and the broom? mistrust the r~ligious who is seen with a :book? Are our local superiors mere permissiori distributors? house-keepers? financiers? "public relations experts? principals or deans? Is obedience explained, demanded, ahd practiced-in~ such a way as to hinder or exclude the perfection of other virtues? Do I realize that the independence, autonomy, or rather autocracy of the individual existing in the youth of today demand a more protracted,~ patient, doctrinal, theological~, and: theocentric p~esentation and exercise'in obedience? Are too many of our religious so immature and undependable that the superior has 'to' go around the school, hospital, or institu-tion picking up their forgotten and careless work? In praising the docile, the conformist,"the conventionalist, am I glorifying the mediocre? .' o. Don't I pay an exorbitant price for my efforts to pacify the malcontents and worldly? Am I too fearful or slothful to correct my subjects? Do correct when it is necessary? patiently?, kindly? calmly? with due firmness when it is demanded? Do I correct too often? on minor details only? too frequently in public? too quickly? too impatiently or harshly? . VI. Prayer What proportion of our religious, especially in institutes of men, fail to make the daffy religious e~ercises? What have I done about it? Does our prescribed regime of prayer tend to produce a pious and devout but not a saintly religious? ~ Are we always praying and yetare not prayerful? is bur ~rescribed prayer sufficiently liturgical? Do we under-stand ~hat the liturg:~ does not exclude but presupposes, ~omple-inehts, and is complemented by individual' practices, for ex~imple, the individual ideals of sanctity Of life, correspondence to grace, and: the" individual and private types of prayer and religious exercises, such as meditation, examen, spiritual reading, retreats, and so forth? Have we so many prescribed exercises that there is no oppor-tuni[ y for 'indivi~lual prayer? Do we esteem mental prayer as the most necessary and valu-able prayer for sanctity of life? 340 November, 1959 RENOVATION AND ADAPTATION Is mental prayer in our institute a mere formality? Is our mental prayer a mere abstract study of virtue and ¯ examination of conscience, not a turning to,. a living 'in-and with God? Do I believe that a retreat'or any other special~religious exer-cises are a rest or recreation for my subjects? Are our retreats so encumbered 'with other religious exercises and .perhaps with work that the retreat ceases to be a period of deep recollection and reflection? , Are we suffocated by devotional practices? novenas? non-liturgical vocal prayers? Have we any periods of prayer 'so. long as to be unbearably burdensome? so long that we cannot reasonably hope for anything but a low fractional part of real prayer? .- Are our prescribed' prayers so numerous that. fervent and faithful religious find constant difficulty.in.,compldting them? Has the history of the prayer of our institute been ohe of pure addition? never of reflection as to whether the quality and quantity of our prayer were suitable or the, most suitable" for attaining the purpose of the religious life? VII. Formation Do I assign our best religious to the formation of our own subjects? What proportion 'of our-religious. 'are interested in or have ever done anything about fostering, vocations? Does our formation, discipline, community life, and govern-ment produce a type of religious who will not. attract vocations? Do we refuse in fact to admit that an unsuithble candidate lacks a vocation? Are we 'nursing along unsuitable postulants, novices, and junior professed? Do I realize that a middle-aged problem religious is nearly always a fully grown youthful problem religious? Am I nullifying the purpose of the postulancy and the second year of noviceship by devoting the postulants and second-year novices to the works of the institute? How does this harmonize with the warning of Pius XII to bishops that they should not rush inexperienced priests into the life of full activity? Are the postulants and novices give~ sufficient instruction in the religious life? Is it solidly doctrinal? Are they mere passive listeners? ~ 341 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious Do I fear to give free time to postulants? novices? professed? How much individual and competent guidance and counseling do we have of postulants, novices, junior professed, and the younger professed of perpetual vows? Do I praise the juniorate but hold that it is for others, not for us? Do I say that it is now impossible for us? What arguments have I to show that it will be more possible in the future? Can I reasonably hold that a religious is properly prepared for his work at first profession? Am I fair to the religious in assign-ing him or her to work at such time? Am I fair to his students? What means have I taken to help young religious in their adjustment to the full active life? What have we done about a somewhat longer period of recollection before perpetual profession and a period of renovation? Have young religious ever been properly formed when their elders were left completely uncorrected? Does our formation produce a religious worker who can think for himself? possesses the power of self-initiative? self-decision? efficiency? dependability? responsibility? prudence? courage? perseverance? Do we check the postulant, novice, young or old religious who does his work childishly, inefficiently, carelessly? Are we training docile automatons or subjects equipped to face the inevitable doubts, difficulties, disillusionments, tempta-tions, demands of work, and personality clashes of life? Do we realize that a formation, in so far as it is insincere, unreal, antiquated, formalistic, legalistic, externalistic, leads the factual youth of today to cynicism? Do we form the impolite candidate of today into the polite, selfless, cultured religious? Do we guide our young subjects collectively ~nd individually to a personal esteem, conviction, acceptance, desire, and resolve of holiness of life? Do we yield to the youthful religious of today who in their studies so frequently give their attention and effort only to the interesting, the novel, the striking, .and habitually neglect those that are essential? The youth of today are not to be considered as glowingly virtuous nor as irreparably defective. As is true of any age, they have their characteristic virtues and defects; and their most conspicuous defects are merely the fuller development of those found in the generations immediately before them. 342 November, 1959 RENOVATION AND ADAPTATION Does our education, formation, community life, practices, and government make our subjects at least appear as antiquated and out of touch with the world they are striving to save? Does it make them appear as aloof and. superior or one with the poor, the afflicted, the unfortunate, the sinner? Have we any permanent plan or arrangement for assigning capable religious to higher studies? Do we properly prepare the religious who are sent to the foreign missions? VIII. Work Do we consider work as a distraction or obstacle to personal sanctification and not as another aspect of the same purpose? Is our formation producing intellectual, cultured, .spiritual subjects? .Are our schools turning out intellectual, cul. tured, and profoundly Catholic laymen and laywomen? What is the level of our schools and institutions compared to those of seculars? Have all our new ideas in education, hospital, and institutional work come from secular sources? What new ideas has our institute, have I, contributed? "Am I ashamed of the qualifications of our school and in-stitutional personnel in comparison with that of secular schools and institutions? Is the cultural level of our subjects equal to that of laymen engaged in the same work? Have I reflected that the publicized lack of sufficient Catholic scholarship may not be due entirely to institutions of higher learn-ing but partially or principally to our elementary and secondary schools? What proportion of students overcome a defective ele-mentary education? Wh~t proportion of our subjects are mere teachers or nurses, not religious teachers and nurses? What proportion of our subjects can be classed as spiritual religious, as proficient and dependable workmen? Are our religious so overburdened with work as to exclude a life of prayer? Overwork is to be eliminated, but isn't it true that very many of the individual religious who are overworked are spiritual? Isn't the lack of spirituality to be found also and principally in other causes? 343 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious What prop~ortion of our religious adhere in fact to the heresy of activity, that is, to work to the exclusion of the ordinary means of self-sanctification? What proportion of our religious do. a minimum of work? Which is more harmful, the heresy of activity or the apostasy of idleness? Are many of our religious enfeebled and reduced to a childish life by an excessive use of television and the radio? Why do so many religious become intellectually inactive after completing their' studies? Do I suspect the intellectuals of my institute? Am I confusing ignorance, incompeten.ce, childishness, and lack of culture with simplicity and sanctity? What proportion of our subjects have the habit of reading? of striving constantly to advance in the knowledge'and practic~ of their matter and assignment? Ignorance and lack of progress in any field of endeavor are not virtues. Few classes of men can do such harm as the sincerely ignorant. An unsatisfactory apostolate is not always caused by incom-petence or sloth. Its cause can be and often is lack of spirituality in the apostle. Do we face the needs, problems, and evils of our day in the choice of works? the proportional emphasis on particular works? the education and formation of subjects? Or are we training re-ligious to meet and solve only the problems of past centuries? Have we at=least a satisfactory library in every religious house? Am I ashamed of the libraries or lack of them in any or all of our religious houses? In the assignment of religious, do I give sufficient thought to the full utilization of their individual abilities~ What have we done to lessen the habitual tension of so many religious? Have we changed an unsuitable horarium? diminished overwork? given a weekly holiday? an annual vaca-tion? removed or lessened added burdens from week-ends and such vacation seasons as Christmas and Easter? given private rooms? allowed the religious to study and do their other work in their rooms? lessened monotony? diminished routine? given sufficient rest and recreation? abandoned the insistence on every-thing being done in common? Is there sufficient sleep? a Sensible rising hour? proper food? 344 November, 1959 RENOVATION AND ADAPTATION Would a competent male dietitian give a favorable j~udgment on the diets in all institutes of religious women? Is our norm in undertaking new works the greater nec.ess.ity of the faithful? Is the horizon of. our zeal parochial or universal? Are we undertaking added.works at the expense of the.proper formation of our subjects? Do I. courageously and steadfastly refuse works, even if good in themselves, that would,deprive the religious of sufficient rest and.vacations? .~ : . .Has our institute a foreign mission? IX. The Religious Habit Wliat have we done to simplify the habit to one that continues to express the' consecration to Christ and retains its modesty but is simple, unaffected, inexpensive, hygienic, efficient, suited to the customs and ways of one's own country and nation, adaptable to the changing seasons, easily laundered, that does not imprison the face and head, eliminates starched parts, is of suitable color, not eccentric, not ostentatious? Can w~ reasonably hold that the simplification of the habit is a question that of its very nature is confined to institutes of women? 345 St. Lawrence of Brindisi Ro F. Smith, S. J. BY THE APOSTOLIC letter Celsitudo ex humilitate (Greatness from Humility) of March 19, 1959, Pope John XXIII by virtue of his apostolic power proclaimed St. Lawrence of Brindisi (1559-1619) a doctor of the universal Church. By that act St. Lawrence became the thirtieth saint to be honored with that title, the third Franciscan doctor, and the first of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin. He also brought to five the number of doctors of the Church who flourished in the latter half of the six-teenth and the early part of the seventeenth centuries, the other four being St. John of the Cross (1542-1591), St. Peter Canisius (1521-1597), St. Robert Bellarmine (1542-1621), and St. Francis of Sales (1567-1622). Childhood, Vocation, Priesthood The future doctor of the Church was born on July 22, 1559, at Brindisi, a town located on the Adriatic coast of the heel of Italy, reputedly founded by the'Greek hero Diomedes on his return from the Trojan war, the southern terminus of the Appian Way, and deathplace of the poet Virgil. The boy's father was William Rossi and his mother Elizabeth Masella Rossi; at baptism the infant was given the name Julius Caesar in honor of Sts. Julianus and Caesarius of Terracina, martyred, according to early martyrologies, in the persecution of Nero. Providence, which was to make the boy one of the most illustrious of the sons of St. Francis, saw to it that he was early brought under Franciscan influence; for at the age of four his education was entrusted to the Conventuals living at Brindisi. In 1573 after the death of his father he ov~ercame his mother's dislike for his desire to be a priest and went to Venice to begin his seminary work in a school whose rector at the time was his uncle, Don Peter Rossi. It was in Venice that the saint first came to have an intimate knowledge and love of the Capuchins; and on February 18, 1575, he received the Capuchin habit at the Verona novitiate of the Venice province, being given the name Lawrence of Brindisi. In 1576 he made his profession in the order and was thereupon sent to the University of Padua to make his studies 346 ~T. LAWRENCE OF BRINDISI in philosophy and theology. The university at that time was the focal point of an atheistic form of Aristotelianism; by reaction the young Capuchin acquired a lifelong distrust of Aristotelianism and was drawn instead to a Platonic way of thinking. The intellectual ability of Lawrence, which had already been noted and fostered by the Conventuals in Brind~si, now had full opportunity to develop itself in the university setting at Padua. His course of studies was brilliantly done; and realizing the in-creased importance of Scripture because of the Protestant defection from the Church, he especially set himself to learn all the languages needed for a mastery of Biblical studies; at the same time the international composition of the student body of the university enabled him to attain a mastery of most of the vernaculars of the European continent. There is in fact good reason for thinking that St. Lawrence was the greatest linguist among the doctors of the Church, for besides mastering Hebrew, Greek, Syriac, and Chaldaic for his Scripture studies, he also had command of Latin, German, Bohemian, French, and Spanish besides his native Italian in several dialects. In 1581 Friar Lawrence was ordained a deacon; such was his ability as preacher of the word of God that he was given the unusual permission to preach publicly; it was the beginning of what was to be the principal.apostolate of his life. He was ordained priest in 1582 and thereupon was commissioned to travel through-out Italy to reinvigorate Christian living;-through his unusual combination of holiness and intelligence, he was able to touch the hearts and minds of his hearers in a way that is remarkable in the history of popular preaching. Doctrinal Synthesis To the end of his life almost forty years later the saint con-tinued his apostolate of preaching. Of his collected works (S. Laurentius a Brundisio, O.F.M.Cap., Opera omnia. 10 volumes in 15 tomes. [Padua: Seminario Vescovile di Padova, 1928-1956]), no fewer than eight volumes are given to his collected sermons. Since the sermons of St. Lawrence are the best source from which a knowledge of his doctrinal synthesis can be made, it will be worthwhile to interrupt the course of the saint's life to give a brief sketch of his doctrine as described in A. Michel's. "Saint Laurent de Brindes docteur de l'Eglise" (L'ami bIu clergY, 69 [1959], 401-06.). 347 R. F. SMITH Review for Religious ¯ " St. Lawrence~ did not conceive of a philosophy with its own method and its own proper aim; for him all speculative thinking is subsumed under theology, of which he distinguishes two types. The first type he dalls mystical theology and.conceives of it as a negative, intellectual proces.s the aim of which is to show what God, Chri.st, the Church, the Blessed Virgin and other supernatural realities are not; this. type of theology must b~ rooted in prayer and it~ s.e.ek~ .to discov.e,r the. spiritua.1 .se.n~.e of the Bible. The second kind of theology is called b~ the saint symbblic theology; it studies the literal sense of.Scripture a~.d a~emP.ts to seek out the secrets of the ph.ysical.u.niverse. ~ Man, according'to St. Lawrence, is composed of sense, reason, and spirit (mens). Spirit receives from God an infused idea of the infinite, while reason, "using sensible creatures, is capable of arriv-ing ;at a .knowledge of .God who is pure being viewed under the 6spect ,of the good. This God of goodness has created the world out:of pure love. To all creatures God gives a general assistanc~ which permits each being to act according to its nature. From this it will be seen that St. Lawrence entered hardly at all into the Bafiez-Molina. controversy which was at. !ts height from the years 1590 to~1604. St. Lawrence's views on the state of the first man' and woman are not-without interest. The state ~oforiginal justice in which they w~re" created was constituted: by a 'gift distinct from sanc-tifying grace;, this gift of original justice is characterized by the saint as'a perfect tranquillity and friendship of. sense and reason. In accordar~ce With this view, St. Lawrence conceives of original sin as the loss of this gift of original justice; which loss necessarily entailed a further loss of sanctifying grace. After sin man is justi-fied by the rectitude of t~e soul when elevated by grace to the supernatu.ral, orde.r. God is the p~incipal efficient, cause of this justification; the Holy Spirit and His gift.s are the intrinsic formal cause; Christ, as exemplary cause, is the extrinsic formal cause of Justifica~!on; while the. humanity of, Christ and the sacraments are the instru.mental cause of justific.a~ion. Christ is presentetl in the theology of St. Lawrence as. the. king of angels and. of men. The salvation 6f the angels revolved around Christ, for. they were assured of eternal life only if they consented to adore Christ. Christ is the cause of all sanctification not only in the sense that He is its exemplary cause but alsd be-cause all graces given to angels and to men are given through the 348 November, 1959 ST. LAWRENCE OF BRINDISI instrumental causality of the humanity of Christ. After Christ the Blessed Virgin occupies the first place among all creatures. She is decisive even in the ca~e of the angels for at the time when the Incarnate Word was presented to themfor their adoration, Mary was also presented for their veneration. Because of her divine maternity the Blessed Virgin was conceived immaculately and given an initial fullness of grace that surpassed the final beauty of all the saints taken together. The motherhood of the. Blessed Virgin extends to all men, for all graces come to men through the prayers she addresses to God. The graces of Mary reach their final glory by the crowning gift of the Assumption whereby she now lives, body and soul, in heaven. Mission to the Jews . The success of St. Lawrence's first Commission .to preach throughout Italy came to the notice of Pope Gregory XIII; in 1584 he appointed the saint to .be apostolic preacher to the Jews of Rome and of Italy. Such was his zeal, his l~nowledge of the. Old Testament, and his manifest affection for the Jews that he was able, as he himself reported, to convert many-of theme All his life he retained h~s interest and zeal for the Jewish I~eople and whenever it was possible would seize the opportunityto preach Christ t~ the descendants of the people who had once rejected Him. This interest of St. Lawrence in the Jewish people is mani-fested in his collected works; for his Explanat!on of Genesis (Ex-planatio in Genesirn), which is the only exclusively exegetical work of his still extant, was conceived and written with the Jews in mind. The commentary extends only through the. first eleven chapters of Genesis. The purpose of the commentary was to achieve a scientific understanding of ~the literal sense .of the book; to achieve this the saint not only utilized the opinions of Christian exegetes, but also made wide use of Jewish commentators on the book. This .use of Jewish commentators makes the work unique in the writings Of the do.ctors~ of the Church. As one writer has put it: ". there is no Doctor, of the Church who. has given such prominence to Hebrew scholars as Lawrence has done. The opus will ever have a special value for the conversion of the Jewish people. For this it was intended; and who knows but that, in God's Providence, the book's mission will find its fulfillment in ways that we cannot foresee.'" ~Cuthbert Gumbinger,-O.F.M.Cap., "St. Lawrence of Brindisi, Exegete," Catholic Biblical Quarter:ly, 8 (1946), 268. 349 R. F. SMITH Review for Religious Counter-Reformation In 1590 St. Lawrence was elected provincial of th~ Tuscany province;., in 1592 he was reappointed .to a t~5-year term as apos- ¯ tolic preacher to the Jews. At the conclusion of this term he assumed the provinciala~e of the Venice province; in 1596 he was elected .Definitor General of the entire order, and in 1598 he became provinc~al~9f Switzerland. Up to this point the zeal and labors of St. Lawrence had been limited almost ~ entirely to the regions of Italy; now, however, hi~ sanctity and his learning were to be given a chance to radiate out into the other countries of the continent. In 1599 St. Lawrence was sent ~o Prague to establish the Capuchins as a source of help for the :Counte.r.:Reformation in Austria and Bohemia. Despite violent opposition., from the Protestants and notwithstanding the . initial indiffe~e6ce, if not the hostility, of the Emperor Rudolph II, St. Lawrence. was able to effect a permanent establishment of the ¯ friars and l~d his fellow religious in a spirited apostoiate to win back Proteit~ants and to '.save lukewarm Catholics from defection. That the Capuchin apostolate was¯ successful can be seen from the words of the papal nuncio: "Thanks be to God, the number of Catholics is increasing . I~ is esphcially the Capuchins who reap a rich harvest.'''~ As a result of, his contact with Protesta~nts the saint com-posed a three-tome work, called An Outline of Lutheranism (Lu-theranismi hypotyposii). The work ~was a long expo6ition and refutation of.Lutheranism together with an apology for the Catholic Church as the only true Church of Christ. This work; together with some of the.saint's sermons; gives some idea of his theology of the Church. According to St. Lawrence, the salvific action¯ of Christ with regard to the human race has a!ways-been¯ exercised through the Church; its.history then goes back to the very origins of humanity, and all persons who have been saved must.be .re~arded as 'constituting the fullness of Christ. The materiali cause of the Church is the entirety of the faithful; its l~nal cause is the glorification "of the ~elect; its efficient cause is Christ, His apostles,- and their successors; and its formal cause is the faith as taught'by the Church~s legitimate rulers. ¯ -~Cited in Ludwig von Pastor, The History of the Popes, 23 (St. Louis: Herder, 1933), 384-85. 350 November, 1959 ST. LAWRENCE OF ]~RINDISI Without neglecting the other marks of the Church, St. Lawrence finds holiness or sanctity to be the principal characteris-tic mark of the Church, for it was primary in Christ's plan that I-Iis people be a holy nation. This mark of sanctity is manifested in the Church throughout her entire history by the multiplicity of her saints. This does not mean, St. Lawrence admits, that every Catholic is holy; but just as we call man a rational animal even though not.every part of him is rational, so also we call the Church holy, not because every member of the Church is actually holy and saintly, but because only in the Church do we find that exalted purity of heart and exercise of virtues which Christ desired for his religious society. Chaplain, Superior, Diplomat St. Lawrence had already had contact with two of the great bodies alienated from the Church--Jews and Protestants; now, and in a much different way, he would meet the third great body that was inimical to the Church--the Turks. Because of the con-tinued military strength of the Turks, Pope Clement VIII had formed a league of Christian princes against them; and St. Law-rence was made chief chaplain of the army the emperor contributed to the league. In 1601 the Christian and Turkish forces met at Szekesfehervar, a town thirty-five miles southwest of Budapest and the place where the kings of Hungary had been crowned from 1027 to 1527. The Christian forces were outnumbered four to one; the generals of the league judged retreat the only feasible maneuver. Lawrence, however, opposed their decision and finally convinced them to attack the Turkish forces. He himself exhorted the soldiers to bravery and went into battle at their head, carrying his crucifix as his only source of protection. For five days the battle continued with the saint always in the lead of the Christian forces; at the end of the five days the Turkish forces had "been routed. A few months after this incident St. Lawrence was elected the head of his order with the title of Vicar-.General. As Vicar- General, St. Lawrence was obliged to visit all the houses of his order from Italy to Spain. He made his visitations on foot and was notably successful in deepening throughout the order the love of Capuchin poverty and austerity. In 1606 St. Lawrence returned to Germany at the request of Pope Paul V to assist once more in the, Counter-Reformation. 351 R.' F. SMITH In 1609 his mission in Germ~n~ was interrupted when he was sefit by the same Pope to Philip III of Spai~i to gain his support of ~h~ Ciitholic League recently founded by Maiimilian of Bavaria. Af~er successfully completing this commission, the saint returned to Munich as papal nuncio; in 1610 while still remaining nuncio, he was also made chief chaplain of the armed forces of the Catholic Leagu~.In 1613 the saint's health was broken and he returned to Itaiy.There he was Minister-Provincial of the Genoa province until 1616. In 1619 he'jburneyed to Lisbbfi to plead the cause of the people of Naples against their viceroy. While negotiating the matter he fell ill and died the{e on July 22, 1619. This sketch of the latest doctor of the Church may be fittingly concluded with the words Pope Leo xiII wrote about him at the time of his canonization in 1881: .".There were resplendent in .him all.virtues, especially those which bring us close to God, faith, hope, and charity, from which all the other .virtues spring and derive their supernatural value. Hence his diligent and fervent love of prayer during which he ~vas frequently rapt in ecstasy; hence his remarkable devotion to. the Blessed Sacrament and his constant grief over the sufferings and death of our Lord; hence his most tender love of the Mother' of God to whom he credited all that he had received from Christ; and hence also his stalwart love of the Catholic faith, his horror for heresy and error, and his rock-firm fidelity to the See of Peter.".~ It is regrettable that little has been written in English about St. Lawrence. The only lengthy life of the saint is the volume entitled Life o[ St. Lawrence of Brindisi Apostle and Diplomat by Anthony Brennan, O.F.M.Cap. (London: Washbourne, 1911). The saint and his activities figure prominently in the second volume of Father Cuthbert's The Capuchins (London: Sheed and Ward, 1928). The best general introduction in English to the saint is to be found at present in various issues of Round Table of Fran.ciscan Research, a quarterly published by St. Anthony Friary, Mara-thon, Wisconsin. Four issues of the magazine are especially valu-able: v. 14, n. 2 (February, 1949); v. 14, n. 4 (June, 1949); v. 15, n. 2 (/~pril, 1950); and v. 15, n. 4 (October, 1950). These issues have furnished much of the data given in the present article. :~Cited in Armand Dasseville, "Saint Lawrence of Brindisi," in ~Round Table of Franciscan Research, 14 (1948-1949), 59. 352 Current Spiritual Writing Thomas G. OTallaghan, $. J. Edification p, RIESTS AND RELIGIOUS are frequently exhorted by. their superiors, rules, and retreat directors, to the practice of edification. They might well:ask themselves, however,, wheth.er they are fully aware of the real m~aning, the ]biblical .m.eaning~ of this word edify, in a rece6t,, scholhrly,, and most interesting article, ' "Building the House Of the Lord,''1 George MacRae, S.J., examines the use of this word in the New Testament, especially in St. Paul, in order to discover what is its proper meaning. To edify in its original literal sense meant to build. But when it was used as a religio~s metaphor in the New Testament, what precisely did it fi~ean; what was being built, who was the builder, and how did he build? In the Gospels Christ uses the metaphor twice: once when He promises to build His Church, that is,'not a structure of stone 'and mortar, but the assembly of God's people, upo.n the rock foundation of Peter; the other occasion was when He spoke of building up in three days the Temple of Jerusalem, which He used as a metaphor for His own resurrected body. Analyzing these metaphors, es-pecially in the light of their Old Testament background, MacRae shows that in Christ's use of the term: the builder is God or the Son of God; what is being built is the Church, the permanent assembly of God's people, the spiritual temple; and the purpose is "to perpetuate God's presence among His people and to provide a vehicle for continuing the salvation accomplished by the death and Resurrection of the Son of God." St. Paul also uses the word edify in a metaphorical sense, but with some variati?ns. In his letter to the Ephesians, speaking of the Church as a spiritual temple, Paul tells his readers that they are "members of God's household, built up on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the keystone. In Him the whole building is joined together and grows into a temple sacred in the Lord; in Him you are also built to-gether into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit" (2:19-22). 1American Ecclesiastical Review, 140 (1959), 361-76. 353 THOMAS G. 0'CALLAGHAN Review for Religious Through a careful analysis of this text, MacRae shows that the primary object of edification is the Church itself, to be edified or built in the first place by our Lord. But the task of edification is by no means confined to Christ alone. St. Paul more than once echoes the prophet Jeremiah in describing his own apostolic role as one of building up the faithful. He also at times makes it quite clear that edification is the work of every Christian: "Let us pursue the things that make for peace and mutual edification" (Rom 14:19); "Go on encouraging one another and edifying one another as you are doing" (1 Thess 5:11). Christ Himself, the apostles and their successors, all the faithful --these are the builders of the Church, the edifiers. In what does their edification consist? In regard to Christ, His "historical contribution to the building of the Church was His life's work of teaching, healing, sanctifying, redeeming man-kind by His death and Resurrection." This work He continues through grace which, says St. Paul, "has the power to edify" (Acts 20:32). As to the apostles, they must first "lay the founda-tion" (1 Cor 3:10) by preaching Christ and then "build up the Body of Christ" by their entire ministry (Eph 4:12). Finally, for all the faithful, Paul mentions several explicit means of edification: good example, love, personal integrity in dealing with others. In a word, all the good works that we perform as members of the Church are works of edification. There is one final problem to be considered in order to r.ecapture St. Paul's understanding of edification. If we examine all the pass-ages that mention edification, we find that at certain times the object of it is the Church as a whole, at others the individual member. Paul exhorts his readers to edify the Body of Christ and to edify one another. It can happen that too often we forget the collective aspect of edification and concentrate on the in-dividual. In fact, historically that has happened; and in the process there has been a distortion of St. Paul's original metaphor. A close study of the Epistles shows that he overwhelmingly stressed the collective aspect of edification. "Strive to be outstanding," he exhorts, "in.the edification of the Church" (1 Cor 14:42). The edification o~ individuals within the Church is only meaning-ful in relation to the Church as a whole. We should, therefore, try to rid our understanding of edification of any selfish or merely personal emphasis. "None of us lives for himself," the Apostle 354 November, 1959 CURRENT SPIRITUAL WRITING reminds us. "For if we live, we live for the Lord . We are the Lord's" (Rom 14:7-8). Edification is every Christian's partici-pation in the redemptive work of the Church, the Body of Christ and the Temple of His presence among us. Prayer For St. Teresa of Jesus mental prayer is an exercise of love, of personal love of God. It is an intimate, affective conversation with a loving God. Of the two major faculties which play a part in prayer, the intellect and will, it is the. will which is the more important. For, as the late Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D., the eminent commentator on Teresian prayer, pointed out more than once, it is from the will that love and the other basic affections flow; since it is these which are most effective and fruitful in uniting the soul with God, the will must hold the first place in prayer. That is not to deny to the intellect its own importance, but it is still secondary to the will. -In fact, the primary purpose of intellectual work in prayer is to prepare for the affections of the will. But, before the will can love God and pour out affections to Him, God must be present to the soul in some way. Thus, Teresa also stresses the importance of faith in the divine presence. For St. Teresa, then, to be with God and to speak intimately with Him, this is the substance of mental prayer. In the Way of Perfection, when commenting on the Our Father, the saint of Avila laid great stress on one way in particular of being with God. She tried to teach and impress on her nuns, many of whom were not learned in things theological, the extraordinary importance of the inhabitation of God in the soul. This doctrine of the presence of the triune God in the soul she made the basis of what she calls the Prayer of Recollection. Since God dwells in the soul, St. Teresa taught her nuns' to seek Him there, and there to speak intimately with Him as with a "Father, a Brother, a Lord and a Spouse -- and, sometimes in one way and sometimes in another . Remember how important it is for you to under-stand this truth--that the Lord is within us and that we should be there with Him.''~ This prayer Teresa calls the Prayer of Recollection because the soul collects together all the faculties, withdraws the senses from all outward things, and enters within itself to be with its 2The Complete Works of Saint Teresa of Jesus (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1946), 2, 115. 355 THOMAS G. O'CALLAGHAN Review for Religious Divine Guest. Thus, there is a detachment from. exterior things in order to center itself on God dwelling within the soul. This recollection; .Teresa of Avila warned her religious, is not an easy thing to acquire, especially at the beginning.It.demands ener-getic effort and mortification, and the soul should expect this. But if one continues faithfully to make the necessary effort--not only during prayer but. also at other times during the day--then the soul will gain .mastery over itself and will be able, without any great, fatiguing effort, to center itself on God within. ' Onde the soul has found God, it doesnot seem that the Prayer of.Recollection demands, any partidular way of praying. St. Teresa even susgests vocal prayer, that one recite very slowly the Our Fathei~. "Accustom yourselves, to saying the Paternoster'in :this recollected way, and before long you will see how you gain' by doing so. It is a method of prayer which establishes habits that prevent the soUl. from going astray and the faculties from becom-ing restless . I only beg~you to test it." ". But whether a person prays vocally or mentally, the general tendency of the Pray,er ,of. Recollection is .that it easily becomes simplified. That is why:some authors, i~ seems,, classify it as a PraYer of simple' regard or of active contemplation. Since it is not too often that one finds in American periodicals an e.xplanation oof St. Teresa's l~rayer of Recpllection,. some may be int.~rested in reading "The Prayer of Remembering" by Father I-linnebi~sch, O.P.3 Eyen better--wi~h all due respect to the learned author--those who are interested might prefer to read the Way Per[ection, especi.ally Chapters 28 and 29, and study there, the doctrine in the saint's own words. Abnegation Despite frequent substitution for one another, the words abnegation, renouncement, and mortification, although they have something in common, are strictly nbt synonyms, nor are they "used.-in Sacred Scripture as such. In order to determine their precise meaning, the very learned and scholarly Father Hausherr, $.J., examines each of th.ese.words in their evangelical context.4 Since his obser~atibns are most interesting, it might 'be useful 3Cro~ss and Crown, 11 (1959), 174-79. 4"Abnegation, Renouncement, Mortification," Christus, 6 (1959), 182-95. . . 356 November, 1959 CURRENT SPIRITUAL WR.ITING to mention¯ a¯ few of° them. But, because a summary of his explana-tion of mortification might easily distort his teaching, we will limit ourself to a few of his observations on" abnegation and re: nouncement. ~n abnegation there 'is hegation; and to deny (negate) is an intellectual operation. But when the Gospel, speaking of abnega1' "tion as some" sort of duty, uses the word abnegate (a'bnegare), it always has, but for one exception, the same direct object: to deny oneself (Mt~ 16:24; Mk 8:34; Lk 9i23). The abnegation which Christ, who is Truth, demands of us is that wedeny of ou~selves that which is not true. That seems to b~little, but it is ieally something enormous. For the great truth about ourselves is that we are creatures of God; .ne.gatively, that. we are not God. Thi~ fundamental negation cohstitutes the whole essence of .~bnegation, just as the essence of ~doration is the fundamental affirmation that God is God. Th~s~ two truths are reallyo~ly ~ne; there is no abnegation without adoration of God, and no adoration of God without abne-gation of oneself. Thus, abnegation taken in this proper sense will last forever. Perhaps the best° formula of ~he basic abnegation of oneself is that of the Baptist: "And he acknowledged and did not deny; and he acknowledged, 'I am not the Christ' " (Jn-1:20). ¯ " AbnegatiOn then, beipg primarily ~an intellectual" a.ct, an a~kfiowledgment of'truth, does ndt indicate any pain or suffering. On the ~ont~ary, itseems quite clear that there isno reai" happiness except in the truth; and in ~ohfirmati(>n of this, one may point to the joy which accompanies devout adoration. But abnegation, precisely because it is an intellectual act,. does entail some inescapable .consequences. Just as to know God in the biblical sense means to acknowledge and to' treat Him as God, so to deny myself means to ackpowledge that I am a.creature and to behave as such. Abneg6tionzadoration lived out in daily living becomes renouncement and mortification. The Greek word which we translate as .renounce means to set apart, to dismiss (Christ dismissed the crowd.before going ~nto the hills to pray), to take leave of (Paul took leave of the brethren and sailed for Syria). .- ~ .: The commandment of renouncement is contained in the~single text: "Every one of you who does not renounce all that h~possesses, 357 THOMAS G. 0'CALLAGHAN Review for Religious cannot be my disciple" (Lk 14:33). This commandment is addressed to all and pertains to all goods of whatever nature. While abnega-tion means that God is God and that we are not God, 'and consists in neither considering nor treating ourselves as God, renouncement emphasizes that God is God and nothing else is God, and consists in neither considering nor treating any created pers.on or thing as God. This then is an affair of the heart, a disposition of interior. detachment, of spiritual poverty. Nothing may be loved with the sovereign love due to God alone. Renouncement is thus the logical consequence of that basic truth: God is God, and neither I nor any created thing is God. ~ Complacency and Concern During the year there appeared in Theological Studies a very long and scholarly article entitled "Complacency and Concern in the Thought of St. Thomas.''5 It was written for experts in the field. But in another article under a similar title the author sum-marized in a simple and clear way a few of the more practical aspects of the matter.6 It might be of some interest to mention here a few of the points which he made. Human activity may be divided into the two compartments of necessity and possibility. Man reacts to these two in different ways. When one is faced with the possibility of accomplishing something of value, he rises to effort and action; but faced with necessity, he must submit. In order to live, then, with wisdom and get the most out of life, one must see clearly what are necessities and inevitable limitations, and be willing to submit to them; but one must also see what are possibilities, and then react with effort and concern. Thus, there are two attitudes towaid life, each complementing and moderating the other. On the one hand there is the rest and simple complacency which comes from acquiescing willingly to the necessities of life, to what must be. On the other hand there is the solicitude and concern of trying to attain certain attractive possible goals, of contending for what is not yet, but can be. To necessity there should correspond in our life the disposition of "complacency in the good that is"; and to possibility there should correspond "concern for the good that may be." ~Frederick E. Crowe, S.J., 20 (1959), 1-39, 198-230, 343-95. 6"Complacency and Concern," Cross and Crown, 11 (1959), 180-90. November, 1959 CURRENT SPIRITUAL WRITING There seems to be something of this division in Scripture. In reading the Written Word of God we meet at times what seem to be contradictory recommendations. If we examine them, perhaps we will find that these scriptural recommendations can be ordered around the two attitudes of complacency and concern, and that the situations to which they are to be applied correspond to what Father Crowe calls necessity and possibility. For example, we are told to strain forward to what is before, to press on to the goal, to fight the good fight. We must watch and pray, be vigilant; we have to serve God with a whole heart and with all our strength. All this suggests effort, drive, concern for goals which can be attained. Yet we are also told not to be anxious for life, to be willing to accept the order of divine Providence. For if, like the humble Christ, we accept the things which we cannot change, then we will find rest for our souls. This suggests complacency in the face of necessity. Although he does not mention the point, it seems that the distinction which the author makes between possibility and ne_ces-sity is very close to the distinction which many modern spiritual writers make between the signified will of God and the will of good pleasure. At least in practice it appears that they would work out to be just about the same thing. Also, what he calls concern and complacency is very similar to what spiritual writers mean by active and passive conformity. I-Iere also it seems that in practice they would more or less coincide. Perhaps these simi-larities are worth some consideration: One thing, however, is quite true. One of the reasons why many generous and dedicated religious do not enjoy the peace of soul which should rightly be theirs is that they d5 not dis-tinguish carefully between what Father Crowe defines and ex-plains as necessity and possibility. They become concerned about necessities and unavoidable limitations, about things which should be the object of peaceful complacency. (Of course, there are also those who are too often complacent when they should be concerned; this is basically laz.iness.) These souls who find themselves without interior peace, overconcerned and anxious about things which they cannot chan~e, might do well to read this article. They might find there a source of some help. 359 Survey of Roman DocUme nts R. F. Smith, S. J: THE DOCUMENTSWhich appeared in Acta (A~A pSo)stoiicae Sedis during June and July, 1959, will be surveyed in the' follow.ing article. Throughout the article all page references will be" to the 1959 AAS (v. 51). ¯ John XXIII's First Encyclical On the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, June 29, 1959 (AAS, pp. 497-531), John XXIII issued the first encyclical of his pontificate. Entitled Ad Petri cathedram, the document was divided into four parts, the first of which was concerned, with truth. The root caus.eof, all the evils that infect individuals and nations today, His Holiness began, is ignorance and even contempt of truth. This condition~ .has arisen, he continued, even though God has given man a reason cap'able Of l~now-ing natural truth and despite the. fact that the Word of God, became flesh to show man the plenitude of truth. Because of the latter fact, the Pontiff continued, all men. must a.dopt the do~trine of the gospe.l; and if they reject it,. they jeopardize the foundations of t~uth, probity,' and civilization and deprive themselves of'eternal life. In this connectior~ the Vicar of Christ warned thos~ ahsoci~t~d with the commucation arts of writing, radio, movies, hnd television to avoid deceit and evil especially 'in matteis intended for~ the ~neducated and the young. In concluding the first" part of .the encyclical the Holy Father lamented the indifference to truth that leads to religious in-difference and eventually to the denial of all religion. The men of today, he remarked, work tirelessly for the progress of human knowledge; should they not, he asked, exercise a similar zeal to acquire that knowl-edge which is concerned not with this earthly and mortal life but with the life of heaven which does not pass away? In the second part of the encyclical, John XXIII noted that from the acquisition of truth there must necessarily flow union and concord. God, he ins.isted, has created men to be brothers, not enemies. To them he has given the earth for their support and sustenance. Accordingly the different nations of the edith should be communities of brothers who should work together not only for their own individual purposes but also for the common good of all humanity. If, he added, brotherly union based on justice and nourished by charity does not prevail; then the world situation will continue to be grave. Shofild a war break out, both conquerors and conquered will reap nothing but disaster and universal ruin, so great is the power of modern weapons. Concord and unity must also exist between the social classes within a nation. Such class distinctions, he said, are necessary; but 360 ROMAN DOCUMENTS just as the different parts of the body form. a symmetrical whole, so also the various classes should by their mutual collaboration realize a harmonious equilibrium. The Vicar .of .Christ completed this part of the encyclical by.urging a similar unity and concord in the family, observing that if concord does not exist there it will never be achieved in society at large. The third and principal part of the encyclical was concerned with the unity of the Church. Noting that in recent times those who are separated from the Holy See have grown in sympathy towards the Catholic Church and at the same time have attempted to create a closer unity among themselves, the Pontiff proceeded to show how the unity Christ willed for His Church is to be found in the Catholic Church with her unity of doctrine, government, and worship. Unity of doctrine, he said, is possessed by the Church because she teaches all the truths of divine revelation as they are conserved in Scripture and tradition and-clarified, by the teaching power of .the Church. The Church's unity of government is easy to perceive: the faithful are subject to their priests; the priests to their bishops; the bishops to the Roman Pdntiff, successor of Peter, the foundation rock of the Church. 'A similar unity of worship is to be found in the Church, for she has always had the seven sacraments and has possessed but one sacrifice, that of the Eucharist. Addressing .himsel~ ~lirectly to those who are separated from the Holy S~e., the Pontiff asked them if this spectaclb of the unity of the Catholic Church .does not answer their own desire for unity; and he invited them to return to the Church which they will find is not a strange dwelling but the common house of the heavenly Father: Re-minding them that the troops of the saints which their nations have already sent to heaven urge them to. unity with the Holy See, the Pdntiff concluded, his plea by s.aying to all those who are separated from the chair of Peter: "I am your brother Joseph" (Gen 45:4) who desires nothin~ for you but your salvation and eternal happiness. In the 'fi~i~l part of the encyclical, John XXIII considered the various member's of the Church. He urged the bishops to fortify them-selves in their work to extend the kingdom of God by ~ecalling the words of St. Paul: "I can do all things in Him who strengthens me" (Phil 4:13). To the clergy he recommended respectful ,obedienc~ to the bishops and exhort&t them never to think that they havb done enough to further the reign of Christ. Having encouraged religions men to live the rule of their live~ in obedience to their superiors, he asked them to be especially zealous for prayer, works of penance,. ~ducation of the young, 'and the care of the needy. He assured the missionaries .of the Church that no enterprise is more pleasing to God than their own. He extolled the role of religious women in the Church as the brides of Christ and noted that their work 361 R. F. SMITH Review for Religious is of incalculable profit both for the Church and fort civil society. To members of Catholic Action he promised a special document later in his pontificate, contenting himself for the present with the remark that the zeal of the laity should be as great as the needs of our times. He consoled the afflicted and suffering by reminding them that we have not here a lasting city but seek one for the future; and he asked them to utilize their sufferings to expiate the sins of others and to obtain the return of those who have quitted the Church. He told the poor that the Church is not their enem. y but rather preaches a social doctrine that aims at a just distribution of material wealth. Above all he urged them not to allow false promi~.es of material goods to lead them to embrace doctrines c~ndemned by the Church. After detailing the unfortunate lot of the refugees in the world today and after describing the bitter situation of the persecute~ members of the Church, the Pontiff concluded his encyclical by .exhOrting all not only to pray for the Church's needs but to contribute to the flowering of the Church by a renovation of Christian living. Allocutions and Addresses At the solemn Vespers for Pentecost, May 17, 1959 (AAS," pp. 419-22), the Vicar of Christ delivered an allocution in which he shared with his listeners both joyful and sad news. The joyful announcement was concerned with the formation of a commission to prepare the work of the projected ecumenical council. The sad news was the worsening condition of the Church in China and .Hungary. After d, escribing the conditions now existing in those countries, the Pontiff promised prayer that Christ, who in founding the Church did not wish to exclude per-secution from her, might give the persecuted brethren cpnstancy and firmness and might bring the persecutors light, pardon, a~d conversion. On the same day (AAS, p. 430) the Pontiff also gave a brie~radio address to conclude an all-European broadcast Of the hymn Veni Creator. On June 28, 1959 (AAS, pp. 476-81), at the solemn First Vespers of the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, the Vicar of Christ delivered an o allocution on the liturgy of the feast and its accompanyipg blessing of the pallium. Just as, the Pope said, the brief dialogue between the angel and Mary in the sacred silence of Nazareth summed up the mystery of the Incarnation and of the redemption, so too the dialpgue between Peter and Christ at Caesarea Philippi established the structure of the Catholic Church. Peter then opens the line" of the Roman Pontiffs whose authority extends to the teaching work of the Church as well as to the organization of the Church's work throughout the world. The pallium, he concluded, which is blessed on the present occasion, is a symbol of unity and sign of perfect coinmunion with the Holy See; it is, as well, an indication of fidelity to the teaching of the head of the Church. On July 5, 1959 (AAS, pp. 536-38), John XXIII broadcast a message to those participating in the seventeenth Eucharistic Congress 362 November, 1959 ROMAN DOCUMENTS of France. Telling his listeners that a Eucharistic congress is nothing else than a long, fervent visit to the Blessed Sacrament, he warned them that the traditional practice of visits to the Blessed Sacrament is today neglected and even disparaged by some members of the Church. Accordingly he urged his listeners to retur~ to their homes persuaded of the excellence of this practice and desirous to make it loved by others. On May 17, 1959 (AAS, p. 431), the Pope radioed a message to the people of Portugal congratulating them on the completion of their national shrine to Christ the King. On May 26, 1959 (AAS, pp. 426-27), the Holy Father addressed the Order of Canons Regular of St. Augustine on the occasion of the federation of the four congregations° which compose the order. On the previous day (AAS, pp. 466-68) he had addressed a letter to Bishop Severinus Haller, newly chosen Abbot Primate of the order, 'in com-memoration Of the nine hundredth anniversary of the Lateran Synod which gave decisive shape and form to the order. The Pontiff encour-aged the members of the order to carry out the principal purposes of their institute; and after bidding them to emphasize common life, to reject worldly ways of thinking, and to practice obedience to superiors as to Christ, he urged them to continue that fraternal charity which has always b~en the characteristic of the order. On June 11, 1959 (AAS, pp. 470-73), John XXIII addressed a group of former chaplains of the Italian army. He told them that his own soldiering experience had led him to a deeper understanding of human nature and had also given him a great respect for the priesthood as he saw it exercised by his army chaplains.' Later as a chaplain, he continued, he had come into contact with the wounded and suffering; and their gro,ans brought home to him man's universal desire for peace. Hence, he said, all military chaplains should be men of peace who by their very presence bring serenity to souls. He reminded his listeners that the chaplain should always approach his men as a priest. The men, he emphasized, expect from their chaplains the light of the gospel and of sacrifi~ce; and they wish to see in the chaplain the minister of Christ and tl~e dispenser of the mysteries of God. On June 28, 1959 (AAS, pp. 481-83), the Pope gave a world broad-cast as part of the beginning of World Refugee Year. Exiles, he explained, have always 'been a special object of the Church's solicitude, for she can not forget the words of Christ: "I was a stranger and you took me I ~n; naked and you clothed me . I was in prison and you came to see me" (Mt 25:35-37). Today, he went on, hundreds of thousands of exiles are living in camps and barracks, are humiliated in their dignity as men, and are exposed to sharp temptations of discouragement and despair. The existence of such a state of affairs, he asserted, is an anomaly in a society so proud of its technical and social progress. The Holy Father exhorted all the faithful to cooperate in the Refugee Year and bade pastors to call the attention of their charges to this invitation of 363 R. F. SMITH Providence to exercise Christian charity. He also urged public authori-ties to' intensify their' efforts in behalf of refugees, expressing a wish that-countries open their frsntiers to them: ~ ¯ Five allocutions' given in the June and July issues of AAS were given to heads of state on thei~ official visits to the Holy Father. They were given to the regents of the Republic of San Marino (AAS, pp. 423-24), to the kirig dnd qdeen of Greece (AAS, pp. 424-26), to the president of the Republic of Turkey (AAS, pp. 427-29),' to the prince and princess of Monaco (AAS, pp. 473-74), and to the president of France (AAS, pp. 474-76). Miscellaneous Documents By th~ apostolic letter Celsitudo ex hurnilitate of March 19, 1959 (AAS,. pp. 456-61), Pope John XXIII declared St. Lawrence of Brindisi a doctor of the Church and established his feast day on July 21. By another apostolic letter "Agnes sepulchrum," February .27, 1959 (AAS, pp.,.415-17), the Church of St. Agnes Outside the .Walls was made a stational church (along with the previous station, St. John Before the Latin Gate) for the Saturday after Passion Sunday. On May 17, 1959 (AAS, ,pp. 401-03), the Pontiff's motu proprio Cum inde granted the Pontifical Lateran Athenaeum the status of a univeroity. On June 5, 1959 (AAS, p. 489), the Sacred Penitentiary released the text of a prayer composed by the Holy Father to be recited~by automobile drivers. Drivers who recite the prayer devoutly and with contrite heart may gain an indulgence of three years. . The Sacred Congregation of Rites on January 28, 1959 ~AA~,:pp. 4.8.5-88), approved the introduction of the cause of the Servant of God Mary Ann Sala (1829-1891) of the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Marcellina (Marcellines). On May 8,-1959 .(AAS, pp. 484-85), the Holy .Office issued a warning concerning Giovanni Taddei, priest of the diocese of Biella, who had ,already been suspended and excluded from the wearing of ecclesiastical costume. Since he has subsequently joined a non-.Catholic sect and has received there episcopal consecration, he has merited excommunication and the other penalties of canon 2314, § 1. Moreover he has dared to confer sacred orders on Catholic subjects; such persons, are to be considered as heretics or 'at least as suspect of heresy; moreover their ordinations are not recognized by the .Church and the persons involved are to be treated as laymen in all things including the right to contract marriage. The same Holy Office in a decree of June 4,. 1958 (AAS, p. 432), placed the following books by Henri Dumdry on the Index: Philosophie de la religion, 2 v. (Paris: Presses. Universitaires de France, 1957); Critique.et religion (Paris: Socidtd d'Edition d'Enseignement Supdrieur, 1957); Le probl~rne de Dieu en la philosophie de. la religion (Bruges: Desclde de. Brouwer, 1957); and La foi' n'est pas un cri (Tournai: Caster-man, 1957). 364 Views, News, Previews UNDER THE AUSPICES of the Sacred Congregation of Religio.us there has been issued a volume entitled Directory of the Religious Women of Italy (Annuario delle religiose d'Italia). The volume, which is to be a quinquennial publication, provides a national directory of the various religious orders and congregations of women in Italy. According to the foreword of the directory the Sacred Congregation had four motives in view when sponsoring the publication: 1) The congregation wished to have a clear, systematic, and. complete view of the numerical, geographical, and social situation of the women religious of Italy. 2) It wished to manifest in a concrete way the importance it attaches to the 'use and proper interpretation of statistics on religious life. 3) The congregation wished to offer to all those interested in the problems of modern religious life an objective and complete view which would aid them to give a correct solution to those problems. 4)' Finally it wished to use the compilation of the directory as a pilot study for a future volume on all the states of perfection in the entire Church. The directory is divided into four parts. The first of these gives an alphabetical listing of all the religious institutes for women .to be found in Italy; and for each of them it gives its specific aim, briefly indicates its history, and notes the extent of its existence m countries other, than Italy. The second part follows the previous alphabetical list, this time noting after each institute the location of each Italian house. The third part provides an~ alphabetical list of the dioceses of Italy, noting in each diocese the location of all its houses of religious women. The fourth and final part is devoted to statistical tables on the number and distribution of religious women in Italy. The directory, which costs 4,000 life, may be purchased from the following address: Segreteria del .C.I.S. Piazza S. Callisto, 16, Rome, Italy The foreword of the directory mentioned in the preceding item includes some interesting statistics of the religious women of Italy. The following chart, taken from those statistics, shows the growth in numbers of religious women in Italy: Year Number ofreligious women 1881 28,172 1901 40,251. 1911 . 45,616 1921 71,679 . 1931 112,208 ~951 144,171 1957 152,312 Number of religious women per 10,000 population 9.9 12.4 13.~. .18.9 27.2 30.3 31.3 365 VIEWS, NEWS, PREVIEWS The directory also makes some important remarks on the geographical distribution of religious women in Italy. In 1881 the greater number of religious women was to be found in the central and southern parts of Italy. In 1957, however, 55% of .the religious women are found in northern Italy, 24 % in central Italy, and 21% in southern Italy. The July 15, 1959, issue of Informations catholiques internationales gave a panoramic view of every phase of the Church today; from it are taken the following statistics of interest to priests and religious. At the present time the Church has 381,500 priests, of which 116,000 are religious and 265,500 belong to the diocesan clergy. On this basis there is 1 priest for every 1,261 Catholics in the world. This propor-tion, however, does not indicate the wide variations in the geographical distribution of priests. Such variations are given in the following table which lists for each geographical division the number of Catholics for each priest as well as the total number of inhabitants for each priest: Number of Catholics Total population Region. per priest per priest Africa 1,538 16,555 Asia 1,531 75,827 Central America 5,077 5,257 Europe 925 2,510 North America 652 2,685 Oceania 588 3,763 South America 4,569 5,030 The same source reports that at present there are 283,640 men religious in the world; 58% of these are in Europe; 16% in North America, 14% in Latin America, 6% in Africa, 4.5% in Asia, and 1.5% in Oceania. Religious women of the world number about 930,000; of these 61% are in Europe, 21% in North America, 8% in Latin America, 4% in Asia, 2% in Africa, and 4% in Oceania. The United States and Italy together have one-third of the religious women in the world. September 27, 1960, will mark the three hundredth anniversary of the death of St. Vincent de Paul. The Vincentian Fathers and the Daughters of Charity throughout the world will celebrate this anni-versary of their founder by an entire preparatory Year of Observance. The year began in September, 1959, and will extend through September, 1960. Those interested in more information about the year may con-tact: Tercentenary Observance Committee, The Vincentian Fathers, 500 E. Chelten Avenue, Philadelphia 44, Pennsylvania. 366 ( uestions Answers [The following answers are given by Father Joseph F. Gallen, S. J., professor of canon law at Woodstock College, Woodstock, Maryland.] I believe that the proportion of very elderly members in the general chapters of our congregation of sisters is constantly too great. I admit the validity of the argument of wisdom and ex-perience, but this does not demand that so many capitulars be from the highest age level. Many elderly religious are simply out of touch. They understand neither the youth of today nor today itself. Is there any system of delegates that. apportions the delegates according to various age levels? I agree completely with the reasoning of this questioner. I know of no such system of delegates that has been actually approved by the Holy See, but one pontifical institute is considering a system of the following type for presentation to the Sacred Congregation. 1. In the election of delegates to the general (provincial) chapter, only the sisters of perpetual vows have active and passive voice. These sisters shall elect twenty-four delegates. 2. From a prepared list containing the names of all local superiors then in office, each sister shall vote for six delegates. 3. The mother general (provincial), with the consent of her council, will have divided into three equal groups according to precedence from first profession the sisters of perpetual vows who are neither local superiors nor members of the general (provincial) chapter in virtue of any office. She will also have made clear to the vocals just what sisters are in each group. 4. At the same time as the election of the superior delegates, each sister shall vote for six delegates from each of these three groups. This voting will be done on a ballot marked group 1, group 2, group 3. 5. In each house, on the day determined in the letter of convocation, the sisters shall assemble under the presidency of their local superior. The latter shall collect all the ballots without inspecting them and enclose them with her own ballots in an envelope, which she shall seal in the presence of the electors. She shall write on this inner envelope, "Election of Delegates, House N." and forward it immediately to the mother general (provincial). 6. As soon as possible after all the envelopes have been received, the mother general (provincial), with her council, shall open the envelopes and count the votes. The secretary general (provincial) shall record the votes. The elections are decided by a relative majority. The sub-stitutes are the local superiors and sisters of each group who in order received the next highest number of votes (c. 174; 101, § 1, 1°). 367 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Review for Religious The first article is to be omitted if stated elsewhere in the con-stitut. ions. Perpetual vows for a determined number of years may be demanded for passive voice or also for active voice, for example, of perpetual vows for at least five years. The delegates will be elected for the provincial chapter; if the institute is divided into provinces; other-wise for the general chapter. This system, as is true in general of group systems, will maintain the same number in the general or provincial chapter not~.'thstanding any increase in the number of members of the institute or province. I believe that the numbe~ in a chapter of lay i~stitutes should not be greater than forty. A chapter of fifty or more becomes progressively unwieldy and inefficient. The chapters of many clerical institutes are also too large for efficiency. Ordinarily seven general and provincial officials are members of the general or provincial chapter. There are frequently two or three added .members, for ~example, forme~ superiors general in the general, chapter. The present system would therefore givea chapter of thirty-one to thirty-five members. Some may prefer to elect twenty-eight delegates. The present system would give a proportion of eighteen subjects to thirteen superiors and officials, which seems appropria.te. ~. Local superiors are eligible by the mere fact that they hold this office. It does not seem practical to divide ttiem also accordihgto preceden~ce.The oldest eligible sisters will be in group one, the middle level in group two, and the youngest in group three. If the total numbe~ does not permit a division into three perfectly equal groups, the added members, according to the general norm of precedence, will be in the older group, for example, 51, 50, .50, or 51, 51, 50. A provincial chapter ordinarily elects two delegates to the general chapter, rarely three or four. The same system may be employed for these delegates by dividing the eligible .sisters into two, three, or four groups. Article six'states that the 'substitutes are thos~e who in order re-ceived the next highest number of votes. Therefore,' no matter how many substitutes are required or how many substitutes are also pre-vented from attending, the places are filled by taking'those with'the next highest number of votes. In institutes divided into provinces, it may be established that this norm of substitution from the. first group applies also to the mother provincial, if she cannot attend" the general chapter. Any tie vote is broken by the u~ual norm of lay institutes, that is, by seniority of first profession; but if the sisters made their first pro-fession on the same day, by seniority of age- I presume that this norm was previously stated i~i the constitutions in a ~eneral article on the number of votes required for an election. 368 November, 1959 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Religious institutes appear to me to be outstandingly lacking in cooperation with other religious institutes. The religious of one institute are at least very frequently aloof and distant in their attitude to other religious, and the institutes themselves often appear more as rivals than partners in carrying out the work of Christ. This does not seem to me to conform to the concept of the Mystical Body. Even in the Church of Chris~, we can have the human failing of being so intent on ourselves and our own work as to forget and neglect others. This is possible in religions and religions institutes; it is equally possible in other parts of the Church, for example, in the relation of one diocese to another and of the Church in one country in relation to the faithful in another. Love of our own nation can so readily and falsely lead ns to the unalterable assumption of its superiority over° ,other nations in everything and the same self-deception can occur with regard to our own institute.- The greatness of an institute i~ not necessarily the measure of such dorporate pride. Pride is not confined to the powerful and rich; it can be more intense, pervasive, and harmful in the weak and poor. Abbe Baechler aptly and beautifully expresse~ the right principle in this matter. It is noticeable that our time, in which institutions and customs change so rapidly and present so many problems, shows a special predilection for the dodtrine of the Mystical Body. It is equally providential that, not content with admiring the doctrine, it should be eager to make use of it in its life; to work together, to pray together, to collaborate as a team, all this is a distinctive feature of the young people of today. The "s~nse of the Church" is developing, and is inspiring many realizations from the top of the hier-archical ladder down to the least of the faithful. To have the "sense of the Church" will mean for a congregation and its members, first of all conscious-ness of being a part of Christ's great family, a branch of the Sacred Vine, a member of the Mystical Body. One of the first consequences of this great awakening will be a feeling of dependence and humility, very necessary in religious life; w~ are not a Whole, but a part: Christ is the whole: omnia in omnibus. This is the way to fight against .a kind of collective individualism, if I may say so, a kind of feeling of perfection and fullness, as well as of family exclusiveness, not unheard of in congregations, especially when they are large and well organized. Individual members feel so well off there that they think they can suffice to themselves. Actually, however glorious the history of an institute may be, however perfect its Constitutions, however enlightened its Superiors, it remains the servant of Christ and of His Church that prolongs and extends Him. It is not an only child; it has many b~oth~rs and sisters. Certainly it is not only legitimate but even h0nourable to be proud of one's Order, of its past, of its great men. But we must not for all that forget the Church,' nor despise the other members of the Mystical Body. St. Francis de Sales exhorted the Sisters of the Visitation in a charming page to complete their personal humility by collective humility: they were to look on theirs as the smallest and last of religious congregations, though they are to love it more than all the others, just as a child prefers his mother to any other woman even although there are others more .beautiful. (Communal Life, 200-201.) Although greater cooperation is always possible and desirable, I belieYe that the religions institutes of our time have not only awakened 369 BOOK REVIEWS Review [or Religious to the necessity but have manifested a heartening spirit of cooperation. This has been evident in the activities of educational and hospital associations; the confederations of higher superiors; the federations of monasteries of nuns; religious congresses, institutes, and workshops; and especially in so many aspects of the sister formation movement. Doesn't renovation and adaptation really imply reform? All writers deny this; but, if renovation means an increase of fer~?,or, doesn't this imply a reprehensible lack of fervor in the past? Renovation and adaptation can be said to imply reformation or reform only if these are taken in the sense of making better or improving, not if they imply moral evil or abuses in the past. The purpose of renovation and adaptation is not the correction of evil but the elimina-tion of a blind, unswerving, and material conformity to everything done in the past and of the lack of a true, constant, and universal spirit of progress. "A true adaptation is a modification of the constitutions and observances for a better realization of the spirit of the founder in given circumstances. The true adaptation arises not from a lessening of life but from an increase of fervor. The more fervent the life, the better it adapts itself" (Most Reverend A. Ancel in Acta et Documenta Congressus Generalis de Statibus Perfectionis, I [Rome: Pia Societh San Paolo, 1952], 124). "Even the Church has always admitted a certain evolution that the circumstances rendered necessary. Anyone who is opposed in principle to adaptations does not possess the spirit of the Church" (Ancel, ibid.). "The purpose is to give a new impetus to the religious life by rendering easier the development of its ti-ue values and remSving the obstacles in its externals that were established in human and social circumstances of life different from our own, no longer have any reason for existence, and can be profitably replaced by others that take. into account the changed conditions of life" (Reverend Gabriel of Saint Mary Magdalene, .O.C.D., ibid., 139). Booh Reviews [Material for this department should be sent directly to Book Review Editor, REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, West Baden College, West Baden Springs, Indiana.] THE BRIDE: ESSAYS IN THE CHURCH. By Daniel Berrigan, S.J. New York: Macmillan, 1959. Pp. 142. $3.50. The excellence of this book of reflections on the Church and her meaning in sacred history and in the life of the Christian will come as no surprise to those who have read Father Berrigan's highly acclaimed volume of poems, Time Without Number. This second book is not easy to classify; the publisher's 370 November, 1959 BooK REVIEWS dust jacket refers to it as a theological prose-poem; perhaps "variations on some theological themes" would serve as a description. In any case, The Bride is eminently worth reading, an unusually moving and beautiful book. Various chapters deal with Israel and her role in the history of salva-tion; with the event of the Incarnation; with the Church as extension of the incarnate Word; the Kingdom in history; the meaning of person in the light of faith; the Christian's knowledge of redeemed creation; the mission of the Church; various elements of the Christian life -- prayer, suffering, the sacrifice of the Mass, fulness in the Church, the saints. Throughout, every-thing is seen in the light of the risen Lord living in His Church. In every chapter the fine sensibility and intelligence of the poet accom-panies uncommon spiritual insight into the theological realities which bear on Christian existence and the ecclesial life~ and again and again the quality of Father Berrigan's writing wonderfully renews what it touches. True, The Bride is not, as Time Without Number was not, an "easy" book. The author is often content to "reveal" a truth in quick bold strokes, rapidly suggest its relevance, and pass on to other reflections. The unity of the chapters, as of the entire book, is to be looked for in the insights which illuminate various aspects of the themes treated. If the reading sometimes proves difficult (we trust the preparation of a second edition will allow the more painstaking editing this book deserves), it is nonetheless invariably rewarding. One hopes that this work will reach the hands of all thoughtful Christians --those above all who are engaged in various forms of the apostolic life--who need just such food for their minds and hearts as this. Religious will find here much that is fresh and valuable for their prayer and reflection, much to quicken true Christian love and apostolic concern. Few books we know impart so well and with such sincerity the breadth and beauty of the Christian vision and. the sense of the imperiousness anal urgency of the Christian vocation to share in the labor of the redemption.--C. G. AR~VALO, S.J. THE BIBLE IN THE CHURCH. By Bruce Vawter, C.M. New York: Sheed and Ward, 1959. Pp. 95. Paper $.75. PATTERN OF SCRIPTURE. By Cecily Hastings, Vincent Rochford, and Alexander Jones. New York: Sheed and Ward, 1959. Pp. 96. Paper $.75. Father Vawter, whose clarity of expression is happily matched by his ind.ustry, states his purpose in the first sentence of his foreword: "This little book is intended as a brief explanation of the role played by the Bible in the life of the Catholic Church." On this basis he divides his material into

Issue 12.5 of the Review for Religious, 1953. ; A.M.D.G. Review for Religious SEPTEMBER 15, 1953 Pleasure and Ascetical Life . Joseph P. Fisher intergroup Relations " Wiiliam H. Gremley The Religion Teacher . Sls~er M. Acjneslne Practice of the Holy See ¯ Joseph F. Gallen Discipline . c.A. Herbst Questions and Answers Rural Parish Wo~'kers VOLUME XII NUMBER RI VII:::W FOR RI::LI IOUS VOLUME XlI SEPTEMBER, 15, 1953 NUMBER 5 CONTENTS SOME THOUGHTS ON PLEASURE AND THE ASCETICAL LIFE-- Joseph P, Fisher, S.J . 225 OUR CONTRIBUTORS . 230 ABOUT BOOKS . 230 SOME DEVELOPMENTS IN INTERGROUP RELATIONS-- William H. Gremley . . . . . 231 A YEAR WITH THE RURAL PARISH WORKERS . 242 PAGING THE RELIGION "TEACHER--Sister M. Agnesine, S.S.N.D. 248 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE--Joseph F. Gallen, S.J .2.5.2 DISCIPLINE--C. A. Herbst, S.J . 272 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS-- 25. Second Year of Novitiate . 276 26. Authority of Superior and Novice Master . 278 27. Sleeping Quarters of Novices . 279 28. Fugitive Religious and Dowry . 280 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, September, 1953, Vol. XII, No. 5. Published bi-monthly: January, March, May, July, September, and November at the College Press, 606 Harrison Street, Topeka, Kansas, by St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas, with ecclesiastical approbation. Entered as second class matter January 15, 1942, at the Post Office, Topeka, Kansas, under the act of March 3, 1879. Editorial Board: Jerome Breunig, S.J., Augustine G. Ellard, S.J., Adam C. Ellis, S.J., Gerald Kelly, s.,j., Francis N. Korth, S.J. Copyright 1953, by Adam C. Ellis, S.J. Permission is her.eby gra,nted for quota-tions of reasonable length, provided due credit be given this review and the author. Subscription price: 3 dollars a year; 50 cents a copy. Printed in U. S. A. Before wrlt;ncj to us, please consult notice on inside back cover. Some Thought:s on Pleasure and !:he Ascet:ical Life Joseph P. Fisher, S.J. ¯|T IS ALMOST INEVITABLE that a good many young reli- | gious, especially among the more fervent, run into certain difficul-ties in squaring their attitude toward pleasure and their acceptance of it with certain ascetical ideals. Practically all ascetical literature, as in a certain sense it must, enlarges on the danger of pleasure and sometimes almost gives the idea to inexperienced minds that pleasure is evil in itself. Likewise there is the insistence that the harder, the more painful, a thing is, the better. While this is true ~rightly under-stood, . young minds frequently make. no qualifications and hence fall into error. Often enough the lives of the saints seem to confirm their exaggerations. The, attitude of mind engendered by such misunder-standings makes for certain practical difficulties in the conduct of these young religious. They are constantly ill-at-ease when faced with pleasure. They feel their ascetical ideals conflict with the mode of action encouraged by customs, by more experienced religious, friends, or relatives. On certain occasions, for instance, feast days, picnics, visiting, it seems they are expected t~o enjoy food, entertain-ment, comforts of various kinds. But they feel that to do so means they must go back on the truest ascetical principles. Or it may be that they are encouraged to enjoy literature but feel that to do so would be. to lessen their ideals. As a matter of fact in the more. ex-treme cases a young religious may have his or her outlook so shaped by the conviction that pleasure is evil (or at least always very. sus-pect) and pain always good that the whole spiritual life is nothing but a kind of self-torture. As is evident, all religious should know the truth about this mat-ter. In general it may be said that not only is it no sin ~o enjoy moderate pleasure but it can easily be an act of virtue. And the goodness of the act can be indefinitely increased by the inte.ntion of directing it to a higher and nobler end, and even actually and ex-plicitly to our ultimate end. For example, a religious who likes honey may eat it with relish and glorify God by so doing. The religious knows there is no sin in such an action and implicitly understands that the action is in accord with God's designs for human life. As a 225 JOSEPH P. FISHER Reoiew ~or Religious matter of fact, the religious could make this an act of the love of God by quietly considering the Wisdom and Goodness of God manifested in this expe.rience of human life. And so with the various simple pleasures that might conceivably, come into an ordinary day. Thdre is a field of pleasure that may well call for special atten-tion. Nowadays many religious are called upon to teach the fine arts, whose whole purpose is to please. This does not mean of.course that this pleasure may be regarded as man's absolutely last end, but it is a relatively ultimate end. Unlike "practical" arts, the fine arts are not aimed at producing something useful, but something beautiful, which causes pleasure. Now if what w,e said above about the possibility of elevating the goodness of sensible pleasures is true, this possibility is even truer in regard to the pleasures of art. For the pleasure of art is a nobler pleasure than that of eating, for instance. Accordingly, it ought to be easier to sublimate the "good" present in an aesthetic ex-perience. Some may doubt this, recalling what they have heard about the immorality of artists of various kinds a~id the. warnings against being a vapid aesthete. And it must be admitted that for certain temperaments there is a danger. Father Graham, in his book, The Looe of God, puts !t stronglywhen.he says: "Artistic sensibility can and should, when controlled by prudence, lend grace and attractive-ness to the moral life. But it frequently happens that the allure-ments of beauty prove so strong that the response to them tends to degenerate into mere aesthetic indulgence. The lover of beauty is con-cerned above all else with the joyous experience of what is pleasing; when unchecked by other considerations he seeks logically an ecstatic existence of perpetual intoxication, through eye and ear and mind, with beautiful objects." It may be added that if a person is of such a temperament and gives in to it, he will undoubtedly do it to the neglect of duty. Even those who are not especially sensitive to beauty can at times be drawn from stern duty by the siren of pleasure. However, it seems that among Catholics and certainly among religious such aesthetes are rather rare. The difficulty is oftentimes the other way about. Even those whose duty it is to study literature and other works of art try to do so without apprec,iating and enjoying the beauty of them. Such an approach is obviously wrong, for unless literature and the other works of art are enjoyed, they are not correctly comprehended. And one who himself does not comprehend can hardly expect to teach others with any success. So it comes about that some rather fail in 226 September, 1953 PLEASURE AND ASCETICAL LIFE their du~;y by not enjoying what is God's Will that theyshould enjoy than by over-indulgence. For example, if Brother Aquinas is pre-paring to teach English and fears to allow himself aesthetic pleasure in reading Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice, he certainly will fail to a great extent in both his studies and his teaching. Moreover, it would be well for men if the right kind of people created and appreciated beauty. Too often the enjoyment of beauty appears to be the monopoly of sentimental, anti-intellectual, or at least non-intellectual, and irreligious escapists. "All things are yours" (I Cor. 3/33) but they won't be if we fear immod'~rately, unreasonably, the enjoyment of the beautiful. Since there is an intimate relationship between nature ahd art. it will help to see first something about the enjoyment of nature. Ac-cording to St. Paul, "All the creatures of God are good and nothing is to be rejected that is received with thanksgiving . " (I. Tim. 4/4). And "From the foundations of the world men have caught sight of his invisible nature, his eternal power and his divinity, as they are knowri through his creatures" (Romans, 1/20). The beau-ties of nature ought to lead us to God, Who is reflected in nature, the work of His bands. Many misunderstand the place of "creatures" in God'splan for men. They are normally the means by which man rises to a knowledge and love of the Creator. Too many look upon them as "absolutes," things apart from God, things which, if appre-ciated, draw us to themselves and away from God. Such a view is based upon a n.isunderstandlng of. their true nature. Creatures, finite beings, are of their very nature dependent beings, relative beings, not absolutes. They must, if properly understood, be related to the In-finite; they point to the Infinite; their participated qualities are finite reflections of the infinite attributes and should more than remind us of their prototype. For one who understands the truth about the nature of finite beings, they ought to be stepping stones or rather springboards by Which he rises to that full Being Who is the ever-active cause of their ever-dependent existence. "The Contemplation for Obtaining L6ve," which crowns the Exercises of St. Ignatius, tries to impress men with this truth, but many, satisfied with a super-ficial approach, never really understand it. But the saints have understood it. It is a commonplace that St. Francis of Assisi made much of the sacrament of nature. A biographer relates "the following of St. Francis during his last days. "Meanwhile Francis was suffering greatly. Yet amidst his bodily 227 JOSEPH P. FISHEI~ agonies .be continued to find a~ absorbing sweetness in meditating upon the be.auty of God ifiHis creationl All the.crea'tion seemed to sing of the glory of its Creator to his pain-racked senses: and this is the more wonderful when w~ rememb& ho'~ 'pain is 'apt to turn all sensible comfort into bitterness. One day,' when he was suffering more than u~ual in eyes ~ifid head, he had a great desire to hear the viol. One of the brothers attending him, had been a violist in the world. Francis called for him and said: 'Biother, th~ children of th~ world do not understand divine sacraments: and musical instru-ments, which in former times were set apart for. the praise of God, man's wantonness has converted to the mere delight of the ear. Now I would hav~ you go secretly and borrow a vi01 and bring comfort with some honest melody to Brother Body who is so full of pains.' " Now without entering into controversy about the relationship between nature and art, we can certainly transfer 'much 6f what we have said about nature and God to art and God. Whether you say that art copies nature, perfects or .sublimates nature, or helps one ap-preciate nature, in any case, artistic works ~re finite participations of Infinite Beauty an'd, if appreciated as such, can and should aid one to appreciate this Infinite Beauty. In o{her words, art ~can help one use creatures for "contemplation." A man who is impressed by finite beauty can thereby be better prepared to appreciate the Source of all beauty. One may, for instance, never have realized how a cloud re-flects God's beauty Until he has read and appreciated Shelley's poem, ."The Cloud." Pleasure, though an end in its own o~der, may, if handled prop-erly, be a means of drawing closer to God. A certain puritanical bent of mind prevents many from appreciating this fact. This is not to deny that one can practice virtue" by foregoing the enjoyment of l~gitimate pleasure. It is often said that such abstinence from legiti-mate pleasure strengthens the will so,that it wili be strong in temp-tation. There is certainly much truth in this statement, but it is well to rememberthat motivation rather than exercise is the best means of strengthening the will. However, it is clear that a religious would scarcely be imitating Christ very seriously if he endeavored to fill life with every legitimate pleasure. Christ being rich became poor for us. All who are in the way of the love of Christ know that they can manifest and add to their love by sacrifice. Even here it is well to remember that' ChriSt made use of at least some.pleasures of Ills, ¯ such as the enjoyment of friendship and of.natur~al beauty. And 228 September, 19~ 3 PLEASURE AND ASCETICAL LIFE theology will not allow us to forget the fact that all His life Christ enjoyed the Beatific Vision, even though it is true at least at times the proper effects were divinely withheld. As to whether Christ enjoyed the beauty of human art, we do not have much evidence. If he did not, it would seem that was Simply due to circumstances; cer-tainly the enjoyment of finite beauty is a very worthy human ex-perience, and Christ was a complete man. God it is who has given the artistic urge and God it is Who has created the arts in which man "imitates" the Creator. The artist, even though unconsciously, casts an illuminating light on some facet of a created good, and aids us to appreciate more fully, the beauty .of God's handiwork. Of course Christ did not need this aid, but there were many things Christ did not need that He made His own to be like us and give us an example. The question as to how far an individual religious ought togo in the renouncemen(' of even legitimate pleasure is a very personal question. Even one who wishes to go far in this regard ought to understand the truth of the matter, so that he knows to what he is bound and where he begins to practice supererogation. It is likewise well to remember that what may be or appear objectively best is not always subjectively so. An individual's nature, vocation, training, ¯ and the grace of God must always be considered in settling such questions. What is good for one may be bad for another. A novice in the spiritual life cannot do what a tried religious can do; an active religious cannot do what a contemplative can. It dbes seem that most active religious, at least in the early years of their religious life, may well use pleasure, the higher pleasur.es and even moderate sensible pleasures, to help them rise to the knowledge and love of their Cre-ator. In doing this they should not feel that they are turning their backs on Christ, for as they 'get to know His "mind" better and begin to love Him more, they will spontaneously and with peace.and equanimity begin to give themselves to what St. Ignatius styles the Third Degree of Humility, the imitation of Christ in s~ffering and humiliations through love. Certain young religious seem to think that what is really the strong meat of the mystic way is already for them early in their reli-gious lives, for they try to get to God without the use of creatures. Cardinal Bellarinine points them the way quite clearly: "But we mortal men (as it seemeth) can find no other ladder whereby to ascend unto God, but by the works of God. For those who by the singular gift of God have (by another way) been admitted into 2.29 ~JoSEPH P. FISHER Paradise to hear God's secrets, which it is not lawful for a man to speak, and are not said to have a'scended, 13ut to have been wrapt.". At death some religious who have been striving to fly without wings will agree v~itb this statement of Father Martindale: "But may not one of the great 'difficulties' of dying be this--not that yo~u. have worshipped idols--loved created things ~oo much--but that you have not loved them nearly enough? What suddenly appals one is,' that God surrc~unded one with a myriad things of unbeliev-able beauty--like butterflies, or the sea, or uneducated p, eople--and that one has allowed them to slip by almost unnoticed." Certainly one reason many do not get more out of life is that they fail to make Christlike use of one of God's good creatures-- pleasure. "For all things are yours, whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas; or the world, or life, or death; or things present, or things to cg.me--all are yours, and you are Christ's, and Christ is God's" (I Cor. 3/22:23). OU R CONTRIBUTORS ¯ "JOSEPH P. FISHER is master of novices at the Jesuit novitiate, Florissant, Mo." WILLIAM H. GREMLEY is Executive Secretary for the. Commission on Human Rela-tions, Kansas City, Mo. SISTER M. AGNESINE is nationally known as an expert on methods of teaching religion. JOSEPH F. GALLEN is professor of canon law at Woodstock Coll~ge, Woodstock, Md. C. A. HERBST is on the faculty of the Jesuit juniorate .at Florissant, Mo. ABOUT BOOKS It will be noticed that in this number of the REVIEW; book reviews, book. notices, and book announcements are conspicuous by their absence. The' reason for this is that the varied summer assignments of the editors made it impossible to do the ol~ice work necessary for organizing reviews, notices, etc. The deficiency will be remedied in the November number. 230 Some Developments in Intergroup Relations William H. Gremley IT IS almost anti-climactic these, days to dwell at length on the importance of social and political problems in America occasioned by intergroup relationships. The volume of press stories and magazine articles on the subject,, such as Supreme Court decisions, legislative action of one kind or another or "incidents," either posi-tive or negative in nature, increases daily and 'has come to be almost routine. Scarcely a Week passes without some high official, go+tern-ment or civic, making a major address regarding the international aspects of this issue. That it may be one of the most important topics of our day can-not be denied since, in degree, it permeates almost all other major nation~il concerns, yet, like all social or political issues, it must have proper perspective to be abso'rbed and understood. Unfortunately, the drama and emotion inherent in the problem is a barrier to this perspective. All ioo often the negative--the headlines on race-riots, the grim warnings that we are losing overseas allies, the economic loss from discrimination--dominates the over-all picture with scant emphasis on the positive. And, all too often, the positive is usu~illy limited to gome assertion that "ihe Negro has come a long way since slavery." A brief analysis of some developments in intergroup relations over the past ten years will disclose some positive aspects of far more importance and profundity than the latter remark. The objectives of this article will be to present some analysis of those developments, primarily as they relate to daily situations familiar to most readers. and to attempt a balance of both fiegative and pgsitive aspects so as to present a proper over-all perspecttive. " I Initially, some definitions may be of value as follows: t) The terminology of the problem has, in the past, often been misunderstood. To call it a "Negro problem" is a. misnomer for, in actuality, there is no such thing as a. N, eoro problem in the. United ~tates--nor,.for that matter, a ,Jewish, Mexi.c.o.n, or Puerto Rican .231 X~qlLLIAM H. GREMLEY Review/:or Religious problem or any other issue involving people of one race, .religion, or national origin. The problem, in. terms of a situation demanding attention or correction, is one involving re[ationsfiips between mem-bers of different groups. It is, thus, more accurate to define it as a Negro-white, Jewisb-Gentilel etc., relationship problem. Nothing in the entire range of group discrimination or prejudice has roots solely in one group. A sub-problem, for example, of employment discrimination against Jews or Negroes is dynamically related to the fears, myths, and prejudices of the white Gentile em-ployer. Moreover,. defining the issue as a "Negro problem"-implies a detached and overly-objective attitude toward 15,000,000 people that is quite unrelated to the facts of group discrimination. 2) The term, "intergroup relations" is replacing, in g~neral, such terms as "race-relations" or "human relations." The word "intergroup" obviously pinpoints the is~sue far more than either a phrase excluding religious or nationality conflicts or one embracing all personal relationships, both "inter" a'nd "intra." 3) "Minority groups," as a phrase, is confined solely to a group that, because of some facet of assumed ~roup identity--skin color, religion, language, or group, custom--suffers social, economic, or political discrimination against it. Actually, however, i'minority group" is divisive in itself since it segments people from others and should be used with caution and clarity. 4) " The phrase "civil rights" is distinct from "civil liberties" in that the latter refers to the political or quasi-political freedoms guar-anteed to all by Constitutional safeguards. These would include freedom of speech, press, assembly, religion, or right to petition or bear arms. On the other hand, "civil rights" ~ire much rffore social in nature, referring to rights involving places of piablic accommoda-tion, public or privately owned, employment, housing, health and welfare facilities, recreation or education. Somewhere in between the two terms would come rights concerning voting and police pro-tection. II. Perhaps tb~ most important single,development in intergroup relations in the last decade has been th~ establishment of official city agencies to deal with urban problems of this type. Known, for the most part, as "commissions" or "councils" followed by the words "on civic unity," "community relations," or "human relations," they represent a significant phase in the over-all advancement toward September, 1953 INTERGROUP RELATIONS solutions of these problems. In essence,, such, city agencies mean a full realization of and acknowledgement by city authorities that in-tergroup relationships in the diverse populations making up most of America's urban areas can no longer be left to chance or haphazard methods. Just as in decades past, public health, transportation, wa-ter supply, street maintenance, and a host of other various civic con-cerns have been progressively added to the functions of American city government, so too the concerns of intergroup violence, dis-crimination, and individual civil rights are now the official tax- " supported duties of more than 60 American cities. The origins of such city agendes, most of which are goyerned by city ordinance, date from the Detroit race riots of 1943. Shortly after that catast~rophe, a group of Chicago citizens, headed by the late Edwin Embree, then head of the Rosenwald Fund, persuaded the late Mayor Edward Kelly to establish the first such agency. In time, other cities followed suit ~nd today the list includes such arras as Detroit, Milwaukee, Cleveland, Buffalo, Toledo, Kansas City (Mo.), St. Louis, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Denver. Seattle, and scores of others. In addition, many cities, both North and South. lacking a tax-supported agency, have privately supported groups working to-ward similar ends. Basically, these agencies, composed, for the most part, of mayoral appointees serving without salary but with a paid professional staff, have three aims: 1) To prevent or lessen intergroup violence~ u~hether of the col-lective mob type or as an isolated action (i.e., a bombing or an indi-vidual attack). The most singular success in this regard has taken place in Chicago where the police force, after utilizing the guidance and resources of the Chicago Commission on Human Relations, has achieved a high degree of efficiency in the prevention of intergroup mob violence. (The Cicero riot of 1951 is a case in point. So strict and effective were police measures taken to prevent a "spilling"'over Of ¯ this affair into Chicago that, while law and order broke down com-pletely in Cicero--adjacent to Chicago-the prevalent tensions in the latter city were kept completely in check.) 2) To d~oelop harmonious relationships bettveen all groups And eliminate the causes of group friction and. prejudice. In this regard, such~ city~ag.encies have,available.,a vast.amount of resource material built up over the last ten years. The material available to schools of 233 WILLIAM H. GREMLEY Review for Religious all type~ and a~ all levels will illustrate. Audio-visual aids, teacher training workshops, and curriculum and school-community relation-ship material are some of the areas where resources may be obtained. In addition, ~xtensive tl~eoretical and practical research has been ac-complisbed regarding such problem areas a~ community organization, employment, housing, health, welfare, recreatiom and civil rights. 3) To safeguard and protect the ci~)il rights" of all groups. A greater divergence among such agencies is found in this objective th~an in the other two for an obvious reason~ The degree of civil rights legally accorded to citizens, for the most part, depends on the local or state laws on the subject. Many states, like New York and Rhode Island, have effective Fair Employment PracticeLaws. In addition, New York has a Fair Education Practice Law that prohibits school "quotas" based on group differences. Conversely the s~gregation laws of the South deny civil rights to manycitizens. Thus an inter-group city agericy relies on laws if they exist and persuasion to pro-tect such rights. In "border" states like Missouri, the agency must depend on persuasion alone to accomplish this objective. In general, the types of intergroup probiems faced by a city agency will depend on the population make-up of the city itself. In cities like Chicago, Detroit, and Kansas City, perhaps 90% of such problems spring from Negro-white relationships. New York City with a Puerto-Rican population of.some 500,000 must consider this particular problem along with Negro-white and Jewish-Gentile con-cerns. West Coast cities with people of Japanese descent comprising large .segments of the Ipopulation, Texas urban areas containing sig-nificant percentages of Mexican-Americans, and Rocky-Mountain or North Mid-West states with American Indian reservations, all have different kinds of problem areas sometim_es calling for different kinds of treatment techniques or materi~ils. III An inevitableconsequehce or ,concomitant.of the growth of both" intergroup city agencies and the extensive resource material men-tioned has beeh the development of the 'intergroup relations "pro-fessioni" For the most part, the usual frame ofreference associated with any profession--research material, academic courses and,degrees, job personnel standards, establishment of a national organization (in this case the National Association of Intergroup Relations,Offi-cials)--- characterize intergroup, relations. Over and above these cri- 234 Sgptember, 1953 teria, however, certain premises exist regarding this'field Which have strong foundation~ not only in law where the c'ase may be but, in all cases, in democratic and religious principles as well. -It may be un-necessars; to ~dd that such principles are wholly consonant with those of the two major religious traditions in America. Both Judaic and Christian concepts of individual dignity, of course, are clear and defined. Man is an individual with God-given rights as well as .God-given responsibilities. In addition, it is inher-ent in his nature to mingle and commune.with his fellowmen. Both singly and collectively, he has rights and responsibilities to others and to himself in'a social sense. It ,is thus essential to th~ nature and work of these city agencies that the premise of natural rights for all should underscore and per-meate their functions and programs. The assumption that the hu-man family is one under God, that variations between peoples of genes or customs do not detract from this assumption., and that, in keeping with this "oneness" under God, all are equally entitled, to basic rights, are fundamental four~ations for inte, rgroup wozk' not only of.the "official" city agency type but in the private an'd volun-teer area as well. Some exa.mples may help, to illustrate these concepts. Labor 1) The dignity of labor, exalted by Christ and sustained by the Popes through encyclicals, certainly means the right to fully utilize one's skills. Yet the record ~f denial ofthis righ[ by r~fusals to hire or to upgrade extends back to the mid~lle 19th Century when (and continuing almost to the 20th Century) such denial to Irish Cath-olics was illustrated by factory signs--"Help Wanted--No Irish Need Apply." Tod~y, through cultural assimilation, neither the Irish immigrant nor those of Irish descent suffer this indignity. In their place, the Negro or those of Jewish. faith.are the major victims of job discrimination. It may be said that, to some extent, every racial, religious, or nationality group whether indigenous or not to America has suffered this type of injustice. Recent advances, however, in this problem 'area give hope for the future. The numerous state and city FEPC laws, the changing atti-tude of many industries, aware of the great economic loss in wasted skills, the strong stand of the American Catholic hierarchy as well as other religious bodies against job discriminatioh--all developments INTERGROUP RELATIONS 235 WILLIAM H. GRE/vlLEY Review/:or ReligiOus for the most part of just the "past decade--indicate .a point in time when this problem will no longer be major. Health 2) Perhaps no area of life involves more compassion or human feelings than suffering brought about by sickness or accident, and in this area, perhaps above all others, divine precepts of mercy and brotherly .love should prevail. Yet, this compassion is, strangely lacking in many American cities when hospital facilities for Negroes are considered. Segregation, even in many Northern cities is the rule despite worthy exceptions and it would be impossible to estimate the amount of loss of life or unnecessary pain caused by refusals of hos-pitals to admit Negro patients. 'For example, in the Kansas City area recently, a young Negro woman, injured in an auto accident, was refused admittance to or hastily transferred from four different hospitals because of her color. Eventually taken to her home, she died shortly after. Competent medical authorities definitely asserted that, with prompt and adequate attention, she might well have survived. ' Adding to this problem is the inability of qualified minority-groups doctors, nurses, and medical technicians to obtain staff ap-pointments to hospitals practicing discrimination. Thus the ,hos-pital rationalizes--"We have no Negro doctors so we don't have Negro patients." In this aria as well as employment, however, encouraging prog-ress has been made in ~ecent years. Laws in many states have been .passed prohibiting hospitals from refusing emergency patients Because of race, color, creed, or national origin. Many single hospitals in ~ities like Chicago, New York, Kansas City, and others have taken the initiative in eliminating color bars and given Negro or Jewish doctors and nurses staff appointments. The number of Negro medi-cal students in formerly all-white attended schools is on the increase, and Negro graduates are finding it easier to obtain interr;ships, par-ticularly in municipal hospitals. Education 3) In the, field of education as well, divine concepts of justice and decency to all mankind are just as strong as the above, but school segregation, with its foolish emphasis on the "separate but'~qual" tbegry, at a time when equal facilitiesAor .minority grqups i.s .p.hy.~si.-~ cally and economically t;nfeasible, continues as a burning, national 236 September, 1953 INTERGROUP RELATIONS issue. The waste, not only in dollars but in imperfect or thwarted personal development because of these barriers amohg children is in-calculable. To fully equalize, for example, the separate public schools of the State of Missouri alone wduld cost $20,000,000 according to a re-cent surveyl--without counting the cost of continuing extra trans-portation for Negro pupils. 'On the other hand, it was estimated that approximately $.1,150.000 a year of tax-monies could be saved by integrating the Missouri public school system. It is in the field of education, however, that the record of ad-vancement in the last decade is brightest. U.S. Supreme Court deci-sions have opened ~graduate schools in the South to all applicants. (Those in the North, for the most part, have been integrated sinc'e the 19th Century.) The forthcoming Supreme Court decision on public school segregati.on may well mean thd eventual end of this-anomaly on American democracy. The record of Catholic school authorities in school segregation matters is most significant. In community after community, in-cluding' Kansas City and St. Louis and even in Deep South areas where school segregation was deep-rooted custom, boId and cou-rageous action by diocesan' or arch-diocesan officials have integrated Catholic schools at all l~vels. Jesuit colleges and high schools, in particular, have a record of many "firsts'" in this respect, welcoming all stu~tents in communities otherwise strongly segregated. " IV Despite the. admirable record of Catholic schools in eliminating school segregation, many serious problems still remain to be faced. Perhaps chief among these is that regarding the efficacy of teachers as well as curriculum material in instilling sound intergroup attitudes among pupils. Chiefly. because of existing residential segregation of minority groups in most American cities, the elimination of segregation in Catholic schools where ~t has been.accomplished does not always mean extensive integration. As a rule, a school attended wholly by white pupils remained white-attended With the reverse true for schools Wholly attended by Negroes or children of Mexican descent. It has been usually in the "fringe" areas--where the population was 1"The Cost of Segregated Schools"--Study by Stuart A. Queen, Washi~gtoa Uni-. versity. Available from Missouri Association for Social Welfare, 113 ~ West High Street, Jefferson City, Missouri. " " 237 WILLIAM H. GREMLEY mixed racially or ethnically--that significant integration of different groups took place. Such "fringe" schools are usually in a minority compared to the total number in any given urban community. Ex-ceptions should be made with reference to any isolated Negro-occupied areas outside .the main such area in an urban center. Even in those cases, however, usually not more than a handful of new Negro pupils were registered after the integration order. This residential segregation has, in some areas where the popu-lation is predominantly Catholic, stimulated several situations of racial violence in which the role of the Catholic school has severely been called into question. Following the Cicero anti-Negro riot of 1951, which occurred in a community estimated to be 65 % Cath-olic, the writer interviewed an official of a local Catholic ~chool. In response to questions concerning the use of curriculum material pro-moting positive intergroup attitudes, it" was indicated, that the teaching of such attitudes was confined to the history classes. Worthy as such teaching may be, it was hardly sufficient to relate present-day intergroup problems to the pupils. Since many of the youthful par-ticipants in that affair were observed wearing Catholic insignia of some type, such limitations were not effective as a deterrent to vio-lence. The Peoria Street violehce of 1949 in Chicago, in which extreme ¯ anti-Semitism as well as anti-Negro prejudice took the form of severe assaults and beatings on bystanders allegedly "3ewish-looking," oc-curred in an area estimated to be 90% Catholic. Teen-agers in both incidents played a predominant role in the violence. It is true, of course, that such incidents of racial and religious violence are by no means confined to areas predominantly or heavily Catholic in population. Numerous other disturbances equally or even more severe than those cited have occurred in urban localities pr(~dominantly non-Catholic. The immediate concern, however, is with the role of the local Catholic school, in social situations involv-ing pre.judice and intergroup violence and in localities where ~ignifi-cant portions of the population¯ are of the Catholic faith. Something Lacking? The percentage figures and role of teenagers in the above two af-fairs pose an important question--what was lacking in the teaching techniques of the local Catholic school that could have prevented such expressions of violence and prejudice at least by participants who 238 September, 1955 INTERGROUP RELATIONS may have been Catholic? That something was--perhaps is-- lacking is obvious. While it may be that such a lack is due to com-munity pressures and mores hostile toward p~ople of different color or religion, it is possible that lack of awareness by teachers of the problem coupled with teaching materials that possibly create disre-spect and prejudice for different groups, may also account for this deficiency. For example, in one type of reader used in Catholic ele-mentary schools, the following quotation is f6und: (The reference is to the American Indian.) "Hello, Mother," cried Tom, as he ran into the apartment house where he lived. On the table in the kitchen Tom saw a large white cake. 'Tm glad that I'm an American boy tonight," he said. "Indians never had cake for supper, did they. Mother?" "I'm afraid not, Tom," answered his mother. "They didn't wash their faces before supper, either, but American boys do that.''2 Apart from the "1o, the poor Indian" attitude implied, it is manifestly unfair to deprive tbe native American of his nationality. The matter of bodily cleanliness, of course, varied in custom among the numerous Indian tribes. It is hardly possible that- respect and dignity for the American Indian as an individual created by God could be implanted in children's minds from this passage. On the other hand, an example of the type of curriculum material that can advance positive attitudes in a realistic social situation sense is found in another reader containing the story, "Toward a Promised Land.''3 Dealin~ with effort~, based on race prejudice; to oust a competent Negro doctor from a hospital, the tale. resolves the situa-tion satisfactorily from both a moral and practical viewpoint. The efforts fail, the ~doctor is retained, and his little son sees another ad-vance toward "a promised land." Both examples above perhaps will illustrate the social impor-tance of developing proper intergroup attitudes among children, ad-mittedly often a difficult task in the face of possible parental prejudice and objections. This social importance, however, is far overshadowed by the spiritual importance. To permit or ignore the development in children of prejudiced attitudes, unchecked or not counteracted in 2"This is Our Town," Faith ~ Freedom Series, Book 3, by Sr. M. Marguerite, 'Ginn E4 Company, 1952, p. 46~ 3"These Are Our Horizons," Faith ~3 Freedom Series, Book 7, by Sr. M. Charlotte, and Mary Syron, LL.D. Ginn E4 Company, 1945, p. 136. 239 WILLIAM H. GREMLEY Review for Religious the school, may be almost as much a negation of. ~hrist'~ ~eaching.as the actual encouragement of group prejudice or bigotry. The re-sponsibility, ofcourse, is no less in the home than in.the school, but in the Catholic school the duty to ~each the'ethics of the brotherhood of man unde~ the Fatherhood of God seems of particular concern. The concern is that of Christ. In her excellent study4 on attitudes towards Jews~ by .Catholic school children, Sr. Mary Jeanine Gruesser states: "Interest in the social attitudes of Catholic children is bound up with Catholic belief and practice. Today the. tremendous~octrine of the Mystical Body of Christ is being .preached and taught with new stress and emphasis. In language that he can understand, the youngest Catholic school child is learning to live the fact that all are members, one of another, in Christ. But the teacher who is really concerned that the child take this lesson away from the classroom and back to his play group in the neighborhood, rnus~ know some-thing about the situations and conditions of intergroup interaction of which the child is.a part, of the attitudes toward other people, other religious and nationality groups, that be has already formed. These are the realities to which the doctrine' must be applied, but the two must be related t:or th~ child." Having stated and, it is hoped, adequately illustrated the prob-lem, some positive resources may be listed that may be of value. Available Resources 1) As indicated, a local city intergroup agency can be of as-sistance in suggesting acceptable audio-visual and curriculum ma-terial designed to counteract prejudice and develop healthy and wholesome attitudes in children regarding people of different groups. ~2) Private agencies such as local community relations bureaus,. some school or teacher associations or local offices of the National, Conference of Christians and Jews also have resources ~eadily avail-able for this purpose. 3) Teacher workshop~ in intergroup r61ations are now available each summer in practically every section of the country. For tb~ most part, these workshops are given at local universities and colleges. A lis[ of them may be secured from the office of the National Associa- 4"Categorical Valuations of Jews Among Catholic Parochial School Children," St. Mary Jeanine Gruesser. Dissertation, Catholic University of America Press, Washington, D. C., 1950, p. 8. 240 September, 1953 INTERGRouP RELATIONS tion of Intergroup Relations Offici'als.s Most of these institutes are secular in nature and sponsorship. They are open to all applicants and usually held during the day. A special workshop designed for Catholic religious teachers has been instituted in the Shell School 6f" Social Studies in Chicago. 4) Competent rating scales for determining children's attitudes toward members of other groups are available. Examples are the "Wrightstone Scale of Civic Beliefs," the "Bogardus Social Distance Scale," and the "Grice Scale for.Measuring Attitudes Toward Races and Nationalities." (The latter is available in Sr. 3eanine's study.) As initial steps, such s~ales are extremely valuable in determining an inventory of such .attitudes and measuring the extent of such prob-lems existing in any school. V In conclusion, the international significance of official city agen-cies as resources leading to solutions of group problems of education, employment, health, or welfare facilities is manifest. In essence, they indicatd a "coming of age" for America, a growing realization that America must and can fight its own dilemma on its own grounds. For too long the Communists have pointed a distorted finger of shame at this dilemma in our democracy withoutwas is natural for them--mention of the earnest and valiant efforts made to work 6ut these problems within the framework of our democratic tr'aditions. That we can and will continue to do so, that all group~ and re-ligious bodies, Catholic and 'iaon-Catholic alike, will strive to give substance and body to our great political and religious heritage, is inevitable. Despite the discordancies, whether of violence, discrim-inations, or prejudice, the record of progress in the over-all march of American democracy toward its fulfillment for all, is clear and pro-. found. SNational Association of Intergroup Relations Officials, 565 North Erie Street, Toledo 2, Ohio. "'Opposed to all of these and a billion times rhore powerful is that Love repre-sented by the Sacred pierced Heart of Christ. It is the love for all men, who have equal opportunity tOoshare that tremendous Love, and to return it according as they will, for it has "first loved them and gone down to death for them singly and col-lec/ tively. Such a Lo~,e, even more than the common hand of the Creator unites all men before God. Can men be so callous as to remember race-hatred while kneeling around the Cross of the Crucifie~[ Christ?" '(The Most Rev. Vincent S. Waters, 'Bishop of Raleigh, in his Pastoral Letter of June 12, 1953.) 241 A Year wit:h the Rural Parish Workers [EDITORS' NOTE: The Rural Parish Workers of Christ the King are laywomen de-voted to works oi~ the apostolate in rural areas. Father Edward A. Bruemmer, in whose parish they bare worked for several years, says of them: "[ am convinced that theE are as essential to the welfare of a rural parish as the teaching sisters in the parish school. Perform!ng the corporal and spiritual works" of mercy on a scal~ hitherto undreamed of, they have renovated the face of the earth here." We had planned to give a rather complete sketch of the beginning and growth~ of this work but it is impossible to do that in our present issue. We hope however, to give it later, because we believe it is very important for our readers to know about the va-rious possibilities ot: the lay apostolate. For the present, we content ourselves with printing this informal article written by a Rural Parish Worker who signs herself, Miss Mary. The material in this article can be obtained in brochure form from: The Rural Parish Wokers of Christ the King, Route 1, Box 194, Cadet, Mis-souri.] THE residence and center of the Rural Parish Workers of Christ the King (laywomen dedicated to the service of their neighbors in rural areas) is at Fertile.in the large rural parish of St. ,Joa-chim, Washington County, Missouri'. This is picturesque with its rolling hills, great trees and valleys, but there is evidence of poverty everywhere to mar its beauty. The inhabitanl~s for the most part are a poor, uneducated, generous, loving, and appreciative people. The Rural Parish Workers, cooperating with the pastor, do much to edu-cate, see social justice done, relieve want, spread Catholic Action in the area. I'm spending a year with the Rural Parish Workers, participating in their work and sharing in all their activities. This means sharing in the spiritual life also . . . daily Mass, Prime and Compline or Lauds and Vespers in English, individual recitation ot: the. Rosary, reading and study. This summer when I first arrived, along with two other volun-teers, Miss Pat and Miss Christina, plans for the Open House were already under way. This project is given yearly under the sponsor-ship of a group of men to make new friends for the Parish Workers and spread word of their work. We three pitched right in, helping clean up house and grounds with the neighbors and others who came to help. A week later the big day came. So did 1000 visitors. About the middle of the afternoon Mol~her .Nature came along with the 242 RURAL PARISH WORKERS biggest rain of the season! Many persgns hurried home, but many stayed, so we served food all over the house and on the porches until everyone was happily fed. That night we washed up the biggest gobs of mud and thanked God for a very wonderful day in spite of the rain. Not long after Open House we had a Clothing Giveaway for the needy people. Several times we went on visits in different parts of the parish which is 150 square miles in size. Can you imagine people who live only 50 miles from St. Louis being so isolated as not to see other human beings for weeks at a time? Well, I can state this is the truth. In 3uly a neighbor took us to visit such a family. You can imagine how glad the old couple were to see us. Even though we had been jostled around on the back of a truck (the only way we could get through the woods) and then soaked in a sudden down-pour of rain! Baptisms During another visit a littl~ girl came running across the road. "Could we come over right" away?" A neighbor's new-born baby was dying and the parents wanted Miss LaDonna or Miss Alice to baptize it. So we thankfully watched another child added to God's family in the car of the doctor who was taking the baby to the hos- ¯ pithl. We were present for many weddings in the parish church this summer. But one morning the celebration was for a different reason ¯ . . the baptism of an entire family instructed by Miss LaDonna. We volunteers were happy to witness the event and to take part in 'their joy. Although life with the Parish Workers is anything but routine, there are some things that must be done regularly. Each of us kept her own room neat and clean, and helped with the thorough weekly cleaning. We took turns, two together, in preparing meals and washing the dishes. Each evening one of us volunteers got to milk the goat. This was quite a thrill for us city girls. We volunteers helped Miss Alice with the outside work such as tying up grape vines, wa-tering trees, pulling weeds, raking gravel in the newly-made drive, etc. The Parish Workers' clean-up activities aren't limited t6 their own home, however. One afternoon we all went to watch the completing of the purifi-cation of the spring used by the people of the immediate area. The 243 RURAL PARISH WORKERS Reoieu) for Religious Parish Workers had had the spring cleaned and enclosed in 'concrete with a pipefor'tbe water to run through. This prevents people from dipping their buckets into the .waterand has greatly improved the health of the children in the neighborhood. After an especially b,u~y week we were all preparing for a day of rest when an elderly man came to the door. He bad walked several miles to tell us that his grandson was suffering from a brain tumor and must be rushed to the hospital ira.mediately. Could we get him in? So, this ended our day of rest and sent us on an errand of mercy. Several times this summer Father Bede, O.S.B., spiritual director of the Rural Parish Workers, visited us and gave us many interesting and enlightening talks which broadened our knowledge of the lay ¯ apostolate and helped our spiritual growth. Seven Weeks for doing something you thoroughly enjoy are too short as we three volunteers discovered when the Summer Session came to an end. We all left with heavy hearts. Miss Pat had to re-turn to school. Miss Christina was needed at borne. And I went borne to prepare my winter clothing and tell my family that I in-tended to return in September for a year.of service. Instructions Upon my return [ entered more fuIly into the life of a Parish Worker. Activities began with the start of weekly religious instruc-tions for the public scl~ool children. My class of twenty youngsters is made up of 2nd to 4th graders who have received their First Holy Communion. I find them very attentive and well-behaved with a thirst for knowledge. I had returned to Fertile when the country was most beautiful and the large pears on our tree were ready for picking. I donned a ¯ pair of blue jeans and an old shirt and had the time of my life climbing the tree and shaking down the pears, using the garden rake for the hi~hest branches. Seven bushels of delicious fruit were added to our pantry and shared with our neighbors. In October we entertained the members of the Parish Workers' Advisor~ Board and their wives ata buffet supper. Miss Par'and Miss Christina came to help with this gala affair., We all had so much fun together they were reluctant to leave. But plans were made to get together again when time came for selecting and packing Christmas gifts for.the 250 children in the families we assist during the year. 244 September, 1953 RURAL PARISH WORKERS Travel The distribution and sorting of clothes for these families has been given me as my special project, and I must admit I find it both interesting and helpful. Interesting because of a natural woman's instinct wondering what I will discover in each box I open, for these boxes and packages come to Fertile from all over, sometifnes from as far away as NeW York. And helpful, for in this exploited area wages are very low. Many times we bear of a child out of school bedause of no shoes or other clothing. And for many families the only new baby clothes are those we are able to supply in the layettes generously donated by women and college girls interested in this apostolate I am learning to drive. " If you ask'the Parish Workers how I am doing they ~vill answer, "Wonderfully well." But if.y6u put the question to me ~ am afraid you would receive a different answer. However, I shall keep on-, for often I could help out if I were able to drive the station wagon myself. We travel many miles,each month. Over two thousand is the average now. A number of trips are made to St. Louis, eSl~ecially to clinics and hospitals. One such trip concerned my special ,family. While visiting them one day I noticed the baby looked ill. He was terribly undernourished anyway, and I was truly worried about him. We telephoned a St. Louis hospital and the Sister told us a bed'would be available as soon as we could get.him there. The familywere un-able to pay anything but the baby remained in the hospital seven weeks and is now doing wonderfully. From.time to time I ~ake visits with ~ne of thd Parish Workers. One morning it was necessary to make a trip to the courthouse to see the judge about a f~imily we were helping. I was more than giad to be risked to go along as I would get the opportunity to meet some of the civic officials and learn how,they and the Parish Workers work together to help others. Since I have been here I have learned much about Secularigm and Communism and the inroads tb~y baremade in our country. I am also learning how to detect their prop~an~la in radio programs, newspaper articles, etc. Accompanying Miss LaDonna to the Well-Baby Clinic was al-ways a pleasure., until one day she pulled a fastone and asked the County nurse to give me a typhoid shot. Of course I knew about"it beforehand, but being a city girl I really h~d.~'tthought, much about it., We take pure drinking, water, for gr~inted' in the city, but out here 245 RURAL PARISH WORKERS Review for Religious it's different. All the water is from creel~s and springs like the one the Parish Workers fixed up last summer. The home of the Parish Workers is an old brick house. Major remodeling has made it into a modern home with many conveniences so that they may devote as, much time as possible to their apostolate of serving others. Minor work in the house proceeds slowly, one room at a time, and furniture is supplied by donations. Most of it we repair or repaint, but recently a women's group brought out a complete flew bedroom outfit which the Parish Workers placed in .my room. "Harmonious surroundings help in the development of a Christian home'," they always say. I know for sure they are relaxing at the end of a busy day. The apostolate of the Rural Parish Workers is not well known, although for several years, under the patronage of the Most Reverend Archbishop of St. Louis, they have been quietly working among the poor and downtrodden. So now we send out a monthly memo of recent news to The King's Men, an auxiliary of the Parish Workers. This and other secretarial work enables me to make good use of my typing learned in high school. Christmas There is always activity here at Fertile, but preparations for Christmas are something to behold. First, making of the Advent wreath. Three days before Advent we gathered pine from a large pine forest nearby. I had the pleasure of helping make thewreath, which we hung from the living room ceiling. ¯ With its four candles. magenta-colored ribbons and fresh green l~ine it was a beautiful re-minder of the season of preparation for the great Feast of the Nativ-ity as well as of the long period of waiting for the first "coming .of Christ over 1900 years ago. Decorations in the house were c.hanged to conform with the spirit of the season, and each evening after sup-per, as we lit the candles, one the first week, two the second, and so on, and asked God's help and blessing, we seemed to come closer to the Divine Infant soon to be born again in our hearts on Christmas Day. It was during one of these evenings when all felt in a gay and joyous mood that we selected the °"jewels" for our decorated cross. We finally all agreed on the selection and then could hardly wait for Christmas to hang the beautiful cross with its sparkling stones of red, yellow and blue. Several trips were made to St. Louis and near- 246 September, 1953 RURAL PARISH WORKERS by towns for Christmas shoppi.ng ~and to pick up clothes, canned goods, toys and candy donated by generous friends for "the needy. Also to distribute gifts to our families and friends~ Miss Pat and Miss Christina returned for a week-e.nd to help with the toys, sacramentals, and candy for the children. We were all busily engaged in this task when the Auxiliary Bishop, Most Reverend Charles H. Helrrising, arrived for a short visit with the ¯ Parish Workers. He .gave us his blessing and told us to tell others ot the need for volunteers in this rural apostolate. The following week we packed food for all the needy people of the area. We could gix;e large boxes, due to the generosity of our friends. Gifts and candy were also prepared for our children in the Sunday classes. Several trips were made to the parish church with the station wagon full of people. We live eight miles from church and "many neighbors .would have no way to get to. confession or Holy Mass if it were not for the Parish Workers. Even on the day before Christmas as we worked on the Crib and tree, time was taken so that no one would miss the opportunity to receive Holy Communion on the great feast. As we finished trimming the tree we realized the season of prepa-ration bad ended. Gifts had been hung on the tree ready for the children when they came to visit during Christmas week. They would come with hearts full 6f joyand expectancy to receive their gifts. And we were ready, too . . ." for the greatest Gift of all, ~he Son of God Himself. At Vespers on Christmas Eve the lights from the four candles of the wreath flickered and caught in the jeWels of the decorated cross. A feel!ng of peace and joy filled each of us. Later when we drove with our neighbors to Midnight Mass we could almost hear the Angels singing, "Glory to God in the.highest . . ." And afterwards the gently falling snow seemed to enhance the feeling of peace and love as all exchanged the Merry Christmas greeting. I have written of many things during my first six months with the Rural Parish Workers. There are many more, all pointed to the development of Christian homes, wi~:h interest in government, edu-cation, culture and religious welfarel But you have not the time, ¯ nor I the space to include them here. UPon reading this you may. ti~ink all is Work and no play. But that is not true. Recreation is impor~tar~t in the life of a Parish. Worker. And in the evening you may find us reading, listening to. 247 SISTER M. AGNESINE, Review [or Religious the radio, playing cards, doing hand work according to one's inte~- "ests, and occasionally going to a movie. This summer we even took time out to, go swimming, hiking, picnicking, or for an evening drive. You see, we are just one happy family and all share in one another's joys or" sorrows, working, praying and p, laying together for the glory of God and the service, of.our neighbors. " If I intend becoming a Rural Parish Worker I must spend a pe-riod of reading and instruction, and learning what my duties would be in this area or any area to which I may be sent. Already I have seen the need of the work and the good the Parish Workers are doing. So I say, "God bless them and all their under-takings, and please send more workers for this vineyard." Paging !:he Religion Teacher Sister M. Agnesine, S.S.N.D. " " THE story is told of a prosperous business man who claimed that allMs success was due to a single statement left him as a legacy by his father: "My son, when everything goes wrong with you and ill luck seems to pursue you, then look around and see where you are mismanaging things." Instead of throwing up our hands in despair, as we realize the cryi~ag needs of a world strayed far from its. Maker, suppose that we, too, look around to see whether by any chance we religion teachers might be mismanaging things. Making Religion a Living Reality Granted that we are thoroughly equipped, theologically and in-tellectually, what else is required to assure our success? Let us as-sume that we teach our religion classes regularly and cgnscientiously. We may even boast that our pupils know all the answers. But have we any assurance that they also accept these truths and are prepared to live them? In other words, have we set their hearts on fire with love and motivated their wills with .a strong determination to live their religion intelligently and consistently all th'rough life? Their words alone are not sutticient assurance: neither is their more or less praiseworthy conduct in school. Their religion must be a-living re-ality. It must be~:gme so much a part, of their being that they can- 248 SeptemSer, 1953 PAGING THE RELIGION TEACHER not. lose it without losing life itself. To imbue children with such. a living faith means more than merely teaching Christian Doctrine. It means keeping in mind the fundamental needs of our times and directing pupils to meet these needs according to God's plan. It means, therefore, to help them un~derstand and appreciate God's complete ownership of the world and all it holds, and instilling in them a deep reverence for His au-thority. ,It means helping them to evaluate the things of time in the light of eternity; of making them seeall of life from God's point of view. It means preparing them to meet the problems of life, whether as humble employees, as members of a Christian family, or as leaders of a nation. It means impressing them with a sense of responsibility not only toward God but toward their fellowmen, whom they must recognize as members of the My.stical Body of Christ. It means, finally, giving them a sense of direction, so that they will always and above all things keep clearly in view their eternal destiny. Knou)ing Not Onlg What But Also Hou) to Teach How can the religion teacher,acco, mplisb so tremendous a task? He dare not excuse himself by saying that it is primarily the function of the home to train theyoung for Christian living. For, while he cannot, exempt parents from their duties, the wise teacher will first re-establish Christian ideals in the home through the boys and girls in his classes by teaching them to understand and accept the responsi-bilities of Christian marriage and Christian family life. All of this means more than imparting knowledge. It is not the printed or spoken word alone, no matter bow important in itself, that is necessarily convincing. If the teacher is to gain the desired effect, be must know not only u)bat to teach but how to teach. He must not only inform the pupil's mind but also aim to arouse his emotions to love the faith and to move his will to accept and live it. "Religion is no use" says Father Drinkwater, "until it is accepted and" lived." Teaching b~j Example To teach religion for Christian li~ing, therefore, we must pene-trate the thick shell of modern materialism which surrounds the n~en-tality of even our Catholic pupils. But to be able to do so, we must first of all be living examples of the truths we teach. To the young--. and to the old as well--we are the Church, ~ve are religion, we are 249 SISTER M. AGNESINE Review [or Religious Christ. And unless we outrival in all that is ¯good and true,.in all that is. noble and beautiful in the highest sense Of tl~e ~word, those who, knowingly or otherwise, contrive to shape .the aims, the atti-tudes, and the ideals of the young, we cannot hope to influence them for life. If we.teach that religion must take prec.edence over all other values in life and that therefore the religion lesson is the most imPor-tant of all subjects on the program, then we ourselves ¯will have to put first things first and prove by our regularity and zeal that we mean what we say. Then, too, we will quite naturally do all in our power to make the lesson the most fascinating and interesting sub-ject taught in the school. That means, ir~ the second place, that the teacher must have some knowledge of the techniques of teaching. All too many instructors of religion are still under the impression that all they need to do is to explain the subject ~ind that the child will naturally imbibe what is being said. They do not realize that in spite of a seemingly atten-tive attitude, the pupil is often miles ~way during the religion period : like the boy who, after hearing a long explanation of what it means to be selfish and unselfish, innocently asked the teacher what kind of fish that was. Making the Lesson Purposeful and Effectit)e The following questions may help the teacher to see more clearly whether the proper means are being used to make the lesson effective. Do I know how best to appeal to the child's heart, in language adapted to his age and ability? Do I strive not only to teach the Catechism lesson but more particularly to give children a lasting love and appreciation of those sacred truths? If they are leaving the Cath-olic school or study group shortly after these instructions, am I rea-sonably sure that I have instilled into their hearts the desire to grow in the knowledge and love of their faith, through the grace of the sacraments and also through a desire for further study and readir~g? Do I have a fund of convincing illustrations and stories, prefer-ably out of everyday life, that come close to the experience and un-derstanding of my pupils, so that they will the more' readily retain what I have tried to impress upon. them? Do I giye my students an opportunity to do things for them-selves, to ask questions, and think things througb.? Or do I do all the talking myself and take it for granted that th~ pupils are thinking and learning? 250 SISTER M. AGNESlNE, Review for Religious Do I know how to motivate their wills to action so that th~ knowledge of the truths they have learned will carry over to future years? When I teach the Mass, for example, do my pupils giadually learn to live and apply its beautiful prayers and lessons to themselves, not only for the present but especially for th~ years to come? Do I aim to bridge the gap between the day's seemingly unrelated lesson to tomorrow's realities? The sacrament of matrimony with all its implications is a case in point. How well do I prepare espe-cially those pupils who are about to leave the Catholic school, to ac-cept and appreciate the Church's teachings on the subject, and to lay firm hold on high ideals of Christian family life for future use? Am I familiar with the many teaching aids that are at my dis-posal to make my work more interesting and to help deepen the im-pression? Do I know how to use them to the best advantage? There are charts and pictures, fil~ns and slides in abundance. Can I distin-guish between what is most helpful and what is merely ~ntertaining? Do I realize the importance of making careful preparation for the daily.lesson? To outline my objectives? To divide the subject mat-ter according to its imporian~e and time allotment? To test pupil knowledge and particularly to evaluate my own teaching? reading By wrong, things. Acquiring Skill in Techniques How can the religion teacher acquire a fuller knowledge of those procedures that will best insure success? Here are a few suggestions: By accepting wholeheartedly the~ responsibility to teach ~eligion for living, that is, in a manner that will help those whom he teaches to lead fully integrated Christian lives. By keeping an open mind and realizing that no matter how ex-perienced or learned he may become, there is always room for im-- provement. " By prayerfully and conscientiously preparing the daily lessons and by carefully thinking the subject matter through himself, so that he may present it most effectively. .By keeping in touch with modern methods of teaching, through and lectures, and by observing experts in the field. looking around occasionally, especially when things go to see whether by any chance he might be mismanaging If, then, we are willing to face our problems and to set about en-thusiastically learning how to meet them, we may hope to add our little share in the great work of restoring 'all things in Christ. 251 Prac :ice: ot: !:he I-Ioly . ee Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. ~ T IS both profitable and commendable for religious to study the ~ d0~uments of the Holy See that affec~ their state of life., .This is particularly true at present, when the Sacred Congregation of Religious is exercising a more .positive and directive influence on the lives of religious. This article is devoted prin~ipally to' documents addr,essed to individual religious institutes. These are evidently not a matter of general knowledge but they are of general utility, since they reveal the practice and thee principles of the Holy See. I. ERECTION AND PONTIFICAL. APPROVAL OF CONGREGATIONS 1.Constituti.ons of. a new diocesan congregation. For at least the licit erection of a new diocesan congregation, the local Ordinary must first consult the Sacred ,Congregation of Religious.1 This. con-sultation is to be addressed to the S. C. of the Propagation of the Faith for the .erection of native congregations in missionary countries. Diocesafi constitutions should be compiled in conformity with the Code of Canon Law and the practice of the Holy See as found in the approved constitutions of pontifical congregations. They ate to dif-fer from pontifical constitutions only in the matters proper to dioce- .san congregations. For the attainment of this end the practice of the S. C. of the Propagati~'n of the Faith had already commanded that after the erection of the new congregation: "The Constitutions of the new congregation, in Latin and in the vernacular (at least six copies), must as soon as possible be submitted to this Sacred Congregation so that they may be duly examined, amended, and returned with suit-able remarks to the Ordinary, to be approved by him.''2 The S. C. of Religious now follows the same practice and demands that the local Ordinary present the complete text of the 'constitutions with the con-sultation for the erection of the new diocesan congregation.3 At least one author had previously recommended such a practice to local Or-dinaries.~ The fear, already expressed by some authors, that this oractice 1Can. 492. § 1. 2Bouscaren, II, 158, n. 10. 3Larraona, CpR, XXVIII (1949), 228, nota ). 4Muzzarelli, n. 53. 252 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE will ~ause an excessive similarity in the constitutions of various insti-tutes can be avoided by greater care in the. compil~tion of the spir-itual, as distinct from the canonical, ~rticles of the constitutions. The practice will also preclu,de the opposition that often arises when the ihstitute wishes to become pontifical. This opposition is usually con-cerned" with matters that are thought to be new but which should have been contained in the diocesan constitutions of the congregation, for example,~e system of delegates for the. general chapter and the six-year term~'Bf the superior general. 2. Mbtters to be presented fora decree of praise. A diocesan con-gregat! on ordinarily becomes pontifical by a decree of praise, With which the Holy See practically always now grants an experimental approval of the constitutions for seven years. The conditions neces-sary for pontifical approval are: the congregation by a sufficient test~ of time should have given proof of stability, religious observance, and of spirituai profit in its work; it is sufficient that the congregation number one hundred and fifty ~nembers and.is not necessary that the congregation have houses in more than one diocese. These facts are established primarily from the testimonial letters of the local Ordi-naries. To obtain a decree of praise the following matters are to be sent to the S. C. of Religious: a) A petition for the decree, of praise addressed to the Ron~an Pontiff and signed by the superior general and his or her c~uncillors. b) The testimonial letters of all the local Ordinaries in whose dioceses or territories the congregation has houses. Each local Ordi-nary is to send his letter directly to the S. Congregation. c) The"number of religious and houses. The S. Congregation will be aided in its judgment on the system of delegates for the gen-eral chapter !f the houses are listed in a tabular form that gives sepa-rarely the number of professed of perpetual and temporary vows in each house. d) The name in religion, full name in the world, and a brief biography of the founder or foundress and of the first superior of the congregation. e) The S. Congregation is to be informed of any extraordinary facts, such as visions and the like, .that occurred at the foundation of the congregation or thereafte~ and also of the special devotions and special and. favored religious exercises of the congregation. f) A copy of any special book of prayers in use in the congrega-tion. 253 ,JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious g) A colored picture of the habit of the professed and of the novices. h) 30 typed copies of the constitutions. These should prefer-ably be in Latin, but French or Italian is admissible. The constitu-tions should have been revised, for the new pontifical status and have been previously examined and approved by the local Ordinary of the motherhouse. They are to conform to the Code of Canon Law and the practice .of FheHoly See, and are to contain the norms and safe-guards necessary for attaining the special end of the c~regation. A recent form letter of the S. Congregati6n appears to demand only two copies of the constitutions, but it is not certain that the former num-ber of thirty is no longer obligatory,s i) Information is to be given as to the number of members who were formerly in other religious institutes. j) An historico-juridical account of the congregation from its beginning. k) A quinquennial report, which may be in the vernacular, for the five years immediately preceding the petition and compiled ac-cording to the questions of the new quinquennial report for pontifical institutes. 'A question that can apply only. to a pontifical institute will obviously not be pertinent. ¯ l) It is to be stated whether there are other religious institutes in the diocese with the same special purpose. m) If the congregation is a third order, an attestation of aggre-gation from the superior general of the first order must accompany the petition. n) The. superior general, with the consent of the local Ordinary of the motherhouse, is to designate a secular or religious priest resident in Rome to act as agent for the matter with the S. Congregation. 3. Miscellaneous details. The expense incurred at Rome for the de:- cree of praise is to be classed as insignificant. The. process can be quite slow. One American congregation mailed the necessary mat-ters to Rome in June, 1950, and received the reply in March, i953. During the pontificate of Pius XII (1939-1952) the decree of praise has been obtained by ninety-two congregations; the highest number in any one year was twelve;" and eight of the congregations listed have their motherbouses in the United States.6 4. Continuance of superiors in ottice. Muzzarelli states that on the scf. Guti,%rez, CpR, XXXIV (1953), 129. 6Cf.Guti~rrez, ibid., 130-138. 254 September, 1953 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE occasion of obtaining pontifical approval .or of a new approbation of the constitutions the general, provincial, and local superiors.remain in office but only for the time for which they had been elected or ap-pointed. At the expiration of this period a new election or appoint-ment is necessary. The ~ame principle is to be applied to general, provincial, and local councillors and officials. Canon la.w regulate.s precisely the duration in office of a local su-perior, who may not have more than two successive full three-year terms in the sam~ house inclusive of the time in office hnder the for-mer and the new constitutions. However, in the case of higher su-periors the Code merely.prescribes that they are to be temporary and leaves the determined legislation on the duration.and re-election or re-appointment to the constitutions. The almost universal practice of the Holy See in approving constitutions now gives the superior gen-eral a term of six years and permits an immediate re-election only for a second ttrm. A mother general who had two full six-year terms expiring after the approval of the new constitutions is fully eligible for a six-year term, and even for immediate re-election on the expira-tion of this term, under the newly approved constitutions. The time spent in office under the former constitutions is not to be computed, since these have now lost all force.7 II. LAW 1, Observance ot: laud. It is evidently the duty of superiors to en-force the exact observance of all the pertinent laws of the Church on religious, the Rule, and the constitutions. Negligence in the observ-ance of inual[dating laws on religious can have most serious conse-quences, and this is especially true of invalidating laws on the novice-. ship and professions. The S. C. of Religious gently admonished the superiors of one institute to be more diligent in the future in com-plying with all the laws on the noviceship and the professions. 2. Exaggerated custom books. Customs are necessary for order, effi-ciency, and reasonable uniformity, but some custom books have been too minute and oppressive. From unofficial reports and summaries this appears to have been the thought at the meeting of superioresses general of pontifical institutes held at Rome in September, 1952. Greater attention is to be given to the spirit of the law, since the law of any institute should be the incarnation of its spirit. Not many prayers, but prayer is what is necessary. Formalism, legalism, and ;Muzzarelli, pp. 206-207. 255 JOSgPH F. GALLEN ' Revietv for Religious externalism are to be avoided. The centering of the religious life in the fulfillment of innumerable details, formalities, and observances should be abandoned. Religious are magnanimgus souls who have sacrificed everything to attain and intensify the love of God, not fussy externalists. III. HABIT OF RELIGIOUS WOMEN 1. Form o~ the "~abit. Pius XII expressed the. general principle on the habit of religious women when he state~l that it should manifest the consecration to Christ, religious simplicity and modesty, and be in conformity with time, place, work, and hygiene.8 This norm does not demand any universal and fundamental change in the traditional habit of religious women. Furthermore, the prin, ciple is not new in the practice of the Holy See. The Normae of 1901 stated that the habit in material, form, arrangement, and color~ should conform to religious dignity, gravity, modesty, and poverty, and that "it should exclude any adornment that was apt to l~rovoke adverse comment or ridicule.9 In its typical constitutions for diocesan missio.nary con-gregations the S. C. of tl~e Propagation of the' Faith enjoined: "The habit is to be simple, accommodated to the usages of the people and the climate and not to European customs.''1° In the Statutes for Ex-tern Sisters the S. C. of Religious cdmmanded that the habit of these sisters was to be suitably adapted to their external work and also to external and local circumstances.1~ Sincere reverence for the religio~s habit does not exclude neces-sary modifications. The more practical doubts that arise about some habits seem to be of the following nature: Is sufficient allowance made in .the habit as a whole for the heat of summer and the cgld of winter? The cove~ing of tl~e head and face often causes a questiQn in the chance observer by its stiffness, closeness, ornateness, the time evi-dently necessary for laundering, the extension of the covering beyond the face, and in a.few cases this part of the habit appears to be pro-vocative of adverse comment. We may be permitted one illustration of these observations. The extension beyond the, face does not con-tribute to safety in driving an au.tomobile, frequently makes conver-sation somewhat unnatural, and ~nust be an obstacle in such cases as working on .a patient with a doctor. This is not the most serious SAAS, 43 (1951), 741; 44 (1952),.825. . 9Normae of 1901, nn. 66-67. ' lONormae pro Constitutionibus" Cong(egationum luris Dioecesani, n. 19. IIStatuta a Sororibus Externis Seruanda, n. 26. 256 September, 1953 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE defect that has b~en noted in some religious habits. The sane and practical principles of the Holy See are clear in themselves. Each habit should be sincerely examined on its conformity with these prin-ciples. 2. White habit. The Holy See has f~equently approved in constitu'- tions an ;irticl~ permitting the use of the white habit to hospital sis-ters and to those for whom such dress is necessitated or counselled by other duties or the climate. This habit is accordingly in use in sev-" eral institutes in the infirmary, kitchen, in teaching home economics, and. in similar duties. We can argue safely from the practic~ of the Holy See that such a use of th~ white habit is permitted in all insti-tutes of religious women. The white habit should be as similar as possibl'e to the ordinary habit within the demands of hospital effi-ciency, which is its primary use. The ordinary habit does not have. to be worn under the white habit. 3. Change in the habit. A change in the habit of a pontifical insti-tute or of a diocesan congregation whose habit had been submitted to the judgment of the Holy See may not be made wit,ho,ut the permis-sion of the Holy See; in other diocesan congregations the permissior{ of all the Ordinaries in whose dioceses the congregation has houses is necessary and sufficient.12 Since the habit ik prescribed by the consti-tutions, a change must also have been previously approved by the general chapter. It can be safely held that only a change in the ex-ternal appearance of the habit demands these formalities. The Nor-mae of 1901 required the permission of the S. Congregation only for a change in the appearance (t:orrna) of the habit,13 and the Holy See approves constitutions that demand the permission of the S. Congre-gation only for a change-in the form or color. These constitutions. permit the mother general with at least the advice of her council to, make other changes in the habit, for example, in the material, and this norm should be followed by all institutes for a change that does hot affect the externa! appearance of the habit. IV. DOWRY AND RENUNCIATION OF PATRIMONY IN CONGREGATIONS l. Dowrg. The dowry'is and always has been proper to institutes of women. An amount larger than the one prescribed may be re-ceived as a dowry. An institute that does not exact a dowry may ~2Can. 495, '§ 2. 13Normae of 1901, n. 70; cf. n. 69. 257 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Reviev2/:or Religious receive a dowry that is f~eely offered as such. A subject may give, comple'te, or augment a dowry during the novic~ship and after first or final simple profession. In all the cases listed above the amount that may be given is unlimited, but any amount accepted as a dowry is subject to the laws on the dowry. ' These statements are accepted canonical doctrine.14 2. Renunciation of patrimong in'a congregation of women. The point here can be more clearly proposed in the form of a case. Sister M. Anita, a professed sister in a congregation, has a patrimony of $50,000. She wishes to give the entire amount to her institute, but can. 583, 1°, forbids her, whether her congregation is pontifical or diocesan, to give away this money during her life without a _dispensa-tion from the Holy See. When asked recently for such a dispensa-tion, the S. Congregation replied that the sister, without any permis-sion. of the Holy See~ could give the money to her institute as a dowry or as an increase in her dowry. If the institute wishes to spend any part of the $50,000, permission of the Holy See will be necessary, because can. 549 forbids the expenditure of the dowry. This per-missio, n will be given if the. institute furnishes satisfactory guarantee of returning the capital sum to the sister in the event of her departure from the institute. The interest on the $50,000 is acquired abso-lutely by the institute, but the capital sum must be restored to Sister M. Anita if she definitively leaves the institute, licitly or illicitly, whether her vows have been dispensed or not,15 This is the prefer-able solution of the case, since it was proposed by the S. Congrega-tion itself. The same solution may be followed in any congregation of reli-gious women for either a professed or a novice. A dowry given during the noviceship passes into the revocable proprietorship of the institute only at first profession and thus is not a violation of can. 568, which invalidates any renunciation or obligation that a novice places on his or her patrimony during the noviceship.16 The institute is the mere depositary of the dowry, without p~oprietorship, use, or usufruct during the postulancy and noviceship. 3. Renunciation of patrimonV in a congregation of men or women. The prohibitior~ of can. 583, 1°, quoted above, applies to all congre-gations of men Or women. However, according to the common in- 14Cf. q. 194 of the Quinquennial Report [or Pontifical Institutes. 1SCan. 551, § I. 16Cf. Larraona, CpR, XIX (1938), nora 17. 258 September, 1953 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE terpretation, this prohibition does not ~xtend to the case in which t'he patrimony is given away, wholly or partially, on the agreement and with secure guarantee that it will be restored if- the religious should leave the institute or be dismissed. Professed religious in congrega-tions of men may thus follow this solution, for example, to give their patrimony to their institute. If this solution is follbwed, no law of the Code obliges the institute to secure the permission of the Holy See for the spending of the money. 4. Partial renunciation of patrimony in a congregation of men or women. Without any permission .of the Holy See, professed reli-gious iri congregations of men or women may with safe pr6bability give away absolutely to anyone even a large part of their patrimony provided the amount retained is sufficient to take care of the support of the religious in the event of departure from the.institute. A patri-mony that is. so small as to be entirely inadequate for such support does not fall under the prohibition of can. 583, 1% and may be given away absolutely to anyone,a7 5. New tendency in povert~l of congregations. There are indications that some wish the poverty arising from the simple vow in congre-gations to be made the same or at least to approach more closely the poverty effected by solemn profession, for example, by permitting the professed of simple perpetual vows in congregations to give away all their patrimony.~8 Only one known concession has thus far been granted by the Holy See in this matter. An institflte of religious women of simple vows obtained the following indult from the Holy See in February, 1951: "With the consent of the Prioress General and of bet Council, and upon a favourable report from the Mother .I_n_st_ructor, the religiou.s __m_a.y.at. tb.e _e.n_~ of .tb_e!_r tert.ianship, that is, about ten years after their first profession in the Institute, and pro-vided they have made perpetual vows, renounce their personal prop-erty present and future in favour of the persons or institutions whom they judge before God to merit their preference." V. ADMISSION OF ASPIRANTS The following articles, found in some constitutions recently ap-proved by the Holy See, will be of interest to other institutes. The candidate is obliged to present a testimonial of her free state, that is, lvCf. Bastien, n. 543, 3; Larraona. CpR, II (1921), 71-76. lSCf. Acta et Documenta Congressus Generalis de Statibus Perfectionis, I, 377,429- 431. 259 3OSEPH'F. GALLEN " Ret~ietu for .Religious ¯ of her freedom from impediments. The testimonial of good character is to ,be obtained from the pastor or another known priest. ,The S. Congregation inserted the following article in one set of' constitu-tions: "The Mother General is to interrogate accuratgly on the mat-ter of health, especially concerning diseases that are classed as heredi-tary, and she is to record in writing the replies of both the aspirant and her.parents or guardians." VI. P0STULANCY Although the practice of the Holy See was said to demand that the time of the postul~ncy be accurately determined in the constitu-tions, thre'e sets of constitutions recently approved for congregations of sisters state this time only indefinitely, that is, "for .at least six months," and "not less than six months." A. congregation 6f sisters, whose postulancy is six months, re-quested and,received from the Holy See an indult for fivel years to prolong the postulancy two and a half months for all. This pro-longation will make it possible to complet~ a full coll~ge year during the postulancy. The Apostolic Delegate possesses the faculty of shortening or prolonging the postulancy prescribed by canon law.19 VII. SECOND YEAR OF NOVICESHIP 1. Dispensation. Canon law commands only one year of novice-ship, but many institutes prescribe a second year by the law of their own constitutions. The Holy See evidently does not wish an insti-tute to make a ~practice of asking dispensations from this second year. One pontifical congregation added the second year only recently, and {he Holy See granted an indult for three yeats to one of its provinces to have only. one year of noviceship. The province was.in extra-ordinary and urge.nt need of personnel. 2. Ernptogment in external" works. On November 3, 1921, the "S. C. of Religious issued an Instruction for all congregations, pon-tifical and diocesan, on the employment of novices in the external works of the institute during the second year of noviceship. " The Holy See inserts the principles of this Instruction in the constitutions of pontifical congregations. They should, therefore, be contained also in'diocesan constitutions, either approved 6riginally or revised after the promulgation of the Instruction.' These princil~!es are: (a) The spiritual formation proper to the noviceship.must be pri- 19Bouscaren, 1948 Supplement, 131. 260 September, 1953 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE mary in the second year, employment in external works secondary. (b) This employment is allowable only if permitted by the consti- . tutions, custom, or usage of the congregation. (c) The only licit motive for such employment is the instruction of the novices, never th,e utility or advantage of the congregaiion. (d) The employment is to be carried out witb.~ruderice and moderation. Novices are never to have the sole charge of any external employment but are to work under the direction and supervision of an experienced and exemMary religious. (e) Novices may not be sent out of the novitiate house for such employment unless this is permitted by the constitutions, custom, or usage and the motive is exceptional, extraordinary, seri-otis, and based solely on ~be requirements of the. novice's t~aining, never on the necessity or advantage of the congregation. (F) All such employments must be given up for the two full months pre-ceding first profession, and this time is to be devoted wholly to svir-itual formation and to preparation for profession in the novitiate house?0 A congregation of sisters stated simply in a quinq.uennial report that i~ employed the second-year novices in external works. The reply of the Holy See contained the statement that the Instruction quoted above was to be observed.21 An unofficial summary of the Roman meeting of superioresses general quotes the Secretary of the S. Congregation, Father Larraona, as having r~asserted the principles of the Instruction. He is also reported as having stated that there are always dangers attendant upon this work outside the novitiate. The motive for a second year of noviceship has b~en the necessity of a deeper spiritual formation in institutes, devoted to a very active life. This motive is verified in practically all modern congre, gations. No one experienced in the training of young religious will deny that two years are too brief a period for a proper spiritual formation. It is not very reasonable to prescribe prudently a second year of novice-ship in law and then imprudently overturn the law in fact. This is the reason why the S. Congregation insists on the fundamental prin-ciple that the second year must be maintained as a year of novicesbip. Employment outside the novitiate house should be even mor~ care-fully avoided. The practical consequence of separation from the master or mistress o'f novices is almost always'the lack of any spir-itual formation proper to a noviceship. A sincere examination of the ~°Bouscaren I, 302-304. ¯ 21Cf. q. 176 of the Quinquenn:,al Ro~ort for Pontifical Institutes. 261 JOSEPH F. (3ALLEN ReOiew for Religio,,s effects of employing the second-yehr novices in external works will lead to a more universal observance of this most important Instruc-tion of the Holy See. VIII. PROFESSION I. Dispensation from longer period of temporary vows. The Code of Canon Law prescribes that a perpetual profession, solemn or simple, is invalid unless preceded by three full years of temporary vows.zz Only the Holy See may wholly or partially abbreviate this triennium in any institute; since the abbreviation would be a dispen-sation from the law of the Roman Pontiff. The same principle and reason are true with regard to permitting perpetual profession before the completion of the twenty-first year.23 Some institutes impose a longer period of temporary vows by the law of tfieir own constitutions. This period is usually five, much more rarely six, years. These added years are required only for the liceity o~ perpetual profession unless the constitutions certainly de~ mand them for validity. The latter is practically never permitted by the Holy See in approving constitutions. The constitutions of one pontifical congregation of brothers state that the prescribed five years of temporary .vows are required for the validity of its simple per-petual profession. ¯ In diocesan congregations the local Ordinary may dispense from the entir~ added duration of temporary vows if it is required only for the liceity of perpetual profession24 and probably also when it is demanded for the validity of the latter,25 since he is the legislator for such congregations.~6 Many canonis~s would very likely demand that the dispensation be secured from the Holy See in the latter case, if we mawr argue from their similar doctrine on a dispensation from the second.year of noviceship. The local Ordinary has no power to dispense in this matter in pontifical congregations. Some authors .permitted the religious superior who admits to perpetual profession to abbreviate briefly the added duration of tem-porary vows, for example, to dispense from three months of a six-year period, but they restricted this faculty to the case. in which the 2ZCan. 572, § 2; 574, § 1. ~Can. 572, § 1, I°;. 573; 574, § 1. z4Cf. Bouscaren, II, 167. 25Cf. Regatillo," Interpretatio et lurisprudentia, 172; Instituti'ones furls Canonici, I, n. 698. Z6Can. 492, § 2: 495, § 2; 80. 262 September, 1953 PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE added duration was required only for the liceity of perpetual pro-fession. 27 However, in the constitutions of pontifical congregations recently approved, the S. C. of Religious ,has been adding the clause that the Holy Seealone may dispense wholly or partially from the added duration, even when required only for the liceity of perpetual profession. Therefore, the faculty of abbreviation given to religious superiors in the doctrine of authors quoted above is more probably not true. The better doctrine is that they possess this power only if it is expressly granted to them by a general or. particular principle of their law. Otherwise any dispensation from the added duration in pontifical congregations should be secured from the Holy See .and in diocesan congregations from the local Ordinary. 2. Prolongation of temporary prot:ession beyond six years forbidden. The point here also can be more clearly proposed in a case. Brotl~er Francis Joseph made his temporary profession at the age of seven-teen. His profession extended to the completion of his twenty-first ~'ear. At the latter time and after the brother has spent four years in temporary vows, his higher superior is doubtful of his suitability for perpetual profession. May this superior prolong the temporary vows for another three years? Tlhe source of the difficulty is can. 574, § 2, which states: "The legitimate superior may prolong this period but not beyond a second term of three years . " The more probable interpretation of this canon has been that a pro.longation is illicit if thereby the entire pe-riod of temporary vows exceeds six years. The. contrary opinion was admitted to be probable and safe. One of the arguments for the first opi.nion has been the practice of the Holy See. The S. C. of Religious has constantly admitted a prolongation of only one year when the constitutions prescribed five years of temporary vows and has excluded any prolongation when the constitutions imposed six years of temporary vows. It was con-cluded that the S. Congregation did not wish the period of temporary vows to exceed six years. This argument is strengthened by the cur-rent practice of the S. Congregation, since recently approved consti-tutions contain the explicit statement that the entire period of tem-porary vows may not exceed six years. Furthermore, Larraona states that the 1)emporary profession may never be prolonged beyond six years without violating the Code and affirms that this has been de- 27Cervia, 128; Goyeneche, CpR, IX (1928), 325; Schafer, n. 973. 263 J(~SEPH F. G?~LLEN for Religious tided in plenary sessions of the S. Congregation and in audiences.28 He and Guti~rrez state that this same doctrine is based on a reply of the Code~ Commission, has been the constant in(erpretation and prac-tice of the S. CongrFgation, and conclude that a prolongation beyond six years in any institute demands an indult of the Holy See?9 This conclusion is justified by the arguments, even though the reply of the Code Commission has not been published. The solution of the case given at the beginning of t.bis number is accordingly that the vows of Brother Francis Joseph may be pro-longed for two years but a prolo,ngation beyond the six years de-mands an indult from the Holy See, whether the institute is pontifical or diocesan. 3. Place of first ternporar~lprofession. Can. 574, § 1, commands for liceity that the first temporary profession be made in the novitiate house. The Code prescribes nothing concerning the place of sub'se-quent temporary professions nor of perpetual profession, solemn or . simple. Constitutions frequently explicitly state that these may be made in" any house of the institute. For a proportionate reason, the S. C. of Religious.will grant a dispensation permitting the first temporary profession to be m~ide outside the novitiate house. If a motherhouse is under the authority of the one local superior and consists of a novitiate, juniorate, ter-tianship, and an academy for girls, the first profession may be made in any part of such a motberhous~ without a dispen.sation from the Holy See. The canon does not demand that the first profession be made within the part of the house reserved for or used by the novices but in the novitiate bourse. Th.erefore, a first profession m~ide any- .where in the latter satisfies the prescription of this canon. 4. Private devotional renetoal of vows. Constitutions approved by the Holy See often counsel th~ freqiient private .renewal of vows, especially after the reception of Holy Communion. Such constitu-tions usually add that special indulgences are attached t'o the latter ¯ practice. It is true that an indulgence, of three years is attached to such a renewal after the celebration of Mass or the reception of Holy Communion,3° but it is difficult to see why such a fact should be men-tioned in the constitutions, which are to contain.the more funda-mental laws of the institute. ,- 2SLarraona, CpR, XXVIII (1949), 196, nota 17. ~Larraona-Guti~rrez, ibid., 332~ .nota 42. 3ORaccolta, n. 695. 264 September, 1953 5. Special vows. The Holy~ See manifested from at least 1892 that it would no longer approve special vows in new institutes.31 The -same principle has been reaffirmed on more than one occasion. congregation of sisters, approved by the Holy See before 1850, re-cently asked the S. Congregation of Religious for an authentic inter-pretation of its constitutions on the. existence of a fourth and fifth vow. The S. Congregation in its first reply affirmed the existence of ¯ both vows, since the language of the formula of profession and the history of the matter clearly indicated that these were intended as special vows. The fourth vow was the ser'~ice of the poor, sick, and ignorant. This is especially the 'type of vow'that the Holy See will not ~dmit in new institutes, since it constitutes the special end of the institute, is already an obligation of the constitutions, and is accordingly pri-mary remot~ matter of the vow of obedience. The fifth vow, taken also in temporary profession, was that ofperseverance. A. second reply of the S. Congregation clarified this fifth vow: "The fifth vow of persevering in the same vows is to be understood in the following sense. The obligation of persevering temporarily or perpetually, ac-cording to the mind and practice of this Sacred Congregation, is in-cluded in the temporary or perpetual profession. Accordingly the words of the formula of profession on perseverance are not to be ¯ understood in th~ sense of another vow." The Holy See and authors have also defined the special vow of stability, taken in imitation of the Benedictine vow, as being con-tained in the obligation of perpetual profession,aa The vow of s~a-bility of Benedictine Sisters is defined: "By the vow of stability the Sisters attach themselves to the hbuse of their profession and ufiite themselves with the religious family there existing, and promise never to 'wrest their necks from under the yoke of the Rule.' " It is not impossible to find different and approved definitions of these special vows in theconstitutions of pon.tifical institutes, for example, that of stability. IX. TELEPHONE AND RADIO In a recent approval of the constitutions of a congregation of sis-ters, the H01y See inserted the.article: "The use of the telephone and alBattandier, n. 186¯ 32Normae'of 1901, n. 102¯ 33Bastien, n. 481. 2: Battandier, n. 187. 265 ,JOSEPH F. (3ALLEN ,Review [or Religious radio is to be regulated by the superior." In its reply to the quin-quennial report of the same type of congregation, the Holy See stated: "Listening to the radio in private does not appear becoming; therefore it would be better to forbid it." X. WORKS OF THE INSTITUTE § 1 Teaching Sisters and School~ 1. duniorates. This section on the works of the institute contains the most practical matter of this article. Unless otherwise noted, the articles quoted in this section have been inserted by the Holy See in constitutions approved during the past two or three years. The articles on the juniorate are: "After their profes,sion the Mother General shall assemble the junior professed in houses of formation, where, under the direction of a competent, l~Iistress, they shall attend Catholic schools, if. such exist. They shall be supplied with all m~ans necessary' for the pur-pose and shall apply themselves diligently to the attainment of diplo-mas that will be recognized also civilly." ¯ "During this time of formation it will be profitable to supple-ment the classes with lectures and instructions by learned Catholics, who shall emphasize the relation of teaching with Catholic faith and morals." The question of juniorates was discussed at the meeting o~ the superioresses general in Rome. The value and necessity of juniorates were clearly seen, but their immediate initiation, program, extension, and duration were left. to the individual institutes. The necessity of appointing a special Mistress of Junior Professed, distinct from the local superior, . was stated more categorically. It is to be noted that the article quoted above is far more absolute than the unofficial ,re-ports of the Roman meeting. I doubt that any experienced higher superior of congregatio,ns of brothers or sisters denies the necessity of juniorates for the proper spiritual formation and education of subjects. I personally believe that the necessity of juniorates has passed the point of discussion and opinion; it is now a matter of conviction and urgency. Congrega-tions of brothers and sisters should immediately institute a juniorate. This means that the junior professed will not be applied to the ex-ternal works of the institute until they. have completed their under-graduate studies. Extyerience proves that there is only one way of attaining this supremely important object: the superior general must 266 September, PRACTICE OF THE HOLY rise to his or her strongest moment and command it. Let no one swell the low notes of those who chant mournfully that it cannot be done: whaf has been done can be done. If the argument is proposed that the junior professed should be tested in the external works and life of the institute before perpetual profession, the answer is easy. The institute can study the expediency of increasing, with proper permission, the prescribed period of temporary vows to five or six years. The juniorate for those destined to be nurses will require study and investigation for the attainment of a suitable program. 2. Preparation for perpetual profession. This number and the pre-. ceding apply equally to brotbe~s and sisters destined for works other than teaching. At the Roman meeting of superioresses general the withdrawal of the junior professed from the ordinary life of the in-stitute for one or several months of renovation of spirit and of deeper and more mature spiritual formation before perpetual profession ap-pears to have been authoritatively favored. However, this can scarcely be held as necessary if the institute has an-adequate junior-ate. It will also be very close to the noviceship, since most institutes have only three years of temporary vows. While I do not deny the merit of this suggestion, it seems to me to be far more necessary for institutes of brothers and sisters to study the initiation of such a program several years after perpetual profession, when the religious has spent more years in the ordinary life and works of the institute and is in the age group of thirty to thirty-five. This is the critical age for religious. The vision and heart of spiritual youth have often suffered a slow death from worldliness, selfishness, the gradual e'xclu-sion of mortification, the abandonment of real prayer, and the de-structive, disillusioning, and even embittering example of others. It is. the age that needs spiritual revivification and rejuvenation. If this is not had, the soul can readily grow old with the body and crawl into eternity as enfeebled by mediocrity as the body is by age. A longer period is desirable, but it would be sufficient to devote one full summer to such a renovation. This plan does not exclude the advisability of the renovation before perpetual profession, but the necessity, value, intensity, and duration of such a renovation would depend on the length of the noviceship, the existence of a juniorate, the number of years spent in the active life, and the adop-tion of the later renovation here recommended. 3. Continuation of studies after the junforate. "After they have received their diplomas, it is the duty of the 267 JOSEPH F.'GAIzLEN Rebiew For Religious Sisters t6 advance their k~towledge by unremitting study anal reading of the books that are constantly being published." Th~ sense of this article admits no doubt, but its present observ-ance is more than doubtful; It is safe to assert that the daily average time granted to sisters for preparation for class and advancement is about an hour. If this is sufficient for preparation for class and ad-vancement, it seems equally safe to hold that only a genius may am-bition the life of a sister. ¯ The article is merely a dictate of common sense for instittites de-voted, to teaching. It will never be properly observed unless careful thought is given to such headings¯ as the following: learning is not incompatible with true piety: a solid and inspiring education in the juni0rate; the elimination of interminable vocal prayers in common: the realization tbat some spiritual duties may be made privately; the quick and painless death of the restlesshorarium that finds peace only in the clangor of. the bell; peaceful acquiescence in the fact that study in'one's room or cell is not forbidden by the natural'or canon law:~ sufficient sleep, holidays, and vacations; .a notable lessening of the time given to domestic work; the employment of more lay teachers and more secular help for domestic work; finally and especially; the elimination of the present totally unreasonable overwork. We can aptly add the admonition given by the Holy See in its reply to the quinquennial report of one institute. There are very few institutes of brothers and sisters that cannot profit by. this ~idmoniti6n: "If possible, something should be done to correct the situation whereby the' sisters, exhausted by excessive labor, are apparently exposed to many difficulties and dangers and consequently fail in carrying out, the religious life." An unofficial summary of the Roman meeting ~f superioresses general contains some very pertinent thoughts on this heading. Let us hope that the superiors subscribed .to these thoughts as actualities to be attained and not as 'the dreams of a waning summer. These thoughts are: "Maternai care must be taken of the health of the religious; the work of each must be orderly and moderate; each religious must have time for her exercises of piety." "The schedules must always be reasonable and adapted to the various regions and apostolic ministries today confided to religious." "In their individual houses, the Superiors General will provide for all the Religious the possibility and facility; 'of a Christian life 268 September, 1953 PRACTICE OF: THE HOLY SEE (with the Sacraments, the Word of God, Spiritual Direction, etc.) and of Religious life with the posiibility of carrying out the duties imposed on them by their consecration to God (day~ of Retreat, Spir-itual Exercises, and spiritual practices common to the individual In-stitute) ." "It must be remembered that the a~ostolate is also a science and an art and that the Holy See insists on the elevation of the literary. technical and professional culture of the Religious, on the absolute necessity of degrees required for the exercise of the various profes-sions: on the necessity of aspirin~ to a greater degree of proficiency, never thinking that one's culture is adequate f9r the present need." 4. Progress and annual meeting. "The Congregation is to adopt, the prhisewortby custom of an annual meeting of all the Sister teachers, under the presidency of the Mother General. for a discussion of methods of teaching and of the traditional pedagogy of the Congregation, in order that the schools of the Congregation may not only equal but surpass secular schools." 5. Subjects at~o to be studied. The following article will encourage those who are promoting courses of theology for brothers or sisters. Such a course should be partially completed in the juniorate. "They ar~ to study also dogmatic and moral theology, ecclesiasti-cal history, sociology, liturgy, Gregorian chant, and similar matters. For all of these studies the Sisters are to be" supplied with books for their individual and constant use." 6. Library. The community library, especially in small religious houses, can readily be neglected. If we had the pen and unction of Kempis, we would lament that the food of the modern monk is more abundant than his books. The library should be augmented con-stantly with books appert~aining to the subjects taught in the school and also with newly published spiritual and cultural books. The article of the Holy See On the library is: "Each house shall have a library containing Catholic books on the entire field of pedagogy." 7. Teaching of Christian doctrine. "The Sisters shall not forget that they must be approved by the local Ordinary for the teaching of Christian doctrine." "In explaining Christian doctrine, the Sisters .shall proceed gradually and, as far as possible, they shall aim to instill into the minds ,of their, pupils a thorough knowl~edge of the tt, u_ths of o~faith rather than to have them commit to memory a series of formulas." 269 JOSI~PH F. GALLEN Review For Religious The following articles were inserted' by the Holy See in the con-stitutions of a congregation especially dedicated to the teaching of Christian doctrin~ and approved finally by the Holy See in 1949. "Since the sacred sciences are especially helpful to an' understand-ing of Christian doctrine, the Sisters shall place great emphasis on the .study bf dogmatic, moral, and pastoral theology, eccl~siastical history, and similar subjects. A collection of books on Christian doctrine, especially ~f recent worthwhile publications, is to be ac-cessible to the Sisters and others who devote themselves to the teaching of Christian doctrine." ""It will be very advantageous for the Sisters, with the proper authorization', to publish and distribut~ printed works on Christian doctrine." 8. Some norms of teachin~l. , "The Sisters. shall take care that order and cleanliness are ob-served in the classroom." "They should stu.dy the character and disposition of mind of all their pupils and are to unite a certain gentleness of treatment with strictness, when/he latter is necessary." "The 'inordinate inclinations oi the children are to be corrected gradually, and they are to be aided in the acquisition of good habits by the stimulus of admdnition, opportune advice, and by bringing to light the law Of conscience, which,'as is well known, appears from the earliest years." "Offensive speech~ blows, and intemperate anger are to be avoided in punishments. A moral sense of responsibility for theii actions rather than servile fear is to be inculcated in the minds of the chil-dren." "The Sisters are to refrain absolutely from partiality and prefer-ence in their relations with the children. The deportment and coun-tenance of the.Sisters should manifest an evenness of disposition and kind.heSS united with something of reverence." "" "Experience proves that the fostering of the interior life, which is developed by good actions, faith in God, and self-sacrifice, appears even in young children as the right and safe path along which life is to be guided." "A love of modesty is to be developed in girls with regard to dress, deportment and their conduct with others." 270 " September, 1953 .PRACTICE OF THE HOLY SEE § 2 Sister Nurses arid Hospitals 9. Training and.continued pr6gress. "['he problem of overwork is particularly acute in the case of brothers and sisters applied to hos-pitals. In some religious hospitals a weekly holiday is apparently unknown. The continuation of this practice is unthinkable. Every brother and sister nurse should have at least one day a week that is completely free from hqspital duties, and it would contribute' much to 'their health, quiet of mind, and spirituality to spend as often as possiblea notable part of this weekly holiday awa.y from the hos-pital environment. Overwork will not facilitate the continued study and progress demanded by th~ following article that is inserted in constitutions by .the Holy See: "The Sister nurse must strive to increase her knowledge after she has secured a diploma valid also according to civil law." I0. Medical ethics. "A Sister is to refrain from administering medicines or assisting at Operations that are forbidden by the Church. In cases of doubt she is to consult the Superior." "Especially in extraordinary and important cases where there are at stake .the preservation of a human life, reverence for the human person, and care for the conscience of the patient, even if it is a case of extreme pain and gi.ves rise to such questions as euthanasia and others of similar nature,, the Sister shall be careful to give no help to an ac-tion that is contrary to Catholic principles." 11. Mod~stg¢. The Holy See has been inserting the following article in constitutions for several years past: "In certain cases where the care to be given is Of a particularly delicate nature, the Sisters shall dvail themselves, if possible, of the services of .the secular personnel or of the members of the sick per-son's family; for extraordinary cases the Superior should designate Sisters of proven piety and mature age who are williog to perform such works of chhrity. It is the duty of the General Chapter or Council to enact measures in this regard, to which the Sisters must con form." 12. Education as doctors. The following article, proposed to the Holy See in the genera] revision of the constitutions of two. congrega-tions, was approved by the S. C. of Religibus: "The Sisters assigned to the hospitals must be thoroughly pre-pared for the efficient discharge oftheir duties. There should be some Sisters educated as doctors and qualified for th6 various .departments 271 , C. A. HERBST Review for Religious ¯ of the hospital." Canon law does not forbid clerics or religious to study medicine or surgery. Canons 139, § 2, and 592 forl~id clerics and religious of both sexes to devote themselves avowedly, habitually, and for profit to the practice of medicine or surgery. Religious institutes devoted to nursing have by their approbation as such permission to practice the medicine and slight surgery demanded of nurses. Local Ordinaries in missionary countries may permit their missionaries, priests and re-ligious men or women, to practice medicine and surgery provided they are skilled in these arts, demand no payment, and observe rood-esty intreating the opposite sex. In other countries clerics, brothers, and sisters Who wish to i~ractice medicine or surgery must secure an indult from the Holy See. The article quoted above and approved by the Holy See implicitly grants to the two congregations a dispen-sation from th~ canonical prohibition of the practice of medicine and surgery for those qualified as doctors. Care is always to be taken to secure prbper civil authorization for the practice of these arts. [EDITORS' NOTE: Father Gallen's article will be concluded in November.] Discipline C. A. Herbst, S.J. It"I"HE very first step towards wisdom is the desire for discipline, .,| .and how should a man care for discipline without loving ~t, or love it without heeding its laws, or heed its laws with-out winning immortality, or .win immortality without drawing nearer to God" (Wis. 6:18, 19) ? Who could explain more clear!y or_show more beautifully than the Holy Spirit Himself does the place of discipline in the life of one who really wants to love God? "Order is heaven's first law" the proverb says. ¯ This conformity to law comes from discipline. Discipline in the passive sense is con-trol gained by enforcing obedience or order. There is order even in heaven, where God is supreme and the angels are ministering spirits. Where there is disorder chaos soon appears and it is impossible to at-tain the end of any organized society, which is the common good. The modern "autonomous man" is a law unto himself, a tyrant, an outlaw. Were the order established by discipline removed, "the bounded waters would lift higher than the shores," as Shakespeare says~ ?and make,a sop bf, all this.solid globe.';o ~ Then might, is right, "and the rude son should strike his father dead." Unleashed from 272 September, 1953 DISCIPLINE discipline, power obtained by our modern Hitlers and Stalins whets the appetite for more power. "And appetite, an universal wolf, must make perforce an universal prey, and last eat up himself." (Troilus and Cressida, I, iii.) Discipline corrects. This is its first function: a negative one, surely, but basic and important ever since the beginning when man short-circuited his powers through original sin and "to err is human" became a proverb. It is only too clear that in younger religious fre-quent correction is necessary. It helps to make away with the "old man," and who can put on the "new man" before putting off the old? The ways of the world (and they are gaining mightily with each decade) are not God's ways. In men of good will. which we presume aspirants to the religious life to be, correction should lead to prompt reform, or at least to a prompt attempt at reform. In those. who have already spent some time in religion it should lead not only to prompt but to thorougl~ and lasting reform. ReForm. That is a distasteful word to the worldling but opens up a vast field white for the harvest for the ease-loving religious. And we need not look across the table and plan reform for him. As Father said: "If ever you want to start a reform, start on yourself." "Charity begins at home" is true even in this negative aspect. Reform is the correlative and result of correction, and d'iscipline's first work is to correct. Discipline molds. It forms a religious after thi~ likeness of Christ. It shapes him. A character, a soul, is like clay in the hands of the p.otter. As defects are removed by correction the new man takes form under the interior influence of grace and the external influence of dis-cipline. It is exhilarating to see the young religious grow. That an earnest and fervent religious does grow even those who live with him can see. Those, however, who had known him i'n the world and after a few years see him as a religious are the ones who are really amazed at the change. The religious life is a school of perfection. One ex-pects a school to teach and mold and form and change and enlighten. ¯ .Discipline educates a soul, "leads out" its powers, the mind and the will, and induces them to make the most of the wonderful gifts God has given to each one of His children. Discipline strengthens. It gives one moral and spiritual power to act, live, and carry on enduringly and vigorously. This is conspicu-ous in the athletic world. Those who achieve fame in the field of sports do so because they have acquired physical strength, speed, and" accuracy of sense and muscle through long and severe disciplinary 273 C. A. HEI~BST Review for Religious train!ng. This extended and careful practice, their abstinence from food and luxuries and entertainment, is more rigorous than most re-ligious have to submit to. ."And they for a corruptibl( crown, but we for an incorruptible one." ~ Through discipline we store up resources of moral and spiritual strength whict~ we may draw upon in times of trial and temptation. A well-trained sc~ldier will come through many a difficult'and dang(r- ~ ous battle where an undisciplined one will succumb, as we found out in World War II. Through'discipline one acquires a great power of resistance. Discipline causes a soul to become effective and efficient in the direction~ of spiritual achievement, and to be foiceful in its life and work. A strong soul is ardent and zealous, too, and enthusiastic for, the things of God. Neither is a well-disciplined soul easily injured, subdued, or taken in. He is like a fortress, strong and firm. It is vigorous, healthy~ and tough, like an oak. Discipline makes a soul sturdy and unyielding. In the religious life we consider religious discipline in connection v~ith obedience. From an analysis of the word itself, discipline means teaching, training. "Considered in the authority which governs, re-ligious discipline is the sum total' of the rules with their ~anction. By the rules superiors teach the way which is to be followed; by pen- "ances in ~ase of infraction they bring back those who have strayed and repair the scandal given. Considered in inferiors, discipline is also c~lled regular observance, and is the ,faithful observance of the rules, in which observance all the members of the community unite in holy harmony. So important is religious discipline that it must be con-sidered as morally necessary for the conservation of the order as a whole, for that of.the religious life in a community, and for that of the spiritual life in each individual. According to what has been said, it is easy to see that superiors are under grave obligation to maintain religious discipline in the community; and in this regard, "connivance. on their part can easily become a consideiable sin" (Cotel, Catechism of the Vows, 137- 140.), In this connection we might note Canon 593: "Each and every religious, superiors as well as. subjects, must not only keep faithfully and completely'the vows they have taken, but also lead a life in conformity with the rules and constitutions of their own in-stitute and thus strive ~fter the perfection of their state." The rule of each religi0us.institute urges regular observance on ¯ all Each institute must first and foremost, of course, observe the law 274 ' September, 1953 D~SCIPLINE of the Church for religious. In Canons 594-612 we have mentioned especially the careful observance by all of th~ common llfe with re-gard to food, dress, and furniture; the careful performance of gpir-itual exercises; the wearing of the religious habit;

Issue 10.4 of the Review for Religious, 1951. ; A. M. D.G. ~o Review for Religious JULY 15, 19 51 Our Aged Religious . Sister Mary Jafie Redemptorls÷ Spiri÷uali÷y. . Joseph I~t. Coller~n Recollectio"n Day Ouestions " ° Winfrld Herbsf Elections and Appointments . Joseph F. Gallen Grow÷h through the Eficharls÷ Anselm Lacomara ins÷ruction on Sponsa Christi , List of Psychometric Tests Communications Book Reviews VOLUME X NUMBER 4 Rfi::::VII::::W FOR Ri:::LIGIOUS VOLUME X JULY, 1951 NUMBER Jr CONTENTS SOME PROBLEMS OF OUR AGED RELIGIOUS-~Sister MaryJane, O.P1.69 COMMUNICATIONS ': 173 OUR CONTRIBUTORS . 174 VACATION SCHOOL IN SOCIAL ACTION .1.7.4 REDEMPTORIST. SPIRITUALITY--Joseph M. Colleran, C.SS.R. 175 QUESTIONS FOR MONTHLY RI~CO~LECTION-- Winfri~l.Herbst, S.D.S . 185 ELECTIONS AND APPOINTMENTS--Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. 187 GROWTH IN GRACE THROUGH THE EUCHARIST-- Anselm Lacomara, C. P .200 HERESY OF RACE 204 INSTRUCTION ON 8PONSA CHRISTI . 205 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS-- 19. Sister Digna's List of Psychometric Tests . 213 BOOK REVIEWS~ Religious Life and Spirit: Living the Mass; Jesus.Christ; The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius . 217 BOOK ANNOUNCEMENTS " 222 FOR YOUR INFORMATION-- Morality and Alcoholism; The Good Confessor; Seventy Years 224 REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, July, 1951, Vol. X. No. 4. Published bi-monthly: January, March, May, July, September, and November at the College Press, 606 Harrison Street, Topeka, Kansas, by St. Mary's College, St. Marys, Kansas, with ecclesiastical approba~tion. Entered as second class matter January 15, 1942, at the Post Office, Topeka. Kansas, under the act: of March 3, 1879. Editorial Board: Adam C. Ellis, S.J., G. Augustine Ellard, S.J., Gerald Kelly, S.J. Editorial Secretary: Jerome Breunig, S. J. Copyright, 1951. by Adam C. Ellis, S.J. Permission is hereby granted for quota-tions of reasonable length, provided due credit be given this review and the author. Subscription price: 3 dollars a year; 50 cents a copy. Printed in U. S. A. Before writ;ncj to us, please consult notice on inside back cover. Some Problems ot: Our Aged Religious Sister Mary Jane, O.P. THE problems of old religious are the problems of each and every one, for none of us is getting any younger. The proverbial old-fashioned rocker on the farmhouse porch where Granny could drowse away her honored last years has vanished, but Granny has not and neither has the aged religious. Never before our generation was the old age problem Sb great because there never were so many old folks. "Statistics tell us that today men and women sixty-five and overc~prise seven per cent of our population. Science has graciously presented another twenty years or more. Religious as well as others must plan what they are going to do. Sixty-Fiue is Young One wonderful and bright fact is that there are numerous reli-gious, both men and women, over sixty-five who are still,:bearing a large share of the burden of the community's w6rk. Dodge and Ford proved that old folks can work; they maintained old-age shops whose able personnel included men in their eighties. Long before either of the above thought of this, religious communities were taking it for granted. Sixty-five in a religious community is usually con-sidered young. Rarely does one find a religious who even considers retiring at that age, or at any age for that matter. How often one finds religious teaching school or doing other types of work at the ripe age of seventy-five and eighty. The author knows a religious who still goes out collecting alms for the community at the age of ninety-two. ~ During the past two wars employers in general were del~ighted with the oldsters' low accident and absenteeism rates,, as well as with their strategy in attacking problems. They were proud o'f the pro-duction power of that proportion of their workers. We, too, have every right to be proud of our aged religious. In the United States most old people subsist on some form ot~ organized "handout.," A few may enjoy adequate pensions from private sources,'frorr/civil service retirement allowances, Veteran allot- 169 SISTER MARY JANE Review [or Religious o merits, or old age relief or insurance. For others, an unfinanced senescence is likely to ,be dreaded: Often, it means ending up in a pub-li~ or private "nursing home." Not so our religious brethren; there is not this-fear for a member of a community. A few religious com-munities have a home for their dear ones, some with a'long waiting list. Waiting, yes, waiting for one or more to be called home for the longed-Ior eternal reward, but. waiting, too, to "occupy the places made vacant. What about the ~ged religious who cannot be admitted to these havens for some reason or other? The Housing Problem Where should these aged religious live? No one would deny them the balmy ease of Orlando, if they could have it. The public institution is out of the question. Some communities have done much but others have mad~ slight provision for their aged members either ih the past or at present. '~In many cases existing conditions and facilities are pitifully inadequate. It is undeniable that unless some corrective measures are set in motion, this already serious prob-lem'will become more acute as the average life expectancy climbs higher. Perhaps many more of the aged religious should be living with their communities, but, where this is not feasible, they ought to have a'special home ~where they may be left alone, but where they can obtain help when they need it. We all agree, that individualization in the care of o~r aged religious is preferable to institutionalization. There is hardly an institutional home for the aged which does not mingle the sick with the near-sick. More often than not, the latter need nothing more than custodial care. It is true that the pressure of modern .urban living makes domestic adaptability between age groups difficult and in many cases well nigh impossible. The aged find it difficult to change their habits so late in life. Nevertheless, many religious can and do get along together, particularly where th~ old religious remember the Golden Rule and the younger ones bear in mind that Our Lord said, "What you have done to these, you have done to Me." Some Symptoms o[ Age Old age is a gradual progression toward deterioration. It often shows symptoms of growing self-interest and lack of impressibility. Important events are no 19nger significant to old people as long as they do not touch directly upon their lives. There is usually a gen- 170 Jul~,1951 OUR AGED RELIGIOUS eral reduction in mental effidency, forgetfulness, arid loss of memory for recent events. Other symptoms include the tendency to reminisce and to fabricate, intolerance of change--routine must be observed and must never be disturbed lest irritability and tension rise--a rest-less desire to be up and about, to travel here and there, "frequently getting lost in transit (whether in or out of the monastery or con-vent) ; insomnia, and a tendency to putter aimlessly about the house and gardens. The t.endency to live in the pasi is very strong in some. Others show a total lack o~ interest in everything about them. Some are unsympathetic and indifferent, and the mood may ,change frequently and even without ~any apparent cause. Some ma~. be cooperativd, orderly, and quiet, and give very little trduble, .While others are untidy, meddlesome, 'and rcstless; Very.'often aged people become resistive when they think they a~.e: being coerced by those who are younger. One may even hear such expressions as "That fresh young thing!" Some Solutions The psychology of persuasion may have t'o called iflt.6.play to meet behavior problems that arise. Various stages of senility can effect disposition changes that necessitate parti.cular ~tre.atnlent and care. A great need is companionship. At its best old age is°a lonely existence, to say the least, and must be brightened by cheerful com-panions and a staff with a sense of humor. Everyone, we are told, comes into this life with three strong fundamental drives or needs: (1) the need of security; (2) the need fcr affection; (3) the need to do things for others or to mean some-thing to others. Frustration of these ftlnda~nental needs, even among religious, causes tension which makes the individual uncomfortable. The persistence of this tendency may be the beginning of a. nervous condition. Disability and chronic illness in the ageing and aged religious are increasing. The burden upon the communities, is already very large. It clearly threatens to increase year by year, unless something effective is done now to better conditions. . Nou) is the Time What can be done now with our young and middle-aged to make them strong, able, and competent to contribute to the general welfare and happiness during their declining years instead of being a burden to their fellow religious and themselves. This is a matter of concern 171 SISTER MARY JANE Reoieu~ [or Religious to each and every one of us. The time has come to speak out. It is not enough for y, ounger members to feel the wave of sentimental pity that sometimes sweeps over them today. It is not enough to provide the physical comforts of shelter, food, and clothing for these aged religious. These dear ones must be understood now by their fellow religious. Now,. too, they must learn to understand them-' SelVeS, The author is not bitter, but sometimes has to count to ten or perhaps whisper an "Ave Maria" to hold back angry words provoked by thoughtless acts, looks, and sometimes even just the tone of voice directed at some aged ~eliglous. If only everyone remembered how little they like. to be singled out as special beings! The attittide.of others is often a great handicap. It may be the lack of belief, the misdirected ~sympathg, sometimes the lack of sympathy, or the failure to regiird the aged one as an individual. Abrasions and fractures may heal, but a broken spirit will not. Often the feeling of younger religious towards the aged of their community combines pity and confusion. The pity may express itself in remarks like: "Isn't that sad?': "Too bad, we ought to be thank-ful." "She's old enough to die." "She served her purpose." Is there perhaps "no room" for the old religious? Again, why do some always make the mistake of thinking that all aged religious are deaf? Needless to say, over-hearing such remarks will hardly boost their morale. If this is what we ageing religious must look forward to as our life-span is extended, we may find ourselves agreeing that there are worse things in life than dying young or dying suddenly. Belonging What the aged religious wants more than anything is to be treated like everyone else, to feel that he belongs to the community, that he is stil! wanted. Belonging is the big thing. The penalties of old age are aggravated with rustication, particularly when undesir-ability, is felt. The aged religious should not be ruled out of any social life in the community nor excluded from recreations. Even when they cannot do the things the younger generation does, they like to watch. It makes, them part of what is going on. An occa-sional movie or a short excursion is sometimes most welcome. Ap-propriate occupations and recreations should be provided. Some religious are more efficient at seventy than others at fifty. Old people --religious are no exception--should be kept as active as possible to I72 ' duly, 1951 COMMUNICATIONS' make rise of their skills and preserve their morale. When they are occupied, they are happy. Properly selected bccupational .therapy exercises arthritic hands and encourages the use of affected extremltle~, preventing complete invalidism. Most activities tend to. stimulate normal functions and to counteract the tendency to apathy, brooding, and introspection. Anything that will preserve the self respect and dignity of old age should be appropriated .for the rise of our elderly religious. They should not be permitted to lose their identity in an atmosphere of depressing gloom and finality. Sickness or dependence of any kind is often a. degrading enough experience in itself. Above all, we must not call attention to their infi~rfiities, if they have any, not even with affectionate attention. Sur.~ly, .it is their right and privilege to have their few remaining years happy and free from worry. The aged are here td stay for longer periods th~n ever. The living and working conditions, then, of our dear aged religious should be a considerate concern of every one. And besides, none of us is getting any younger. Communications Reverend Fathers : In the March issue of the REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, I read with consternation ,the letter of,Sister M. Catherine Eileen, S.H.M. Since one might be misled by Sister's optimism (justifiable in her particular case), I think a little more information on the fenestration operatiori is essential.' A.few of Sister's statements also should be clarified. Sister writes: "There is fenestration surgery now to cure the type of deafness known as otosclerosis." However, men who have dis-tinguished themselves in this work say that it is only an amelioration of this disease and a restoration of serviceable hearing in suitable cases and,the~results are not as yet individually predictable. There are some who would disagree with Sister when she sa'ys, "Any otologist can diagnose this most prevalent kind of deafness." They hold that there is no method upon which one can depend with absolute certainty for the diagnosis of otosclerosis and that surgery on one afflicted with pathology wbich simulates but is n6t otoscler-osis will not improve the hearing of the individual. 173 COMMUNICATIONS "Some'time to re~over" may mean a period of years accompanied by a discharging ear. Whether or not the operation is successful, the ear will require care for the remainder of the patient's life, i.e., peri-odic visits to the ear specialist. This perhaps is not too great a price if the hearing is improved but rather a steep one if no improvement has resulted. Sister's" c~se does seem successful and I don't wonder she is so enthusiastic. To those whose hopes might have been raised by Sis-ter's zeal, I should say seek the advice of one who has an enviable reputation in the field of ear surgery. May I quote'one such otol-ogist, "In a suitable case the decision between operation and a hearing aid is a question which should be decided by the individual." Anyone who is further interested may write to the American Hearing Society, Washington 7, D. C., and get a copy of Hearing NewS, March 1948, from which I have taken the information con-tained in this letter. The New York League for the Hard of Hearing did not have any later available data on the subject. --SISTER HELEN LOYOLA, C.S.J. ' OUR CONTRIBUTORS JOSEPH M. COLLERAN, the translator of St. Augustine's Greatness of Soul and The Teacher in the "Ancient Christian Writers" series, is a professor of philosophy at Mount St. Alphonsus Seminary, Esopus, New York. SISTER MARY JANE taught both elementary and high school' for twenty-five years before entering the fidld of nursing. She is now an affiliate at the Brooklyn State Hospital for the mentally ill. ANSELM LACOMARA, a missionary and writer, is from Our Mother of Sorrows Monastery, West Sprihgfield, Massachusetts. WINFRID HERBST, au-thor and retreat master, is on the faculty of the Salvatorian Seminary, St. Nazianz, Wisconsin. JOSEPH F. GALLEN is a professor of canon law at Woodstock Col-lege, Woodstock, Maryland. VACATION SC~HOOL IN SOCIAL ACTION St. Francis Xavier University, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, is offering a vacation school in social action for priests and seminarians from August 14-25. There will be lecture courses, combining exposition and opportunity for discussion, on the spiritual foundation of social action and on organizing the parish for social action. The director is the Reverend D. MacCormack. 174 Redemptorist: Spirit:ualit:y Joseph M. Colleran, C.SS.R. WHEN St. Alphonsus de Liguori, in 1732, gathered a groupof ¯ priests and brothers to form the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, he intended primarily to 6rganize a band of missionaries to evangelize the neglected country districts of his native Kingdom of Naples, and later, of other parts of the world, and everywhere to preach redemption and repentance to "the most abandoned souls." That its concentration upon this precise .field of apostolic activity constitutes the sole feature disting.uishing the con-" gregation from other religious institutes is the impression given, upon first reading, by the .explanatory constitutions which the saint added in 1764, and which, in this respect, remain the same today. "Every Religious Institute proposes to itself a two-fold end:the first is its own sanctification, the second the salvation of the people and the good of the Church. The former is general, the latter special, and it is by this that the various. Religious Orders differ from one. another . With regard to the second end, by which we ,are dis-tinguished from all other Orders and Religious InstitUtes within the Church, the Rule enjoins that . . . by preaching l~he Word'of God, we should labor to lead the people to a holy life~, especially those who, being scattered in villages and hamlets, are ,most deprived of spiritual help--and this is our specific end" (Constitutions 1 and 5). From the very beginning, howeverl Alphonsus himself practiced, and inculcated upon his spiritual family, a type'of spirituality that would best fit in with this apostolic purpose and would be a distinc-tive mark of his little congregation. This pattern of ascetical formation became more clear and systematic as time went on, and its principles were more exactly formularized as the saint undertook to publish for his followers and for the universal Church, his popular and practical treatises on ascetical and pastoral theology. St. Alphonsus realized deeply that fruitful apostolic activity and personal sanctity were inextricably connected. The sermon that is most effective is the one' that has been lived before it is preached. The asceticism that is most valuable to an apostle is the one that most readily overflows into works of zeal and charity. For that reason he insisted upon an exact proportion between the active labors of the 175 JOSEPH M. COLLERAN Revieud for Religious ministry and the retired contefnplation of.the monastery. He would have his priests be "Carthusians at home and apostles abroad." It was always his ideal that missionaries spend no more than six months of each year in the actual work of the missions, "lest the active life overbalance the contemplative, to their spiritual loss" (Const. 108). He:would have the Coadjutor Brothers, who are engaged in prayer and domestic work, as well as the Sisters of the co.mpanion institu'te, the "Redemptoristines,", not only consecrate themselves to self-sanctification, but also offer their labors and devo~ tions vicariously for the success of the missions. Thus, the saint's pastoral and ascetical directions are inseparable, and together they indicate the spirit of the institute that would continue his labors and copy his way of living with God. The Facets ot: Love Our Lord tells us that the great commandment, for the apostle to preach and for the religious to practice to perfection, is to Iove the Lord thq God u2ith thai whole heart (Mark 12:30),°and St. Paul likewise makes it plain that all Christians must above all things bare cbaritg, which is the bond of perfection (Col. 3:14). While some masters of the spiritual life propose the practice of the various spe-cific virtues as means toward the acquisition of love--so that morti-fication, for example, arises from penance and leads to love--others, like Saints Bernard, Bonaventure, Francis de Sales, propose love as the beginning, th~ seed out of which the other virtues grow. X~v'ithin this second, so-called "seraphic" school, Alphonsus must be num-bered. 1 Love, he recognized, includes and requires both hope and fear. Against Jansenism, whose rigoristic spirit, despite its condemnation, was still deterring sinners from approaching God with confidence and was influencing confessors to demand signs of perfect love before they would grant absolution and permit Communion, the Saint inveighed vigorously. For his more benign practices, he was accused of laxity.At the same time, be fell prey to charges of severity from writers who, holding on to relics of Quietism, were averse to strenu-ou~ ascetical activity, under the pretext of passive indifference. He insisted that his missionaries r~alistically set before the people, to incite them to conversion and fervor, the reality of hell. And out of :tCf. A. Desurmont, C.SS.R., Oeuores Completes, tome 1, L'Art d'Assurer Son Salut. Paris, Libraire de la Sainte Famille, 1906. Introduc~don, p. 23 f. See also C. Keusch, C.SS.R., Die Aszetik des hi. Alfons Maria v6n Liguori. Pader-born, Bonifacius-Druckerei, 1926. P. 236 f. 176 July, 1951 REDEMPTORIST SPI'RITU~ALITY his own missionary experiences,' he formed judgments that other saints and doctors would probably not have expressed so boldly for instance: "If God had not created be!l, wh6 in. the whole world would love Him? If, with hell existing as it really does, the greater part of men choose rather to be damned than to love Almighty God, who, I repeat, would love Him were there no hell? And therefore the Lord threatens those who will not love Him, with an eternal punishment, so that those who will not love Him out of love may at least love Him by force, being constrained to do so through fear of falling into hell.''-~ The keynote of all his exhortations is'salvation, the individual participation in the merits of Christ's Redemption, and salvation is to be. worked out with fear and trembling (Philipp. 2:12). This fear, or more exactly, this love that involves fear, has a function in every grade of the spiritual life. In sinners, Alphonsus aimed to awaken fear by warning them of the eventual limit to the sins that God would forgive, and the limit .to the graces that God would provide. He tirelessly reminds them of the imminence of death, the terrors of hell, the imperative need of conversion. He warns them solemnly" of the fearful dangers of the "occasions of sin." "In regard t9. those striving for perfection', he also has recourse to the motive of fear, although it is prin.c.i.i0Mly the filial fear of losing God and of losing the special graces that are attached to a higher vocation. He voices the warning that although vocation to the religious state is a free gift that does.not imply a strict obligation, yet because special graces are attached i!o this state, it 'is most difficult to attain salvation if one neglects his vocation. Because perseverance is a grace that can be lost by failure to pray, and by lack of correspondence with grace, there is still reason, even in the state of pe.rfeCtion, to fear. (In his own congregation, he added to the three customary vows, a vow and oath of perseverance.) In re~ard to religious, too, he strikds hard at "tepidity," which he identifies as the habit of deliberate venial sin, and which he considers a state to be avoided" with fear. If the saint seems at times encouraging and at times severe, it is only because he is presenting, one at a time and each in its own clarity, the facets of love: confidence and fear. It is, however, con-fidence that predo.minates: "If we have great reason to fear ever-lasting death on account of our offences against God, wfi have, on 2Ditzine Love, II, in The Way of,Salvation and of Perfection, part III. Brookl~n, Redemptorist Fathers, 1926. P. 311 f. 177 JOSEPH M. COLLERAN Review for Religious the other hand, far greater reason to hope for everlasting life through the merits of Jesus Christ, which are infinitely more able to bring tlon.ab°ut" ,,a°ur salvation, than our sins are to bring about our damna- The Practice o[ Love In complete harmony with the long tradition of saints and theo-logians, but with an insistence and clarity peculiarly hi~s own, Alphonsus points out that the measure and the practical test of love of God is conforroit~. , or better, uniformity, of one's will with the Will of God. "Conformity" ~.involves the acceptance of whatever God intend~ for us or permits to happen to us. "Uniformity" sig-nifies our blending our own will as it were, into the Divine Will, so that we .never desire but wh.'a~"[God desires, and there remains only the Will of God, which becomes our own. "The entire perfection of the love of God," the saint writes, "consists in making our own will one with His most holy will . The more united a person is with the Divine Will, the greater will be his love of God . This is the summit of the perfection to which we must be ever aspiring. This has to be the aim of all our work, all our desires, all our meditations and prayers.''4 For Redempto~rists especia.lly, as Alphonsus conceives their voca-tion, uniformity with the Will of God involves two essential require-me, nts. The first is negative: detachment from all created things. The second, more positive means, is imitation of Christ the Redeemer. Detachment While, of course, the conception of detachment is not new with Alphonsus, he gave it such emphasis and priority that he made it a distinctive characteristic of his ascetical doitrine. "Detachment" signifies the exclusion from the heart of everything that is inordinate and alien to perfection; it invplves the denial to self of anything material that does not serve sanctification; it implies the performance of unpleasant rather than of pleasant actions, and greater charity toward the ungrateful than toward the grateful, as signs and means of more ardent love of God; it even requires the sacrifice of certain 3Tbe Practice of the Love of Jesus Christ, Introd., III, in The Hol~t Eucharist. Brooklyn, Redemptorist Fathers, 1934. P. 285 f. 4Conformit£l with the Will of God, I, in The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, part-III, pp. 353, 358. 178 duly, 1951 REDEMPTORIST SPIRITUALITY virtuous actions when the higher demands of charity or obedience conflict with them.5 So important did he consider this purification of the heart as a preparation for advancement in perfection that in the little treatise, The True Redemptorist, which he wrote for his first members, he confines himself to this one point, and reduces the special requirements of any applicants to _a four-fold detachment: from the comforts of life, from relatives, from self-esteem, and from self-will. ¯ The practice of poverty he kept as strict and uncompromising as an active apostolate would allow; and the peculium and any other method of private control of material things, he excluded rigorously from the very beginning. The "common life" he. ev.e.r.,g.uarded jeal-ously, and he manifests his legal tr.aining in the deta~i'~'and precision of his enumerations of things allowed and forbiddeti." The things provided for common use, the amount of the portions at table, the size, number, and materials of various furnishings for the rooms be determined with exactitude and uniformity. Under the vow of poverty is incIuded the renunciation of a bishopric or any other ecclesiastical dignity or benefice outside, the congregation, unless the Holy Father commands its acceptance. Knowing from experience, sometimes from the bitter experience of defections from his infant institute, that the people of his time and land were often loath to permit their sons to make sacrifice of themselves in r~llgion, he was adamant about detachment from rela-tives. In answer to a request from a sick. subject who wanted to go home for the freshness of his native air, he replied that "home air is always pestilential to the religious spirit." When one who was ill offered to go to his relatives, to save expense to the community, he quickly answered that the congregation would sell ~ts books to take care of the sick. The strictness of the saint's rules and written'com-ments on detachment from seculars is balanced by his efforts to promote in his communities the hospitality and brotherliness of family life. Insistent as be is that individual desires be restricted to needs, he is even more insistent that .t.he community provide for every need to the extent that is possible. Self-esteem and independence of will he opposed as mortal dis-eases. Not only did be insist on individuals giving up all ambition for preferment and distinction, but he would have the'institute itself 5Detachment from Creatures in The Way of Salvation and of Perfection, part II, XLI; also Divine Love, ibid., pp. 317-19. 179 JOSEPH M. CoLLERAN Review for Religious humbly accounted the least of all in the Church. Although the work for which each must be ready is preaching, he deprecated'anyone's: putting himself forward to preach without waiting for designation by superiors. "He only has the spirit of the institute," he wrote, "who enters it with the desire of practicing obedience, and,of sub-mitting peacefully to be put away in some corner without having any employment, happy that the good is done by others, while he himself will only do that which is.directly imposed upon him by obedience, without having asked for it.''~ "Re-living the Redemption The imitation of Christ that he proposed to his members is not only the general one that is obligatory on all, but a concentration upon the formally redemptive phase of Christ's life, the motto of his congregation being Gopiosa Apud Eum Redemptio. This emphasis affects both the active apostol~te and the ascetical development of Redemptorists. " They are to be employed only in those tasks that have to do directly with the salvation of souls, and indeed, so far.as is ordi-narily possible, only in those that Christ and His ApoStles per-formed. Hence the principal field of labor is the conducting of mis-sions, in ~vhich the essential and fundamental truths are preached, with a view to converting souls from sin to the state of grace, from inconstancy to perseverance in virtue, and from ordinary fidelity to Christian perfection. Occupations that are not in harmony with the work of redemption ifi the strictest sense, such as t~aching secular subjects in schools, parochial work, the conducting of orphanages, and the like, were deliberately excluded by Alphonsus, and have tra-ditionally been accepted only rarely and temporarily, as need arose and higher authority commanded. The apostolate of red.emption extends to all classes of people, but preference is strictly to be given to the poor,,, to those who have been abandoned by others, and to those found far from those centers of population where the means of salvation are more readily within reach. The style of preaching set by the saint is affective, rather than argumentative; simple, rather than ornate; apostolic, rather than academic. It was his aim to set OThe True Rederoptorist. This short work, with slight alterations to .adapt it to all religious, and with preliminary chapters on detecting and preserving vocations, was also published by Alphonsus under the title Counsels Concerning a Religious Vocation. This treatise is available in English, in the volume The Great Means of Salvation and of Perfection. Broot').yn. Redemptorist Fathers, 1927. Pp. 381- 417. , The sentence which is here quoted from the Manua[e Presbyterorum C.SS.I~. does not appear in the reprint. 180 Jul~,1951 REDEMPToRIsT SPIRITUALITY up in the garden of the Church, not an exalted fountain that would impressively spray its streams on high, but a rivulet that would seep into the ground to nurture and fructify the lowly and the towering growths alike. Since He who saves is He who sanctifies, the Redeemer is the model of asceticism too. "The end of the Institute of the Most Holy Redeemer is no other than to unite priests to live together, and ear-nestly strive to imitate the virtues and example of Jesus Christ, our Redeemer, devoting themselves kpecially to the preaching of the word of God to the poor" (Text of Ruie, Introduction). The Passion is proposed as the customary subject of all evening meditations, and the central act of R~edemption is the.core of all Redemptorist devo-tion. It is likewise the pattern of their personal efforts at self-sacrifice: "the members of our Institute, after the example of the R~deemer, ought to spend their lives in thb endurance of sufferings, and should have a great hatred of a comfortable and luxurious life." (Const. 489). True it is that Alphonsus taught in his writings and inculcated in his religious various devotions in honor of Christ; he was, for example, one of the most ardent proponents of devotion to the Sacred Heart, which, in his time, was "opposed by some writers'and often avoided in practice. But crib and cross and altar are the principal themes of his devotional exhortations, the cross being central, the crib its forerunner, and the altar its keepsake. To devotion toward the Blessed Sacrament he made a tremendous ¯ contribution by his Visits to the Blessed Sacrament, originally in-tended for his own novices but in time spread throughout the world with a popularity that P~re Pourrat compares to that of the Imita-tion of Christ.7 Adoration, thanksgiving, and reparation are the sentiments he would awaken in his followers in regard to the con-tinual presence of the R~deemer among us. He could conceive of no devotion to the Redeemer that did not include devotion to Christ's Persoflal Relic of the redemption. It is true of Alphonsian asceticism, as it is true of practically every modern school, that it is not so liturgically centered as that of St. Benedict. Nevertheless, Alphonsus quite definitely recognized the primacy among devotions that belongs to the Mass. For the laity he wrote The Sacrifice of desus Christ, expounding the doctrine of sacrifice and the meaning of the prayers; for priests he published "a 7Cf. P. Pourrat, La Spiritualit~ Chr~tienne, tora~ 4. Paris, Gabalda, 1947. P. 456. 181 JOSEPH M. COLLERAN Reoiew [or Religious book on The Ceremonies of the Mass, and another, a devotional one, on Preparation and Thanksgiving. The devout and affectionate prayers he composed have as their purpose the extension throughout the. day of the spiritual benefits of the Holy Sacrifice. He also recog-nized the importance of the official prayer of the Church, requiring the Divine Office to be recited in the various communities when the 'missionaries are not engaged in apostolic works. The Mother's Place St. Alphonsus was one of the principal expositors and defenders, in the dogmatic field, of the doctrine of the universal mediation of Mary. As a corollary of this teaching that all graces come through her hands, he taught that some devotion to her is morally necessary for salvation. In asceticism, also, he proclaimed that imitation of the Divine Redeemer involves, a wholehearted and practical devotion to His Mother. In both their personal lives and in their apostolic works, be would have Redemptorists Mary-minded. Preachers are urged to make mention of the intercession of the Blessed Mother in every discourse; every series of sermons or instructions is to include at least one talk devoted to her. From the time of Alphonsus until the definition of the dogma, Redemptorists were required to take an oath that they would defend and teach the truth of the Immaculate Conception; and under this title Mary is the principal patron of the congregation. The saint insists emphatically that Mary is the keeper of vocations; in his congregation the perseverance of every member is committed to the care of the Virgin most faithful. The Practice oF Virtues To facilitate and intensify the practice of virtues, Alphonsus pro-poses the method of concentrating explicitly on one at a time. His original rule was arranged in twelve parts, each of which set forth one virtue. Each "rule" wasit'self rather a short exposition of the relation of the virtue of the R~deemer and an application, rather ex-hortatory and devotional than diregtive and legalistic, to the life of a religious. Each rule is followed.by a "constitution" that gives more detailed and specific directions. In 1749, the Rules and Constitutions were put into a more formal a~d legal structure, but one constitution still directs the special practice of a single virtue each month. In the order of the months of the year these virtues are proposed: faith, l~ope, love of God, charity toward one another, poverty, chastity, obedience, humility, mortification, recollection, prayer, and self- 182 dul~ , 1951 REDEMPTORIST SPIRITUALITY denial with love of the Cross. These virtues, in turn, are to consti-tute the subject-matter of meditations, of particular examens, and of exhortations by superiors during the respective months. Such a division gives ease, simplicity; order, and solidity to the acquisition of virtue, and with all the members of the institute making an effort to concentrate upon one virtue at the same time, each individual is to find in the common activity a strong external support and example. Furthermore, since the different virtues are always considered as phases of the life of the Redeemer and as means of being united with Him, such repeated concentration upon each one serves to impress the mind with the richness of the Divine Model, and to strengthen the will to accept Christ's life as one's own. The Primacy/of Pra{/er The genius for simplicity and practicality that Alpbonsus .pos-sessed shines out pre-eminently in his teachings on prayer. The singular importance he attaches to prayer, he indicates succinctly in the title of one of his most famous works: The Great Means of Sal-vation and of Perfection. Well knovcn is the practical conclusion with which he cut through the learned and endless theological con-troversies on the efficacy of 'grace and predestination: "He .who prays is certainly saved. He who does not pray is certainly lost . Pray, pray, never cease to pray. For if you pray, your salvation will be secure; but if you stop praying, your damnation will be certain.''s No less does he insist that perfection depends upon prayer. He would have religious life a life of prayer, flowering into a continual "con-versation with God," where God speaks to the soul through His vis-ible creations and the impulses of His graces, and the soul responds with acts of love and gratitude. Prayer, for Alphonsus, is nothing less than the breath of super-natural life. Only by praying do we receive efficacious grace to per-form meritorious acts; only by pr~ying do we obtain the help to overcome temptations; only by praying do we acquire the light to know God's Will for us and thestrength to fulfill our vocations; only by praying do we acquire the grace of perseverance; only by praying, indeed, do we acquire the g~ft of praying sufficiently, and of being constant in making our requests. Mental prayer he considers morally necessary as a means to incite the prayer of petition, without which God does not grant the divine 8The Great Means of Salvation and of Perfection. Brooklyn, Redemptorist Fathers, 1927. Part I, ch. 1, p. 49 and Part II, ch. 4, p. 240. 183 ,JOSEPH M. COLLERAN helps, the lack of which, in turn, frustrates all attempts to observe either commandments or counsels. For mental prayer manifests one's spiritual n'eeds, the dangers to his progress, and the measures of improvement to be adopted; and all these stimulate him to prayers of petition. So far as the "meditation" itself is concerned, he reviews and recommends the usual methods that had been developed and proposed by the saints, especially by Theresa and Ignatius. His special and distinctive concern, however, is not with the method of meditation, but with the "affections, petitions, and resolutions" which are to follow upon the considerations as the thread follows the needle, for these constitute the real fabric of mental prayer. In the affections, he would have repeated acts of love, humility, gratitude, confidence, and contrition. Petition should be concerned, above all, with for-giveness of past sins, increase of love, and perseverance until death. Resolutions should be practical, specific, and usually limited to the near future. Petition is the most important of all, and this is the meaning of the saint's striking statement: "To pray is better than to meditate"--that is, petition is of much more .value thanconsidera-tion of trflth. This stress upon acts of the will-rather than on acts of the intel-lect, this priority of affections over considerations, the saint himself illustrates in all his writings and, most notably perhaps, in his familiar Visits to the Blessed Sacrament, where there is frequent and easy transition from description and exposition to fervent iorayer. This procedure facilitates progress from the more common discursive type of mental prayer to habitual recollection and the prayer of simple regard, which prepare the soul for infused contemplation. The school of perfection of~ which Alphonsus is master is thus a simple and practical trainings~ool in uniformity with the Will of (Sod, by imitation of the Redeemer on the cross and closeness to the Redeemer in the tabernacle, by0~etachment from creatures, by prayer of petition, and by tender deybtion to the Virgin Co-Redeemer. There is no favor the saint would ask for his institute but the privi-lege of continuing the effects of Calvary's Cross; for he prayed: "Per-fect Thy work, 0 Lord, and fo~ Tby glory make us all Thine own; so that all the members of this Congregation, even to the day of judgment, may continue to please Thee perfectly, and to gain for Thee a countless number of souls." 184 -Quest:ions t or Mon :hly Recoiled:ion Winfrid Herbst, S.D.S. yOU asked for it. You requested a series of questions for your monthly recollection~uestions that will elicit good resolves urging on to greater perfection in religious observance. And I am glad you realize there is no nobler ideal to strive for than perfect religious observance according to your constitutions. "Make an accounting of thy stewardship" (Luke 16:2). Do this in medita-tive self-examination. Take the following series, not exhaustive by ,any means, but sufficient for your purpose. Place yourself in the presence of Almighty God, before whom, at what hour you know not, you will appear for judgment, and in the presence of your guardian angel. Recall to mind the many graces and benefits bestowed upon you, an unworthy sinner, from the first mo-ment of your existence, and also during the past month. Then humbly consider the following points. 1. What is my service of God like? Do I render tribut~e of Mass and my Office devoutly, in a holy manner, in God:s presence, and without haste? Do I act on the principle that thoughtless haste kills all real devotion? 2. Do I do what is to be done before, at the beginning of, and after my daily meditation? 3. Am I able to look death in the eye without fear? How ashamed would I be to meet Jesus my Judge,now? What am I doing to make myself less ashamed, by living in continual recollec-tion and fraternal charity? 4. Do I try to increase in. personal[ love for Jesus by thinking often of His love for me? Can I, too, exclaim: ".In whatsoever, place Thou shalt be, my Lord and King, either in death or. in life, there ~ill Thy servant be"? (2 Kings 15:21.) o. 5. Whose room is the better, Jesus's (Bethlehem's cave) or mine? What can I do to make mine 19.ok more like His in poverty? 6. Do I recall that Jesus's hidden life says to me, "Family (com-munity) life means charity"? 'Am I trying hard to make others and myself happy in community life by adhering zealously to my prac-tice of increasing acts of charity and considerateness? 185 x,VINFRID HERBST 7. Am I giving to God what He so insistently asks of me: uni-versal, beautiful, fraternal charity and gentle helpfulness, especially in community life? Am I giving it all geneiously, despite the fact that. it is hard? 8. And am I giving Him this other thing for which He asks with similar insistence and which is equally hard: numerous ejacu-lations every day combined with the greatest possible recollection? 9. Have I the habitual disposition rather to suffer anything than commit a deliberate venial sin? Do I occasionally aspire to the third degree of humility, desiring to do and actually doing some hard things just because I want to be more like Jesus and out of love for Him, forgetting the reward? 10. Do I look upon all the rules, even the smallest, as the express will of God in my regard and observe them accordingly, realizing that I can save souls in this manner without even leaving the cloister walls? 11. Do I, for love of Jesus crucified, practice little acts of morti-fication daily, in folding the hands, in kneeling, and in a score of other simple ways? Do I restrain myself at table when I would eat too eagerly? 12. Do I recall that the body of Jesus was placed into a tomb "wherein no man had yet been laid," and do I place His living body into a heart that is new every morning in its purity and fervor, into a heart that is prepared for Him? 13. Do I strive to maintain within myself that spirit of joy and holy gladness without which there can be no real progress in the spiritual life? Do I show it exteriorly, as I ought to? 14. Do I value my vocation as my pearl of great price? 15. Do I try to love God because He is the Supreme Good, of whom the goodness of all creatures is but a faint reflection? It seems to me that it is because of such striving after perfection there are so many beautiful souls in this world. These souls make one resolve not to be outdone in goodness even while they almost fill one with despair of keeping pace with them. PLEASE NOTE CAREFULLY The subscription price of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS is now: $3.00 per year for Domestic and Canadian subscriptions; $3.35 per year for all foreign subscrip-tions. For further details please see inside back cover. 186 I:lections and Appointments Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. ELECTIONS a.nd appointments to office are not a daily occur- .fence in the religious life but they are of supreme and lasting importance. The observations that follow concern congrega-tions of Sisters and Brothers. The law of the Code of Canon Law and the practice of the Holy See in approving constitutions are almost the same for Brothers as for Sisters., These observations are not a complete canonical commentary but are limited to the more impor- ¯ .rant and, perhaps, more human elements of elections and appoint-ments. It is evident that each institute must follow it~ own consti-tutions, but some of the suggestions given below can be pondered by all congregations. They may not be contained in the constitutions, but they ycill not be contrary to the constitutions. I. The Elective Sgstern Religious chapters in virtue of canon 507, § 1 are obliged to observe the canonical norms for elections prescribed in canons 160- 182. The Code does not determine what religious in an institute are to be the members of a general or provincial chapter, and here we encounter the first difficulty in elections. Several diocesan congrega-tions of Sisters and a few pontifical institutes that retain the govern-mental structure of an independent monastery' of nuns have what is commonly called the direct vote. In other words every Sister of perpetual vows is a member of the elective chapters. The difticulty arises in this matter when the diocesan congregation wishes'to be-come pontifical or when the pontifical institute described above de-cides finally to conform its constitutions, to its actual life by a general revision. The direct vote must be g.iven.up. The Holy See demands the system of delegates for botl4?'the general and the provincial chapters. First of all, this difficulty is q.r should be practical for several congregations in the United States. The new quinquennial report for diocesan congregations is pellucid on the point that it is the will of the Holy See that very many of the diocesan congregations in the United States should become pontifical. The pontifical congregations alluded to above should institute a general revision of their constitu-tions. It does not seem reasonable to maintain that constitutions 187 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious devised for the relatively small community of one house of enclosed nuns are suitable for a congregation of several hundred Sisters, scat-tered in various houses and cities, and laboring in the active life. A protest against giving up the direct vote is really futile and unreasonable. If the Holy See has now for more than half a century constantly demanded the system of delegates, what is the utility of wishing to retain the direct vote? The Holy See corrects the pro-posed constitutions and will insert the system of delegates if it is riot in the constitutions. Is it likely that a protes} against such a pro-longed and.constant practice of the Holy See is reasonable? The Holy See, in 1901, published a plan of constitutions, called the Norrnae, on which the constitutions of lay congregations that wished to be approved by the Holy See had to be based. These Normae are still in effect in so far as they have not been modified by the Code of Canon Law or the later practice of the Holy See. The Norrnae demanded the system of delegates and prescribed that the general chapter was to be composed, of the general officials, of all the superiors of houses of at least twelve religious and one delegate elec.ted by each of these houses, and finally of one superior and one non-superior delegate elected by smaller houses, which were to be united into elective groups of at least twelve religious. The constitutions could also make former superiors general members of the chapter. If the institute was divided into provinces, the provincials and two elected delegates from each province supplanted the superiors and delegates from the houses. The provincial chapter was to be composed of the provincial officials and the superiors and delegates from the houses as described above for the general chapter. Further-more, we have published corrections of constitutions which show that the Holy See was demanding the system of delegates at least as far back as 1887.1 Diocesan congregations also .should have the system of delegates. It is an admitted principle that diocesan constitutions should con-form to those of pontifical congregations except in matters that are proper to the latter institutes. The system of delegates is in no sense proper to pontifical congregations. The mind of the Holy See on this point is sufficiently indicated by the plan of constitutions pub-lished in 1940 by the Sacred Congregation of the Propagation of 1Analecta'Ecclesiastica IV (1896), 158, n. 12; VI (1898), 57, n. 1; Battandier, Guide Canonique, 4th edit., 1908, n. 300; Bastien, Directoire Canonique, 1st edit., 1904, n. 431. 188 Jut~, 1951 ELECTIONS AND APPOINTMENTS the Faith for diocesan missionary congregations. This plan pre-scribes the system of deleggtes. Reason itself manifests the necessity of the system of delegates. Some of the institutes that have the direct vote can have a chapter of four hundred religious and even more. This is obviously an inefficient number. The vote for the superior general can go to four ballots. Imagine the labor, difficulty, and weariness merely of counting six-teen hundred votes! Each vote must then be opened, examined, and recorded. Then follow six other elections, each capable of going to three ballots. How can a chapter of affairs be efficiently and expedi-tiously conducted when the assembly numbers several hundred? A pontifical congregation of twelve hundred religious divided into four provinces will have a general chapter, exclusive of former superiors general, of nineteen members. As opposed to this practice of the Holy See, a congregation of three hundred religious with the direct vote will have an elective chapter of approximately two hundred 'religious. The opposition of the direct vote to the practice of the Holy See, to reason, and efficiency is so evident that further argumen-tation would only torture the obvious. The principle of the system of delegates is not proportioiaal representation. A province of a thousand will have the same number of delegates as a province of four hundred. Proportional representa-tion is not necessary, since the purpose of a chapter is the good of the congregation as a whole. The capitulars should divest themselves of the narrowness of merely local interests, prejudices, and ambitions and consider only the interests of the entire congregation or prov-ince. It is of no import that the United States, or the East, or the West should get its turn at the office of superior general. Not only the one important principle but the one principle of the election is that the congregation should get the best possible superior general. A greater appreciation of and fidelity.".to this principle would not only effect better elections but would also' assure a more peaceful sequel to some elections. : The system of delegates brings to a chapter a sufficient and effi-cient number of capitulars, who are from all parts of the congrega- ¯ tion and can thus give the information necessary for a knowledge of the congregation as a whole. However, no elective system is an ade-quate substitute for the study, prayer, and purity of intention re-quired for a proper vote. Capitulars can rush into this most impor-tant matter unprepared, grasp at the first prominent name or most 189 " JOSEPH F, GALLEN Review for Religious striking personality, and give a vote that may be firm but not thoughtful. They should previously have studied all religious known to them who are possibly qualified for the consult one another on those qualified, but they are forbidden to electioneer. Prayer is never useless, but in preparation for an election it is especially necessary. Vital prayer brings a peaceful sleep to pre-judice and passion, and t~hese are the natural enemies of a proper election. The illumination and strength of prayer are required to vote for the one God wants rather than the one I like, to vote 'according to the will of God rather than according to the choice of any group. Prayer will bring purity of intention by which the vote will be given to the one most competent and will exclude self-interest, sectionalism, and nationalism. II. Elect Only When Necessary 1. General Officials. The designation of superiors and officials is a matter of internal government and thus appertains to the institute itself. The superio~ general must be elected by the general chapter, since this chapter is the only superior higher than himself in the insti-tute. The general councillors are also elected by the general chapter. This is the reasonable method of designation rather than appoint-ment by the superior general. No superior should choose his own councillors, since ther~ is danger that he would select only those of the same mind as himself or those who would be pliable to his own will. This would be opposed to the canonical concept of canon 105, 3°, which commands a councillor to give his opinion not only respectfully but also truthfully and sincerely. The purpose of a council is to preclude a government that would otherwise be purely individual. At least occasional dissent and opposition of councillors is inherent in the obligation of superiors of seeking the advice and consent of their council. In almost all congregations of Sisters and Brothers the general. chapter also elects the secretary general and the bursar general, but the Sacred Congregation of Religious in approving constitutions also permits that these two general "officials be appointed by the superior general with consent of his council. In my judgment this is the preferable method. The secretary and bursar as such have no part in government. The secretary is merely what his name implies, a secretary and an archivist. The bursar is a treasurer and a bookkeeper. No attribute of these offices demands an election by the general chap-ter. I think we can go further and maintain the following principle 190 ELECTIONS AND APPOINTMENTS as practical: an elective chapter is a sufficiently compet.ent judge of the broad human qualities required for government but is not a good judge of specialized abilities. Chapters have elected secretaries who ~ould not type and bursars who knew nothing of keeping books. What has been said of the secretary and bursar is much more true of the director of schools, or studies, the inspector general of hospitals, and, above all, of the novice master who are elected by the general chapter in a few congregations. The procurator general in congregations of Brothers is also an official of specialized abilities. 2. Provincial Ogicials. The Code of Canon Law does not de-termine the method of designation of the provincial superior, the provincial councillors, or the provincial secretary and bursar. In theory at least the constitutions may determine whether the designa-tion of these officials is to be by appointment of the superior general with the con~sent of his council or by election in a provincial chapter. However, many things that are left undetermined in the Code are determined by the practice of the Sacred Congregation of Religious in approving constitutions, although that is not completely, true in the present instance. Nevertheless, it is most worthy of note that the Normae described above mention only the appointment of provincial officials by the superior general. It is also significant that the two outstanding authors on the practice of the Sacred Cdngregation for the constitutions of lay congregations, Bastien2 and Battandier,"~ do not even mention the designation of provincial officials by election. Looking through thirty sets of constitutions of pontifical congrega-tions of Sisters and Brothers, I find that twenty-six appoint and only four elect the provincial officials in a provincial chapter. It thus ¯ appears more than evident that appointment is by far the preponder-ating method of designation in the practice of the Holy See. Reason itself commends the method of appointment. If the term of office of the provincial is three years, a provincial chapter is neces-sary every three years. Experience seems to prove that the election year is also a distracted year. This argument is not so fdrc~ful when the term of the elected provincial isosix years, as is sometimes pre-scribed in constitutions. The usual norm also is that the superi6r general or his delegate presides at a provincial chapter in which pro-vincial officials are elected. The territorial extent of congregation~ divided into provinces is usually very extensive. If the superior gen- 9Directoire Canonique, nn. 239, 3; 381; 387-389. 8Guide Canonique, n. 505. 191 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review for Religious eral believes that he should personally preside at these chapters, he is faced with a burden of travel that can interfere with the duties of general government. It is to be remembered that he is already obliged to make a canonical visitation of his entire institute at least once during his term of office. It is also the ordinary norm of constitu-tions that the superior general with the consent of his council must confirm the election of the provincial officials. These cannot validt~t enter on their offices before they are confirmed. For example, if a religious who is elected provincial superior places any act as provin-cial before being confirmed, that act is null and void (canon 176, § 3). Furthermore, the superior general should, at least outside of an urgent case, assemble his council to secure their vote (canon 105, 2°). The members of a council, at least ordinarily, are to give their opinion in an assembly of the council and not by individual and separate replies to the superior. It is certainly somewhat contradic-tory, as also inconvenient and difficult, that the superior general should ordinarily preside over a provincial chapter and yet ordinarily be present with his council to confirm the election. 3. Is a prooincial chapter necessar~l? A provincial chapter always elects the delegates to the general chapter. It is almost universally true that these delegates are two in number. In some institutes the provincial chapter also decides on the, proposals that are to be sub-mitted to the chapter of affairs in the general chapter, and in a few congregations the provincial chapter may make financial and dis-ciplinary enactments for the province, which, however, are not effective until they are confirmed by the general council. A provincial chapter brings together superiors and delegates from the entire prov-ince. It thus entails the suspension of other works by the members for the duration of the chapter and also the expenditure of a sufficient amount of money for travel. The latter consideration is of no small moment in congregations of ~is~ers and Brothers. It is a safe pre-sumption that such institutes are so poor that economy becomes a basic principle of conduct. It must be admitted that in the practice of the Holy See the pro-vincial chapter is almost the universal means of electing the delegates to the general chapter. However, th~ Holy See has also approved the following method. Those of active voice assemble in each house under the presidency of their local superior. Each vocal writes on the one ballot the names of the two Sisters that she elects as delegates to the general chapter. The local superior encloses these in an 192 dulq, 1951 ELECTIONS AND APPOINTMENTS envelope with her own vote, seals the en,~elope in the presence of the vocals, and immediately forwards it to the provincial superior or superior general. A meeting of the provincial or general council is held after all the envelopes have been received, and at this meeting the votes are counted, examined, and recorded. The two religious with the highest number of votes are the delegates, the next two are the substitutes. It is difficult to see why this simple method is not preferable when the only business of a provincial chapter is to elect the delegates to the general chapter. The two other matters within the competence of the provincial chapter of some congregations can be taken care of in other ways. The disciplinary and financial enactments, which must be confirmed by the general council, can be procured by the exercise of the right of representation to higher superiors, especially at the time of the provincial and general visita-tion. Nothing also forbids an individual religious from suggesting to the provincial superior or either of the two delegates the matters that he believes should be proposed to; the general chapter. 4. Local o~cials. The election of local superiors, councillors, and bursars is blessedly unknown in congregations of Sisters and Brothers. A universal statement is dangerous in such a matter and does not exclude isolated exceptions. III. Reelections and Reappointments 1. Mother General. The legislation of the Code on the duration of office ot: higher superiors is found in canon 505 : "The higher supe-riors shall be temporary, unless the constitutions determine other-wise." Higher superiors in institutes of women are the mother gen-eral, mother provincial, and the superiors of independent monasteries. The Code does not abrogate a prescription of the constitutions in existence before the Codd which ordains~hat the office of the mother general is to be for life. One or two congregations of Sisters have perpetual mothers general. Outside of the preceding case the Code commands that the office of mother general be temporary, but it does not determine the duration of the temlSorary term nor does it forbid the continued and immediate reeiection o'f the same mother general. These principles of the Code a~e very severely limited both by the directives and the practice of the Sacred Congregation of Religious in approving constitutions. It is undeniable that the Sacred Congre-gation is opposed to the continued immediate reelection of the same mother general. The almost universa'l modern practice of the Holy See is to give the mother general a term of six years but to permit an 193 JOSEPH F~ GALLEN immediate reelection only for a second term. A few pontifical con-gregations prescribF a term of twelve years but do not permit imme-diate reelection. The Sacred Congregation manifested in a letter of March 9, 1920, that it is opposed to a reelection of a mother general c~ntrary to such limitations prescribed in constitutions of pontifical congregations and that it is also averse to granting a dispensation. All congregations of Brothers and diocesan congregations of Sisters whose constitutions prescribe the same term of office and contain the same limitations should follow this letter as a directive norm, since it manifests the mind of the Holy See. Some diocesan congregations assign a term of only three years to the mother general. This does not seem to be an efficient norm, at least in large congregations. It takes a mother general a year or more to acqu.ire full mastery of her extensive and detailed office. tions and the distractions of tion. A mother general who gibility. Some constitutions two six-year terms only when The three-year term also makes elec-elections too frequent in a congrega-has been out of office recovers her eli-ordain that she is again eligible after she has been out of office for six years. The matter of the reelection of the mother general has been taken care .of by the Holy See, and the mind of the Holy See at present is that the mother general should have a term of six years but she may be reelected immediately only for a second term. 2. The General Councillors. Ordinarily a congregation of Sis-ters has four general councillors. The first councillor elected is the mother assistant and vicar general. There is nothing in the Code of Canon Law concerning the duration of office or the repeated reelec-tion of the same general councillors. In the practice of the Holy See ¯ their term of office is the same as that of the mother general, but in this same practice it is almost universal that they may be reelected indefinitely. One consequence of this inde.finite elegibility is that in some in-stances and for a long period of time the mother general and the mother assistant have merely rotated in these two offices. Undoubt-edly the reason for this in many cases is that the two were the most competent religious in the congregation for these offices. It is diffi-cult to adcept this as a universal explanation of the fact. Rather fre-quently the impression can be gained that the capitulars did not carefully and thoroughly[ study the possible qualifications of other members of the congregation, and thus chose the effortless path of voting for those whose names were extrinsically prominent. To aid 194 ELECTIONS AND APPOINTMENTS such a study by the capitulars many constitutions prescribe that a list of all religious eligible as general officials is to be posted in a place accessible to the capitulars. This is done in many very large con-gregations. The two in question can be the most competent religious for the office, but we do not have to fall back on conjecture or imagina-tion to see a very talented, competent, and energetic mother general who would-not fit comfortably into the subordinate position of mother assistant. We can readily find a somewhat subdued person-ality who would be a success as mother assistant but who would not necessarily possess the vigor and firmness of will that all supe-riors general must at times exercise. A prolonged period of general government by the same two religious can also deprive a congrega-tion of the quickening influence of new ideas, a new approach, and a new enthusiasm that it may need. The difficulty in this matter could be solved by a more thoughtful, prayerful, and, perhaps, dis-interested choice by the capitulars of the religious most competent for the office. A law to preclude the rotation should be resorted to only if necessary, as can happen in a congregation in which the rota-tion has become ingrained to the detriment of the institute~ Some pontifical and diocesan congregations have enacted laws in this matter by directly forbidding that a retiring mother general be immediately elected mother assistant, and one congregation forbids even postula-tion in this case. The election of a retiring mother genera! as one of the other three general councillors can also create a problem. It is not difficult to imagine that the presence of her predecessor on the council would prevent a mother general from initiating or proposing to her council. a course of action at variance with that of her predecessor. Thus one congregation forbids a mother general to be elected general councillor before a lapse of six years. The continued immediate relection of the same four general councillors is justifiable and commendable when they are the reli-gious most highly qualified for these offices. However, the. repetition here also can be due rather to thoughtlessness than to a studied and prayerful choice. The study of tbe qualification~ for any elective office should go deeper than mere externals. General competence and not mere personality is the rational basis of selection. _An attractive personality is not always.the sign of a competent person. A careful study will also exclude a choice based on first impressions. The price 195 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Re~iew /:or Religious we pay for actions based 6n first impressions is usually delayed, but it is often exorbitant. It is a fact of experience that many people never free their judgment of the influence of externals and first im-pressions. Several congregations bare believed it necessary to place limitations on the repeated immediate reelection of the same four general councillors and thus include the mother assistant. These limitations take various forms: a)an immediate reelection for a second term only: b) reelection for a third term only after the lapse of six years out of office: c) at least at every ordinary general chap-ter two new councillors must be elected; d) a second immediate term only if they receive two-thirds of the votes, but not for a third term before the lapse of six years out of offce. These limitations are practically always applied also to the secretary and bursar general. Since these two officials as such have no part in governme~nt, it is most difficult to see any reason for limiting their tenure of office. 3. The Mother Prooincial. The law of the Code on the dura-tion of the offce of the mother provincial is the-same as that given above for the mother general. As far as is commonly known there are no perpetual provincials. The ordinary practice of the Holy See assigns a three-year term to the provincial and permits reappoint-ment or reelection for an immediate second and, in some instances, even for an immediate third term in the same province. Thus the Holy See has settled any question concerning the repeated reappoint-merit or reelection of the mother provincial. 4. The Provincial Councillors. The provincial councillors are ordinarily either two or four. The Code of Canon Law does not legislate on the term of office of the provincial councillors, and the practice of the Holy See permits their indefinite reappointment or re-election. However, we have here also the possibility of the same diffculties in the mere interchange of the offices of provincial and assistant provincial, in the presence of the former provincial on the provincial council, and in the protracted tenure of office by the same councillors. 5. Local Superiors. Canon. 505 legislates on the duration of office of minor local superiors. The adjective, "minor," is Used to distinguish local superiors from the superiors of independent monas-teries, who are higher superiors according to the Code, for example, the superior of a Visitandine monastery. The Code forbids a minor local superior to be designated for a term of more than three years. At the expiration of this time she may be designated, if the consti- 196 July, 1951 ELECTIONS AND APPOINTMENTS tutions permit, for a second, but not for an immedifite third term in the same house. In brief, the Code permits a local superior only two successive three-year terms in the same house. No furthe~ limitations are added in the general practice of the Holy.See in approving con-stinttions. If the Sister is local superior and also holds an office such as presi-dent of a college or supervisor of a hospital, she must be taken out of the post of local superior at the end of the second term. The six-year tenure can certainly create a difficulty in such a situation. The Code applies the law of canon 505 equally to active and contem-plative institutes. It is therefore reasonable to assert that the Code favors this temporary tenure primarily, if not exclusively, as regards the government of subjects in their religious life. The Code does not deny the principle that greater permanency in the direction of some. external works of religious institutes is desirable. The automatic six-year change of presidents of colleges and supervisors of hospitals can cause wonderment and lessened efficiency. It will not be easy for any institute and very difficult for a great number to find many able presidents and supervisors. The law permits only two remedies. A petition may be made to the Holy See to prolong the tenure as local superior. The difficulty of this solution is the prolongation of the six-year tenure in the government of the religious life of the com-munity, but experience seems to confirm the wisdom of the six-year tenure in this respect. The other solution is to separate the two offices and to have a superior of the community, who alone is bound by the six-year tenure, and a president or supervisor. The usual objection against this solution is that it creates a dualism of authority. The objection may really be founded on the fact that the system is some-thing new, but we cannot hold that change is of its nature evil and that the only good is the good old way. The greater extent and complexity in modern times of some external activity of an institute may demand a departure from the former method of direction. It is certainly nothing unusual in secular.life and in business for a .person to be subject to two authorities. Docility on the part of subjects and a reasonable working Out of the distinction of the two fields of authority by the superior and the president or supervisor can bring success to this system. A serious reason may exist for retaining a particular local supe-rior in office beyond the six-year tenure, for example, the completion of a buildi'ng whose erection was begun under this superior. The 197 JOSEPH F. GALLEN Review/or Religious Holy See will grant the dispensation for a serious reason. It is not in accord with at least the spirit and purpose of the law to make the asking for dispensations a general practice in the congregation. The constitutions of a few congregations emphasize this doctrine by pre-scribing: "Without a real necessity the mother general shall not" ask for a dispensation from a law so salutary for the religious them-selves and for the whole congregation." The limitation of the Code affects the reappointment of a local superior only in the same house. The Code permits indefinite reap-pointment to other houses, and constitutions approved by the Holy See rarely place any limitation on such reappointment. Subjects, however, have been known to grumble at the principle: "Once a superior, always a superior." It is also true that the volume of a grumble quite frequently exceeds that of the idea producing it. Higher superiors and their councils are obliged to secrecy, but evi-dently their justification for the repeated reappointment of the same religious is the dearth of others qualified for the office. This justi-fication must frequently be admitted. However, it is not true in a11 cases of protracted reappointment. We can at times suspect that general and provincial councils have not been at all thorough or per-severing in compiling a list of those qualified for government. Reap-pointment should also not be allowed to become so constant that the reappointment of every superior is expected and its absence is con-sidered a blot on her reputation. On the other hand, religious should remove even from the field of the sub-conscious the principle that a delayed or excluded superiorship bears the same stigma as a delayed or excluded profession, that every priest must have his parish and every Sister her house, that the one source of peace of soul of mature religious life is to be or to have been a superior, and that never to have been a superior is never to have been approved. These are in-sidious thoughts. They can and, perhaps, do cause great loss of peace of soul. It is a very evident but in no way dishonorable fact that all religious are not qualified for government. Few of us are in danger of psychic disorders because we cannot teach Hebrew, but it is most doubtful that the chair of Hebrew exacts the price of pa-tience, humility, charity, self-sacrifice, misunderstanding, and com-pletely unwarranted criticism that must be paid by the one who has the first chair in chapel "and refectory. General and provincial councils should not only prayerfully and perseveringly search for those best/qualified, but in this matter we 198 ! July, 1951 ELECTIONS AND APPOINTMENTS believe it is a prudent and efficient principle that they should gen-erally incline to a new appointment rather than an immediate reap-pointment to another house of a. religious who has completed a six-year tenure as a local superior. A few congregations have legislated in their constitutions on the reappointment of local superiors to other houses. One form of such legislation is: "After bearing the burden and responsibility of supe-rior for six years, it is necessary (essential, very helpful) that the Sister enjoy for at least three (six, one) years the liberty of subjects and the merit of obedience and submission." It can be doubted that a six-year interval is either necessary or expedient. An interval of from one to three years would be sufficient. A second form of the same legislation is: "A third (and fourth) immediate term may be permitted in another house, but at the expiration of three (four) consecutive and full terms of office, a Sister cannot again be appointed local superior before the lapse of at least a.year (three years)." This law inclines against a third or fourth term, since it merely permits such a term. The limitation of this law of four terms with an interval thereafter of at least a year is a generally practical and pru-dent norm. It could well be followed by all congregations as a direc-tive norm. 6. Local Councillors. The Code of Canon Law does not legis- /ate on the tenure of office of local councillors, and the practice of the Holy See permits their indefinite reappointment. In congregations the influence of local councillors is not very great and thus a pro-tracted tenure of office by the same religious is not apt to cause any serious difficulty. However, a change could at times be helpful to give new life to the house, to avoid the monotony of the same old things in the same old way, to soften rigor, to broaden under-standing, to add stability, and even to quicken to activity a govern-ment that has confounded patience with passivity and tolerance with lack of courage. Conclusion The moral of our story has been frequently expressed above. Careful study, sincere prayer, and absolute purity of intenti6n will assure worthy elections and appointments. This extends to the in-dividual religious, who can more readily transgress these norms in the election of the delegates. The legislation that has been enacted in several congregations to secure better elections and appointments manifests that at least these congregations thought there had been 199 "ANSELM LACOMARA Reoieu~ [or Religiou~ a neglect of these norms. Law is a necessity and is born of an abuse. Law also can never be an adequate substitute for human knowledge andintegrity of will. Some things are highly capable of arousing unworthy emotions, and one of these is elections. The best advice to any elector whether of a delegate or of the superior general is first pray, then study, examine the purity of your intention before God, and then vote. Growt:h in Grace Through t:he ,l::ucharls : Anselm Lacomara, C.P. THE life of grace may be compared to a steep hill which has a great treasure await.ing the climber when he reaches the top. Like every such climb, progress in grace meets difficult portions which are apt to slow us down and give us a.little hardship before we finally continue up. At times like this we need a helping hand and an inward drive to propel us forward. In His divine foresight and infinite mercy, Christ has provided us with a help which enables us to take care of every difficulty and overcome every obstaclee. The divine help is none other than Him-self in the Holy Eucharist. He is the help and the helper. We are never alone in walking the road that leads to the heights. Christ's strength and companionship are ours whenever we need them. His company is ever at our disposal when we need a helping hand over the rough spots, ggception of the Blessed Sacrament brings divine help into our lives. Fervent reception of Holy Communion increases our spiritual vitality, for it unites us to the source of all grace. The fruits of this union with Christ are mutual charity and peace. The Holy Eucharist enables us to keep faith with Christ, and with Christ's brothers and sisters through charity. Christ's grace flows through us as the life of the vine flows through the branches out to the tiniest leaf. That it should be thus is clear from the cir- 20O GROWTH THROUGH THE EUCHARIST cumstances in which Christ instituted the Blessed Sacrament and from His prayer on the first Holy T-hursday. Revelation of Love As Christ reclined with the Apostles for His final Passover Feast, the time of prophetic fulfillment had arrived. The sacre~t Jewish ritual was about to be celebrated by its Author and Object. Jesus was at the head of the table. Nearby was John who would not for-get this holy night as long as he lived. Exactly as the Law prescribed, the Master passed the ritual cup, partook of the lamb, consumed the bitter herbs, chanted the Psalms. Suddenly an unexpected hush fell on the group. The Master paused, looked upon His own and silently took bread into His holy and venerable hands. His voice alone broke the reverent silence: "This is my body which is being given for you;',do this in remem-brance of me." In awe and profound humil!ty the rough men received their First Holy Communion. The Master then took the cup, saying: "This is the cup of the New Covenant in my Blood, which shall be shed for you." The Apostles, each with deep emo-tion, partook of Christ's Precious Blood. While He was yet in them by His sacramental presence, Christ revealed the infinite riches of love stored in His Sacred Heart. Hear His words: "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled or be afraid . . . I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine-dresser. Every branch in me that bears no fruit he will take away; and every branch that bears fruit he will cleanse that it may bear more fruit. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it remain on the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for without me you can do nothing. If you abide in me, 'and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wil1,'and it shall be done to you . . . As the Father has loved me, I also have loved you. Abide in my love . . . This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. These things I command you, that you may love one another." Thus did Christ reveal Himself as our friend and our food, the help and the helper in the life of grace. He has willed to remain with us all days so that we are never alone, so that we never have to 201 ANSELM LACOMARA Review for Religious face life and its burdens by ourselves. He. is with us always to bear us up and to give us strength. The Bread of Life St. Augustine, in one of his sermons on the Passion, put these words in0Christ's mouth: "I am the food of the strong. Have faith and eat me. But thou wilt not change me into thyself; it is thou who wilt be changed into me." And St. Thomas develops the same thought in his commentary on Lombard: "The matter of the Eucharist is a food; the proper effect, then, must be analogous to that of food. He who assimilates corporal food transforms it into him-self; this change repairs the losses of the organism and gives it the necessary increase. But the Eucharistic food, .instead of being trans-formed into the one who takes it, transforms him into itself. It follows that the proper effect of the Sacrament is to transform us so much into Christ that we may say, 'I live, now, not I, but Christ liveth in me.' " Christ is truly the food of the soul in the Blessed Sacrament. Holy Communion is the "Sacred Banquet in which Christ is re-ceived." The source of all life and grace comes to share that same life and grace. In His sermon promising the bread of heaven, Christ said: "I am the bread of life. He that comes to me shall not hunger. I am the living bread which came down frdm heaven . the bread which I shall give is my flesh for the life of the world . . . Unless you eat of the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you . . . My flesh is real food, and my blood is real drink. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood, abides in me and I in him." It is evident that Our Blessed Lord never intended that the Holy Eucharist to be a reward for goodness of life. It is a food without which we cannot live any kind of a spiritual life. Christ certainly indicated His mind on the matter when He stated with so much force: "Unless you eat of the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood you shall not have life in you." ;Faken simply as spoken, this can mean only one thing: just as physical life cannot continue with-out physical food, so also our spiritual life is unable to continue without the spiritual food of Christ's Sacred Body and Blood. Christ wants us to receive Him frequently and fervently that the life of grace within us may flourish and come to full flower. He has left Himself as the food of our souls'that we may abide in Him, and He in us, and all in the Father. Christ comes to us with His divin- 202 dul~,1951 GROWTH THROUGH THE EUCHARIST ity, His merits, and His infinite riches that He may become for the soul its light and its way, it wisdom and its truth, its justice and its strength. In short, He. who is life itself, comes to fill the soul with divine life that we may see things as He sees them and do things as He wants them done. Union with One Another in Christ The effect of sacramental union will make itself felt not only in the life of the individual religious but in the life of the whole reli-gious family. Christ said: "Love one another as I have loved you." When He gave that command, He and His own were united in a bond of love as they had never been united before. They had come together to worship the same God according to the same ritual. They had partaken of the same food, broken the same bread. Above all, they were united to Christ and to one another in Him because all had shared in Christ's Body and Blood. The supernatural vitality of the Eucharist made their souls throb (vith God's own life shared through divine grace. He in them and they in Him and all in the Father--a unity ineffable. This unity among the Apostles and the Master accomplished in the reception of Communion is a sign of the wondrous unity which exists in Christ's Mystical Body. St. Paul (I. Cot., 10:17) wrote: "XVe, being one, all partake of the same bread." Christ is still in the place of honor. The Pope and bishops are in their allotted place; priests, religious, and laity in theirs. All receive the same Lord; all are nourished by the same divine food. The life of Christ flows in a constant stream to all His members. He is still the vine, we the branches. The words of the Last Discourse still hold true: "the glory that Thou hast given Me, I have given to them that they may be one; I in them and Thou in Me; that they may be perfected in unity." ' Solidarity in Christ! This idea so permeated the early Chris-tians that their charity became their mark of identification. "Behold these Christians: how they love one another." They loved one another in Christ. They shared the same bread of life in conscious imitation of the scene which took place in the Cenacle. Their breaking of bread was a liturgical and ritualistic banquet at wlqich each received Communion. They were acutely conscious that the Master had promised peace and love to all who did in like manner. The secret of the intense love, that led them to sell what they had and give to the poor, was their mutua! love for Christ, their mutual 203 ANSELM LACOMARA life and sanctification in Him. Their reception of Communion was the strong bond which held them to one another in charity. Our first brethren knew that Communion was a vivid continuation of the Last Supper. Holy Communion is also our way of being ~nited with Christ as the Apostles and early Christians were. We partake of the same chalice, break the same bread. This cannot fail to produce the effect desired by Our Lord, our growth in grace and charity. When Jesus comes to us in Holy Communion, let us allow Him to work in us so that we may be truly one with Him. If we are one with Him, we will surely be one with our fellow religious,, for our hearts will be attuned to His words: "Love one another as I have loved you." If we are one with Him, His influence will make itself felt in our daily lives. The curt word will die in its utterance. The sharp reply will be softened on our lips. Our judgments will be kind. We will listen to and respect the opinions of others. Our outlook will be that of Christ, who "loving His own, loved them to the end." Christ wants ~to work wonders in our souls. He loves us more than words can say. His Body and Blood are given to us daily. He desires us to join Him in this Sacred Banquet that His spirit and His peace may fill our souls. If we receive Him in the same spirit of fer-vent generosity with which He comes to us, His priestly prayer, "Holy Father, keep in thy name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are," will have its glorious fulfill-ment in our souls. HERESY OF RACE One can scarcely mention any of the various ways in which Negroes are unjustly treated when he is confronted with the old objections: the-value-of-property-goes- . down-when-the-Negro-moves-in : the-parish-runs-down-if-Negroes-are-not-kept-out ; would-you-want-your-sister-to-marry-a-Negro? : the-black-baby-in-the-seventh-gen-eration; white-students-would-leave-the-school-if-Negroes-were-accepted; hospitals-would- go-bankrupt-if-Negro-patients-were-admitted ; white-patrons-would-boycott-the- hotels-if-Negroes-were-served; and so forth. "All these woulds and ifs," writes Sister Mary Ellen O'Hanlon, O.P., in The Heresy of Race, "and many more, so repeatedly rolled off loose tongues, are false conjectures for which no real or honeit experiences have ever given any proof/' The Heresy of Race. which deals with these old objections and other points regarding the true Christian attitude towards race relations, can be obtained from: Rosary College Book Store, Rosary College, River Forest, Illinois. Single copies, 50 cents. Reduced rates for quantity orders. 204 Ins :rucfion on Sponsa Christi [EDITORS' NOTE: We present here the Instruction of the Sacred Congregation of Religious on the practical application of the Apostolic Constitution, Sponsa Christi. This document was given at Rome under date of November 23, 1950, and pub-lished in Acta Apostolicae Seclis, under date of 3anuary 10, 1951, pp. 37-44.] I. Among the remarkable documents by which our Holy Father, Plus XII, by Divine Providence, Pope, has willed to adorn and crown the Holy Year as with so many precious jewels, assuredly not the least is the Apostolic Constitution, $loor~sa Christi, which deals with the renewal and advancement within God's Church of the holy and venerable institution of nuns. This Sacred Congregation; which as its appointed task, promptly and faithfully assists th~ Holy Father in all things pertaining to the state of perfection, has reverently and joyfully received from him the commission of putting into execu-tion this Constitution, truly remarkable from so. many points of view, and of making its application assured and ea.sy. II. To fulfill this honorable duty, the Sacred Congregation has assembled in this Intruction some practical norms for those points which offer greater difficulty. III. Now, the points in the Apostolic Constitution which offer difficulty and hence require special clarification are:. (I) those which refer to the major or minor cloister of nuns; (2) those which deal with the establishment of federations and the limitation of auton-omy; (3) finally those which have to do with obtaining and co-ordinating productive labor for the monasteries. I. MAJOR AND MINOR CLOISTER FOR NUNS IV. The Apostolic Constitution, Sponsa ~hristi (art. IV), pre-scribes a special cloister for monasteries of all nuns which differs from the episcopal cloister of congregations (c. 604), and which, according to the general ngrm of the law, is papal, as is the cloister of orders of men (c. 597, § 1). In fact, regarding a number of prescriptions dealing with both the entrance of externs into the limits of the cloister and the going out of the nuns from the same, the regu-lations are stricter than those which control the papal cloister of men. V. Hereafter there will be two types of papal cloister for nuns: the one major, which is reserved for monasteries in which solemn vows are taken and a purely contemplative life is led, even though the number of the nuns may have decreased; the other mirror, which 205 INSTRUCTION Reoieu3 for Religious as a rule, is applied to monasteries in which a life is led which is not exclusively contemi~lative, or the nuns take simple vows only. A. Major Papal Cloister VI. Major papa/ cloister is that which is described in the Code (cc. 600, 602) and accurately defined by the Sacred Congregation in its Instruction, Nuper edito, approved by the late Pop~ Pius XI on February 6, 1924. This cloister is fully confirmed in the Constitu-tion, Sponsa Christi, safeguarding the following declarations which the Constitution empowers the Sacred Congregation to make (art. IV, § 2, 1°) 'so that its observance may be prudently adapted to the needs of the times and to local circumstances. VII. Nuns bound by major papal cloister, after their profession, by reason of the profession itself and by the prescription of ecclesi-astical law, contract a grave obligation: 1° of remaining always within the precincts of the monastery which have been put within the definite limits of the cloister, so that they may not leave the cloister ~ven for a moment under any pretext or condition without a special indult of the Holy See, except in those cases only which are provided for in the canons and instructions of the Holy See, or which are envisioned in the constitutions or statutes approved by the Holy See itself. 2° of not admitting to the parts of the monastery subject to the law of cloister any. person whatsoever no matter of what class, con-dition, sex, or age, even for a moment, without a special indult of the Holy See. Certain exceptions, however, of persons and cases are expressly made in the canons and in instructions of the Holy" See, as well as in the constitutions or statutes approved by it. VIII. 1° Indults and dispensations to leave the major cloister after profession (VII, 1°) or to enter it or to admit others (VII, 2°) are reserved exclusively to the Holy See, and can be granted by it alone or in its name and by its delegation. 2° Reasons for obtaining dispensations should be proportionately grave, due consideration being given to the circumstances of cases, times, and places, keeping in mind the practice and style of the Roman Curia. IX. 1° The faculty to dispense may be given ab bomine, either for a definite period of time for all cases occurring during it, or for a certain number of cases. There is nothing; however, to hinder the granting of certain permissions habitually in particular law having 206 duly, 1951 SPONSA CHRISTI legitimate approval, for instance, in the constitutions, in the statutes of federations, and in similar documents.' 2° Whether granted ab homine or by general or particular law, indults and dispensations must determine, according to the instruc-tions of the Holy See affd the practice and style of the Roman Curia. the conditions and precautions .to which the dispensation is subject. X. The penalties against those who violate the laws of cloister remain as stated in toe Code (c. 2342, nn. 1, 3). B. Minor Papal Cloister ~ XI. Minor papal cloister: 1° retains intact the fundamental rules of the cloister of nuns, inasmuch as it differs greatly from the cloister of congregations (c. 604) as well as from that of orders of men (cc. 598-599) ; 2° must safeguard and facilitate for all the observance and care of solemn chastity; 3° it must protect and efficaciously rosier the contemplative life of the monastery; 4° The employments which the Church hag designedly entrusted to these monasteries must be so harmonized with the contemplative life within the confines of the minor papal enclosure that the latter may by all means be preserved while these works are properly and advantageously performed. 5° In monasteries which engage in approyed works, the pre-scription of canon 599, § 1 for the cloister of or'ders of men, which is likewise applied by canon 604, § 2 to the cloister of congregations, is to l~e strictly and faithfully observed, in such a way that a clear and complete separation be ever maintained between buildings or sec-tions thereof set apart for the living quarters of the nuns and for the exercises of the monastic life, and those parts made over to necessary works. XII: Minor papal cloister includes: 1° a grave prohibition against admitting into the parts of the house set aside for the community of nuni and subject to the law of cloister (c. 597) any persons whatsoever who are not members of the community, regardless of class, condition, sex, or age, according to canon 600; 2° another grave prohibition forbidding the nuns after profes-sion to leave the precincts of the monastery, in the same way as nuns subject to major cloister (n. VII-IX). XIII. 1 ° The passage of the nuns from the parts reserved to the 207 INSTRUCTION Revieu~ for Religious community to the other places within the precincts of the monast~ery destined for the works of the apostolate is allowed for this purpose alone, with the permission of the superior, and under proper safe-guards, to those who, according to the norms of the constitutions and the prescriptions of the Holy See, are destined for the exercise, of the apostolate in any way. 2° If by reason of the apostolate, dispensations from the pre-scriptions of n. XII, 2° become necessary, they may be given only to nuns and other religious who are lawfully assigned to the employ-ments, under grave obligation in conscience for superioresses, for or-dinaries, and for superiors regular, to whom the custody of the cloister is entrusted (c. 603). XIV. Admittance of externs to the parts of the monastery de-voted to employments of whatever kind is governed by these norms: 1 o Habitual admittance is allowed to, pupils, boys or girls, ot to other persons in whose favor ministries are performed, and to such women only with whom necessary contact is demanded by reason and on the occasion of such ministries. ' 2° The local ordinary should, by a general or habitual declara-tion, define as such those exceptions which must be made of necessity, for instance, those,ordinarily required by the civil law for the pur-pose of inspections, examinations, or for other reasons. 3° Other exceptions, should such at times seem truly necessary in individual cases, are reserved to the express grant of the ordinary, who is in conscience bound to impose prude.nt precautions. XV. 1° Nuns who unlawfully leave the precincts of the mon-astery fpso facto incur excommunication reserved simply to the Holy See according to canon 2342, 3°, or, by express grant reserved to the local ordinary. 2° Nuns who illicitly leave the parts of the monastery reserved to the community and go to other places within the precincts of the monastery, are to be punished by the superior or by the local ordi-nary, according to the gravity of their fault. 3° Those who illicitl.y enter the parts of the monastery reserved to the community and those who bring them in or allow them to enter, incur excommunication reserved simply to the Holy See. 4° Those who illegitimately enter the parts of the monastery not reserved to the community, as well as those who bring them in or permit fhem to enter, are to be severely punished according to the gravity of their fault by the ordinary of the place in which the mon-astery is located. 208 duly, 1951 SPONSA (~HRISTI XVI. Dispensations from minor papal cloister, except those ad-mitted by law, are, as a rule, reser~red to the Holy See. Faculties more or less broad, as circumstances seem to require, can be granted to ordinaries either ab homine or in the constitutions and statutes. II. FEDERATIONS OF MONASTERIES OF NUNS XVIL Federations of monasteries of nuns, according to the norm of the Constitution, Sponsa Christj" (art. VII, § 2, 2°), are earnestly recomrriended, both to avoid the harmful effects which both more grievously and more readily befall entirely independent monasteries, and which by union can to a great extent be avoided more effectively, as well as to foster both their spiritual and temporal interests. Although, as a rule, federations of monasteries are not imposed (art. VIII, § 2, 2°), nevertheless, the reasons which would recom-mend them in general, could, in particular cases be so strong that, everything considered, they would be deemed necessary by the Sacred Congregation. ~' : XVIII. Federations of mona~'teries are holt to be impeded by the fact that the individual monasteries which intend to form them are subject to superiors regular. Provision will have to be made for this common subjection in the Statutes of the Federati(~n. XIX. When, because of the intention of the .fou~de~ or for any other reason that may occur, there already exists some.kind of begin-ning of a union or federation of monasteries of the same order or institute, anything already done or outlined must be taken into ac-count in the development of the federation itself. XX. A federation of monasteries in no way directly affects the relation, already in existence according to the common or to the par.- ticular law, of the individual monasteries to the local ordinaries or to the superiors regular. Hence, unless an.express and lawful deroga-tion is made to this rule, the powers of ordinaries and superiors is neither increased nor diminished nor changed in any way. XXI. The statutes of a federation may grant certain rights over the federation to ordinaries and to superiors which as a rule do not beloiag to them, leaving intact generally the right over each individual monastery as such. xxII. The general and principal purposes and advantages of unions and federations are the following: 1° the legally recognized facuIty and the canonically sanctioned duty of a mutual fraternal assistance, both in the conservation, de- 209 INSTRUCTION Reoieu~ [or Religious lense, and increase of regular observance, and of domestic economy, as well as in all other th~ngs; 2° the establishment of novitiates common to all or to a group of monasteries for cases in which, either because of a lack of person-nel necessary for the directive offices, or because of other circum-stances moral, economic, local, and the like, a solid and practical spir-itual, disciplinary, technical, and cultural training cannot be given in the individual monasteries; 3° the faculty and the moral obligation, defined by certain norms and accepted by federated monasteries, of asking for and of mutually interchanging nuns who may be necessary for government and training; 4° the possibility of and freedom for a mutual temporary ex-change or ceding of subjects, and also of a permanent assignment, because of health or other moral or material need. XXIII. The characteristic notes of federations which are to be considered essential when taken together are enumerated as follows: 1 o From the source from which they spring and [rom the author-ity from which as such they d.epend and which governs them directly, federations of nuns are of pont[lical right according to the Code (c. 488, 3°). Hence not only their establishment, but also the approval of their statutes, and the enrollment of monasteries in, or their separation from, a federation, belongs to the Holy See exclusively. Provided all the rights over individual monasteries granted by the Code to ordinaries are safeguarded, federations are subject to the Holy See in all those matters in which pontifical institutes of women are directly subject to it, unless a lawful exception has been expressly provided for. The Holy See may commit certain items of its pre-rogatives, either habitually or in single instances, to its immediate assistants or delegates for federations. 2° B~t reason of territory or of extension, federations of monas-teries are to be established preferably along regional lines, for easier government, unless the small number of monasteries or other just or proportionate causes demand otherwise. 3° By reason of the moral persons which constitute them, inas-much as they are collegiate persons (c. i00, § 2), federations are composed of monasteries of the same order and of the same internal observance, though they need not necessarily depend on the same local ordinary or superior regular, nor have the same kind of vows or form of cloister. 210 dulq, 1951 SPONSA CHRISTI 4° Confederations of regional federations can be allowed if need, or great advantage, or the traditions of the order recommend them. 5° From the standpoint ~f the independence of the monasteries, the bond which holds the federated monasteries together should be such that it does not interfere with their autonomy, at least in essen-tials (c. 488, 2°, 8°). Although derogations from autonomy are not to be presumed, they can be granted with the previous consent of each monastery, provided that grave reasons seem to recommend or demand them. XXIV. All ~ederations of monasteries of nuns must have their own statutes subject to the approval of the Holy See before they can be established. The statutes must accurately determine the following: l° the aims which each federation proposes to itself; 2° the manner in which the government of the federation is to be regulated, either with regard to constitutive elements, as for ex-ample, president, visitators, council, and the like; or as to the manner of appointment to these offices; or, finally, the power of this govern-ment and the manner of conducting it; 3° the means which the federation should use that it may be able to carry out its aims pleasantly and vigorousl~; 4° the conditions and means to be used in putting into execu-tion the prescriptions regarding the mutual interchange of persons laid down in art. VII, § 3, 2° of the Constitution, Sponsa Christi: 5° the juridical standing of nuns transferred to another mon-astery, whether in the monastery from which the transfer takes place, or in that to which it is made; 6° The economic help (o be given by each monastery for the common enterprises of the entire federation; 7° The administration of the common novitiate or of other works common to the federation, if there be such. XXV. 1° In order that the Holy See may be able to exercise a direct and efficacious vigilance and authority over federations, each federation can be given a religious assistant, as need or usefulness may suggest. 2° The religious assistant will be appointed by the Sacred Con-gregation according to the statutes, after all interested parties have been heard. 3° In each case his duties will be accurately defined in the decree of appointment. The principal ones are as follows: to take care that the genuine spirit of a profoundly contemplative life as well as the 211 INSTRUCTION spirit proper to the order and institute be securely preserved and in-creased; likewise, to see that a prudent and exact government be established and preserved in 'the federation; to have regard for the solid religious training of the novices and of the religious themselves; to help the council in temporal matters of greater moment. 4° The Holy See will delegate or commit to the assistant such powers as may seem opportune in individual cases. III. MONASTIC LABOR XXVI. 1° Since, by the disposition of Divir~e Providence, the temporal necessities of life are at times so pressing that nuns seem morally compelled to seek and accept labors beyond their accustomed ones, and even perhaps to extend the time given to labor, all should as true religious submit themselves promptly and humbly to the dis-positions of Divine Providence, as the Christian faithful do in like circumstances. 2° They should do this, however, not anxiously or capriciously or arbitrarily, but prudently as far as may seem truly necessary or .suitable, seeking with simple hearts a balance between their under-standing of fidelity to the letter and to tradition, and a filial subjec-tion to the permissive and positive dispositions of Divine Providence. 3° Keeping these directives in mind, let them submit to ecclesias-tical or to religious superiors, as the case may require, whatever ar-rangements seem advisable. XXVII. Ec~iesiastical and religious superiors must: 1° by all means seek and obtain profitable labor for the nuns who need it, and, should the case require it, also employ committees of pious men or women, and, with due caution and prudence, even secular agencies established for such purposes; 2° maintain a careful supervision of the quality and orderly ar-rangement of the work, and require a just price for it; 3° to superintend diligently the coordination of the activities and the labor of individual monasteries so that they may help, sup-ply, and complement one another, and see to it that every vestige of competition is entirely avoided. PLEASE NOTE CAREFULLY The subscription price of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS ~s now: $3.00 per year for Domestic and Canadian subscriptions; $3.35 per year for all foreign subscrip-tions. For further details please see inside back cover. 212 uesUons and Answers In the March issue of the Review Sister Digna wrote about men÷al and other.tests for candidates aspiring to the religious life. Would you kindly 9ire "Fhe name and address of the publishers of these tests? Sister Digna prepared the detailed description of the following tests which she suggests as helps to'Ocarry out the program outlined in her article. Since we received these lists some tiptoe ago, a number of the prices may have been changed. ~; 1. American Council on Education Psychological Examination for ttigh School Students. This is a time-limit test. Time: 54 min- o" utes. Norms: Comprehensive norms for e~ich annual edition are pub-lished in series V of the American Council on Education Studies for. April of'the school year in which the test is current. Authors: Louis L. Thurstone and Thelma Gwinn,Thurstone, University of Chicago. Publishers: The American Council on Education, 744 ,IacksowPlace, Washington, D.C.; distributed by Science Research Associates, 1700 Prairie Avenue, Chicago, Illinois. Cost: $.07 per test, including test booklet and answer sheet. Additional answer sheets, $.02 each. Manual, scoring keys, and norms, $.25. ~ ,, 2. The Otis Self-Administering Tests of Mental.Abilit.~. These are time-limit tests, consisting of a Higher E~amination designed for grades 9-12 and for college students; and an Inter~edlate t~xamina-tion designed for grades 4-9. Norms: Age and grade norms fur-nished in the manual, as well as charts for .translating raw score to percentile rank, or to Binet Mental Age and I.Q. Author: A. S. Otis. Publisher: World Book Company, Yonkers-on-Hudson, New York. Cost: $1.25 per package of 25 tests, including manual, scoring key, and norms; specimen set, $0.35. Four alternate forms of each test are available. 3. Wechsler-Bellevue Intelligence Scale by David Wechsler. An individual examination including eleven tests for use at all ages from adolescence (age 10) up to 70 years. Five tests are verbal: Similari-ties, Comprehension, Information, Arithmetic, and Memory for Numbers. Five are nonverbal performance tests: Object Assembly (profile, Manikin, and Hand in Form I; face, horse, and auto in Form II), Block Design, Picture Completion, Picture Arrangement, and Digit-Symbol Substitution. An alternate test of Vocabulary is QUESTIONS AND .,~NSWERS Re~ieu~ for Religious provided. A feature of the test is that the IQ can be obtained from as few as eight tests without serious loss in reliability. Scores on each test are converted into star~dard scores. The total of these scores is converted into IQ equivalents by means of a table which takes into account the age of adults. The materials appeal to testees at all ages and levels of ability and are well-suited for classification of .both normal and abnormal individuals. Text, "The Measurement of Adult Intelligence," $2.60. Form I. Test Materials, including 25 Record Blanks, $14.00. The text contains the administrative man-ual for Form I, and must be ordered separately. Form II. Test Ma-terials, including 25 Record Blanks and the manual required for ad-ministering this form, $15.50. Manual alone, $2.00. Specify Form I or Form II. Record Blanks, sold only in packages of 25 and 100 copies. Packages of 25--$1.25 each. Personality Tests . 4. The Adjustment Int~entorg by Hugh M. Bell. A diagnostic tool to .aid the counselor and guidance worker in discovering the sources of personal and social maladjustment in students and adults. The separation of adjustment into four types (home, health, social, and emotional) aids in the location of specific adjustment'difficulties. Scoring requires about three minutes. Tentative norms are given for high school students, college students, and adults of both sexes. Adult form also has scoring fbr occupational adjustment. Untimed. Forms: Student and Adult. Specify form desired. Sold only in packages of 25, $1.85, and. packages of 100, $5.75. Manual and keys included. Specimen Set,'~cluding both forms, 35 cents. Regular IBM answer sheets--for use with regular booklet of questions. Same answer sheet used for both Student and Adult forms. Sold only in packages of 50, $1.10, and packages of 500, $7.75. Stencils for both hand~ and machine-scoring; Student form, $1.10 per set, Adult form, $1.30 per set--specify form de-sired. Nontimed. Author: H. M. Bell, Chico, California, State Col-lege. Publisher: Stanford University Press, Stanford University, California. Cost: $1.85 per 25; $1.75 per 100 machine-scorable answer sheets; specimen set, $0.15. 5. The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality InuentoW by Starke R. Hathaway and J. Charnley McKinley. A diagnostic test con-structed entirely on the basis of clinical criteria. At present the au-thors have made available nine scales: Hypochondriasis, Depression, Hysteria, Psychopathic Deviate, Masculinity and Feminity, Paranoia, 214 dul~,1951 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS " Psychasthenia, Schizophrenia, and Hypomania. Four other scores are ascertained: the Question score, the Lie score, the Validity score, and the K score (a suppressor variable refining the discrimination of five of the clinical variables)i Untimed. Individual Form Forms: Individual and Group. Spec.ify form desired. Individual Form ("The Card Set"). Box of 550 item cards with three sorting cards marked True, False, or Cannot Say. Sturdy wooden box. $12.50. Manual, containing description (including complete list of questions), the6ry, administration, and norms, with supplement ex-plaining how to use the K score. $1.00, when ordered separately. 75 ccfits each when ordered in lots of 10 or more for class use. Keys. Eleven transparent guides made of map cloth, one for each of the nine scales, one for the F or Validity score, and one for the K score. $7.50 including manual. Recording Sheet for recording the subject's sorting and the profile of his scores. One sheet needed for each case. Sold only in packages of 50. 1-9 packages--$2.50.each. ¯Group Form Group Form ("The t~ooklet Form"). The Group Form has been prepared for use witb~IBM answer sbegts, thus permitting either hand-scoring or machineT~coring. The,authors recommend that the Group Form be used only with person'S~°who are still in school or who have had recent contact with test materials in group form. For clinical cases or small groups, the Individual Form is considered de-sirable. Booklets for Grghp Form are printed on heavy stock and will stand repeated use. 1-24 booklets, 25 cent~;e0db; packages of 25, $5.50 each. Manual. This is the same as for the Individual Form but has a supplement. $1.00 when ordered separately. 75 cents each when ordered in lots of 10 or ran.re for class use. Key:;. Envelope contains manuaI, supp!ementary manual, and 16 hand-scoring stencils, $4.00. Similar envelope with machine-scoring stencils, $4.00. Specify which i~ desired. Answer Sheets. IBM answer sheets which can be either machine- or hand-scored. One copy needed for each testee. For each answer sheet ordered, one Pro-file and Case Summary form is. included. Answer sheets are sold onIy in packages of 50, $3.00 each, and packages of 5~)0,.$23.00 each. Extra Profile and :Case Summary forms, for duplicate reports, $1.60 per package of 50. 6, Minnesota Personality Scale by 3ohn G. Dadey and Walter 3. blanks, $:50 per 25;-scoring keys, $1.10 for one key, $.80 for 2 to 215 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS McNamara. ' Five aspects of personality are measured: Morale, Social Adjustment, Family Relations, Emotionality, Economic Conserva-tism. These are based on a factor analysis of several pers6nality tests. Each item is scored for only one scale and each scale is highly reliable. Norms are based on almost 2000 university students. The questions are in reusable booklets. The answers are marked on IBM answer'sheets which can be either hand- or machine-scored. Grades 11 through college. Time, no li,mit, about 45 min. Forms: Men and Women. Order booklets, answer sheets and scoring stencils separately. Specify form (Men's or Women's) and quantity of each. Booklets. Sold in packages of 25. 1-9 packages--S2.50 each. 10 or more packages--S2.25 ',each. Answer sheets. Sold only in packages of 50, $1.80 each, ~tnd packages of 500, $15.00 each. Same sheet is used for either Men or Women. Manual and hand-scoring stencils must be ordered separately, 50 cents. Specify form desired. Manual and IBM machine-scoring stencils, $1.25 a set. Specify form. desired. Specimen Set, either form, 60 cents. Specify form desired. Men's or Women's. 7. The Perso, nality Inuentor~ by Robert G. Bernreuter. Stanford University Press, Stanford, California. Designed to measure six as-pects of personality at~one administration: Neurotic Tendency, Self-sufficiency, Introversion-Extroversion, Dominance-Submission, So-ciability, Confidence. Norms for both men and women have been established for h.igh school, college, and adult ages. Untimed. Sold 'only in packages of 2.5, $1.85, and packages of 100, $5.75, with manual, norms and set of keys. Individual Report Sheets, sold only in packages of 25, 35 cents. Specimen Set, 35 cents. IBM answer sheets available. Sold only in packages of 50, $1.10 each, and packages of~500, $7.75 each. Machine-scoring keys, $2.60 per set; cannot be used for hand-scoring. 8. Stronfl Vocational Interest Blank, (for Men and Women) Author: E. K. Strong, Jr. Publisher: Stanford University Press, Stanford University, California. Cost: Tests, $2.10 per 25; .report 9 keys, $:72 each for 10 or more keys; machine-scorable answer sheets, $2.72 per 100. The Psychological Corporation, 522 Fifth .Avenue, Neb¢ York, N. Y. 9. Kuder Preference Record. Form A and Form BB. Publisher: Science Research Associates, 1700 Prairie Avenue, Chicago. Cost: Form BB-test booklets which can be used many times, $.48 each; answer pads, $.08 each; profile sheets, $.02 each. '216 RELIGIOUS LIFE AND SPIRIT. ByRev. Ignaz Waffero÷,O.M.I. T~rans-lated by Rev. A. S{mon, O.M.I. Pp. vff~ ~- 408. B.Herder Book Co., S~'. Lou~s, Mo. $6.00. Community exhortations and conferences are an important means to spiritual perfection. Just as by the will of Christ the trde Faith was to be preached and propagated mainly by the living w,ord, so also Christian perfection. Christ¯ Himself set the exa'mple¯ in the Ser-mon on the Mount; the apostles and first bishops taught the more perfect way by word of mouth; virgins, ascetics, andoreligious from ¯ the earliest days were instructed and encouraged to ever greater perfec-tion by exhortations; witness, fc~r example, the monks of the desert. Spiritual conferences soon became traditional ~ in the Church; they went down the centuries, from Cassian to Bernard, to Teresa, to Francis de Sales, to Faber, Marmion, and Leen. ¯ Today canon law prescribes them as a regular spiri'tual exercise for religious and semi-narians (cf. canons 509"and 1367), and the rules of almost all reli-gious communities make provision for them. H~nce, they are not something boring, to be minimized and neglec'ted, .but rather a spir-itual element, to be valued and put to good .use. Their purpose: to enlighten the mind b~'instruction and to sup-ply motives and warmth to the will, leading to virthous action. ' For this spiritual energizing the living word is far more effective than the printed page. Of-course, the. person giving the exhortation should posse.ss certain qualities: he must be a man of prayer, self-abnegation, virtuous life, and prudence: .he must have the requisite knowledge derived from study, prayer and experience; he must make careful preparation and adapt his .conference skillfully t.o his audi-ence~ Orat?ry and rhetoric are of sec6ndary importance; simplicity and sincerity are more efficacious for this work. The listener, too, must come to the conference prepar.ed; hi must have a good intention, a desire to profit spiritually from v~hat he hears; he must not be criti-cal, but humble and receptive, diligently making practical applica-tions, not to his neighbor, or tothe speaker, but to himself. Such in brief is the doctrine of the spiritual masters on the exhortation with which religious are so familiar. 3udged in the light of the above doctrine the present collection of conferences for religious stands up quite well, though 'it is by no 217 BOOK REVIEWS Reoiew for Religious means perfect. The author, Fathe~ Ignaz Watterot, O.M.I., was competent to give these cbnferences to nuns, having been for many years a successful superior and counsellor of religious. He knows the religious life, both theoretically and practically; he has put his mes-sage in a concrete way, well-suited to his hearers. Hence, it is not su_rprising to learn that the book has been often reprinted in the original and can be found in almost every German convent. It merits the enthusiastic reception given it by the reviewers when it first appeared. There are forty conferenc~es on forty different topics, averaging ten to twelve pages in length, each one neatly and logically divided by means of sub-headin'gs. The subject-matter covers the excellence and dignity of the religious state, the duties, difficulties, and means to perfection in the religious state, its weakness and defects, its joys and consolations. Almost every important point of the ordinary life of religious receives due consideration. However, there is a surprising and inexplicabl~ dmission, daily~Holy Mass. The conferences are doctrinal and psychological. Holy Scripture, both Old and New Thstament, is cited profusely. Canon law and selected instructions of the Holy See are utilized. The principal ascetical sources are the works of Augustine, Chrysostom, Bernard," Bonaventure, Thomas Aquinas, Teresa of Avila, Ignatius Loyola, Alphonsus Liguori, and above all thos.e of St. Francis de Sales and. St. Jeanne de Chantal. Among the more recent" writers we find Alban Stolz, Albert W.eiss, and Clara Fey, foundress of the Sisters of the Poor Child J~sus, whose cause, for canonization has been intro-duced. The author is also well acquainted, with feminine psychol-ogy, and his conferences abound with practical, even homely, ex-amples and illustrations. The chief drawbacks of this American edition are two. First, the book has not been brought up to date. It was first published some forty years ago. Pertinent official documents of the Holy

Issue 69.4 of the Review for Religious, 2010. ; Holy Models Religious Growth Lighting the Way QUARTERLY 69.4 2010 Review for Religious fosters dialogue with God, dialogue with ourselves, and dialogue with one another about the holiness we try to live according to charisms of Catholic religious life. As Pope Paul Vl said, our way of being church is today the way of dialogue. Review for Religious (ISSN 0034-639X) is published quarterly at Saint Louis University by the Jesuits of the Missouri Province. Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393 Telephone: 314-633-4610 ¯ Fax: 314-633-4611 E-Mail: reviewrfr@gmail.com ¯ Web site: www.reviewforreligious.org Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor: Review for Religious ¯ 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, MO 63108-3393 POSTMASTER Send address changes to Review for Religious ¯ P.O. Box 6070 ¯ Duluth, MN 55806. Periodical postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri, and additional mailing offices. See inside back cover for information on subscription rates. ©2010 Review for Religious Permission is herewith granted to copy any material (articles, poems, reviews) contained in this issue of Review for Religious for personal or internfil use, or for the personal or internal use of specific library clients within the limits oudined in Sections 107 and/or 108 of the United States Copyright Law. All copies made under this pernfission must bear notice of the source, date, and copyright owner on the first page. This permission is NOT extended to copying for commercial distribution, advertising, institutional promotion, or for the creation of new collective works or anthologies. Such permission will only be considered on written application to the Editor, Review for Religious. ~ gournalof Catholic ~piri~uali~y eview for religious Editor Book Review Editor Scripture Scope Editorial Staff Advisory Board David L. Fleming SJ Rosemary Jermann Eugene Hensell OSB Mary Ann Foppe Tracy Gramm Judy Sharp Paul Coutinho SJ Martin Erspamer OSB Margaret Guider OSF KathleEn Hughes RSCJ Louis and Angela Menard Bishop Terry Steib SVD QUARTERLY 69.4 2010 contents 340 prisms Prisms 342 357 holy models The Spirituality of Francis Libermann: A Man Beyond His Time David L. Smith CSSP presents the embodied spirit of Francis Libermann's spirituality, underlining many instances of how his thought and action is very contemporary. The Love Mysticism of Bernard of Clairvaux and Julian of Norwich Marian Maskulak CPS shows how Bernard and Julian provide valuable material to ponder for contemporary readers who wish to explore the relationship of love between God and human beings. Personal Reflection / Group Discussion 377 religious growth Cultivating Mature Relationships in Religious Formation Chinyeaka C. Ezeani MSHR outlines how religious formao tors can model mature interpersonal relationships and respectful ways of communications that can better prepare candidates for a Christlike way of living and relating. Review for Religious 390 Operatic Discernment of a Vocation Daniel J. Heisey OSB suggests that opera, especially Gian Carlo Menotti's The Saint of Bleecker Street and Amahl and the Night Visitors, can help someone discern a religious vocation. Personal Reflection / Group Discussion 4O5 42O lighting the way Searching for Jesus at Christmas James H. Kroeger MM treats the nature and purpose of the Gospels, the role of the evangelists, questions of the "historical Jesus," the infancy narratives, and the need for an "adult" faith. Edith Stein, Woman of Light Carolyn Humphreys~ OCDS demonstrates that the themes most apparen.t throughout Edith Stein's life are her integrity, her search for truth, and her complete trust in God. departments 434 Scripture Scope: Meeting the Prophet Isaiah Again for the First Time 439 Book Reviews 444 2010 Indexes 69.4 2010 prisms 340] I seems appropriate in this final issue of Volume 69 that I acknowledge and pay tribute to Father Philip Fischer SJ who has served this journal for some twenty years. Father Fischer died quickly after being diagnosed with liver cancer just as we were sending the previous issue to the printer. For the staff and for me personally his death has left us with an aching loss as a companion in the workplace and a notable hole in our edito-rial process. Philip Fischer had amazing editorial skills. He was the one that I depended on for doing the first edits on all our manuscripts. He took real care in preserving a writer's style and expression while trying to bring a better clarity and a sharpening conciseness in eliminating repetitions. He double-checked all references, sometimes correcting misinformation and at other times adding the proper data. He made our various writers look good', and I say this from my own experience since he made me in my own writing look better than I ever would have through my original draft. In these latter years, Father Fischer made his own special contribution to our journal through his review of books summed up in what he ritled "book shelf life." From all the various books that we receive from the publishing houses, Father Fischer would quickly scan through each Review for Religious book, take notes on a number of them, and then begin to group books into similar themes or subject-matter. Within the weeks more immediate to our publishing schedule, he would construct his own essay on some twenty-five to thirty-five books, relating them in their strengths, referencing occasionally previous works, and adding sometimes his own personal preferences. Over the years, many people have taken the time to express their appreciation of his efforts in book reviews. Philip Fischer died shortly before his eightieth birth-day. He would have been celebrating his sixtieth year as a Jesuit. He was a quiet and unassuming man with great intellectual gifts. He generously offered his services as advisor and editor to many foreign Jesuits studying at Saint Louis University in their writing of class essays and term papers. He also was consulted by a good number of people writing books. He seemed to put no restrictions on the time he would spend in helping others beyond his own editorial responsibilities. Over the past twenty years, Father Philip Fischer has brought the Review for Religious to the kind of excellence in style and correctness that our readers have come to expect. In expressing our own debt of gratitude to him, I and the rest of the staff will do our best to continue the legacy which he has left us. Please join us in our own continuing prayers, that Father Philip Fischer, a wordsmith, can be enjoying companionship with the Word forever. David L. Fleming SJ P.S. Review for Religious staff and advisory board wish all our readers a most blessed Advent season and Christmas season. 341 69.4 2010 DAVID L. SMITH personal witness The Spirituality of Francis Libermann: A Man Beyond His Time ¯ . . the Holy Ghost over the bent World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings. --Gerard Manley Hopkins Since the mid 19th century, Francis Libermann's spiritual teachings have inspired the Congregation of the Holy Spirit. To appre-ciate his unique spiritual doctrine fully, one must know about the congregation's original cradle. Born the son of the Rabbi of Saverne and reared in the study of Torah, the Law, and the Talmud, Libermann was immunized against the philosophical anthropology of his day, the dichotomized worldview of Ren~ Descartes. David L. Smith cssP has taught for thirty-five years in Duquesne University's department of psychology and has also been executive director of its Phenomenology Center. His address is Duquesne University; 600 Forbes Avenue; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15282. Review for Religious His philosophy had tainted Western thought-categories since the early 17th century. Under the pervasive influ-ence of this philosophy, all things spiritual--mind, soul, and spirit--had become disembodied. The separation of mind and body, spirit and matter, natural and super-natural, and secular and sacred became the coin of the religious and spiritual realms. In many ways, human spirituality had turned into an angelic perfectionism. Libermann in large part escaped this pernicious Cartesian influence, thanks to his early education. Under his father's tutelage, he would have learned that . the Hebrew language had no word for body, the human body. The closest Hebrew word is basar, sometimes trans-lated as body, but its essential meaning .is flesh. Robinson informs us that in the ancient Hebrew worldview the flesh-body did not make us separate individuals, but rather connected us in a web or tissue of life to all other human beings. This flesh-body--this animated flesh--is the total human being and the basis for our corporate identity, our solidarity with one another, and especially our common bonding with God. Robinson emphasizes that the ancient Hebrews were interested, not in the body for its own sake, but in its vertical dimension, in that the flesh-body binds us together and binds us Godward. Basar, our animated human flesh, emphasizes our coexistence with others, our bodily To understand Libermann's uniquely existential and incarnational spirituality, we must keep this Hebrew meaning of the human body in mind. 343 69.4 2010 Smith ¯ The Spirituality of Francis Libermann togetherness with them in the world, and our openness to the Holy Spirit of God. To understand Libermann's uniquely existential and incarnational spirituality, we must keep this Hebrew meaning of the human body in mind. It will sharpen our insight into his passion for social and racial jus-tice, human solidarity, democratic values, and the free-dom and dignity of every human being. Pope Pius XII described Libermann as an "outstanding master of the spiritual life." Henry Koren CSSP, after studying his writings intensively for many yeays, did not hesitate to claim that in the sphere of spiritual doctrine he proved himself an authentic pioneer. Koren attributed the originality, universality, and timelessness of Libermann's spiritual doctrine to his ability to transcend the narrow confines of his native France's romanticism and the self-absorbed bodily mortifications of 19th-century spirit-u-ality (1958, p. 157). With his deep convictions about our common human flesh and our God-given solidarity, Libermann was ahead of his time in many ways and in many arenas. He under-stood that the mission of the Christian community and of the missionary is identical with Jesus' mission, namely, the proclamation of the power of God's unconditional grace to restore all of creation--persons, bodies, and relationships--to wholeness (Volf & Lee; p. 389). Libermann's .spiritual doctrine, always rooted in basar, points us toward the Holy Spirit's action in the world of our daily life. Koren never tires of reminding us that it is not enough just to listen to the words or read the texts to discover what truly animates an indi-vidual or an organization. We must pay heed to what the French phenomenologist Maurice Merleau-Ponty has called "operational intentionality," the lived and living Review for Religious motivation of a person or an organization. Koren asks of his fellow Spiritans, what has been and what is the driv-ing force of their founders and of their members? In his unequivocal and oft repeated response, he replies that the Spiritans' lived spirituality can best be described as an Evangelical Availability, attentive to the Holy Spirit, manifested in the "concrete situations of life." Libermann's spirituality is contemporary in many ways, precisely because he roots it always in the exis-tential situation. In his insistence upon the "concrete situations of life," we detect echoes of Gestalt Therapy's focus on the Here and Now of human experience. The authors of Gestalt Therapy: Excitement and Growth in Human Personality (Perls et al.) encourage this exercise: "Try for a few minutes to make sentences starting with what you are at this moment aware of. Begin with the words 'now' or 'at this moment' or 'here and now.'" After presenting this technique for attending to the environ-ment more vividly, they make this comment: "V~rhatever is actual is, as regards time, always in the present. Hence the stress, if we wish to develop the sense of actuality, on words such as 'now' and 'at this moment'" (p. 31). Libermann's constant advice to seek the Holy Spirit "in the concrete situation of our lives" cradles the "here and now" of Gestalt therapy. It grounds the individual's spiritual life in the actual here and now of the existential dialogue of a personal past-present-future. In this con-text, Libermann reminds us that openness to experience demands detachment from the past. A Man of His Time Libermann seems to .have been richly endowed with the gift of "reading the signs of the time." For this rea-son he could consider the clergy's failure to keep up 69.4 2010 Smith * The Spirituality of Francis Libermann with the times to be their greatest fault. During the French revolution of 1848 and the subsequent demo-cratic elections, Libermann, unlike many of his reli-gious contemporaries and superiors at home and even in Rome, did not pine for some mythical golden age. He was prompt to let go of the traditional church devotion to the ancien rggime. He encouraged his men to get out to vote at the dawning of the democratic state in France. On 22 February, thousands of Parisians had taken to the streets to demand suffrage reform. King Louis Philippe lost his nerve and abdicated. After months of chaos and confusion in the parliament and throughout the nation, Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, nephew of the exiled great emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, was elected president of the Second RetJublic on 10 December 1848 by an overwhelming majority, 5.5 million votes to his closest contender's 1.5 million. No matter that Louis Napoleon had the reputation of a "cretin" and licentious playboy, the people had spo-ken and Louis's election held out promise of a more just order for the poor of France. Libermann honored the people's decision. His sentiments must have reso-nated also with the goals of the American Declaration of Independence of 1776, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." In a letter to a friend in 1848, he wrote that he welcomed the revolution, for the royalist govern-ment in his judgment was not genuinely concerned for "the happiness of the people." Ahead of his time in the political arena, he took pains to make clear that he saw the downfall of the old regimes as a sign of God's justice against the autocratic rulers that abused the rights of the common people. These sentiments prompted him to opine that someday the autocratic rulers of Russia would also fall. Even in the life of vowed religious com- Review for Religious munities, he expressed his inclination toward democratic values when he reminded his members that the congre-gation's highest authority rested in the consensus of its membership and not in the Rule or the superiors (letter to Father Gamon, 1848, cited in Koren, 1990, p. 18). In the arena of social and racial justice, Libermann also proved himself to be far ahead of his time. At least 125 years before the Catholic Church adopted its "pref-erential option - for the poor," ' Libermann had made this con-cern the keystone of his life and his work. When a Carthusian monk in France wrote to ask about the purpose of his new congrega-tion, Libermann replied that its general purpose was to preach the good news to the poor, in particular the poor blacks of the mis-sions (letter to Dom Salier, cited by Gilbert, p. 106). Koren points out certain sympathies between the doctrines of Karl Marx and Libermann. In their com-mon concern for the poor and oppressed of society, they in their own ways arrived, at the conviction that individ-ual acts of charity would never suffice to ameliorate the social conditions that spawned poverty and oppression. They both grasped the necessity for the structural and systemic change of social conditions. What was needed to reform society was not a handout but a hand-up. In Libermann's opinion it was not sufficient to teach the At least 125 years before the Catholic Church adopted its "preferential option for the poor," Libermann had made this concern the keystone of his life and his work. 347 69.4 2010 Smith ¯ The Spirituality of Francis Libermann 481 poor in Africa "how to operate things," but "how things operate" (1983, p.105). Marx equally promoted an inti-mate link between education and work. Koren tells us that he advocated an "early combination of progressive labor with education" as "one of the most potent means for the transformation of the existing society into the new society of universal brotherhood" (Selected Works, 2, 38, cited in Koren, 1990, p. 106). In some ways, Libermann's values so closely matched some of Marx's that today he might well be condemned as an enemy of capitalism, or besmirched with the tag of socialist, promoting class warfare¯ Koren tells us that Libermann experienced a profound gratitude over the downfall of the privileged classes of the rich, "that bourgeois aris-tocracy" which he calls "the legal establishment . . . which worships money and tramples on the interests of the poor . God has overthrown their idol" (cited in Koren, 1990, p. 107). Libermann is not speaking here in the voice of a political or economic reformer; he echoes the Hebrew prophets of old. "Hear this, you who tram-ple the needy to do away with the humble of the land. ¯ . The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob, indeed, I will never forget any of their deeds" .(Amos 8:4,6-7). In the realm of personal spiritual direction, Libermann's principles far transcended the common orientation of his contemporaries. As we shall soon see, his style of spiritual direction closely resembled in many ways the nondirective and client-centered approach of the 20th-century American psychotherapist Carl Rogers. But Libermann was not just a man ahead of his time. He was a man beyond his time: he had no desire to be first in anything, except for. love of God and service to others. He was beyond his time because his message and his approach rested solely upon the action of the Holy Review for Religious Spirit. He taught us to be like a feather in the wind or the sail of a ship responding to the breath of the Holy Spirit. It is in a pervasive docility to the Holy Spirit that we find the source of Libennann's flexibility and notable lack of rigidity in his spiritual doctrine. His natural dis-position to allow others to be themselves anticipated and prefigured Carl Rogers's client-centered counseling by at least a hundred years. A Hundred Years before Rogers For instance, empathy plays a central role in Rogerian psychotherapy. It also played a major role in Libermann's life and in his spiritual doctrine. Rogers tries to describe what occurs in the most satisfactory therapeutic relationships. He writes: "It is the counsel-or's function to assume, insofar as he is able, the internal frame of reference of the client, to perceive the world as the client sees it, to perceive the client himself as he is seen by himself" (1965, p. 29). The effective thera-pist must suspend all personal assumptions about the interior life of clients and refrain from imposing any external frame of reference upon them, while trying to convey to them an empathic understanding. It would appear that Libermann's personality was richly endowed with this gift of empathy. Boniface Hanley OFM indicated this special talent when he wrote that "Libermann was a negotiator par excellence. One of the things that contributed to his success in any transaction was his delicate courtesy" (p. 24). One of Libermann's closest collaborators, Father LeVavasseur, often remarked on his keen and delicate sensitivity toward others. He recalled his extraordinary ability in his dealings with others to imagine how he would feel if he were treated as he planned to treat them. 1349 69.4 2010 Smith ¯ The Spirituality of Francis Libermann It is amazing how this ability to mentally exchange places with other people reflects basic Rogerian princi-ples. For example, Rogers postulates that "every individ-ual exists in a continually changing world of experience of which he is the center" (1965, p. 483). This postulate closely mirrors the central role that "the concrete situ-ation of the individual" plays in Libermann's spiritual doctrine. A Rogerian corollary of the previous postu-late states, "The best vantage point for understanding behavior is from the internal frame of reference of the individual himself" (1965, p. 494). In his own life and teachings, Libermann fully embraced this axiom. This gift of empathy, Libermann's extraordinary capacity to understand the other person by entering the personally experienced world, is intimately linked with another concept of Rogerian psychotherapy, uncondi-tional positive regard. Rogers describes this condition of therapeutic change as follows: "When the therapist is experiencing a warm, positive, and acceptant attitude toward., the client, this facilitates change. It involves the therapist's genuine willingness for the client to be whatever feeling is going on in him at that moment" (1961, p. 62). Relating to the client within this attitude, the therapist allows the client to be. It is an attitude of total acceptance of the client's experiential world, with-out any condemnation of what the client may be expe-riencing. For Rogers this attitude means "an outgoing positive feeling without reservation, without evaluation" (1961, p. 62). Unconditional Positive Regard Keeping in mind this description of unconditional pos-itive regard, we canonly stand in awe before Libermann's spiritual genius when we read these words of his: Review for Religious The uncomfortable feeling we can have when we are with people who think and judge differently from ourselves, who despise us and have no time for us, can easily make us stiff and timid, with the result that we are gloomy, evasive, and awkward when we are with them. This can give a very bad impression and put people off our religion. We must love everybody, whatever they feel about us or our religion. (letter to LeBerre, 1847, cited in de Mare, p. 376) Libermann's attention to his "uncomfortable feelings" reminds us of Rogers's focus upon the essential impor-tance of accepting all our competing and conflicting feel-ings if we wish to attain to a wholesome state of bodily (organismic) congruence. Intimately bound to Roge~-s's therapeutic principle of unconditional regard for the client is his principle of acceptance. He defines acceptance as "a warm regard for him asa person of unconditional self-worth--of value no matter what his condition, his behavior, or his feel- ¯ ings. It means a respect and liking for him as a separate person, a willingness for him to possess his own feelings in his own way" (1961, p. 34). Libermann's writings abound in examples like this Rogerian attitude of acceptance. His close associates commented on feeling at home and at ease in his com-pany. Without doubt his generous capacity to accept oth-ers as they were, to let them be themselves, contributed greatly to the healing power of his spiritual direction. He encouraged self-acceptance and acceptance of oth-ers. He always advised individuals who were anguishing over their faults and imperfections in words like these: "Bear gently, patiently, and most peacefully--as best you can--your needs and your infidelities. Etch deeply in your heart that Jesus and Mary tolerate them with 69.4 2010 Smith ¯ The Spirituality of Francis Libermann sweetness and kindness, and that their love for you is always the same" (Libermann, pp. 5-6). He alwhys advised people who sought his advice to strive for tranquillity and serenity in their spiritual lives, and he recommended as a general rule that all harsh-ness and rigidity toward oneself should be rejected as a temptation. Some religious people have been suspicious of "self-acceptance," rejecting it as an invention of secu-lar humanistic psychology. Vitz, for example, parodies humanistic psychology and blames its "selfist" theories for the narcissism of our age. Unlike Rogers and Libermann, who believe in the essential goodness of human beings, Vitz stands more in the Calvinist tra-dition of gloom and doom, and does not so believe. It is obvious from Libermann's advice that self-acceptance is central to his doctrine of spirituality. Over and over he urges us and encourages us in the strongest terms to treat ourselves always in a calm, gentle, peaceful, and self-accepting fashion. His language is never hard, harsh, severe, judgmental, or condemnatory. All self-rejection or self-hatred is foreign to his spirit. Only in the heart that is at peace with itself can the Holy Spirit be free to do its work. The acceptance of others is a correlate of this self-acceptance. When the gentle angel of self-acceptance swoops down to slay the dragon of self-negation, it simultaneously opens its arms to embrace and affirm He always advised people who sought his a~vice to strive for tranquillity and serenity in their spiritual lives. Review for Religious others. Rogers stated that, close to an openness to our own inner and outer experience, there emerges an open-ness and acceptance of others. To make his point, he quotes from Maslow about self-actualizing individuals: "As the child looks upon the world with wide, uncriti-cal, and innocent eyes, simply noting and observing what is the case,., so does the self-actualizing person look upon human nature both in himself and in others" (cited in Rogers, 1961, p. 174). Gracious Acceptance of Others Expressions of this gracious acceptance of others, just as they are, abound in Libermann's spiritual writings. He vigorously insists: "Put down as a fundamental principle in the matters of direction: one must not constrain or cramp the one being directed. Refrain from prescribing too many rules" (pp. 13-14). In his spiritual direction he approached others with great flexibility and rejected all legalistic attitudes. He took great pains not to impose his own will or personal preferences upon others, but inclined rather to respect individual differences. We can say that Libermann's spiritual doctrine of unconditional acceptance spared him from all tenden-cies toward an idealized perfectionism. Once again, he was at least a hundred years ahead of his time. In the 1940s and 1950s, the renowned neo-Freudian Karen Horney developed the concept of the "idealized self." She describes this "idealized self" as "what we are in our irrational imaginations, or what we should be according to the dictates of neurotic pride" (p. 158). This idealized self is impossible of attainment, for it is based upon the illusion that a finite being can be perfectly complete. Libermann had anticipated this psychoanalytic insight in 1846 when he warned against "ideal perfection." For 69.4 2010 Smith ¯ The Spirituality of Francis Libermann the success of our endeavors, he urged that we learn to modify our views and to flow with the circumstances of the actual situation: otherwise we are always stumbling over obstacles and opposition (Libermann, pp. 51-52). A Man Beyond His Time The record indicates that Libermann was a man with a message ahead of his time. His vision did, indeed, transcend his own constricted time and place. While most of the Western world gloried in its own cultural imperialism, he wrote to his missionaries in Africa that they should "forget about Europe and its customs, its ways of thinking" (cited in de Mare, p. 351). He wanted his missionaries to identify with "the Blacks" and not form them in the European model. A good century before the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act of the 1960s in the United States, Libermann expressed his conviction that black people are in every sense equal to the white and that they are equally children of God "with the same nobility of soul . In short, color does not in any way denote inferiority" (letter to M. Percin, 1845, cited in de Mare, p. 377). We may recall the words of a powerful curial cardinal at the time of Vatican Council II when the Declaration on Religious Liberty was being debated: "Error has no rights." With this bon mot, he hoped to squelch the church's belated recognition of religious liberty for all. In light of current church teaching, Libermann's posi-tion was certainly more prophetic than the cardinal's. In 1846 he wrote: "It is difficult to appreciate how impor-tant this tolerance is. There is no way in which people will always agree" (letter to Lossedat, 13 April, cited in de Mare, p. 367). Most striking are the words from one of Libermann's letters quoted earlier. In 1847, he wrote Review for Religious that people "must be given complete freedom to think and act as they want. No man on this earth is capable of forcing the will, the conscience, or the intellect of others (letter to LeBerre, 8 September 1847, cited in de Mare, p. 376). Libermann's vision embraced many of the values we hold close to our hearts today. He cherished and advocated for religious tolerance, racial justice, human dignity, liberty, and solidarity with all the poor and oppressed of the world. He could see far because of his total availability to the Holy Spirit. It may be a little hagiographical to say so, but he was not only ahead of his time, but a man with a message beyond time, His spiritual wisdom constantly reminds us that we never labor alone in some ideal situation in some perfect world. It is only under the brooding of the Holy Spirit that the groaning of creation is stilled and the wounded heart of the world healed. With Libermann we pray, "Come, Holy Spirit, and renew the face of the earth." References Bierman, J. (1988). Napoleon III and His Carnival Empire. New York: St. Martin's Press. De Mare, C. (ed.). (2002). Spiritan anniversary diary (1703-2003): An historical overview published by the Generalate of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit as part of the celebrations of the Spiritan year (February 2002-Pentecost 2003). Rome: Congregazione dello Spirito Santo. Donnelly, D, (2003). A Universal Call. [Review of the book Housing Heaven's Fire: The Challenge of Holiness]. America, 188 (7), 32-33. Gilbert, A. (1983). You have laid your hand on me: A message from Francis Libermann for our time (M.L. Fay, trans.). Rome: Spiritan Research and Animation Centre. Hanley, B. (n.d.). TO the ends of the earth: Francis Libermann. [Brochure reprinted from The Antonian]. Pittsburgh: Holy Ghost Fathers. Horney, K. (1950). Neurosis and Human Growth: The Struggle Toward Self-Realization. New York: bV.W. Norton. 69.4 2010 Smith ¯ The Spirituality of Frands Libermann Koren, H. (1958)¯ The Spiritans: A History of the Congregation of the Holy Ghost. Louvain: Editions E. Nauwelaerts. ¯ (1990). F~says on the Spiritan charisnt and on Spiritan history. Bethel Park, Pennsylvania: Spiriths Press. Libermann, F. (n.d). Simplified advice¯ (EX. Malinowski, trans. & ed.). (Available from the Holy Spirit Provincialate, 6230 Brush Run Rd., Bethel Park, Pennsylvania 15102). Unpublished booldet. Perls, E, R. Heffenline, & P. Goodman (1951). Gestalt Therapy: Excitement and Growth in the Human Personality. New York: Dell. Malinowski, F.X. (n.d.). The Holy Spirit in Francis Libermann. Unpublished manuscript. Robinson, J. (1952). The Body: A Study in Pauline Theology. Philadelphia: Westminster Press. Rogers, C. (1942). Counseling and Psychotherapy: Newer Concepts in Practice. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. ¯ (1961). On Becoming a Person: A Therapist's View of Psychotherapy. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. ¯ (I 965). Client-Centered Therapy: Its Current Practice, hnplications, and Theory. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Vitz, P. (1977). P~ychology as Religion: The Cult of Self-Worship. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans. Volf, M., and M. Lee (2001). The spirit and the church. In B. Hinze & D.L. Dabney (eds.), Advents of the Spirit: An Introduction to the Current Study of Pneumatology. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press. Forerunner If even He Was made perfect By what He suffered, Why do we expect To be exempt? This is no easy path We have begun But, ah, the Trailblazer We have in Him. Teresa Burleson Review for Religious MARIAN MASKULAK The Love Mysticism of Bernard of Clairvaux and Julian of Norwich ~f~lian of Norwich (1342-c.1416) has been recognized r her Trinitarian and Christocentric mysticism as well as for her maternal imagery for God. While these placements are certainly accurate, I believe that more attention needs to be paid to the love mysticism in her spirituality. After all, Julian herself came to understand that love was precisely the meaning of her revelations,l As Joan Nuth writes, "If Julian's teaching can be summed up in one word, that word is love.''2 I find it instructive to examine how her treatment of love compares with that of someone who is considered a "classic guide" for love mysticism--Bernard of Clairvaux3 (1090-1153). Scholars of mysticism generally agree that Bernard stands out among Christian writers of his time as one who cul-tivated a spirituality of love and affective mysticism. Marian Maskulak CPS, assistant professor of Theology and Religious Studies, writes again from St. John's University; 8000 Utopia Parkway; Queens, New York 11439. 68.4 2009 Maskulak ¯ The Love Mysticism In fact, Louis Dupr~ credits Bernard with defining, in the West, contemplation as love.4 In their introduction to Julian's Showings, Edmund Colledge and James Walsh identify two connections between Julian and Bernard: understanding contempla-tion as "the working of mercy and grace, desire and fulfillment," and focusing on God's desire for human beings,s This article demonstrates that a number of other love-related themes in Julian's Sbo~vings can be linked with several of Bernard's writings, namely, On Loving God and selected sermons on the Song of Songs. Both authors speak with great abandon in describing God's first, gratuitous, and universal love, and both use strong imagery to portray the love and mutual desire between God and the human being. Both also charac-terize true love as including self-knowledge and absence of fear. I believe that the correlations are sufficient to rank Julian's love mysticism with Bernard's. This is not to say that the love spirituality they advocate is the same or that there is any simple corre-spondence to be found. Nor is their manner of expres-sion the same. While Bernard's thoughts are often clearly punctuated with scriptural verses or references, there are very few of these in Julian's Sbozvings. This lack seems attributable to Julian's time and place, for in 1409 the archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Arundel, placed regulations on preaching and theological teaching, and forbade written copies of English translations of the Scriptures. Julian, however, does incorporate several scriptural themes, often by way of allusion, and refers to events like the annunciation and Jesus' passion and death. After examining both authors, I maintain that that the quality of Julian's love mysticism is no less than Bernard's. Review for Religious Brief Historical Context Bernard and Julian were two extremely diverse persons living in vastly different times. It will help to situate them historically. Well educated, Bernard lived as a Cistercian monk from the time he was twenty-one until his death at sixty-three. He advocated monastic reform, founded sixty-eight monasteries, was engaged in political, church, and theo-logical disputes, supported the Second Crusade, and left some 3,500 pages of let-ters, treatises, and sermons.6 Interestingly, the 12th century witnessed a proliferation of literature dealing with love, not only in the secular West, but also in the world's religions.7 Two centuries later, Europe was smitten with the Black Plague, the Hundred Years' War, and numer-ous other state and ecclesiastical conflicts. From this very different sociohistorical world comes the voice of Julian, about whom there is very little biographical information. At the age of thirty she had sixteen rev-elations, which included bodily visions of the crucified Lord, words formed in her understanding, and spiri-tual visions (ST 7, LT 9). As an anchoress, she spent the next twenty years reflecting on these revelations, which she recorded in a short and long text of her single work, Showings (LT 51). Although she refers to herself as "a woman, ignorant, weak, and frail" (ST 6), Julian demonstrates knowledge of the Latin Vulgate and the classical spiritual writings. It is not known where she received her education or where she had access to such Bernard and Julian were two extremely diverse persons living in Vastly different times. 69.4 2010 Maskulak ¯ The Love Mysticism 601 writings, but the possibilities are not lacking. There was an Augustinian friary on the same street as her anchor-hold adjoining the Church of St. Julian. Norwich also had a Dominican, a Franciscan, and a Carmelite friary as well as a Benedictine cathedral priory.8 A Cistercian abbey, Sibton, about thirty-seven miles outside the city, was within the diocese of Norwich and held estates in about ten parishes in Norwich. The Experience of God Although their mystical experiences of God greatly differ, the first correlation between these two authors is precisely the importance of experience for both of them. Although Bernard engages in some speculative thought, Jean Leclercq points out that "for Bernard, everything begins and ends with experience and, in between, experience is the object of reflection.''9 From a specifically mystical perspective, Grace Jantzen also notes the importance of experience for Bernard. She writes that "the mystical is no longer confined to the meaning of Scripture. nor to an intellectual progress, but is extended to experience . We have in Bernard a clear recognition of the mystical as experiential: it is a shift in meaning whose resonances are with us still.''~° Julian also engages in speculative thought, but all her reflection is on the experience of God's sixteen rev-elations to her. She repeatedly notes that this was what she saw or heard, or this was what was shown to her or what came to her understanding. A look at the mystical experience of each shows that, ironically, the well-known, charismatic, highly active, prolific Cistercian writer expe-rienced God's presence almost imperceptibly, while the fairly obscure English woman experienced God's presence quite dramatically. Both, however, were convinced of Review for Religious having experienced the divine presence. Moreover, rather than placing emphasis on themselves, both Bernard and Julian focus on the God of their experience. In one of his sermons, Bernard describes his mys-tical experience as follows: "I tell you that the Word has come even to me. and that he has come more than once. Yet, however often he has come, I have never been aware of the moment of his coming. I have known he was there; I have remembered his presence after-ward; sometimes I had an inkling that he was coming. But I never felt it, nor his leaving me.''1~ Bernard has no explanation as to the how of the Word's coming or going, but knows that, when present, the Word stirs his sleeping soul and moves, soothes, and pierces his heart. The warmth of Bernard's heart indicated the Word's presence, and as proof of the Word's power he states that his faults were purged and he experienced the good-ness of God's mercy. These affects became dim and cold when the Word left him, and Bernard describes his soul as being sorrowful until his heart would warm again, signaling the Word's presence. In the Word's absence, Bernard longed for his return.~2 While secondary mystical phenomena such as visions seem to be absent in Bernard's experience, their startling prevalence characterizes Julian's. Julian herself remarks on the lifelike vividness of her visions, especially those of the crucified Christ (LT 12, 16, 17). Although she never received any more visions after the sixteen revela-tions (certainly, these would last anyone for a lifetime!), Julian gives proof of having at least one more experi-ence of a spiritual understanding given to her some fif-teen years later while pondering the Lord's meaning in the revelations. She was told, "Know it well, love was his, meaning. Who reveals it to you? Love. What did t361 69.4 2010 Maskulak ¯ The Love Mysticism he reveal to you? Love. Why does he reveal it to you? For love" (LT 86). In the years that followed her revela-tions, Julian most likely felt God's presence or absence much the same as other Christians. In fact, God's felt presence or absence was the subject of her seventh revelation, where in quick, repeated succession Julian alternately experienced the comfort of God's presence followed by the heaviness of God's absence. In this way God taught her that it is God who keeps one whether in sorrow or joy (LT 15). As noted above, Bernard also recognizes the distinction between feeling God's pres-ence and absence, but provides no rationale as to why this happens. He comments, however, that one cannot attribute the desire to seek God to God's absence since God is always present.13 God as the Source of Loving God Despite the contrasts in their mystical experience, both Bernard and Julian recognize that God desires to be loved by human beings. Echoing 1 John 4:10, Bernard succinctly states that God is the cause of loving God, and ought to be loved beyond measure.~4 Bernard supports this position by distinguishing between four degrees of human love. The first degree entails loving oneself for one's own sake, or what Bernard calls bodily love. Bodily love can be extended to love of neighbor in the community. When people learn that God is the author of their existence, they start to seek God's help out of need and thus begin to love God, marking the second degree of love. As they approach God repeatedly out of need, God's self is gradually revealed through their prayer, reflection, reading, and obedience. In this familiarity, they begin to experience God's sweetness and pass to the third degree, Review for Religious loving God for God's sake. In addition they freely love their neighbor as belonging to God. Bernard believes that the fourth degree of love, marked by loving one-self for God's sake and willing only what God wills, is very rare on earth. He writes, "To lose your-self as though you did not exist and to have no sense of yourself, to be emptied out of yourself and almost annihilated, belongs to heavenly not to human love.''~5 ' Should people be admitted to such a union with God, they are soon called back by the distractions and cares of life, and by love for their neighbor. To love in the manner of the fourth degree is to become like God. Bernard uses beautiful imagery to describe how human love that is free of self-will "dissolves" and is poured into God's will. His analogies include a drop of water in wine which seems to disappear while taking on the wine's flavor and color, a red-hot iron that cannot be distin-guished from the fire, and air suffused with sunlight so that it seems to be light itself. In all three analogies, the substance itself seems to disappear, yet it remains in another form. Bernard submits that something similar takes place in the human being in becoming more like God. Although martyrs partly received this grace, as seen by their being unmoved in their great love of God in the midst of bodily torment, he believes that this kind of love is only possible in a spiritual and immortal body, subject to the spirit in all things. It cannot be obtained by human effort, but is in God's power to give as God pleases.~6 As for the greatness of God's love, Bernard Both Bernard and Julian recognize that God desires to be loved by human beings. 363 69.4 2010 Maskulak ¯ The Love Mysticism affirms that even those who are weighed down in sin can turn back to God, not just in the hope of mercy, but with the aspiration to be the Word's bride,my Although Julian is fond of "numbering" some of her insights in list style, she does not do so with love. Rather, she repeatedly emphasizes that God greatly loves even when humans sin (LT 40, 61, 82), and that God desires human love. The extent of God's love is perhaps best portrayed when she states that, if Jesus could suffer more, he would do so--because of his great love. From this perspective, Julian concludes that there is nothing that God would not do for humans out of love (LT 22, 24). Also, God holds the same love for the least soul to be saved as for the soul of Christ (LT 54). As with Bernard, she recognizes that God is the cause of loving God. She speaks of this in terms of God being the ground or foundation of human seeking of God (LT 41; 86). Julian delineates three longings in God: God longs to teach people to know and love God, longs for their personal presence, and longs to fill them with bliss (LT 75, 31). God rejoices in human beings and desires that human beings also take joy in God (LT 11, 30, 36). While Bernard asserts that it is easier to love in return when one knows that one is loved,ms Julian stresses that knowing how greatly the Trinity rejoices in human beings will cause them to likewise rejoice in God (LT 68). 364 Human Desire Not only do Bernard and Julian discuss God's desire for human love, but both take into consideration the role of human desire. Bernard writes that the greatest good is that of seeking God, and that "God is sought not on foot but by desire." 19 Furthermore, finding what one desires R~view for Religious only enhances desire. He illustrates this by noting how desire continually prompts people to seek material things and positions that are finer, higher, or better. Rather than enjoying what they have, they anxiously want something more or else fear losing what they already have. This is a never ending process since no discuss God's desire for material posses-sions ever fully sat-isfy them. Bernard states that, after attaining every-thing attainable and still finding themselves dissatisfied, people who desire the greatest good would ultimately seek what they still lack, God. He realizes, however, that, because of the shortness of life, temptations, and insufficient strength, this sce-nario is impossible. For this reason he wishes that people would be satisfied with reaching their desires in thought alone rather than in actual experience, for the mind is quicker than the senses. In this way they would learn more quickly that God causes human desire and God alone satisfies that desire.2° But this desire will be fulfilled only when they attain their glorious body in heaven. Here it is helpful to note that Bernard delineates three phases for the body. The earthly body helps the soul to love God, the dead body brings peace, and the glorious body brings completeness. Bernard views the body as a good companion to the good spirit and main-tains that the soul would not want to be perfected with-out the body that has served it well. Those who have Not only do Bernard and Julian human love, but both take into consideration the role of human desire. 69.4 2010 Maskulak * The Love Mysticism 366 assumed their glorious bodies burn fiercely with love for God for God's sake alone. Nothing holds them back. These are forever intoxicated with love, immortal life, and the torrent of God's delight "in the most passionate and most chaste embrace of Bridegroom and Bride.''21 Using the language of Augustine, Julian states that the soul will find rest only in God (LT 5, 26, 68). Along with Bernard, she counsels that created things are too small to satisfy people's desire, and that everything that falls short of God will never satisfy human beings. She agrees that God is the source and fulfillment of desire, for God reveals to her: "I am he who makes you to love; I am he who makes you to long; I am he, the endless fulfilling of all true desires" (LT 59, 36, 41). Julian adds that, in itself, seeking God also pleases God and is as good as beholding God, if this is God's will (LT 10). Exemplifying Bernard's statement that finding what one desires does not end but only increases desire, Julian admits that she saw God and yet sought God; that she had God, and yet still wanted God. From her own expe-rience she recounts that the more the soul sees of God, the more it desires God (LT 10). Julian believes that this desire will be fulfilled in heaven, and like Bernard she uses strong imagery to describe this culmination of desire. At that time we will know ourselves clearly and wholly possess God, and "endlessly hidden in God, truly seeing and wholly feeling, and hearing him spiritually and delec-tably smelling him and sweetly tasting him., we shall see God face to face, familiarly and wholly" (LT 43). Universality of God's Love and Self-Knowledge Both writers indicate, to an extent, God's universal love. In his treatise On Loving God, Bernard extends his discussion of love to include unbelievers who are able Review for Religious to witness God's generous love in such gifts as food, sun, and air as well as in the gifts of human dignity, knowledge, and virtue, all of which work together to confess God's glory. For Bernard it is inconceivable that unbelievers should not recognize that all the above-mentioned gifts come from God. Indeed, he asserts that it is inexcusable for unbelievers not to love God with all their heart, mind, and strength, which for Bernard means loving God with all one is, knows, and does. It is inexcusable because unbelievers know themselves, and such knowledge results in their recognition that they owe God everything, including their own dignity, knowledge, and virtue. This, in turn, leads them to con-cliade that God is the author of everything.22 This seems a rather strong assertion in today's world, where atheism abounds, but Bernard was most likely thinking of Jews, Muslims, and pagans, all of whom accepted belief in God or gods. Bernard extends his understanding of the universality of God's love to all creation when he states that love is the eternal law that creates and governs the universe.23 In her writing, Julian stresses that the revelations were given to her in order to make the comfort of God's love known to all. At times she uses phrases such as "fel-low Christians," "all mankind which will be saved," or "all mankind" for whom Jesus was sent, or "all the souls which will be saved in heaven" (LT 8, 40, 51, 53). Yet at other times she clearly says that God desires to draw home by love all humankind in general, and that God's merciful comfort is plentiful enough for all (LT 75, 79). Like Bernard, Julian points out the goodness of all creation, which God made out of love (LT 5, 11, 57). Both authors also speak of self-knowledge. For Bernard, self-knowledge is clearly people's first step '367 69.4 2010 Maskulak * The Love Mysticism towards recognizing their own dignity, and their sin-fulness as well: it makes humility and conversion possi-ble. 24 Julian directly relates knowing oneself to knowing God. In fact, because the soul is so deeply grounded in God, she believes that people come to know God before knowing their own soul. Yet they must also desire to know their own soul and to seek it where it is, that is, in God. Whether they are seeking to know God or themselves, the Holy Spirit leads them to know both God and their own soul in one (LT 56). 368 Creation and Re-Creation Another strong correlation between both writers is their emphasis on the immensity of God's love for human beings, shown not only in their creation but also in their re-creation through Jesus' self-giving on the cross. Bernard asks how, in one's smallness, one can love God who loves so generously. No one can really perceive iust how .much God deserves to be loved, and people owe their whole self in return for their creation. And Bernard holds they were not only "made" in cre-ation, but also "remade" through redemption. They owe their whole selves twice over. As already noted, Bernard counsels loving God without measure, but recognizes that even this is God's gift and persons can love God only according to their capacity. To love God more requires God's help.25 Julian also stresses that human beings were first made in the likeness of the Trinity and then remade through Jesus' passion and death (LT 10). Emphasizing that God has loved humankind from eternity, Julian elaborates on the mutual love and indwelling of God in the soul and the soul in God (LT 53). The soul is so united to the Creator that' there can be nothing between the soul Review for Religious and God. The soul is kept whole in the endless love of God, who loves even the least soul as much as the soul of Christ. In his translation of Sbozvings, John Skinner highlights the unity between the soul and the Creator by speaking of it as being "oned with the Maker.''26 In this mutual indwelling, Julian sees no difference between God and human substance (that is, that which is of God). She distinguishes between substance and sensuality (that which relates to being human), noting that human sub-stance is in God and God is in human sensuality (LT 53, 54). It seems that Sbo~vings presents a more holistic approach to the human person than Bernard's writings, or, as Grace Jantzen states, Julian integrates the body into her spirituality.27 She views the soul as "a created trinity," united to the Creator, and known and loved from eternity. In this unity, both body and soul help each other until the person reaches full stature (LT 55). Intimate Love This notion of union or "oneing" between the soul and its Creator leads to a consideration of the imagery which these writers use regarding the love .relationship between God and the individual. Bernard uses the erotic language of the bride and bridegroom found in the Song of Songs. His sermons on this book are replete with images of human love and intimacy. Insisting that God loves for no other purpose than to be loved, he states that the bridegroom is love and asks for love, and only in love can created persons respond to their Creator. All is given when one loves with all one's heart. With overtones of Julian's description of the soul united to the Creator, Bernard writes that such love "is nothing other than holy and chaste love, love sweet and tender, love as tranquil as it is true, mutual, close, deep love, 69.4 2010 Maskulak * The Love Mysticism 3701 which is not in one flesh, but which joins two in one spirit, making two no longer two but one.''28 Julian never explicitly refers to the Song of Songs, but she does use language that evokes the love and intimacy found in that text. For example, she point-edly states that God rejoices to be Father, Mother, and Spouse of the soul, which is God's beloved wife. "And in the joining and the union he is our very true spouse and we his beloved wife and his fair maiden., for he says: I love you and you love me, and our love will never divide in two" (LT 58). She also refers to God as the lover who desires that persons see themselves bound to God in love as though all that God has accomplished was done for themselves alone. Julian concludes that, when everyone looks at God as their lover, a strong bond of unity is created among people (LT 65). Other words that might indicate the influence of the Song of Songs are Julian's statement that God is pleased when a soul approaches "naked, openly, and familiarly" (LT 5). It can be noted that Bernard also counsels approaching God confidently, as a friend,29 but Julian emphasizes God's courtesy and familiarity rather than that of the human being (ST 16, 24; LT 5, 7, 40, 48, 52, 53, 58, 61, 73, 77). An echo of the poetic descriptions in the Song of Songs may be detected also in Julian's statement "Glad and merry and sweet is the blessed and lovely demeanor of our Lord towards our souls, for he saw us always liv-ing in love-longing, and he wants our souls to be gladly disposed towards him, to repay him his reward" (LT 71). Like Bernard, Julian uses the metaphor of embrace, but she does so with reference to clothing, describing Jesus as wrapping himself about human beings and never leaving them (LT 5). Review for Religious Maternal Imagery Far more than spousal imagery, Julian uses the image of a loving, caring, compassionate, and nurtur-ing mother to depict God's love. She frequently applies the image of motherhood to Jesus as one who loves his children, bears them to endless life, feeds them with himself, leads them into his breast through his wounded side, watches over them, and washes and heals them with his blood (LT 58, 59, 60, 61). Without giving any indication of purposely doing so, Julian provides us with an excellent example of how language about God is analogical. While she notes a number of similarities between Jesus and human mothers, she clearly identifies how Jesus as mother goes beyond the ordinary human conceptions of motherhood. For Julian, the word mother can be applied truly only to Jesus (LT 60). Even if she is not trying to provide a lesson on analogical language about God, perhaps she is indeed making her case for using maternal imagery for God by showing how it exceeds human categories. It is known that maternal imagery to describe God and Christ was popular among 12th-century Cistercian monks. In his Sermon 9 on the Song of Songs, Bernard quotes its first verse as saying "your breasts are bet-ter than wine." Noting that the speaker is not iden-tified, ¯ Bernard consecutively attributes these words to the bridegroom, the bride, and the groom's compan-ions. Associating the bridegroom with Jesus, Bernard speaks of the grace, joy, sweetness, and milk of conso-lation that flow from the bridegroom's breasts.3° In a letter Bernard writes: "Do not let the roughness of our life frighten your tender years. If you feel the stings of temptation., suck not so much the wounds as the breasts of the Crucified. He will be your mother, and 371 69.4 2010 Maskulak ¯ The Love Mysticism you will be his son." Interestingly, Bernard also applies the image of mother to "Moses, Peter, Paul, prelates in general, abbots in general, and more frequently himself as abbot,''3~ but he does not develop the mother image for Jesus as fully as Julian does. Perhaps it is because, in this analogy for love, his focus is on the child more than on the mother. He writes that, although children ought to love their parents, they are more inclined to honor them; in fact, some only love their parents out of concern for their inheritance. Unquestionably, Bernard sees the bond of bride and bridegroom as the epitome of love, stronger than the bond between parents and children.32 No Place for Fear Attesting to the greatness of God's love, Bernard asserts that one who loves God has nothing to fear, even if one has been an unfaithful lover. Every soul, no mat-ter what its condition, whether filled with anxieties or trapped in sin and error, can turn back to God to find not only mercy and forgiveness, but even hope to be the bride of the Word. The fact that one is created in God's image should allay any fear. Confidence and freedom accompany a love which, in the words of 1 John 4:18, casts out fear.33 Although Julian does not speak directly about the sense of freedom enjoyed by those who love without fear, she often implies it. She writes of God's pleasure when a person approaches unafraid, in simplicity and trust. Sinners need not fear, for much to her amaze-ment Julian discovers that in God there is neither anger nor blame (LT 13, 45, 46, 49, 50). Except for "reverent fear," which causes us to flee from harm and to seek God, Julian asserts that fears are not from God and R~view for Religious should be avoided. Her overriding message is that God is so good, merciful, and compassionate that, like a child confidently running to its mother's arms, one need not have any fear in approaching God (LT 48, 61, 74). Reward The notion of reward as related to love is also found in each author's writings. Bernard states that God ought to be loved without seeking reward, for true love finds reward in what it loves. Therefore, one who asks for any reward other than God does not love God. God's love rewards human love, and God is our eternal reward.34 Agreeing that God is our eternal reward (ST 16, 20; LT 41, 81, 82), Julian elaborates on the concept of reward. In an unexpected twist, she asserts that human beings are Jesus' reward for his acts of salvation (ST 12, LT 22, 31). In an even bolder declaration, she maintains that human beings will be rewarded for the pain they suffered from sin. When speaking of - those who are sorry for their sins, confess them, and perform the required penance, she writes, "And as sin is punished here with sorrow and penance, in contrary fashion it will be rewarded in heaven by the courteous love of our Lord God almighty, who does not wish any-one who comes there to lose his labors" (ST 17, LT 38, 39). God also rewards human beings for their patient waiting until they are able to leave behind the pains and woes of this life (LT 64). God's love rewards human love, and God is ,our eternal reward. 373 69.4 2010 Maskulak ¯ The Love Mystidsm Summary Comparisons While classifying mystics might hold some advan-tages, it also has the drawback of focusing attention in certain directions. Julian of Norwich, known for her Trinitarian and Christocentric mysticism, as well as her referring to God as mother, provides a case in point. Since Bernard of Clairvaux is known for the pri-macy of love in his mysticism, I have used several of his writings as a standard, so to speak, against which to measure Julian's love-texts and show how central love is in Julian's mysticism. While Julian and Bernard both present their own experiences and perceptions, their treatments of the love of God also display much in common. Despite diverse styles, they both speak of this love with great abandon. In strong and compelling language, both describe God's immense love as given first, and gratuitously, to all. They give firm assurance that God loves human beings and seeks their love. They portray the love between God and the human being in strong and beautiful imagery, pointing out the mutuality of desire that this involves. Both Bernard and Julian show that people's self-knowledge is important for their knowledge of God, and that absence of fear characterizes true love. Bernard certainly deserves his position of prominence in the church and his title of "doctor mellifluus" for his achievements in expressing a mysticism of love, but Julian, too, displays an expe-rienced teacher's mastery of love mysticism. From the depths of their own experience, prayer, and reflection, these spiritual writers offer much to those who wish a better understanding of the love relationship between God and human beings. Review for Religio~s Notes l Julian of Norwich, Showings, trans. Edmund Colledge and James Walsh (New York: Paulist Press, 1978), Long Text 86. Hereafter, in parent.heses, Long Text will be designated as LT, and Short Text as ST. 2 Joan M. Nuth, Wisdom's Daughter: The Theology of Julian of Norwich (New York: Crossroad, 1991), p. 169. 3 Bernard of Clairvaux: Selected Works, trans. G.R. Evans (New York: Paulist Press, 1987), Preface by Ewert Cousins, p. 5. 4 Light from Light: An Anthology of Christian Mysticism, 2nd ed., ed. Louis Duprfi and James Wiseman (New York: Paulist Press, 2001), General Introduction, pp. 7, 10. s Colledge and Walsh, Showings, Introduction, pp. 26, 107. They also find her dependent on Bernard's fellow Cistercian William of St. Thierry, in her discussion of the godly will and God as mother. 6 Evans, Bernard, Introduction by Jean Leclercq, pp. 16-17, 30. Y Evans, Bernard, Preface by Cousins, in pp. 5-7. 8 Norman P. Tanner, The Church in Late Medieval Norwich, 1370- IY32 (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1984), p. 19. 9 Evans, Bernard, Introduction by Leclercq, p. 31. 10 Grace Jantzen, Power, Gender, and Christian Mysticism (United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 1995), p. 126. n Evans, Bernard, "Sermons [on the Song of Songs]," Sermon 74, pp. 254-255. 12 Evans, Bernard, Sermon 74, pp. 255-256. is Evans, Bernard, Sermon 84, pp. 274-275. 14 Evans, Bernard, "On Loving God," 1.1, 6.16, 6.22; "Sermons," Sermon 83, p. 274; Sermon 84, 275-276. is Bernard, "On Loving God," 8.23-10.27, 14.38, 15.39. 16 Bernard, "On Loving God," 10.27-11.30. i~ Bernard, Sermon 83, pp. 270-271. 18 Bernard, "On Loving God," 3.7. 19 Bernard, Sermon 84, p. 274. 20 Bernard, "On Loving God," 6.18-6.21. 21 Bernard, "On Loving God," 11.30-11.33; see also Bernard, Sermon 83, p. 271. 22 Bernard, "On Loving God," 2.6, 5.14. 23 Bernard, "On Loving God," 12.35. 69.4 2010 Maskulak ¯ The Love Mystidsm 24 Bernard McGinn, "The Human Person as Image of God: II. Western Christianity," in Christian Spirituality: Origins to the Twelfth Century, ed. Bernard McGinn and John Meyendorff (New York: Crossroad, 1985), p. 324; Bernard, "On Loving God," 2.3-2.4. z~ Bernard, "On Loving God," 4.5-6.16. 26 Julian of Norwich, Revelation of Love, trans. John Skinner (New York: Doubleday Image Books, 1996), p. 55. 27Jantzen, Power, p. 156. 2s Bernard, Sermon 83, p. 274. 29 Bernard, Sermon 83, p. 271. 3o Bernard of Clairvaux: On the Song of Songs, vol. 1, trans. Kilian Walsh, The Works of Bernard of Clairvaux (Spencer: Cistercian Publications, 1971), pp. 55-58. 3~ Caroline Walker Bynum, Jesus as Mother: Studies in the Spirituality of the High Middle Ages (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982), pp. 117, 115. 32 Bernard, Sermon 83, p. 273. 33 Bernard, Sermon 83, pp. 270-271; Sermon 84, pp. 276-278; Bernard, "On Loving God," 14.38; Sermon 7, p. 232. 34 Bernard, "On Loving God," 6.17, 6.22, 11.33; Bernard, Sermon 83, p. 272. Personal Reflection [ Group Discussion 1. What is your favorite image to describe your own love-relationship with God? 2. Both Bernard and Julian use a number of love images for God and our human relationship. What images have I found most helpful? Review for Religious CHINYEAKAC. EZEANI Cultivating Mature Relationships in Religious Formation It is rightly said that "no one is an island." Human beings like to live in relationships. Social psychologists have noted that people usually prefer living with others, in families and communal groups, to living alone.~ Even amid relationships, however, there is yet in the human heart a certain hesitancy and fear at the possibility of losing oneself in others. Hence, naturally, diverse factors have significant influ-ence in interpersonal relations. Difficulties and conflicts can spring up while a person tries to relate with others in an authentic way. This helps us understand why formators struggle in their day-to-day relations with one another and with those in formation. Individuals in for-marion experience similar struggles as they try to relate not just with their formators but also Chinyeaka C. Ezeani MSHR served as a formator in Nigeria and is now a member of her congregation's leadership in Dublin: 23 Cross Avenue; Blackrock, Co. Dublin; Ireland. r lioious 68.4 2009 Ezeani ¯ Cultivating Mature Relationships with their peers coming from different backgrounds. In this article, we will examine some of the chal-lenges to good communication and relationships in for-marion. People cannot claim to love God, whom they cannot see, while they have no love for their neighbor. And so we will explore some skills that can facilitate mature human relations in the formation ministry. We will make some suggestions on how to offer helpful feed-back to persons in formation in ways that respect their integrity and enhance their personal growth. Learning this will no doubt flow into one's relationship with the Creator and make it flourish. Obstacles to Mature Relationship in Formation Intimacy versus isolation. As indicated above, human beings have a basic need for intimacy with other human beings, and consequently they desire to be close to oth-ers. There is a corresponding need for isolation, a need to be alone. Erik Erikson,2 in his analysis of psychosocial development, identified the polarities of desire for union with or closeness to another (intimacy) and desire for aloneness (isolation). We experience a tension between wanting to be close to another and a fear of being too close. When you come closer to another person, or when you allow another to come close to you, sooner or later that closeness begins to make demands on you, on your time, your personal space, your freedom. This provokes a dilemma: Should I keep this person at arm's length, or should I create some space for him or her in my life? Usually, interpersonal relational ambivalence emerges because of the primary "striving for related-ness to other human beings" and the simultaneous striv-ing for "a sense of personal identity.''3 Because of these seemingly contradictory longings, persons who enter Review for Religiotts a community or group go through different stages as they get integrated into it.4 The first stage is inclusion, in which individuals' primary preoccupation is whether they are loved and accepted. The next stage is power, in which people wonder about their autonomy and their capacity to challenge, in this case, both the formator and their peers. The third and final stage is intimacy or affection, in which the primary concern is equality with others, the readiness of all to give rather than to receive. These stages involve confusion and uncertainty regarding one's status and position in a group. Hence, before one can get fully involved in the give-and-take of interpersonal relations and communal life, one goes through these stages. And, naturally, these stages can involve personal difficulties. Communication deficiency. When it comes to mature interpersonal relations, communication is vital. To be helpful, however, communication must be healthy and mature; if not, any authentic relating with the other at any level will be almost impossible. Can you imagine a religious formation community where people com-municate only by slipping little pieces of paper under one another's door? "Unhealthy communication can be a block to healthy intimacy and affective maturity. Communication helps foster greater connection, and communication is fundamentally a learned set of skills and behaviors.''5 Arrogance and a superior attitude. Whenever some-one approaches another with an attitude of arrogance When it comes to mature interpersonal relations, communication is vital. 69.4 2010 Ezeani ¯ Cultivating Mature Relationships and superiority, the other may respond with either anger, self-defense, or resistance. Alternatively, the per-son could cower in fear, feeling like a "lesser being." When this happens, for example, between a formator and someone in formation, the formative environment becomes tense, and the one in formation may try to cope by external conforming. As a result, there could be apparent peace and tranquillity in the formation house, because such persons would seem to have no difficulty with answering "Yes, Brother," "Yes, Sister," or "Yes, Father." In the long term, however, the result may be groups of young priests and religious who bully others because that was what was modeled for them in their own formation. Aggression. The environments in which we are raised usually have an influence on us. In some cultures, shout-ing at one another seems to be an acceptable way of relating. Such scenes abound even in public places such as post offices, government offices, and marketplaces. To sell wares in the market or to get passengers into public buses, people have been conditioned to shout in order to draw attention. It appears to have become normal to shout to get some attention or make a point subjectively considered to be important. A sister once confessed that, when she was a postulant, whenever the directress gave her feedback gently without shouting, she did not take it seriously. She thought the matter was not serious because she had been socialized to believe that, if an issue was serious enough, the directress would have shouted at her to indicate the seriousness of the matter. Aggression usually attracts aggression. Suppose someone approaches you to express his or her disap-proval or ill feeling over how you handled an issue. What can happen if the person begins to speak to Review for Religious you with strong and accusing words? You are likely to respond or react in the same way or with self-defense. The meaningful dialogue that could have taken place is thus aborted. Low self-esteem and negative self-image. Just like an attitude of superiority towards others, low self-esteem is a great enemy of mature human relations. If people have a good sense of self, they are better disposed to relate with other adults as equals. Where this does not hap-pen, an individual either too easily defers to others even in matters that need assertiveness, or reacts aggressively in subtle passive ways instead of clear self-expression. Low self-esteem also leads to feelings of envy, which can constitute a real obstacle to genuine caring regard and goodwill towards other people. Prejudice, misinterpreting deeds and intentions. Prejudice is a negative prejudgment of individuals or a whole group. It can lead one to irrational and hostile behavior towards them. When people's way of seeing things is prejudiced or biased, they view other people and their intentions in a distorted way, and can hardly avoid relating to them distortedly. The flow of commu-nication becomes blocked. A similar dynamic is opera-tive in tribalism, ethnocentrism, and other forms of discrimination. One perceives others in a negative way and treats ,them in like manner. Unrealistic expectations. The well-known Indian Jesuit spiritual writer Anthony de Mello6 maintained that to be truly happy in life you should "have no expectation of anyone." This might sound weird or exaggerated. Some might be wondering, "How can I live without having expectations of people with whom I live?" I have come to value De Mello's advice. A great source of difficulty in interpersonal relationships is that we tend to have too '381 69.4 2010 Ezeani ¯ Cultivating Mature Relationships Formators are challenged to take on the responsibility of dealing with their own issues first. high and often unrealistic expectations of other people. While it is good to have ideals and norms of expected behavior, our attitude towards persons in this regard is equally important. The Scriptures remind those who are strong to bear with the failings of the weak (Rm 15:1). But the question arises "Which of us is really strong?" Although we need to carry out our ministry diligently, the manner in which we do it is vital. It is better to be effective forma- . tors than just "efficient machines" that end up producing battered individuals for the Lord's vineyards. We shall come back to this point below, where we look at how to give feedback in a helpful way. Some psychological baggage. Each of us is a "strug-gling human being." Sometimes we struggle with unre-solved personality issues from our childhood and our families of origin. Some battle with a self-centeredness that unmindfully uses others for self-gratification, some have addictive behaviors, and some have difficulty feel-ing empathy for others. Others tend toward anxiety, harbor resentment of authority, or have deep-seated anger. Some have deficient social skills or problematic psychosexual issues. These difficulties can and do inter-fere in interpersonal relationships to various degrees. Formators are challenged to take on the responsibility of dealing with their own issues first. This will facilitate their relationship patterns in ministry so that they can functon more effectively and lovingly. Review for Religious Skills for Mature Relationships in Formation Growth in interpersonal relationships tends to point to maturity. It is equally a good indicator of openness to a good relationship with God. For instance, no one can say he or she loves God if the person detests fellow human beings. The following are some of the skills required for such mature human relations in formation: A prayerful and reflective way of life. "An unexamined life is not worth living," as Socrates said. It goes without saying that a reflective and discerning lifestyle is neces-saW for healthy living and good human relationships. People then are able to respond to others and to various situations instead of reacting to them. Self-awareness and acceptance. There is also the important value of self-awareness in interpersonal rela-tionships. Appropriate self-awareness helps much in cultivating good communication and relational skills. When people are more self-aware, the greater inner freedom they have to respond positively and maturely to people in various situations. Misunderstandings that often occur during conflicts can be more maturely dealt with. Recognizing and admitting their own motivations and personal struggles facilitates good relationships with others. It is not enough for formators to be commit-ted to the faith and to Christian discipleship and ready to give both spiritual and human assistance to others. They must also have begun vigorously their own jour-ney of self-understanding. They must be dealing with the major issues in their own life. Self-care. A healthy and integrated formation environ-ment is possible only with formators who are committed to fostering cordial relationships between themselves and those in their care. To be effective in their ministry, formators must also be taking care of their own physi- 69.4 2010 Ezeani * Cultivating Mature Relationships Mature interpersonal relations do require a degree of "dying toself.," 384 cal and spiritual needs. Such self-care should include days off for rest and reflection, along with friendship and companionship with others not under their care. "Many religious and clergy have discovered the hard way through burnout and various overdependencies that not attending to self-cai'e can have disastrous con-sequences.'' 7 From time to time, formators need some form of supervision and spiritual direction. Interaction with other formators can help them sustain the capac-ity to relate, with compassion and genuine interest, to those who are in formation. Trust and ability to be and work together. Interpersonal relations, whatever the context, always pose challenges. The work of formation includes training for trust and effective interpersonal communication. No matter the amount of expertise brought into the formation program, if we do not have social skills and the disposition to col-laborate with others, our efforts might bear very little fruit. Good relationships are not just about "assembling" and "being together." That is too simplis-tic. A .good "team" spirit and mutual respect are what is really needed. Mature people can safely count on each other in appropriate interdependence. They can dis-agree or differ in certain issues in a nonaggressive way, without undermining their respect for one another. Self-discipline. The .religious and priestly vocations are based on self-transcendence as the path to real self-fulfillment. Although, before Vatican II, forget.ring self Review for Religious to the point of near self-effacement was advocated, the pendulum swinging in the opposite direction can have an equally negative impact. Mature interpersonal rela-tions do require a degree of "dying to self." A measure of self-renunciation and discipline for the common good is important. Nonviolent communication. Good communication skills are indispensable in the work of accompanying others in their religious lives. This accompaniment consists in more than verbal teaching of values. To be effective, teaching is to be done by example. In teaching people to be respectful of others, teachers must model respect for others in their very manner of communica-tion. In his book Non-violent Communication, Marshall B. Rosenberg8 offers some tips on how to deal with others in harmonious, nonviolent, and nonthreatening ways. He does this under several headings. 1) What we are seeing/observing: First we need to be aware of what we are seeing or observing in another and to communicate that instead of offering our own judgment, our own interpretation of other persons' actions. Keeping observed facts separate from our judg-ments helps towards clear communication. Describing what we have observed, rather than judging it, respects others in our interpersonal relationships. Judgments can easily be wrong. An example of confusing observation with judgment is the following: Saying "Nigerians are proud" instead of saying "I met a Nigerian sister taking the same course who did not talk much to me." 2) What we are feeling: According to Rosenberg, our feelings are the door to our inner world. They tell us whether what is happening is wh~ t we desire or not. To be in touch with our feelings is to be in touch with our inner world. Alienated from our feelings, we 69.4 2010 Ezeani ¯ Cultivating Mature Relationships 386 are alienated from our values. For example, if I simply express how I feel about what I have observed instead of expressing a judgment, others respond to me better. We need to be present to our real feelings and express them clearly to others. People sometimes avoid awareness of their real feelings by merely using the word "feel" and then following it with more of a thought than a feeling. They say: "I feel I am right," words that speak more of what I think than how I feel. Other such thought-filled "feelings" are "I feel inadequate" or "I feel misunder-stood." As judgments, they may be right or wrong, but they express thought more than feeling. 3) What we are thinking or what we value: What we value contributes to our feeling and may affect com-munication. Our feelings may result less from what we observe than from the meaning we attribute to it. When I fail to be aware of the meaning that contributes to my feeling, I may be blind to the cultural programming I bring into communication situations. Then, instead of constructively saying "I felt hurt when you did not ask me to go along with you," I might say, unhelpfully, "When you did not ask me to go along with you, I felt hurt because it showed your rejection of me." 4) What we are requesting: When we make our requests to others in positive-action language, we have a better chance of a good response. It is not enough to be sure of what you do not want; you should know what you want. When you make a request, ask specifically for what you desire the person to do for you. Avoid vague requests like these: "I want you to accept me as I am," "I want you to respect my rights," "I want some understanding," "I want you to be more cooperative." Instead, make specific requests in more positive words: "I like it when you call me, but once a day is enough" Review for Religious instead of "I don't want you phoning me every day"; or "Please keep the knife in the kitchen" instead of "Is this the place to keep the knife?" Learning to communicate with one another in these ways can greatly enhance the quality of relationships. Giving Helpful Feedback to Those in Formation There is no doubt that good communication pat-terns are the heartbeat of human relationships. Hence the manner in which feedback is done is crucial. Feedback, not correction. Many readers may be famil-iar with the Johari window. It indicates, among other things, that there are aspects of ourselves known to oth-ers but not to us. It suggests that every human being needs some form of feedback or "reflecting back" from others in order to grow. Formation programs seek to provide such feedback regularly for those in training for the priestly and religious life. How this is done is important. First in importance is to have deep respect for people. Second is attentive listening. The purpose of the feedback given to persons in formation is to foster in them an awareness that will help them to truly inter-nalize Christ's values. Formators need to be fully aware of that purpose. In addition, they need to be in touch with their own motives for giving the feedback. A variety of motives may be operating. Here are some: (1) care, concern, and love. (2) respect. (3) empathy for the other person's perspective. (4) intimidation, to instill fear. (5) a sense of "duty." (6) a sense of superiority ("I know it all" or "I know better"). (7) a sense of power. Feedback achieves its aim when it comes from motives 1, 2, and 3 above. It does not achieve its aim if it comes from any motive from 4 through 7. Our manner of giving feedback ought to be mod- 69.4 2010 Ezeani ¯ Cultivating Mature Relationships 38'8 eled on the values of Christ, and it should illilstrate them. Otherwise it could do damage rather than help. The capacity to offer and receive good feedback greatly enhances relationships. It helps people to care for one another and enlighten one another. What does it profit if feedback only puts out the light in other persons or makes them think they are no good? Feedback should help others find and tap the positive resources that are already within them. I shall end this article with a story of an old rabbi and his disciple. One day the disciple called on the Master confessing, "Master, when I study or join oth-ers in great feasts, I feel a strong sense of light and life. But when it's over, it's all gone. Everything dies in me." After some moments of thoughtfulness, the old rabbi raised his head and, looking lovingly at the youth, replied: "Ah, yes, of course. 'It is just this feeling that happens when people walk alone through a wood at night. If another comes along with a lantern, they can walk safely and joyfully together. But, if they come to a crossroad and the one with the lantern departs, then the other must go on alone, carrying the light inside." This is what mature relationships can help people do. Notes 1 D.G. Myers, Social Psychology, 7th ed. (Boston: McGraw-Hill College, 1999), p. 168. 2 E. Erikson, Childhood and Society. (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1950), 1963, pp. 263-265. 3 L.C. Wynne, "The Epigenesis of Relational Systems: A Model for Understanding Family Development," Family Process 23, no. 3 (1984): 298. 4 E. Fried, "Basic Concepts in Group Psychotherapy," in H. Kaplan and B. Sadock (eds.), Comprehensive Group Psychotherapy (Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins, 1971), pp. 55-56. Review for Religious s Kevin McClone, "Intimacy and Healthy Affective Maturity- Guidelines for Formation," Human Development 30, no. 4 (Winter 2009): 5-13. 6 Anthony de Mello, Awareness (London: HarperCollins, 1990), pp. 6-8, 31-32, 50-55. In his writings he often said we should not put such burdens of expectation and dependence on them, for it results in stifling both them and us. 7 McClone, "Intimacy," p. I0. 8 M.B. Rosenberg, Non-violent Communication: A Language of Life (Encinitas, California: PuddleDancer Press, 2003), pp. 25-102. Word Made Flesh At the tnidnight hour when the world is asleep, you are born in a hovel for donkey and sheep. We wander in from hills of unaware, valleys of apathy, deserts of despair to gaze on you in dulnbstruck awe - Lamb of God sleeping on borrowed straw. Irene Zimmerman OSF 69.4 2010 DANIEL J. HEISEY Operatic Discernment of a Vocation Ion September 2009, the Metropolitan Opera pened its season with a controversial production of Giacomo Puccini's Tosca. When it was first staged, in January 1900, Puccini had sought realistic detail in set and costume, part of what is known in opera as verismo. A little over a century later, the Met's new version took liberties that drove the audience to boo.1 Whatever vision the director follows when staging this opera, there will be in act 2 a moving aria sung by Floria Tosca herself, "Vissi d'arte," in which she prays to God and begs to know why her faith is rewarded with suffering. It is a perennial plea, well known to or awaiting every Christian. For fellow believers, not only is Tosca's pain familiar, but also, perhaps, the weakened will and darkened intellect that complicate her spiritual life. Unfortunately, sharing in Tosca's anguished prayer tends to be beyond the ordinary routine of English- Daniel J. Heisey OSB is a monk of Saint Vincent Archabbey, where he is known as Brother Bruno and where the address is 300 Fraser Purchase Road; Latrobe, Pennsylvania 15650. Review for Religious speaking Christians. Moreover, Tosca is often classified as "anticlerical," especially in contrast to Puccini's more obviously religious opera Suor Angelica.2 In what fol-lows, staying basically within the Puccini style, we will look at two operatic works by Gian Carlo Menotti, The Saint of Bleecker Street and Amahl and the Night Visitors, to explore ways that opera in English can help with the discernment of a religious vocation. Menotti's use of English makes more accessible the religious themes of these two operas, especially when one contemplates what place opera can have in voca-tional discernment. The Saint of Bleecker Street won the Pulitzer Prize and has been called "strong and realist, yet plainly on the side of the angels,''3 and Amahl and the Night Visitors, meant to be staged at Christmas, retains its warm place in Christian hearts. Moreover, opera has its roots in the baroque world of 17th-century western Europe, the world of the cultural efflorescence known as the Counter-Reformation. A magnificent baroque opera house, with the florid emotions it stages, welcomes spec-tators much as a vast Gothic cathedral engulfs worship-ers. Both, as one historian has observed, enshrine "the only splendor in their lives.''4 Whereas the celebration of the Eucharist is the central "drama," so to speak, in a cathedral, in opera--in Menotti's operas at least--one may find signs pointing one to a renewed appreciation of the Priest, Victim, and Host of that sacrificial ban-quet. We will look at The Saint of Bleecker Street and Amahl and the Night Visitors together, as if they were antiphonal choirs forming a composite work. Menotti's "The Saint" Despite his prodigious and prolific work, Menotti is sometimes dismissed as secondhand and second-rate ,391 69.4 2010 Heisey ¯ Operatic Discernment of a Vocation During a career spanning seven decades, Menotti seems to have reached his creative and popular height in the 1950s. Puccini, but he is worthy of study in his own right,s Born in northern Italy in 1911, he studied music in Milan and there met Arturo Toscanini, who advised Menotti's parents to send the boy to the United States for further training in composition. After studying at Philadelphia's Curtis Institute, Menotti moved to New York City. A resdess and energetic man, he traveled widely, establish-ing the Festival of Two Worlds, operatic centers at Spoleto, Italy, and Charleston, South Carolina. In 1974 he bought an estate in Scotland; in early 2007 he died in Monaco. His operas, as with any good opera, convey their message by means of the music, and so they must be at least heard if not seen. Here on the printed page, we must content ourselves with verbal description and passages from the libretti. During a career spanning seven decades, Menotti seems to have reached his creative and popular height in the 1950s. By 1955 he had appeared on the cover of Time magazine, had received two Pulitzer prizes, and was celebrated in London, Milan, and Paris. Although he preferred not to use the term, he wrote verismo operas in English, the first to concern us here being his Saint of Bleecker Street (1954). Its plot is simple. A young woman in New York's "Litde Italy" neighborhood wants to become a nun, and her brother tries to stop her. She has the support of friends and her parish priest, Don Review for Religious Marco, who faces much of the brother's wrath. In the end she makes her vows as a religious, but at a price. It must be said that the young woman, Annina, is not the usual candidate for religious life. She is chronically and, as it happens, terminally ill. She has a deep prayer life, each Good Friday having visions of the Passion and receiving the stigmata. As with more usual candidates, her attraction to religious life has consequences familiar to many who are discerning such a vocation. Her broth-er's opposition, impetuous and irrational to the point of physical violence, carries verisimilitude. Likewise, Don Marco's role as gentle yet firm shepherd rings true. He must comfort and console her, and he must confront and contradict the brother, Michele. He is an angry young man, his life shown to be at odds with most of the virtues, and he demands the priest tell him if he believes in Annina's visions. At this point Don Marco tells Michele, "A priest is not a judge but only a guide.''6 Of course, nothing anyone can say makes Michele see a point of view other than his own. Michele and Annina are adult orphans and share an apartment, from which he is frequently absent for work or for his girlfriend. When Annina receives her annual stigmata, neighbors flock to the apartment, causing in Michele an explosion of jealousy. As he furiously drives them from the flat, the scene is an inversion of Jesus driving the money-changers from the temple. When, at the wedding reception of friends, Michele ends up shedding blood, it is a grotesque distortion of the wed-ding at Cana. As Annina moves closer to God, her life fills with these stumbling blocks, twisted 'scenes from the life of Christ. Her brother becomes a hindrance in a more literal sense. Act 2 of the opera ends with a religious proces- 69.4 2010 Heisey ¯ Operatic Discernment of a Vocation sion, thus providing a parallel with the end of the act 1 of Tosca. But, whereas the main characters in Tosca reverently let it pass, Michele tries to stop Annina from participating in the procession. This already frustrated man finds himself restrained by the faithful, who then accompany Annina and join the procession. Again, persons discerning a religious vocation will recognize that sometimes they have more support from folks they scarcely know than from their own family. Part of Annina's cross is thus her brother's boorish and self-absorbed behavior. He challenges her search for God and her desire to become a spouse of Christ. Michele rails against a decision he deems abnormal and reduces her sense of religious vocation to the delusions brought on by illness. He pleads that he needs her and must not lose her to her God. Annina tries in vain to show him how she sees the situation. She tells him, "No one can ever be lost who wanders, searching for God.''7 In her argument with her brother, she explains why she wants to take the veil, putting it in terms of love, the exclusive love of man and woman in a sacramental bond. Michele dismisses her explanation as that of a simple-minded child, and he asks her why God would choose her out of the whole human race. "Perhaps because I love Him," she answers. When he counters that she is speaking as though she loved a human being, she replies, "How else can I love Him since I am human?''8 For Michele, whose approach to love is to use another's body for his own indulgence, such explanations are out-side his experience and therefore meaningless. One lesson any Christian must learn is that in Christ one loves a person, not an idea. Michele can see Annina's desire for union with Christ only as a rejection of him-self. For him, her love for Christ has made God his rival; Review for Religious Michele's own love for Annina bursts forth as hatred for God. Within their neighborhood, which might as well be a village or small town, these impassioned disputes between brother and sister, and between brother and priest, make this opera a story about relationships--and in the end a religious vocation is about one's relationship with family and friends as well as with God. While not referring to The Saint of Bleecker Street by name, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa could well have been describing it when she said that opera explores and illustrates "love, duty, temptation, moral-ity, and strength of character in a closely confined society.''9 In that restricted environment, a small family in an old-fash-ioned ethnic neigh-borhood, Annina falls in love with God and desires to dedicate her life to Him. Menotti's opera shows us a moral struggle, strength of character set amidst ques-tions of duty and love. In short, here we see the basic ingredients of any man or woman's story of discerning a call to religious life. One lesson any Christian must learn is that in Christ one loves a person, not an idea. Menotti's "Amahl" Although Annina does not reveal her vision of the Lord she loves, Menotti gives us a glimpse of Him in another opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors. It has the distinction of being the first opera written for televi-sion, first airing live on Christmas Eve, 1951, on NBC. Whereas the setting for The Saint is the austere inte-rior of a poor apartment building in 1950s Manhattan, 69.4 2010 Heisey ¯ Operatic Discernment of a Vocation 396 Amahl gets its setting from a painting, Hieronymus Bosch's Adoration of the Magi. Menotti had seen it in the Metropolitan Museum of Art and decided that Amahl, a lame shepherd boy, and his widowed mother would live in a decrepit hut somewhere on the way to Bethlehem at the time of Christ, but the stage set and the costumes would be anachronistic, capturing the Renaissance styles of the 15th century. Defying historical accuracy in this way suggests the magical realm of the fairy tale, a level of universal ideals that transcend recorded time. On a cold starry night a poor boy and his mother receive into their home three enigmatic kings and through selfless generosity are graced with a miracle. When it was first produced, Amahl was highly acclaimed, its popularity with critics and audiences assur-ing its repetition each Christmas for ten years. Amahl "isn't sacred music," one recent critic has written, but it is "the modern equivalent of a medieval mystery play.''1° Whether on television or on stage, there have been many other productions of this opera, leading an evangelical magazine to call it "a moving piece of modern American mythology, unfailingly powerful.''11 Let us reflect upon the power of that myth for vocational discernment. One winter's evening Amahl and his mother become unprepared hosts of the Magi as they follow the star to Bethlehem. Menotti draws upon his boyhood memories of the Italian custom at Christmas of men dressed as the Three Kings going round one's town or village and visiting homes in order to bring gifts to the children.!2 Amahl, attracted by Kaspar's caged pet parrot, has an exchange with that King, a duet meant to be comic, but in these days, after the priest scandals with teenage boys, it becomes creepy. After more than fifty years, the opera's innocence has been tarnished. Still, the viewer Review for Religious must try to see it in the spirit of its time and from that perspective learn from its intended message. When Amahl is out of earshot, Melchior carries on a dialogue with the mother. Melchior, a baritone, embodies solemnity, and in that conversation one sees from two angles the object of the Magi's search (and so also of Annina's love). In response to the mother's ques-tions about the mission of the Magi, Melchior asks her, "Have you seen a child the color of wheat, the color of dawn? His eyes are mild, his hands are those of a king, as king he was born," and then asks her, "Have you seen a child the color of earth, the color of thorn? His eyes are sad, his hands are those of the poor, as poor he was born." 13 These contrasting descriptions of the One sought by the Magi reflect the ineffable facets of Christ, and yet the mother recognizes Him. She sees Him first in her own son, but at last, when the Magi depart, she sends Amahl along with them to seek the Child. Once he finds the. Child, Amahl is to give Him thanks and praise for the miracle granted to the crippled boy. Here again the man or woman discerning a religious vocation may see parallels, a parent bravely yet tearfully letting go of a beloved son or daughter who wants to join strangers in the search for God. Catholic critics had accolades for Amahl and for The Saint. Interestingly, none of them considered the place either could have in encouraging vocations to religious life. For example, The Saint of Bleecker Street's "poetic truth," according to Commonweal, "is large and profound," bridging "the alien worlds of pure faith and destructive reason.''~4 Another Catholic magazine noted that the opera had the "stark realism of the Old Testament," with violent obsessions, open religious fer- 69.4 2010 Heisey ¯ Operatic Discernment of a Vocation vor, and sexuality barely beneath the surface, yet these extremes of emotion "are more than balanced by scenes of reverence, even exaltation, and instances of touching human affection.''i5 In the secular press, contemporary critical reactions to The Saint ranged from dismissing it with words like "nonsense" and "bogus,''16 to apprecia-tive appraisals, one quoting Menotti saying, "Whatever you believe, all men know that the love of God is incor-ruptible.''~ 7 Here a word may be in order regarding Menotti's own struggle with belief. Menotti and Belief As a boy Menotti was lame, and he was taken to a Marian shrine, Madonna del Monte, where he received a blessing and was cured.18 As a result, throughout his life he remained fascinated by saints and miracles. Even when he fell away from the church, he believed in God and wrestled with questions of faith. In the early 1950s, when he was mulling over The Saint of Bleecker Street, he decided he needed to meet a saint, so he went to Italy to see Padre Pio. He. attended a morning Mass offered by Padre Pio and then was allowed to meet with him in the friary. After having heard about the priest's uncanny insights and deep spiritual gifts, Menotti was deflated when Padre Pio's counsel amounted to what any priest anywhere could have advised: "God gives you a gift, and you must compose the right music in honor of God." 19 Menotti's disappointment at the seemingly banal words from the holy man echoes that of Naaman the Syrian (2 K 5). The leprous Syrian is told by the prophet Elisha to wash seven times in the River Jordan, a rem-edy that strikes the afflicted man as being too simple and something he could have done back home. It can Review for Religious happen that someone discerning a call to religious life will visit a monastery or religious house and find the daily routine devoid of the heroic penances the idealistic inquirer sometimes imagines necessary. A wise direc-tor, a Don Marco, perhaps, will point out that the daily routine of community life, with its Eucharistic liturgy and the Liturgy of the Hours, will provide sufficient penances. As an adult, Menotti seems not to have partaken often of any of the sacraments of the church, and his ongoing doubts about his faith found expression in his operas, most clearly in The Saint.2° At ninety he spoke about his long interior dialogue with the God whose creed he found difficult to believe in. Musing upon the questions God asked him, he said, "That's the trouble, . . . because I don't know what to answer.''2~ One would be hard put to find a more concise summary of the inner turbulence faced by some men and women discerning a religious calling. Of course, artists working with religious subjects need not be religious people themselves, but often their work arises'from "a collaboration" between the artist and "the religious community of which he is a participating member.''2z Menotti, like Puccini, grew up immersed in the Catholic culture of northern Italy, and both men grappled with that culture when creating their operatic worlds. Part of their struggle derived from their lives within the secular culture of fame and fortune. Puccini, though, unlike Menotti, was close friends with his par- "God gives you a gift, and you must compose the right music in honor of God." 399 69.4 2010 Heisey ¯ Operatic Discernment of a Vocation 4oo.1 ish priest, a former army chaplain who loved music.23 As this essay has argued, noble music and revealed religion can complement one another, in particular when a man or woman is discerning a religious vocation. Liberated Imagination--and Faith Charles Moore has hailed opera's ability to "liberate the imagination," and he rejoiced in its "discerning. the basic rhythms of human hopes, fears, and desires.''z4 The value of opera for vocational discernment is in its ability to show us another dimension to the human experience. As with other performances in the theater or on film, one must willingly suspend disbelief when watching an opera; that suspension is even greater in opera, for what would otherwise be spoken dialogue or soliloquies are sung. Such suspending of disbelief leaves behind the normal routines we accept as ordinary real-ity and exposes us to distilled human passions. Whether those passions are those of a Tosca or an Annina, an Amahl or a Melchior, they may transport us to a height from which we may see more clearly the way to respond to the call to holiness. Let us look again at Tosca in contrast to Annina. Meant to be larger than life, Puccini's character of Floria Tosca is a famous opera singer in Rome, and the opera bearing her name opens in June of 1800 in a side chapel of Rome's baroque church of Sant' Andrea della Valle. Tosca's beloved, an artist who reads Voltaire, is painting an image of St. Mary Magdalene, and nearby is a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Tosca, a pious narcissist, makes a grand entrance and lays a bouquet at the feet of the Virgin. When she realizes that the model for the Magdalene is the sister of a Napoleonic revolu-tionary, her jealousy flares up. Such radical associations Review for Religious snare Tosca and her lover in a nightmarish entangle-ment with a corrupt police force. Both are arrested and found guilty without a trial. When interrogated and tormented by Baron Scarpia, the lecherous and sadistic chief of police, Tosca sings of her.faith being rewarded with suffering, but part of her suffering is self-inflicted. She has been devout and gen-erous, it is true, but she has a rationalist for a boyfriend and expects deference because of her fame as a singer. Her heart is divided, always a path to tragedy. Tosca, unlike Mary Magdalene, has not had her demons cast out; rather, they pursue her to a fatal end. In stark contrast to the vain and worldly Tosca, Annina appears as a model of humility. Her faith opens her to suffering, which she bears for her Beloved. Menotti shows Annina wholly dedicated to seeking God and being united to Him, and she must face a brother whose unexamined fear and carnal desires become masks for the false god of the self. Tosca offers flowers to the Virgin, but Annina shares the Virgin Mary's openness to God's call. Like Mary Magdalene, Annina would be willing to sit by the empty tomb, staring into the abyss where He had been. A :nan or woman facing the possibility of a religious vocation must be aware of the Tosca within each of us, while desiring to grow into something of an Annina. The call to be a religious is the Holy Spirit first beckoning and then giving the grace to yearn to see that there is more to life than creature comforts and the cheers of the crowd. Menotff shows Annina wholly dedicated to seeking God and being united to Him 69.4 2010 Heisey ¯ Operatic Discernment of a Vocation One way of understanding the verismo genre used by Puccini and Menotti is to see it as "concerned with common people and their preoccupations, rather than the trials and passions of aristocrats.''25 On one level, Tosca is about two lovers caught in the middle of politi-cal turmoil; on another, as we have seen, it is about a woman of faith in profound crisis. Menotti's operas discussed here are about simple people caught off guard by the arrival in their lives of the Son of God. From studying the history of the church, one learns that such complications occur in the lives of aristocrats and com-mon people as well. Opera, likewise the realm of all who are open to its riches, can help an aspiring religious see anew the gospel call to seek the One who is dawn and earth, wheat and thorn, poverty and royalty, all in all. Notes ' Daniel J. Wakin, "For Opening Night at the Metropolitan, a New Sound: Booing," New York Times (23 September 2009), p. C- 5; David Patrick Stearns, "Boos for the Met's New 'Tosca' Weren't Off-base," Philadelphia Inquirer (24 September 2009), p. D-l; see also Alex Ross, "Fiasco," New Yorker (5 October 2009): 84-85. 2 See John Anthony Davis, "The Political and Cultural Worlds of Puccini's Tosca," in Tosca's Prism: Three Moments in Western Cultural History, ed. Deborah Burton et al. (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2005), pp. 135-144; Susan Vandiver Nicassio, "The Eternal Politics of Tosca," in Tosca's Prism, pp. 249-252; H. Wendell Howard, "Suor Angelica: Puccini's Catholic Opera," Logos 1 (Fall 1998): 94- 103. 3 Charles Reid, "Gian-Carlo Menotti," Tablet (20 October 1956): 319. 4 John Lukacs, "A Night at the Dresden Opera," New Yorker (17 March, 1986): 100; reprinted in Remembered Past, ed. Mark G. Malvasi and Jeffrey O. Nelson (Wilmington: ISI Books, 2005), p. 457. s See John Gruen, Menotti: A Biography (New York: Macmillan, 1978); of the numerous obituaries, see E Paul Driscoll, "Gian Carlo Menotti," Opera News (April 2007): 88. For The Saint of Bleecker Review for Religious Street and Tosca, see Barry Singer, "Changing Fortunes," Opera News 0uly 2007): 50. 6 Gian Carlo Menotti, The Saint of Bleecker Street (New York: G. Schirmer, 1954), act 1, scene 1, p. 14. 7 Menotti, The Saint, act 1, scene 2, p. 23. 8 Menotti, The Saint, p. 22. 9 Kiri Te Kanawa, with Conrad Wilson, Opera for Lovers (London: Headline, 1996), pp. 140-141. ,0 Steve Smith, "A Young Shepherd's Ageless Trek," New York Times (17 December 2007), p. E-5. ~ "Christmas Music," Christian Century (4-17 December 2002): 37. ~2 John Gruen, Menotti, p. 108. ~3 Gian Carlo Menotti, Amahl and the Night Visitors (New York: G. Schirmer, 1951), pp. 20-21. ~4 Richard Hayes, "The Saint of Bleecker Street," Commonweal (4 February 1955): 477. ~s Theophilus Lewis, "Theatre," America (22 January 1955): 434. ~6 Harold Clurman, "Theater," Nation (22 January 1955): 83- 84. ,7 "Successful Saint," Time (10 January 1955): 42; see Irving Kolodin, "Menotti's 'The Saint of Bleecker Street,'" Saturday Review (8 January 1955): 28; Winthrop Sargeant, "Menotti's New Opera," New Yorker (8 January 1955): 74-76; "A Saint Sings in Menotti's Best," Life (14 February 1955): 62-63. 's John Gruen, Menotti, p. 109; see Robert R. Reilly, "Gian Carlo Menotti's Heavenly Muse," Crisis (May 2001): 38. 19 Reilly, "Heavenly Muse," Crisis (May 2001): 39; see Gruen, Menotti, pp. 120-122 and 131. 20 See Gruen, Menotti, p. 166. 2~ Reilly, "Heavenly Muse," Crisis (May 2001): 38. 22 Michael Linton, "Moses at the Met," First Things 98 (December 1999): 15. 23 See Dante Del Fiorentino, Immortal Bohemian: An Intimate Memoir of Giacomo Puccini (New York: Prentice-Hall, 1952); Jane Phillips, "Puccini and the Priest," Opera News (12 March 1951): 26-28; Mary Jane Phillips-Matz, Puccini: A Biography (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2002), pp. 258-259. 403 69.4 2010 Heisey ¯ Operatic Discernment of a Vocation 24 Charles Moore, "The Fantastic Power of Opera to Fly Free," Daily Telegraph (21 July 2009): 19. 25 Johanna Fiedler, Molto Agitato: The Mayhem Behind the Music at the Metropolitan Opera (New York: Doubleday, 2001), p. 79; see Joseph Volpe, with Charles Michener, The Toughest Show on Earth: My Rise and Reign at the Metropolitan Opera (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2006), p. 167: "The characters aren't gods or monsters, they're people caught up in the moral and political issues of their time." Personal Reflection [ Group Discussion 1. What are the ways or method that I have used in making a discerned decision? 2. How has Heisey in using opera as a help in discerning given me new ways of entering into discernment? 404] Review for Religious JAMES H. KROEGER Searching for Jesus at Christmas Once or twice a year, usually around the season of Christmas or Easter, many news-papers and popular newsmagazines (Time or Newsweek) present an article on some aspect of Jesus or the Judaeo-Christian faith. Often these features try to pique readers' interest by using attention-grabbing headlines. They ask: What is the true Christmas Story? Why did Jesus have to die? How do Jews, Muslims, and Buddhists view Jesus? Who was the real Jesus? Often the articles claim to provide new and recent discoveries into the person and identity of Jesus. Believing Christians can read these presen-tations with interest, but they should realize lighting the way James H. Kroeger MM, a Maryknoll missioner, has served in Asia (Philippines and Bangladesh), since his 1970 arrival in the Orient. Currently he teaches at the Pontifical Faculty of Theology at Loyola School of Theology of the Ateneo de Manila University as well as at the Mother of Life Catechetical Center. He can be reached at: 68.4 2009 Kroeger ¯ Searcbing for Jesus at Christmas that such popular portrayals of Jesus will probably add little insight into their knowledge and practice of the faith. One need not be alarmed by these magazine arti-cles. Actually, the popularity of such material shows the continuing interest on a broad public scale in the person and mission of Jesus. Also, as adult believers, we admit that we do have many recurring questions about Jesus and his meaning for our lives and for the life of the world. Where can we and should we look for answers to our questions? Where should we search? At this point, I offer a word of disclosure, telling you who I am. Thus, what I write in this presentation, which will explore some difficult questions, will be anchored into a solid foundation. I am a man of faith, a Catholic priest, serving in the Philippines for four decades. I have taught Christology [theology of the person and mission of Jesus Christ] for over thirty years in several schools of theology, major seminaries, and catechetical centers. My personal library contains well over one hundred books on Christology, and I have published numerous articles and books on the subject. In short, I write as a believer, a man of the church. Beginning the Search For Christians, the primary written source of faith in the person of Jesus is sacred scripture, the Gospels in particular. We rely on four books included in the New Testament: the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Just about everything that the Christian church teaches about J~sus comes through the Gospels. These Gospels, in turn, serve as a criterion of truth and authenticity for the church's teaching about Jesus. Because the Gospels are the central sources for understanding Jesus, one has to ask: What is a Gospel? Review for Religious Parenthetically, readers will note that before addressing specific questions about Jesus, it is necessary to exam-ine some general foundations upon which our faith is based. "Gospel" derives from Old English meaning "good spell/news"; this translates the Greek eu (good) and angelion (news, announcement). As "good news" the Gospels communicate the message of God's saving action in Christ and the accounts of Jesus' activity pro-duced by the early church. A Gospel is a very unique kind of written literature; it is a genre of writing that is different from other liter-ary forms. Thus, a Gospel is not simply a "biography" in the modern sense of that term (a detailed account of someone's life); it is also not "history" in the sense of a chronological presen-tation of a series of events. Yet, the Gospels contain both bio-graphical and historical elements. However, Gospels are written from another perspective and with another motive in mind. Simply, a Gospel can be described as a "faith sum-mary." Gospels contain material that will lead readers to know and love--in faith--the person of Jesus. This means that biographical and historical materials are at the service of the primary purpose of the Gospels: com- ¯ ing to a loving knowledge and experience of Jesus. The Gospels aim to help us in knowing and encountering Jesus personally, not just knowing many factual details about him. Another simple way to express the nature of the Gospels is to accept that they were written "from faith to faith." The Gospels emerged from the living faith of Simply, a Gospel can, be described as a "faith summary. " 407 69.4 2010 Kroeger * Searching for Jesus at Christmas 408 the evangelists and the early church. They were written to faith, to engender and strengthen the faith of believers. The evangelists (Gospel writers) did not intend to sup-ply every detail about the life of Jesus; rather, they chose to include those stories which would best serve the "promotion of the faith." At heart, Gospels are "proc-lamation not biography or history." This insight is well expressed, by:John the Evangelist: "There were many other signs that Jesus worked and the disciples saw, but they are not recorded in this book. These are recorded so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing this you may have life through his name" On 20:30-31). Composing Gospels Related to the nature and purpose of the Gospels, questions may arise about how and when the Gospels were written. Here the Catholic Church has provided solid guidance on the actual "writing process," explaining the "coming-to-be" of the four Gospels that we accept as the inspired Word of God. Again, this background material will serve to anchor our many "Christmas-time questions" about the person of Jesus, questions which will be addressed in the later part of this presentation. Christians believe that the authors of the Bible (both Old and New Testaments) were inspired, or guided, by the Holy Spirit. According to Roman Catholic theol-ogy, this does not mean that God spoke to the bib-lical authors directly, as one might dictate a letter to a secretary. Neither did the evangelists have modern equipment such as a tape recorder to capture the verba-tim words of Jesus. Rather, our church holds that these inspired texts are writings whose authors, prompted by the Holy Spirit, convey God's revealed truth using their Review for Religious own abilities, words, and styles. This is clearly evident in each of the four Gospels; for example, John's literary style differs from that of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. In short, scripture contains "God's Word in human words." God is the ultimate author of the scriptures; the truth that God conveys in and through them is reliable; we can securely build our faith upon these written scrip-tures as they are interpreted within the faith community of the church. It is this same Catholic Church that encourages the use of historical-critical scholarship to better pen-etrate the full meani.ng . of God's Word. Since ' ~ the 1943 magna carta of Catholic biblical schol-arship (Divino Afflante Spiritu), scripture stud-ies have flourished in the church--all to the benefit of believers. The church encourages . its biblical scholars and theologians to employ "scien-tific" approaches to delve deeper into the full meaning of God's revealed message in the scriptures. The church accepts that the Gospels are, in fact, not literal, chronological accounts of the words and deeds of Jesus. Our Gospels are the products of a faith-devel-opment !n early Christianity. They emerged through a three-stage process that moves (a) from the ministry and oral preaching of Jesus, (b) through the oral preaching of the apostles, and (c) finally to the actual writing of the Gospels as we know them. This understanding is echoed in the revelation document coming from the Second Vatican Council. This fact does not imply in any Our Gospels are the products of a faith-development in early Christianity. 69.4 2010 Kroeger ¯ Searcbing for ~esus at Christmas sense that the Gospels are not reliable sources. Today it is generally accepted that the Gospels were written in this order: Mark (60s), Matthew and Luke (70s-80s), and John (90s). Are Gospels Historical? Although there are difficult questions that do not admit of easy, brief answers, we must, in order to pro-mote our faith, struggle to respond to them. On the question of the historical nature of the Gospels [this will directly affect our understanding of the Christmas stories], we can get help by using two German words that give us insight into the nature of history. History can validly be understood through two dif-ferent, yet interrelated, perspectives. Historisch (his-torical) designates the facts of the past that can be demonstrated by documents and critically analyzed by the methods of scientific history. Geschichtlich (historic) refers to the same event(s) but focuses on the signifi-cance and importance of that fact for a certain group of people. In simpler language, historisch focuses on the plain historical data [what happened], whereas geschicht-lich seeks its deeper significance [what meaning does it have]. Some simple examples may prove helpful. As a mis-sionary in the Philippines for forty years, there are sev-eral dates that are important for me (and all Filipinos), but they would have no significance--even for. my own siblings who live in the United States. For Filipinos, 30 December 1896, is significant; it is the death of Jose Rizal, our national hero. The proclamation of Martial Law happened on 21 September 1972--with grave con-sequences for Filipinos. Ninoy Aquino was assassinated on 21 August 1983; the EDSA (Epifanio de Los Santos Review for Religious Avenue, Quezon City, Manila) "people-power" revolu-tion unfolded in 22-25 February 1986; Cory Aquino died on 1 August 2009. Most Filipinos know these dates almost instinctively. Yet, these same events would not be remembered by someone from Italy, Canada, or Indonesia. Here we see the importance and difference between historisch and geschichtlich. The historical facts and dates I have just mentioned are true, factual history. However, they have special meaning and importance only for Filipinos; they are seared into the consciousness of the Filipino peo-ple. While true facts of history, they mean little or nothing to non-Filipinos. Similarly, the Gospels have significant meaning--but only for believing Christians. Evangelists: Pastoral Theologians Moving back to our discussion of the Gospels, we come to appreciate that the evangelists were not pri-marily interested in presenting a detailed historical chronology of Jesus' life; nor were they interested in providing a comprehensive biography of Jesus and his family. The Gospel writers focused primarily on pre-senting the importance and meaning of Jesus for believ-ing Christians. Thus, while not denying or falsifying the historisch (historical data and facts), the main interest of the Gospels is to show the geschichtlich (significance) of this man Jesus for us and for our salvation. The Gospel writers focused primarily on promoting faith in Jesus; that is why the Gospels are not primarily history or biography. They are "faith summaries"; they are written based on the evangelists' faith with the purpose that we too would come to faith in Jesus. To achieve this goal of "faith promotion," each evan-gelist shaped his Gospel differently. Matthew, writing for 411 69.4 2010 Kroeger * Searching for Jesus at Cbristmas Jewish Christians, often demonstrates by the use of Old Testament quotations that the scriptures are fulfilled in the person and work of Jesus. Mark seeks to emphasize that Jesus is manifested as the crucified Messiah, fre-quently rejected by the people. Luke's Gospel is shaped by his religious mentality; he is a faithful recorder of Jesus' loving-kindness. The whole of John's thought is dominated by the mystery of the Incarnation. Each of the Gospels is unique and adopts varied theological emphases, while remaining focused on the person of Jesus. This was done so that the mes-sage of Jesus would bet- Each of theGospels is unique and adopts varied theological emphases, while remaining focused on the person of ]egus. ter reach the intended audience. In this sense, I call the evangelists "pastoral theologians,'~ because they pastorally shaped and focused their theological mes-sage with their audience in mind. Matthew, for example, quoted the Old Testament frequently so that his Jewish Christian audience would more easily come to faith in Jesus. Although we have four canoni-cal Gospels, they all coalesce to produce an integrated Gospel portrait of the person of Jesus. 412]

Issue 40.1 of the Review for Religious, January 1981. ; REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS (ISSN 0034-639X), published every Iwo months, is ediled in collaboration with the faculty members of the Department of Theological Studies of St. Louis University. The editorial offices are Iocaled at Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108. REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS is owned by the Missouri Province Educational Institute of the Society of Jesus, St. Louis, MO. © 1981 by REWEW FOR RELiGiOUS. Composed, printed and manufactured in U.S.A. Second class postage paid at SI. Louis, MO. Single copies: $2.50. Subscription U.S.A.: $9.00 a year; $17.00 for two years. Other countries: $10.00 a year; $19.00 for two years. For subscription orders or change of address, write: Rt:vt~:w t'oR Rt:Lt(;tOUS: P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, MN 55802. Daniel F. X. Meenan, S.J. Dolores Greeley, R.S.M. .~eremiah L. Alberg, S.J. Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. Jean Read Editor Associate Editor Book Editor Questions and Answers Editor Assistant Editor January, 1981 Volume 40 Number 1 Manuscripts, books for review and correspondence with the editor should be sent to REVIEW t'ott RELIGIOUS; Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108. Questions for answering should be sent to Joseph F. Gallen, S.J.; Jesuit Community; St. Joseph's Universily; City Avenue at 54th St.; Philadelphia, PA 19131. Back issues and reprints should be ordered from REVIEW t'OR RELIGIOUS; Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.: St. Louis, MO 63108. ++Out of print" issues and articles not published as reprints are available from Universily Microfilms International; 300 N. Zeeb Rd.; Ann Arbor, MI 48106. Review for Religious Volume 40, 1981 Editorial Offices 3601 Lindell Boulevard, Room 428 Saint Louis, Missouri 63108 Daniel F. X. Meenan, S.J. Dolores Greeley, R.S.M. Jeremiah L. Alberg, S.J. Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. Miss Jean Read Editor Associate Editor Book Editor Questions and Answers Editor Assistant Editor REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS is published in January, March, May, July, Sep-tember, and November on the fifteenth of the month. It is indexed in the Catholic Periodical and Literature Index and in Book Review Index. A microfilm edition of REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS is available from University Microfilms International; Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106. Copyright © 1981 by REVIEW FOR RELIGIOtJS. Toward a Method for the Study of Spirituality Edward Kinerk, S.J. Father Kinerk is presently on sabbatical leave, doing post-doctoral studies in spirituality at St. Louis University. He resides at Jesuit Hall; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108, A former professor of historical theology once described spirituality as a "gl0b" area. He explained this rather inelegant label by pointing out that spirituality enjoys an unlimited wealth of resources but possesses no tools for getting those resources organized. "I understand what it means to do history orto do theology," he objected, "but what does it mean to do spirituality?" StUdents contemplating work in spirituality will take small comfort in his remarks but they will know exactly what he meant, for, unlike most other academic disciplines, spirituality lacks both formal definition of its content and methodology proper to itself. Studies in the history of spirituality, prayer, religious life, Scripture, psychology, theology, and any number of authors and movements can be most beneficial in themselves, but where does one find the unifying principles to bring all this knowledge together? The occasional reader, who finds this or that work personally rewarding, will not be troubled by such abstract concerns,but this vagueness of content and style can be ~a formidable handicap for those who undertake a more thorough study, either for their own enlightenment or with the thought of being of service to others. In .the latter case one must analyze spiritualities, interpret them in their historical-cultural context, compare and contrast them to other spiritualities, and finally develop criteria for criticism and evaluation. The tools for such reflection are not commonly available in the way that they are for other disciplines, including theology.' Part of the difficulty lies in the very nature of spirituality. Except for the 3 4 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 Christological controversies of the fourth and fifth centuries it has been rare for theological speculation to elicit passionate responses on the part of Chris-tians, Spirituality, on the other hand, always makes at least an implicit appeal to the heart; it is much closer to people's lives and emotions than is theology. This is to be expected, but it places the "academic" study of spirituality in an awkward corner precisely because the material lends itself so immediately to practical application, the pastoral. Consequently, spirituality as a discipline finds itself more often called upon to train spiritual directors and retreat-givers than to engage in reflection. This onesidedness is risky. Spirituality can-not afford to neglect the mistakes or the riches which are a part of its heritage; nor can it forego with impunity the arduous task of using the theoretical pro-cess to correct the subtle mistakes of common sense.~ In a recent article for REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, Father Alan Jones chronicled the split between devotion and theology--head and heart--and called for the redevelopment of mystical theology in order to "combat the tendency to anti-intellectualism today, particularly in areas where religious experience is concerned.-3 Using William Johnston's definition of mysticism as "wisdom or knowledge that is found through love,'" Father Jones sug-gested contemplation--which includes all levels of knowing--as the means of bringing reflection into religious experience and religious experience into theological reflection. Father Jones's concern to bring head and heart together must be a con-stant preoccupation for spirituality; the great classics were developed more in the chapel than in the library, though they depended on both. However, I believe that we have an auxiliary task which is less "creative" and more "organizational" in character. In order to bring the vast and often unwieldy material from the history of spirituality into the arena of our prayerful reflec-tion it must first be arranged into digestible form. The purpose of this article will be to suggest some questions or distinctions by which such arrangement can proceed: in other words, a method for the study of spiritualities. Of course, this is an ambitious undertaking, and 1 will protest in advance that ' Theologians may protest that method is a problem for them, too, but at least work is being done. Recently David Tracy has suggested five basic models which have influenced theologica~ inquiry: orthodox, liberal, neo-orthodox, radical, and his own "revisionist" model. See David Tracy, Blessed Rage for Order (Seabury, 1975), pages 22-34. Tracy has been influenced in part:through. his long association with the thought of Bernard Lonergan. In a very important work, Method in Theology (Seabury, 1979; first published: Herder & Herder, 1972), Lonergan ~ipplied his transcendental method to the task of developing a method in theology. 1 will cite Lonergan only briefly in the course of this article, but 1 need to acknowledge that the influence of Method has been considerable. 2 For an explanation of the relationship of the realm of common sense and the realm of theory, see Lonergan, Method, pp. 257-258. ' Alan Jones, "Spirituality and Theology," Rt~vm'w ~oR R~.l.~G~Ot~s 39 (1980), p. 171. ' William Johnston, The Inner Eye of Love (Harper & Row, 1978), p. 20. Jones cites this on p. 170 of his article. Study of Spirituality / 5 these are remarks "toward a method." But since the need is great, I hope that .any venture in this direction might prove useful. Spirituality needs (1) a definition of itself, (2) some tools for analyzing a particular spirituality, (3) some guidelines for relating a spirituality to other spiritualities, and (4) some criteria for evaluation. In the pages that follow I will make attempts in the first three areas and then conclude with some limited thoughts about the fourth. What Is Spirituality? Everyone has a notion of spirituality, but efforts to pin it down in defini-tion can, be frustrating. It is everywhere yet nowhere; its scope is so vast-- potentially as vast as the sum and depth of all human experience--that workable content virtually disappears. Spirituality has been described as "life-style." If we realize that this means more than length of hair and particular preferences for food and clothing, this definiton is actually quite good. A person's spirituality is the way in which he or she lives in accordance with basic values. The famous Swiss theologian, Hans Urs von Balthasar, has given this a more philosophical formulation: "The way in which [an individual] acts and reacts habitually throughout his life according to his objective and ultimate insights and decisions.''~ The strength of such a definition lies in its completeness; its weakness is that it is too complete. We are left afloat on a sea of private human experience with no markers to make this or that dimension of experience stand out. These defini-tions are good because they include everything, but they are not workable because they distinguish nothing. And without distinctions analysis is impossible. What should we look for in a workable definition? First of all, a definition of spirituality for the purpose of study should limit the material to what is expressed. Nothing canbe studied unless it iscommunicated in some way. It is true that spirituality must deal with the mysterious depths of the human per-son in relationship to God and that. this mystery often defies conceptualiza-tion. However, it is usually open to communication through symbolization; and this, too, is a form of expression. Spirituality studies expressions, and these expressions can be conceptual or symbolic: they can be words, or they can be art, music, architecture, or indeed any form of human activity. Of course, an individual's full experience of his or her relationship with God can never be adequately expressed., not even symbolically. This is simply a dif-ficulty which the study of spirituality must accept; we can only examine what is expressed and yet we know that the expression is never exhaustive of the reality. Secondly, a definition of spirituality should contain the idea of personal ~ Hans Urs yon Balthasar, "The Gospel as Norm and Test of All Spirituality in the Church," from Spirituality in the Church, Christian Duquoc, editor, Concilium, vol 9 (Paulist, 1965), p. 7. 6 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 growth. There is no spirituality for an animal, nor do we ever speak of God's spirituality.~ What distinguishes the human condition is growth beyond self, self-transcendence. There is a restlessness which is a constant striving to move from the less~ authentic to the more authentic. This is why spirituality gravitates so readily to psychology, and it is precisely the point at which the greatest care must be exercised not to confuse the two.7 Finally, as indicated earlier, a workable definition must contain markers: terms in the definition which orient the material by distinguishing what is important from what is unimportant. Without some means of making distinc-tions the material of spirituality presents an undivided sameness inimical to study. Markers differentiate that material; and this, in turn, facilitates ques-tions for analysis. The particular selection of markers will necessarily be somewhat arbi.t.rary. Here I have chosen to view any spirituality primarily from the standpoint of expressions of the authentic and expressions of the inauthentic. A spiri'tuality, then, is the expression ofa dialecticalpersonal growth from the inauthentic to the authentic. There are three ingredients in the definition: expression, dialectical personal growth, and authentic-inauthentic. Expres-sion need not be clarified further. Growth has been called dialectical to underscore the fact that all spiritual growth is a simultaneous "yes" to one thing and a "no" to something else. Each step toward the authentic demands a corresponding rejection of the inauthentic.8 The Gospel of Luke manifests this dia.lectical character in its expression of the beatitudes: every benediction has its corresponding curse (Lk 6:20-26). Inauthentic and authentic are the markers referred to above. The total authenticity of a human person would be his or her complete self, transcendence in love. Conversely, total inauthenticity would be complete self-alienation, self-centeredness in hate. For our purposes, however, expres-sions of the authentic and inauthentic will normally be but partial representa-tions of these absolute states. In a famous line from the Imitation of Christ, for example, compunction is an expression of the authentic while vain knowledge is an expression of the inauthentic;9 they are signposts along the ~ Process theologians may take exception to this. In a di-polar notion of God one might be able to speak of God's spirituality: "God in his consequent aspect receives into himself that which occurs in the world, so that it becomes the occasion for newer and richer, as well as better~ concretions in the ongoing movement of divine activity," W. Norman Pittenger, "Process Thought: A Contem-porary Trend in Theology," Process Theology, Ewert H. Cousins, editor (Newman, 1971), p. 27. Even if one were to accept this position, it would be quite difficult to move from the idea of a spirituality of God to its description. ' It is very easy for spiritual direction to become psychological counseling. Of course, sometimes this is desirable because it is counseling which is needed, but often we slide into a counseling framework simply because it seems to have more substance than spiritual direction. This again reveals the necessity of definition and methodology proper to spirituality. a Lonergan views this as a fundamental characteristic of religious development. See Method, p. II0. Study of Spirituality / 7 way. Furthermore, specific expressions of the authentic and the inauthentic are not always univocal, even within the sam, e spirituality. In the Cloud of Unknowing, meditation on Christ's passion can be either an expression of the authentic or the inauthentic, depending on the stage of one's contemplative development.'° Questions for Analysis In an age as hermeneutically conscious as our own, it need not be stressed that a pre~'equisite for the analysis of any spirituality is some understanding of its historical-cultural context. To be unaware, for instance, that the end of the Roman persecutions coincided with the great movement to the desert in the fourth century would be to miss the opportunity for many insights into the roots of desert spirituality. The historical-cultural context is available for anyone who wishes to take the time to do someresearch. Our project assumes that this research can and will be done, but we are concerned here with something more general. Questions for analysis must serve two purposes. They must provide a means of organizing the material of a spirituality in such a way that the material can be more easily assimilated. In other words, they must teach us how to read and. how to retain what we read more effectively. The other pur-pose is that of comparison and contrast. The questions for analysis must be such that they canbe asked more or less equally of any spirituality. It is only by putting the same questions to many different bodies of material that we can begin, the,process o.f comparing similarities and contrasting differences which will lead us to deeper understanding. The first question flows immediately from the terms of the definition: what.are the expressions of the authentic and the inauthentic? An effective way to begin answering this question is to make a list. Reading through the SpiritualExercises of St. Ignatius, for instance, we would observe that shame and confusion, sorrow, tears, anguish, intimate knowledge, poverty, humility and gratitudeI' are but some of the expressions of the authentic; and we could do the same for expressions of the inauthentic. Making a list is a good way to begin because it directs us to the text with a simple and specific objective: how does the spirituality express what it values and what it rejects? An exhaustive 9 "I would rather feel compunction of heart for my sins than merely know the definition of com-punction," Thomas a Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, edited with an introduction by Harold C. Gardiner (Image, 1955), Book I, chapter 1. ,o The Cloud of Unknowing, by an anonymous fourteenth-century Englishman, edited and in-troduced by William Johnston (Image, 1973), chapter vii. , '~ Ignatius Loyola, Spiritual Exercises, translation by Louis J. Puhl (Newman, 1954). Shame and confusion, sorrow, tears and anguish are from the First Exercise of the First Week, #48; intimate knowledge of Christ is from the First Comtemplation of the Second Week, #104; poverty and humility are from the Two Standards, #147; and gratitude isffrom the Contemplation to Attain the Love of God, #233. 8'/Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 list is rarely possible or even desirable, but we do want to be certain that we ini-tiate our analysis by carefully gathering all of the pertinent expressions. A list gives us the concrete expressions from which to work, but it is too one-dimensional to be of more than limited value. By itself a list cannot single out those expressions which are of special importance, nor can it fit them into a pattern of meaning. What we lack is an organiz.ing form'2 which could give the expressions depth and a relationship to one another. In the SpiritualExer-cises an excellent illustration of such a form is the image of the Two Stand-ards: the Kingdom of Christ verstis the Kingdom of SatanI' ~ The Kingdom of Christ gives depth and relationship to t.he expressions of the authentic while the Kingdom of Satan does the ~ame for the inauthentic. Intimate knowledge, poverty, humility, gratitude and the like contribute definite nuances to the understanding of the nature of these two kingdoms; and the expressions, in turn, receive their full meaning only in relationship to the complete image. The Two Standards are the unifying image for expressions in Ignatian spirituality. While Ignatius himself gives the organizing form of the Two Standards, it is often necessary to uncover a form which is not itself one of the particular images used in a given text. Such would be thecase in the Life'ofAntony by Athanasius. ~4 Clearly the text does not lack for images, but the best organizing form is rather the structure which Athanasius employs to develop his story: a series of four withdrawals by Antony, each one into greater solitude. The authgr uses these withdrawals to highlight periods of development in Antony's life, and each period unifies a corresponding set of expressions of the authentic and the inauthentic. In the first withdrawal Antony left his home to li~,e on the outskirts of the village with an older ascetic. The expressions of the authentig and the inauthentic are characteristic of a "novitiate" period: zeal, faith, desire for purity of heart, imitation 6f the older ascetic were set in opposition to anxiety over f~mily, money, fame, difficulties of asceticism and sexuality. In the second withdrawal, closing himself into a tomb,, the chief ex- '~ The identification of basic units (expr~essions of the authentic and the inauthentic) and the discovery of the forms by which these expressions are related have a slight resemblance to struc-turalism. However, a double caution is in order. In i!s extreme sense structuralism can become an ideology in which all we can know about a system are its basic units and their associations; further meaning would be denied. In a less ideological sense structuralism is a method of inquiry which can be more friendly to theology and spirituality, but even here--as the term can be 'very am-biguous- l wish to make clear that my own use is limited to exactly what has been described in the text. '~ Spiritual Exercises, #13~,- 148. ~' St. Athanasius, Patriarch of Alexandria, was probably the author of the Life ofA ntony shortly after the hermit's death in 356. Antony represented a prototype .for the desert fathers, and, whatever the historical accuracy of the Life, it c~ertainly had a profound influence" on desert spiritqality. This important work is once again available in English: Athanasius: The Life of St. AntOny and the Letter to Marcellinius, translation and introduction by Robert C. Gregg, preface~ by William A. CIcbsh (Paulist, 1980~ Study of Spirituality p~'essions of the inauthentic are wild imaginings, terror and the temptation to flight, while defiance of the demons, perseverance and faith are expressio ~ns of the authentic. From the tomb Antony went to live in an abandoned fort in the desert where he was besieged by the demons. A hint of weariness from the clamor of the demons is the only expression of the inauthentic while expres-sions of the authentic reflect Antony's growing strength: confidence, utter equilibrium, purity of soul, and so forth. Antony's final withdrawal was to the "inner mountain" which is described in paradisal terms. The expression of the inauthentic most characteristic of this period is pride in the power God has given him; while the expressions of the authentic are the manifestations of the power of the Spirit working through Antony: overpowering the demons, curing the sick, instructing the monks and confiz lnding the heretics.~ It is not always possibly to find a single form o of material together. One rather difficult text is tt fine analysis of this spiritual classic, Bernard SI truths which they [the four books of the Imitati~ ranged according to a precise play, a rational s~ dialectic."~6 Much of the difficulty is due to the sl of thoughts useful to the spiritual life, possibly There is a variety of equal themes, and so no sine could give unity to all the expressions. The most o is to discover, or invent, several forms which toge into useful patterns. As a corollary to the organizing forms we can i of the authentic and the inauthentic for stages of s life is a type of growth but in many well-devei specified stages,'7 and the key for detecting thesl sions of the authentic and the inauthentic. When ~ authentic becomes an expression of the inauthen growth has been crossed. An example of this ha~ i the Cloud of Unknowing: meditation on Christi! the authentic for the beginner but just the oppt vanced in the spirit of contemplation. Sometimes 'image which will tie a body Imitation of Christ. In his ~aapen has noted that "the n] enfold have not been ar-ructure, or a psychological yle of the work: a collection by more than one author. le form can be found which ne can do in such a situation ther best gather the material dso examine the expressions !iritual growth. All spiritual 9ed spiritualities there are ~ stages lies with the expres-particular expression of the tic, then a stage of spiritual dready been furnished from passion is an expression of ~site for someone more ad-the stages of growth will be '~ The four journeys: leaving his home to live on the outskirts of a village (Life of Antony, c. 4); living in the tomb (Ibid, c. 8); from tl~e tomb to the abandoned fort (Ibid, cc. 11-12); and the withdrawal to the inner mountain (Ibid, cc. 49-51). ,6 Bernard Spaapen, "A New Look at an Old Classic," from Imitating Christ, E. Malatesta, editor, Religious Experience Series, vol. 5 (Abbey Press, 1974). This work is a translation from the French Dictionary of Spirituality. " Frequently a spirituality will describe the break between an unreflective Christian life and the desire to lead a more spiritual life. Another break occurs later when the Christian leaves the period characterized by struggle and "spiritual achievement" and moves more into a climate of sur-render and "spiritual giftedness." The classical distinctions have been the three ways: purgative, illuminative, and unitive. 10 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 the structure giving unity to the material, but this will not always be the case. The second question for analysis comes from the idea of personal growth. A ~pirituality which reaches the state of expression does not appear out of the vacuum, but it is the maturation of much personal experience. One or many have traveled a similar dialectical journey from the inauthentic to the authen-tic and from this experience comes a wealth of valuable insight. This insight, which embodies both the techniques and the lived experience of the journey, can be called wisdom, and it is the ob)ect of the second question: what is the wisdom of a particular spirituality? To discover the wisdom of'a particular spirituality we must look at its teaching. In what special manner does a spirituality propbse.to find God, and what experience flows from its techniques of encounter? In the Life of Antony, for example, wisdom comes especially from the experience of solitude, x~hich for the desert fathers meant struggle with demons representing every imaginable thought or feeling. The wisdom of the Life of Antony is expressed in a long speech by the hermit to a group of other hermits assembled for the occasion.'8 This speech, often called a speech on discernment, is a description of what to expect in solitude and how to deal with whatever (or whomever) occurred. The wisdom of the desert employs some of the most colorful and varied imagery in the history of spirituality, but it is always characterized by the detection and diminishment of interior turmoil in order to find and preserve apatheia.'9 A very different example, though with striking parallels, is fouhd in the wisdom of St. Ignatius. The Spiritual Exercises express wisd6m not in speeches but in appendices: rules for thinking with the Church, rules for eating, rules for discernment, and so on. Ignatian wisdom, however, is not contained equally in all these rules but in one special and famous set: the rules for the discernment of spirits.2° As mentioned above, the primary image of lgnatian spirituality is the Two Standards, and the go~.l is to serve with Christ who wishes to spread his Kingdom and defeat the Kingdom of Satan. Now these kingdoms will enjoy victory or suffer defe~t as a result of our particular choices. However, the kingdoms are distinguished from each other less by the ,8 Life of Antony, cc. 16-43. ,9 Apatheia was the ascetical goal of the desert fathers. It was not apathy but rather a state of in-terior calm and recollection. Athanasius described this state in the Life of Anthony: "The state of his soul was one of purity, for it was not cpnstricted by grief, nor relaxed by pleasure, nor affected by either laughter or dejection. Moreover, when he saw th'e crowd, he was not annoyed any more than he was elated at being embraced by so many people. He maintained utter equilibrium, like one guided by reason and steadfast in that which accords with nature" (c. 14). Perhaps the best summary of desert wisdom is contained in the writings of Evagrius Ponticus (d. 399), especially in his Praktikos. This has been translated together with Chapters on Prayer and published as Praktikos: Chapters on Prayer translated and edited by John Eudes Bamberger, O.C.S.O. (Cistercian Publication, 1970). ~o Spiritual Excercises, #313-336. Study of Spirituality object of a particular choice than by attitudes. Consequently, the disciple of Christ must differentiate between objects of possible choice according to authenticating.feelings (attitudes) or their opposites. The rules for the discern-ment of spirits, are Ignatius' wisdom for making this all important differentia-tion and decision. There is no need to multiply examples. Wisdom gets at the heart of a particular spirituality because it taps the special experience of the person or persons who have lived it. Often referred to "thoughts" in describing the struggle of solitude and to apatheia as the goal of that struggle. For Ignatius, the key word would be discernment. On the other hand, there need not be but one wisdom for every spirituality. Moving beyond the Spiritual Exercises one could speak also of a wisdom of obedience in Ignatius. The 0b)ective~is to identify the central insights of a spirituality; insights, however, that flow from matured experience. Finally, we.should underline the fact that questions for analysis--expres-sions and wisdom--are effective for focusing and organizing the material, but they certainly do not exhaust its riches. In addition to the fact that no set of questions can ever draw everything from the material, a spirituality will always retain a certain opacity regardless of how carefully it is scrutinized; ~and we will always find ourselx~es returning to the source for clarification, new insight, and personal edification. However, at some point in time we must determine that an analysis is finished, both in the number of questions asked and in the depth of the answers. It is the suggestion of this article that the two questions given above will focus and organize the material sufficiently to enable us to turn to the wider arena of comparison and contrast of different spiritualities. Questions for Comparison and Contrast Bernard Lonergan has described method as"a normative pattern of recur-rent and related operations yielding cumulative and progressive results.''2' What we have thus far isnot a complete method but its foundation. Questions for analysis provide a normative pattern of operat!ons which can be applied to. any number of particular spiritualities, but only continued application fol-lowed by comparison and contrast will yield cumulative and progressive results. Now the general matter for any comparison and contrast would normally be the exprbssions of the authentic and the inauthentic, the images and forms which give them unity, and the expressions of wisdom. From this one could proceed in any number of ways depending only on time, interest, and avail-ability of sources. Let us suppose, for example, that someone was interested in the general topic of prayer and that he or she had some familiarity with both 2, Lonergan, Method, p. 4. 12 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 the Cloud of Unknowing and the works of John of the Cross. Even an exami-nation'of the titles would reveal that "cloud" and "night" are expressions of the authentic for both. A study of the similarities and differences between the Cloud's understanding of "cloud" and John of the Cross's understanding of "night" might prove to be a straightforward and interesting investigation into the meaning of apophatic prayer.2' Ordinarily the work of comparison and contrast will draw heavily on our ability to understand the relative hist6rical-cultural contexts. This can be given some direction, however, if we keep in mind two principles for compari-son. The first is that a spirituality cannot help but reflect certain cosmological perspectives. As a result we should always ask: what understandings of space and time shape the relationship between self, world, and God for a particular spirituality? For example, the Life of Antony used a simple cosmological framework which placed a person on top of the world but under two concen-tric hemispheres: the air, which was the abode of the demons, and the sky, which was heaven and the abode of God. Thus, to go to God one had to leave the world and ascend through the air, and this meant battles with the demons. Today we experience ourselves through a cosmology which is couched in evolutionary and psychological terms. Instead of place, time is the important parameter: it is no longer "up" and "down" which correspond to the authen-tic and the inauthentic but "transformation" and "regression." The discovery and investigations of the unconscious have forged a new vocabulary for our descriptions of evil, human growth, and the nature of freedom. The unconscious has also given us a new locus for expressions of the authentic and the inauthentic. The cosmology of the day--be it Antony's, our own, or any other--will not only shape the expressions of spirituality but it will also locate those expressions in accordance with its perception of the relationship in time and space of self, world, and God. ~: The cosmological questions can be made specific. The question, "'Where is Christ?" yields interesting resolts when asked of St. Basil the Great (fourth century) and St. Ignatius (sixteenth century). Each has a passage about Christ the King and his call to men and women to follow him, but note the different images for describing where Christ is and the practical consequences for discipleship. For Basil: "Where is Christ the King? In heaven, to be sure. Thither it behooves you, soldier of Christ, to direct your course. Forget all earthly delights.''23 Ignatius, however, perceived the world as friendlier potential for the self's encounter with God: "Consider Christ our Lord, standing in a lowly place in a great plain about the region of Jerusalem . ,,2, And instead of forgetting the world in order to go to Christ in heaven, Ignatius See note 28 below. Basil, "An Introduction to the Ascetical Life," From St. Basic, Ascetical Works, TheFathers of The Church vol. 9, translated by Sister M. Monica Wagner, C.S.C. (New York, 1950), p. 9. Spiritual Exercises, #144. ¯ Study of Spirituafity / 13 encourages people to follow a Christ who "sends them throughout the whole world to spread his sacred doctrine among all men, no matter what their state or condition.''25 We can do similar comparisons for time. "'When will Christ come?" For St. Paul and the early Christians the answer was, "Soon!" But for most of the Church's history until recently, the question of time hasn't been that impor-tant. Most Christians tended to regard the world as having a certain timeless stability. The important time was not Christ's coming in glory but the individ-ual's meeting with Christ at death. Today, however, an evolutionary con-sciousness has made time very important. When will Christ come for someone imbued with the vision of Teilhard de Chardin? He will come when the human race, now responsible for cooperating in its own evolution, will have (with God's grace) brought about the kingdom. Statements about time and place are not theological statements; they are descriptions of world views. The location of a spirituality within its particular cosmological framework makes possible the comparison and contrast of similar expressions which come from widely different historical-cultural con-texts. It would be far beyond the scope of this article to attempt to outline the world views which have shaped and been shaped by western thought, but it is worth mentioning here two books which are particularly insightful: Romano Guardini's The End of the Modern World and John Dunne's A Search for God in Time andMemory.~6 Guardini has mapped out four cosmologies fun-damental to the history of western thought: classical, medieval, modern, and post-modern. If we take into account that much has occurred which might further clarify his analysis of the present (post-modern) period, this work is very useful. Dunne has given the study of world views an interesting refine-ment by pointing to the different~ ways in which autobiographies have been written: a story of deeds (classical), a gamut of experience (Augustine), a lad-der of experience (medieval), and a story of appropriation (modern and con-temporary). This does not do justice to the nuances given by Dunne, but the distinctions he introduces are invaluable for appreciating the genres under which spiritual growth has been described. A second principle for comparison and contrast is that there exist specifi-cally different, yet equally valid, spiritualities within the Church. In other words, spiritualities differ not only because of various historical-cultural backgrounds, but they also differ according to type. Of course, a rigid and exclusive classification would be impossible and undesirable, but the varied emphases of many spiritualities suggest that we might discover several models which would help us to better understand similarities and differences. ~ lbid, #145. 2~ John Dunne, A Search for God in Time and Memory (Macmillian, 1967). Romano Guardini, The End of the Modern World, edited with an introduction by Frederick D. Wilhelmsen, translated by Joseph Theman and Herbert Burke (Sheed and Ward, 1956). "14 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 To develop models it Js necessary to select criteria for differentiation. This selection, always arbitrary, establishes the parameters by which the models are distinguished. Here the criteria will be "attitudes" toward two potential loci for expressions of the authentic: the world--including human society and institution--and history--especially change and conversion. We can deter-mine the models by asking this question: does a spirituality view the world and/or history as a positive locus for expressions of the authentic?2' If a spirituality is not positive toward either we will call it apophatic; if it is positive toward both we will call it apostolic; if it is positive toward the world but not toward history we will call it city-ofrGod; and if it is positive toward history but not toward the world we will call it prophetic. At one extreme, answering "no" to both the world and to history, are the apophatic'8 spiritualities. These are the mystical spiritualities known to us today primarily through the Cloud of Unknowing, John of the Cross, and Thomas Merton. For an apophatic spirituality, the chief expression of the authentic is negation of the specific image: one goes toGod through unknow-ing or through darkness. It should be stressed, however, that the apophatic spiritualities do not necessarily hold that the world is evil or that history is meaningless; one need only think of the concern and involvement of Thomas Merton. The apophatic spiritualities emphasize a wisdom of contemplation through negation, and the goal of that contemplation is the love and knowledge of God. A curiosity of apophatic prayer is that its central insight-negation- should never be practiced by a beginner. Both the Cloud and John of the Cross counsel that apophatic prayer is not for everyone, that beginners should definitely rely on the media.ting image, and that there are signs by which one can know if he or she is called to this form of prayer.'9 At the other extreme, answering "yes" to both world and history, are the apostolic spiritualities. An apostolic spirituality views the world and history as a locus for self-transformation, Its expressions can vary greatly. Ignatius was concerned with "the defense and propagation of the faith and the progress of souls.''3° For Ignatius holiness was found through an involvement with the 27 The idea for this came to me from reading John Macquarrie, Christian Hope (Seabury, 1978). In a s~ction called, "A Typology of Interpretations" (pp.86-88), Macquarrie works out four types of Christian hope: individual vs. social, this-worldly vs. other-worldly expectations, evolutionary vs. revolutionary, and realized vs. future. 2a Apophatic: in speaking of God one can either affirm certain truths (kataphatic theology) or, realizing that God is beyond any conceptualization, one can speak o'f him by negation (apophatic theology). The apophatic mystics are those whose way the the way of unknowing. This can be found to a high degree in many mystical writers, and the chief source for ~their apophatic vocabulary is the work of a mysterious Syrian monk of the t:ifth or sixth century who has been known through the ages as Dionysius the Areopagite or pseudo-Dionysius. 29 Cloud of Unknowing, c. 75. John of the Cross~ Ascent of Mount Carmel, translated, edited, and introduced by E. Allison Peers (Image, 1958) Book I1, c. xiii, pp. 219-223. ~0 Ignatius Loyola, The Formula of the Institute, as contained in the papal bull, Exposcit debitum Study of Spirituality world in an attempt to spread the kingdom. Ignatius' successor, Father Pedro Arrupe, wants "the conversion of the individual" but he also wants to "transform the world into a fit habitation for justice and humanity.''3' It is important to distinguish apostolic work from apostolic spirituality as that model is being described here. Everyone is called in some way to the apostolate, but not everyone seeks God primarily through involvement with the world and the transformation of its history. When a particular spirituality adopts the vocabulary of involvement and transformation in its expressions of the authentic and the inauthentic and in its statement of wisdom, then it exem-plifies the essential marks of the apostolic model. A city-of-Godspirituality, saying "yes" to the world and "no" to history, is characterized by the location of expressions of the authentic in one special place in the world to the exclusion of others. This place, which then becomes a reflection of the kingdom of God, could be a monastery, the home, or even the individual human heart. St. Benedict summarized his wisdom in the form of a Rule: how to live the kingdom together in the monastery. The Imitation of Christ counsels flight to the safety of our own hearts where "you will see the kingdom of God come into your soul.''32 A city-of-God spirituality has probably been the norm for most Christians throughout history, and it is also a characteristic of every other type of spirituality, even if not the primary one. Whenever we focus on a particular community or on our own heart we are highlighting the city-of-God dimension of our spiritual lives, The prophetic spirituality finds expressions of the authentic in .history but not in the world. The Old Testament prophet offered interpretations of history as well as judgments. The radical poverty of St. Francis of Assisi was a judgment of the abuse of material wealth and it was a sign of hope in a God who would fulfill all promises. Prophetic spirituality is often characterized.by living one or more of the gospel values to an extreme: Francis and poverty, the virgins and ascetics living a life of celibacy while awaiting martyrdom in the early Church, or the gospel-motivated civil disobedience in our own times. While prophetic spirituality often contains the dimension of a "challenge" it certainly need not be a gloomy spirituality--as witnessed by the joy of St. Francis. Once again, we must not adhere to these models too rigorously. The ex-amples given above illustrated the tendencies of their respective models to a marked degree; but most spiritualities, includ!ng those mentioned, are mix-of July 21, 1550. Translation from Th~ Constitutions of the Society of Jesus, translated and edited by George Ganss (Institute of Jesuit Sources, 1970), p. 66. ~ Pedro Arrupe, "The Challenge of the World and the Mission of the Society," opening address to the Thirty-Second General Congregation of the Society of Jesus. Published in .4 Planet to Heal translated with notes by John Harriott (Ignatian Center of Spirituality, Rome, 1975), p. 312. ~ Imitation of Christ, Book 11, c. 1. 16 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 tures of all four, with perhaps one or more predominating. With this caution. in mind we could make use of the models to organize and clarify the dif-ferences and similarities we observe among the various spiritualities. For ex-ample, both Ignatius of Loyola and John of the Cross were sixteenth-century Spanish saints who shared the same geography and culture. The spiritualities of both these men are familiar enough to us that we would not be surprised to find a number of significant differences in spite of similar backgrounds. We know that consolation is an important part of the spirituality of Ignatius: it is an expression of the authentic, something to be sought in prayer. For John of the Cross, on the other hand, consolation in prayer was often a sign of the in-authentic: the contemplative advancing in prayer should neither seek consola-tion nor trust it when it came.~3 This apparent contradiction is resolved when we remember that we are dealing with two very different models of spiritual-ity. John, the apophatic mystic who shuns specific images so as to approach God in the "night," is consistent within his model when he rejects consola-tions. Ignatius, the apostolic man who finds God in the world through specific choices, is consistent in asking to have these choices confirmed through con-solation. Apophatic and apostolic are different paths of spiritual growth. Towards Evaluation Ultimately evaluation is the responsibility of the Church, and over the cen-turies she has generally given a wide latitude to the expressions claiming to be of the Spirit. As long as a spirituality refrained from making its charism nor-mative for all Christians, maintained a balanced view of theology and human nature, and did not habitually defy the directions of the hierarchy, the Church has been at least tolerant if not actively supportive. Ronaid Knox has catalogued a number of exotic spiritual movements beginning with the Corin-thian community, and his very thorough work is an encyclopedia of spiritual aberrations together with the appropriate judgment of the Church.3' Negative criteria are much easier to establish than positive, and the records of the Holy Office detail specific distortions to be avoided rather than positive principles on which to build. But, then, most great spiritual leaders did not consult the Vatican archives in order to construct a charism; they responded to the work of the Spirit and left the editing to others. Nonetheless~ it is possible to point out three indicators of a good spirituality: good theology, good sense, and good results. Good spirituality must flow out of the Christian communi-ty's understanding of the gospel and hence must exhibit good theology. Spirituality is a human movement, and so good spirituality should reflect a keen sensitivity to the human condition--good sense. Finally, a good spirituality will produce good results because it will be the work of the Holy Spirit-- "Whoever remains in me, with me in him, bears fruit in plenty" (Jn 15:5). John of the Cross, Ascent of Mount Carmel, Book II, cc. 4, 7. Ronald Knox, Enthusiasm (Oxford University Press, 1961). Study of Spirituality / 17 Good theology and good sense are not abstract principles which can be ap-plied unerringly to any new situation. In most cases they are the culmination of a long process of give and take between the Church and the proponents of a new spirituality. On the one side there must be an increasingly sympathetic understanding of the expressions of the new spirituality; on the other, there must be a growing clarification of the meanings of those expressions. Let us take St. Francis of Assisi and the Franciscans as an example. The cry for the vita apostolica--a return to the life of the gospels in penance, poverty, and preaching--did not appear suddenly in 1206 when Francis over-came his fear of leprosy. The twelfth century had already witnessed a large nu.mber of spiritual movements toward the vita apostolica, and many of these movements were in tension with the Church. A change in the socio-economic climate, the abuses of wealth especially among the clergy, and the Church's own reforms of the eleventh century had brought about a hunger for new ways of expressing the spiritual aspirations of those who did not feel called to the cloistered life of the monastery. The Cathars,3~ the Humiliati,~6 and the Waldensians~' were some of the better known movements which answered to this hunger. Almost inevitably there was resistance from the official Church. If we leave aside misunderstandings and personal animosities, this resistance was usually on theological and pastoral grounds. Theologically, the new movements presented opinions ranging from the outright dualism of the Cathars tothe denial of the validity of a sacrament administered by a corrupt priest. Such theological opinions, which touched the sacramental nature of the Church, could not be tolerated. Pastorally, the issue was normally over the right to preach. Did a person who took the gospel seriously and lived poorly have the right to preach without the permission of the local clergy or bishops? Both the Waldensians and the Humiliati approached Rome for approval but were rebuffed on the question of preaching. No one denied the need for greater poverty, and the pope himself called ~' The Cathars, also known as Albigensians, were especially active in southern France from the middle of the twelfth century. They were virtually a distinct religion with their own organization of dioceses. Theologically they were influenced by the Bogomils of Bulgaria whose theology can be traced back to a Manichean dualism. ~6 The Waldensians were an evangelical movement founded by Valdes, a merchant from Lyons~ They attempted to remain orthodox but were forbidden to preach at the time of the Third Lateran Council (I 179). ~' The Humiliati appeared in northern Italy during the second part of the twelfth century. They were forbidden to preach in 1179 but were eventually reconciled to the Church by Innocent III in 1201. He gave them a threefold rule which regulated the men as canons regular, the women as religious, and a group of married people as a type of third order. For an interesting treatment of the dealings of Innocent Ill with the Humiliati see Brenda Bolton, "Innocent lll's Treatment of the Humiliati", from Popular Belief and Practice, edited by G.J. Cuming and Derek Baker (Cambridge University Press, 1972). 18 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 the bishops and clergy to task for their failure to preach the gospel;38 it was a c/uestion of finding the right form. What took place in the twelfth century was a twofold development whereby the new expressions of spirituality were being clarified against the theological-pastoral demands of the Church; and the Church was learning to listen with more sympathy to the different spiritual needs of her people. By the end of the century the time was ripe for Francis and Dominic. Of course, the phenomenon of St. Francis was not just the inevitable out-come of an historical development. It was also the special work of God's grace in a man who was both generous enough to respond to the call for a life of radical poverty and humble enough to listen to the voice of the Church. Nonetheless, that long century of development points to the kind of prepara-tion and hard work out of which true spiritual insight is born. Nor did Innocent lII's approval of Francis in 1209 complete the process. As numbers increased problems did also. Good sense and a sound understanding of human nature called for certain modifications. More structure and organiza-tion were needed which could channel the charism without destroying it. Pro-vinces were established, local houses and superiors appointed and a year's novitiate was required.39 If we shift back into our own century we realize that the Church is con-stantly faced with new expressions of spirituality arising from the legitimate aspirations of a people hungering for God. These new movements need ~to be examined in the light of good theology and good sense, and they need to receive the sympathetic understanding of the Church. A serious study of spirituality can make a genuine contribution to this endeavor. First of all, a new spirituality needs to identify, and then clarify its expres-sions. This is the work of analysis described earlier. What are the expressions of the authentic and the inauthentic and the forms which organize them? What is its wisdom? Only after these questions are carefully answered does theological evaluation become possible. When we know the expressions of the spirituality and their relationship to one another, then we know its theological stance and we can judge it. The analysis will also reveal the spirituality's perspective on human nature, its understanding of the human condition. While great care must be exercised here, it would violate good sense to have a ,8 In his treatment of the twelfth century, M.-D. Chenu wrote: "Peter the Chanter had denounced the 'most dreadful silence' (pessima taciturnitas) of the clergy, and both Peter and Innocent Ill had invoked a phrase from Isaiah (56:10) to repudiate "these muted dogs who don't have it in them to bark," M.-D. Chenu, Nature, Man, and Society in the Twelfth Century." Essays on New Theological Perspectives in the Latin West, selected, edited, and translated by Jerome Taylor and Lester L. Little. preface by I~tienne Gilson. (University of Chicago Press, 1968), p. 244. ~9 For a discussion of these developments, see Cajetan Esser, Origins of the Franciscan Order, translated by Aedan Daly, O.F.M: and Dr. lrina Lynch (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1970); see especially Chapter Ill: "First Crises and Attempts to Overcome Them." Study of Spirituality / 19 spirituality which proved to be psychologically destructive. It has unfor-tunately happened in the history of spirituality that "leaving the world" has become an occasion for hatred and destruction of the self or the body rather than a love for God?° Finally, analysis of a new spirituality will reveal its in-ternal coherence or lack thereof. This is important because personal growth demands a certain degree of unity of purpose and technique, and a spirituality which seems to move in many different directions at the same time will only provoke confusion and frustration. While this may appear to be obvious, it is not always so easy to recognize. For example, a spirituality expressed entirely in a nineteenth-century idiom might exhibit good theology and good psychology, but unless it is able to translate itself coherently into the language and forms of the twentieth century there will always be an unnecessary tension from trying to operate in a world view, a cosmology, which is no longer our own. This was one of the reasons for Vatican II's call for adaptation in religious life. In addition, a new spirituality needs to be understood externally, and this is the work of comparison and contrast. From the Church's standpoint, evaluation will be enhanced wfien a spirituality is known in relation to other spiritualities both past and present. This much goes without saying~ But such an external understanding'can also be quite useful for the spirituality itself. One of the habitual dangers for a new movement is to see itself as being unique in respo ~nding to the call of the gospels. Time and time again this has resulted in sectarianism and heresy. When a spirituality understands itself in the con-text of.history it will be better able to appreciate its uniqueness without overestimating its importance. 40 An extreme example of this might be found in the Cathars who practiced (though rarelY,) a form of suicide by starvation called endura. This occurred only after the reception of the consolamen-turn which was a conbination of baptism and Eucharist. Once the believer received the con'- solarnentum he or she was to live without any sin whatsoever. It was in fear of a relapse that some chose to end their lives as soon after consolsmentum as possible. The Treasurer As Professional Paschal Phillips, O.C.S.O. Father Phillips is a member of the monastery of Our Lady of Guadalupe Trappist Abbey; Lafayette, OR 97127. Ulnder the bland title of this article lurks a contentious thesis. I hope to demonstrate that the function of the provincial treasurer is a specialized, pro-fessional calling, importantly distinct from related professions such as accounting or management, but every bit as clearly definable and of crucial importance to religious communities. The practical issue of all this appears in the damage done through failure to recognize or effectively utilize this unique function, and the concomitant misjudgments concerning training, qualification, and role recognition. Problems of Definition At the outset, the multiplicity of terms presents a hurdle with symbolic overtones. Titles such as "procurator" "econome" "cellarer" "fiscus" and "minister" vie with more commonplace old standbys like "treasurer" and "business manager" in vague but roughly interchangeable usage. The fact that such nebulous nomenclature has continued points to a lack of reflection on the common nature of the office underlying the multiple titles. Admittedly the office, which we shall for simplicity's sake henceforth call "treasurer," does admit of multiple definitions, since it changes not only from congregation to congregation, but, even more radically, with the person-alities of the incumbent and of the major superior served by the incumbent. In fact, it is usually easier to note major differences in the function which ensue from each provincial election than it is to discover a consistent pattern of divergence between the "economes" of congregation X and the "proc-urators" of congregation Y. 2O The Treasurer as Professional / 21 Besides, any congregation is free to define the duties of its various officers without having to make special reference to neat patterns convenient to the writers of magazine articles. It might follow that analyzing the functions of a treasurer is spreading nets to catch the wind, and that the function--if indeed there is a function at all--is characterized mostly by its lack of fixed form, for its utility lies largely in adapting to present circumstances and local custom. This is certainly true so far as peripheral duties such as bookkeeping go. But, under all the pluralism, a hard core of significance remains that may reward further reflection. The Core Function We live in a world of professionalism. Our first thought, in any need, is to call in a specialist. But routine can create problems. We are so used to calling in an "ologist,"'or training a member of the community to become one (which amounts to the same thing) that we hardly notice, much less reflect upon, the rather delicate set of questions that ought to proceed the call: Do we need help? Is this area important? Wti6m shall we consult? How Will the answers we get be conveyed to the community and its superiors? How will they be adapted to our needs? And how will we know that the answers have been accurately grasped, and emotionally accepted? The core-function of the provincial treasurer appears to be discovered through asking questions such as those, and providing some approaches to the answers. The function might be defined as liaison between the religious pur-pose of the community, and "the world" as organizational (business, legal, financial aspects). An example may clarify. Take the question of accounting: in many a congregation, any sentence which connects the words "treasurer" and "professional" automatically elicits the image of technical accountant. After all, the thinking goes, do we not carefully train teachers and cooks, pro-vincials and novice masters? So send the treasurer off to the university, and turn him or her into a C.P.A.! But there's the rub! We may have trained a C.P.A. who can perform a useful function-- but we have not trained a treasurer. This is not to deny that technical accounting abilities are one of the building blocks, but it does sug-gest that one building block does not make a whole structure. Reconstruct the scene from, that unfamiliar vantage point which defines the treasurer as the person who provides the liaison between the religious com-munity as religious and "the world" as organization. Obviously, accounting expertise is essential to understand and analyze much of what the organiza-tional world has to say to the religious, as it is also essential to translate some of the organizational and support problems of the community into a concise form that can be understood by speakers of "business-ese." But to stop at that point sets the stage for a familiar scenario: a treasurer who conceives his entire function to be that of expert in accounting (and he exists in a milieu where the tacit assumptions all reenforce this point of view), produces ever 22 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 more sophisticated and technically accurate quarterly reports, and submits them in all their complexity to a superior and council whose ability to under-stand them is no more sophisticated than it ever was. In practice the community ends with some poorly conceived mixture of ad hoc remedies. For example, the superior himself burns the midnight oil, hoping to assimilate the skills which enable business executives to glean their impressive insights from such corporate accounts. What has happened is that the already overburdened superior has taken on what is actually the core role of the treasurer. He is attempting to interpret to himself what the business world is saying, and the results are not always happy. The major superior has no time, really, to handle this added, and usually unwelcome chore. Neither does the training nor the personality traits which qualify a good religious superior easily blend well with the demands of business administration. Fur-ther, the superior is there~by subtly insulated from one key source of counsel, and this in an ominous way, since the change is scarcely noticed. Another common reaction of sophisticated reporting to .an unsophisti-cated audience is one of bland beffiddlement. An increasing percentage of council and community simply announce that they have no time for that sort of thing. They are sure that"such i~pressive figures must mean something, and "it is so comforting to realize that we can depend on such a skilled and dedicated treasurer." This remedy: so called, operates in the reverse of the one before. Now it is the treasurer who is isolated from needed feedback and in-telligent questioning, and the treasurer slowly begins to make decisions (or, more commonly, subconsciously to set things up so that only one decision can be made) which should have involved the superior's informed judgment from the start. The misunderstandings and confusions which result, and which so often are blamed on instincts for power or on exaggerated professionalism, are at root only the natural concomitants of poor role-definition. The above examples are painted in bold strokes. In practice any trained treasurer makes a more or less intelligent effort to translate the economic trends revealed by the analysis of the community books and by a general familiarity with the business cycle (changes of interest rates, increasing cost of government, red tape, inflation), and in those cases where this function is handled with skill and sensitivity, there is no doubt that the treasurer's office is being well served by its present incumbent. However, the main point is precisely that a function so delicate and so important should not be performed in a fit of absentmindedness. Few realize that there is the exact point where unreflective instincts, presenting a hastily conceived adaptation of the secular counterpart found in stockholders reports, as unverified assumption that "they" got the message, in short, amateurism, can effectively negate the benefits arising from professional accounting, skilled business analysis, and all the rest. The Treasurer as Professional / 23 Title and Function It should be apparent that one of our problems stems from the very title "treasurer," with its built-in connotation of "bookkeeper." Things are slightly better in more ancient Orders where the person filling this liaison role is called by some more generic title such as "procurator," but the basic prob-lem of role-definition usually remains unexamined. It is entirely possible that the "core function" we have been elaborating could be performed by someone other than the titular treasurer. Indeed, one of the problems is precisely that such is often the case, that, for lack of reflec-tion on the situation, this crucial liaison function is poorly performed by per-sons who scarcely realize they are even involved in such a role. Take, for example, these instances where some dedicated lay person now holds the office of provincial treasurer. There can be no question of these indi-viduals' technical skills, but, on the other hand, there can be little chance that they could ever deal with the community on the deep level of two-way com-munication that is needed to perform this liaison function. Yet someone must be performing that function--however imperfectly--or else the community would be left on the legendary "Cloud 9," a not unknown circumstance, sad to relate. Whoever that "someone" is, he or she is the de facto treasurer, while the holder of the titular office doubtless remains, skilled in his other profes-sion which is valid in itself but different in scope. Still, the very essence of the liaison function does d~mand an alert, in-formed, and up-to-date acquaintance with modern business and government trends. It is doubtful that any community officer except the treasurer would have the time, or even the inclination, to remain permanently qualified for the role. So if the titular treasurer is not the one functioning in the liaison role, our foregone conclusion is that sooner or later the function will be indifferently served. The essential connection between membership in the religious community and the liaison function is illumined more by practice than theory. At the risk of running one example to death we return to the quarterly accounting report. If the treasurer saw liaison as his or her primary function, the first question would still be "where can I hire a skilled .accounting technician to generate thoroughly reliable and professional figures?" Even the second question might be equally unsurprising: "Have I assured myself that I have the technical expertise to evaluate, accurately and professionally, the implications of the figures so presented?" (Already the field has broadened: the evaluation would, of necessity, include factors not strictly within the purview of an ac-countant.) It is the next step which becomes more demanding. "Exactly who are the real power-people and opinion-molders in the congregation, ~:egardless of title? And which items in this mass of data are the ones they need in order to make the decisions pertinent to th'eir role?" And, "Considering the individual personality, background training, and press of duties experienced by each such individual, what is the most effective way to present this data to him or 94 / Review for Religious, I/olume 40, 1981/1 her?" (These questions can lead to the elaboration of some very unorthodox but extremely effective financial reports!) /. It is a rare treasurer who sees the answer to the last two questions as so cen-tral as to demand more skill, more time, more thought and, if available, more training than the elaboration of the figures themselves. It is a rare community which would not be enriched and facilitated if the treasurer did just that. But it also seems next to impossible that any outsider, no matter how sagacious or trusted, could really have the indispensable in-depth understanding of the per-sonality limitations, the real power distribution (as distinguished from a table of organization), and the sundry lapses in hearing skills which form the living matrix of intramural communications. Perhaps fortunately, the liaison function is not usually looked upon as at-tached to the highest echelons of power. Yet, it is all too easy for casual observers, who already have the treasurer pigeonholed in a relatively trivial technician's role, to see any such outreach into the one indispensable function as an intrusion on the role of the superior. Such a reaction, though, is more concerned with shadow than substance: the very essence of the liaison function is to assist, not supplant, the superior in making informed decisions, and to assist, not supplant, the community in understanding the options open to them. Areas of Practical Concern The many excellent circulars on taxes, social security and related subjects coming from the offices of CMSM and LCWR provide opportunity for a quick, but necessarily very rough, check-up. These documents certainly sug-gest impending changes in life-style, deteriorating legal immunities, new norms of economic security and other important long-term adjustments of our community lives. Are these coming changes being considered in advance in every community? Do the CMSM circulars filter down at all? If not, perhaps the liaison function could improve to fill the void. Before noting more current problems, a somewhat dated example might provide historical insight. Between Leo XIII and circa 1970 there was a grow-ing rift between the papal social encyclicals and the employment policies of certain Catholic institutions. Areas of tension have run all the way from the areas of unionization through wages, pensions, and fringe benefits, to on-the-job working conditions. The business world of the United States had somehow tended to come more into line with the encyclicals than religious! Fortunately, this is largely water under the bridge; the majority of Catholic religious orders have recently shown an informed awareness of the problems of Christian employment, even in cases where lack of funds has made it very difficult to know how to respond. But it did take a long time, in some cases a scandalously long time. And the evident surprise which has overtaken more than one provincial administration when the "dear, dedicated lay-teachers" or the "sweet smiling nurses" hit the picket lines, would argue some degree of The Treasurer as Professional / 25 failure in their early-warning system. It is hard to imagine that the fumbling, uncertain--sometimes obscurant-ist- labor relations poli~ie~ ~l:iich charaCteriZed churchly institutions before 1970 would not have been improved if there had been in each congregation one person who was consciously aware of his or her duty to become fully in-formed concerning these trends, and to communicate them to a congregation which was itself aware of having appointed him to such a post-- and respected his function. In short, if each community had possessed a treasurer who was expected to perform the core-function of that office, and trained t.o do it, and if each such treasurer had been left enough time from routine mechanical ac-counting chores to function thus, the whole tale would have been quite dif-ferent. In the absence of that function filled, too often surprise and misinfor-mation proved a poor substitute for expertise at the bargaining table, and in the delicate reestablishment of truly Christian relationships afterward. Even though the labor relations example can be classified as historical in most communities (not all!), it still cannot be written off. For example, the presence of Douglas Frazier of the United Auto Workers on the Chrysler Cor-poration Board of Directors is no doubt just the tip of a large iceberg. Already in Europe workers' representatives on the top levels of management are a commonplace. Is anyone looking up from the accounting books long enough to start formulating a response, or thinking out alternatives, or evaluating present practices, or otherwise preparing for the day when the staff at Hospital A and High School B will be demanding board representation-- per-haps on the management level of the parent religious community itself? Insurance programs reveal another type of need. Too often "profes-sionalism" in the treasurer has been equivalated to the qualification requisite in some other profession simply because no one has noted that the liaison function is a separate profession in itself. We have already noted how this tends, in the accounting function, simply to distance the treasurer from the needs of the community superiors who are not businessmen and therefore can-not be reasonably expected to get maximum benefit from financial anal~,sis designed for business executives. In the related questions of insurance coverage, the problem takes a slightly different twist, although profes-sionalism (again the wrong profession!) here also ends up searching for the solutions that are most effective in the business world. In practice, we end by asking "How can we most expeditiously fit our community into insurance programs written for secular concerns?" The results are often ingenious and admirable examples of the professionalism of the insurance industry. But if someone in the communitY were professionally alert to the peculiar nature of a religious organization as such, he might well end up asking, "What are tl~e unique needs of this community, regardless of what fits the secular organization?" The answer may be quite surprising, and almost always results in unexpected savings and administrative simplification. Fortunately, the question is being asked more and more, and, as a result, some 26 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 specialized insurance policies are being written from the ground up to fit the unique needs of Catholic religious orders. But it should have happened sooner, and the questions should have been asked in many more quarters. Even today too many religious are paying insurance premiums for maternity benefits! The center-stage projects of the hour are probably energy conservation and socio-political activism via proxy voting and the like. Both problem areas carry implications of long-term and profound changes in community life-style. Both, too, are typical in their relations to the treasurer as professional. The current pattern of response is often enough characterized by aimless drift, unplanned, sporadic action, or responses evidently dominated by oen-thusiasts in the community who may or may not have a grasp of the long-run legal and economic implications. Since these areas do have overtones which are none of the treasurer's pro-fessional concern (although hopefully he or she will be deeply concerned as a committed Christian and religious), it follows that the treasurer should not be trying to direct the basic policy decisions in these affairs. But the complexity and multiple legal interlockings involved also suggest that someone--some one-- in each community has to be in a position to study the question from an overall point of view, and to do so with a trained expertise. Some individual must eventually take responsibility for gathering all available information and casting it ina form that alerts both officers and community to the implications for life-style, future economic security, hazards to legal immunities, and all the rest. Further, whereas ad hoc studies can be commendable, some one has gotto stick to the job and follow through, lest the community of 1985 be still acting on the circumstances of 1975. Both by a process of elimination and by logic, this important and irreplaceable function sooner or later (probably sooner) comes home to roost in the treasurer's office, If the incumbent is viewed as a mere technician who handles the computer printout, the community response will, in all probabil-ity," follow the too familiar pattern of muddling through very deep muddles. The rapid erosion of those tax exemptions which form.the practical economic basis of most religious communities provides another field of con-cern for the treasurer as professional liaison officer. Few communities have ever even done any daydreaming, much less planning, about the impact of various all,too-probable changes in the. tax laws. The tendency is to cling mutely and hopefully to the leaky ship. Thisis a wise procedure so faras day-to- day operations are concerned. But some one somewhere in the community should be monitoring, injecting caution into long-range plans, alerting superiors and community to the dangerous side effects of this or that policy, and noting, at least in passing, such unexamined drifts as the slow tendency of both tax courts and local officials to forget the tacit but once universal assumption that religious communities are families (for example: the recent The Treasurer as Professional / 27 tendency to raise zoning problems about sisters living together in a convent situated in a zone for single families; the erosion of the rights of superiors to make decisions for dying, unconscious, or elderly confused members of the community; difficulties with state officials who insist on nursing-home regulations instead of family rules for convents caring for a few elderly sisters, and so on. It is all of a pattern: we are being redefined as "strangers" -- and no one seems to notice). Unfortunately, the personality who gets maximum satisfaction out of the tidy details of bookkeeping is only rarely the same as the one who can perceive social or economic change from afar off. The rare exceptions are indeed pearls of great price. But the core-function is impossible, even for the pearls, if the only training they receive and the only role expectation they encounter are directed exclusively toward the routine of day-to-day administration. Conclusion In the twelfth chapter of Romans, St. Paul surprisingly lists "administra-tion" among the gifts of the Spirit. Indeed, he lists it just after prophecy and before teaching, preaching and almsgiving. It would be ridiculous to apply his thought literally to any specific church functionary, treasurers included--no doubt he had wider nets to spread. But Paul does thereby warn us not to trivialize the administrative functions in the Church into routine mechanics and technological computer-feeding. Faith, judgment, and spiritual insight are necessary, and the community which restricts its gifts of time, training, and trust to major superiors, novice masters, and theology faculties may be quenching the Spirit in a vital area of action. Reflection on the real core-function of the treasurer may lead in most cases not only to a deeper appreciation, of that office, but t9 some understanding of the damnable frustrations connected thereto. Hopefully such reflection could also lead to a major review of the qualifications for the office, along with adjustments in the organizational and psychological matrix which is required for its effective fulfillment. Admittedly there is no place where anyone can go for training in this most delicate function (the author is hatching a plot in this regard!), but probably such training is little needed at least at first. The first Step is to identify who, if anyone, performs the liaison function in the community and then to recognize that function as needed, legitimate, and welcome. Much else will follow naturally. The Eucharist, Priesthood, and Renewal Neil J. Draves-A rpaia Father Draves-Arpaia is a priest attached to Our Lady of Perpetual Help parish. The mailing address is: P.O. Box 160; Scottsdale, AZ 85252. Priesthood is not intrinsically linked to celebration. It is first, and ultimate-ly, united with self-giving, and therefore, sacrifice. And since the sacrifice of-fered by Christians at Eucharist is the victory of Christ which has brought us salvation, it is impossible, once we have grasped the depth of meaning and the redemptive grace of the eucharistic sacrifice, to be any other way than "celebrative." Those who would reduce the Mass to sober ritual, executed with rubrical precision and stone-faced devotion, or those who would see it as a moment for "religious merriment" have moved awfiy, in either direction, from the core mystery that the eucharistic celebration is. For me, the amuse-ment of one group and the solemn piety of the other are both suspect, and neither adequately speak or witness to priesthood to being a priestlypeople. What then might we look for? 1 believe it is necessary to move away from speaking on the Mass for a moment and concentrate on the daily life of God's people. Self-giving, self-forgetting love, sacrifice (whichever term we use) once placed within Christianity must be evaluated in light of the Cross. The eucharistic sacrifice then has "cruciform" implications, and we must look to a cross section of responses and attitudes that come forth from God's people in Christ. Priesthood is a visible sign in our midst of the reality of sacrifice, specifically in the life of a person who is priest, and in the believing communi-ty that would be priestly. Both must express in clear terms and behavior that something two-fold is happening in their lives: that, first, their personal rela-tionship with God is solid and radically oriented towards incarnating the first 28 The Eucharist, Priesthood, and Renewal and greatest commandment, and, then, that their human relationships are more than superficial and nice, but solid, radically oriented towards incar-nating the second and greatest commandment. How might we begin to make evaluation of these? I'm convinced that the priesthood of the faithful and the ministerial priesthood must look to the life of prayer, be it expressed in formal, informal, public or private prayer-styles. There we must begin to ask if, when we go before the Lord, we are truly inter-ceding on behalf of one another. This will give us an indication of how much and to what degree we are in touch with human life and the genuine human needs of those around us. If we cannot bring ourselves to intercede, then we cannot fulfill our principle role as priests or as a priestly people. This is especially significant to the role of the priest-president at the eucharistic sacrifice, for without a continuous sense of intercession in the daily life of the priest, the eucharistic prayer will be formula-oriented and not at all like the priestly prayer of Jesus, who went to the Father on behalf of the people. Next, we must look, priests particularly, to our horizontal prayer: our beseeching and inviting the people to come forward as instruments and missionaries of love. It might not always mean using words, nor may it require lengthy "shar-ing sessions." Priestly people and ordained priests need to know more about the fact that in any "priestly" experience, the action must speak louder than the words. The religious leaders of Jesus' day, from the picture we get from the Scriptures, had words that spoke more loudly than their actions. Jesus called his disciples to the converse: action over words, both in G~d-oriented matters (faith) and people-oriented matters (charity). It's also important to keep in mind that Jesus had the least to say when he was crucified. It was at that moment alone that his Gospel call to love hung totally on pure act. What can we conclude with regard to priesthood and its place within pres-ent renewal and the Eucharist? Liturgical renewal cannot have the impact it is meant to have if it is not preempted by a priesthood that speaks clearly on the issue of "self-giving." For the decade and a half since the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy was issued by the Council, the Church has heard stressed that "the liturgy is the summit toward which the activity of the Church is directed," and that the faithful should approach the sacred mysteries with the proper dispositions so as to cooperate with grace, for the liturgy to produce its full effect. If the Eucharist is the summit, what is the base of Christian activi-ty, if it is not self-giving? And what is the proper disposition with which we ap-proach the eucharistic celebration, if it is not a readiness and willingness to be of praise and thanksgiving, openness and intercession, primarily in attitude, secondarily in words? Priesthood, both ministerial and the priesthood of the faithful (but prin-cipally the ordained priesthood)in itself must begin to look more like the eucharistic sacrifice to the Father with the people of God assembled. It must show itself "in the flesh" to be a continuum between brokenness and wholeness, of movement from the confines of secular humanism and/or 30 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 religious elitism (clericalism, fundamentally among priests themselves and the structures in which they function) to a sharedness, not solely in matters of, priestly service to the Church, but in the basic issues of their lives, issues which are common to all lives. Priesthood, as an instrument of renewal and in its ef-fect upon the Eucharist, becomes an incarnational experience, for it takes the Word and makes it a Verbum Dei: fleshes it, clothes it, directs it towards the kingdom. The moment becomes a means for priesthood to have within it a holiness that is greater than that of the scribes and pharisees since it acts on rather than talks about the concrete issues which face the world today. So, at the base of Christian existence the priesthood is motivation for the Lord's people to join in sacrifice both at the table of the Lord and at the table which is the world. The nature of this life of self-giving requires unconditionally simple signs which speak to the people, like the signs of bread and wine. But signs of love in the daily life of the priest become obscured when humanness is over-taken by a rank-ism in the Church which, in turn, degenerates priesthood into a separate class aloof from the laity and ineffective in speaking about their life experience except in the most "lofty" sort of ways. As the liturgical renewal called for a stripping of secoridary elements which found their way into the eucharistic celebration over the centuries, the priesthood, too, if it is to be an aid in the deep renewal of the Church, must have itself stripped of non-essentials. Like the eucharistic sacrifice of the Roman Rite; priesthood must begin to face the people and become more accountable to them. It must have its distracti'ng bells quieted. Priests, one would hope, can more effectively speak the language of the people and must appreciate how much priesthood's unique gifts come from the people and must return to them. It must witness a praise of life by the priest's readiness to help the human condition in each per-son's struggle to become reconciled to God. Priesthood, to me, expresses its thanksgiving best when priests themselves show a humbleness (which active thanks implies) before God and people, plus an openness which allows for the person of the priest to be nurtured by the community he is calling into fullness. This call to intercession is a vehicle, not for doing some thing for others, but as a preparation, a prayer, to be with them. To pray on behalf of others re-quires that the priest be half of the person who is neighbor. This would mean that we move beyond any limited and debilitating spirituality which might suggest that God hears the prayers of priest over those of the laity. The truly intercessory prayer that is Christian is the one which seeks from God a "oneness" with the p,eople to whom the priest is sent, as did the prayer of Jesus, "that all may be one as you, Father, are in me, and I in you; I pray that they may be one in us." Intercessory prayer speaks of sacrifice, for it moves away from the tendency to badger God for things for ourselves and others, and, when made by a priest, requests that he, here and now, will become the response the Lord would make to those in need. It is occasion for furthering solidarity in the Body of Christ (person to person) and for furthering solidar-ity in the Body of Christ (person to person) and for allowing the Holy Spirit to The Eucharist, Priesthood, and Renewal use priesthood as sacrament (God to his people). When intercession is made by a priestly, people, they pray to be the response the Lord would make to the world's needs, and the Church then can be a "kind of sacrament of union and unity." In this way, personal needs, while neither denied nor overlooked, become secondary for the moment, and the needs of others become primary for the moment. Intercessory prayer does not give us the chance to be self-seeking, or to approach God with the long multiplication of words that would make prayer manipulative and evasive. It helps us to understand more precise-ly why Jesus r~jects this as authentic prayer and replaces it with a simple prayer of unity that begins, "Our Father in heaven." The prayer of the priest (or of a priestly people) allows for lives to blend, and there will be less cause for disparity in the p.riest's daily life and his ministry at Mass, for this sacrificial celebration at the "summit of the Church's activity" will be an authentic summation of what has been. Priesthood has everything to do with self-giving, and as it forces its way out of entrapments it becomes an event, an encounter with what is real. The same applies to the entire people of God in Christ. Events, or moments of self-giving, are times of celebration and joy for they are an exodus from slavery, from the death of isolation and self~centeredness. It is on this issue where renewal is most needed: moving people away from thinking in terms of what they "do" to how they position themselves towards God and neighbor, the way they choose to be. The vocation of priest and of the priestly people leaps away, so to speak, from cultic functions and attendance at such, to a covenant in the eucharistic sacrifice, because there have already been preliminary celebrations ofthis mutual, self-forgetting love among Christians wherever they meet between the times they gather at table in the grace and peace of God, our Father a'nd the Lord Jesus. Catherine of Siena and Raymond of Capua: A Friendship in Perspective Paul Conner, O.P. Father Conner teaches moral and spiritual theology at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley. His address is: St. Albert's Priory; 5890 Birch Court; Oakland, CA 94618. Catherine Benincasa's public life is more widely known than her personal life: during the six hundred years since her death, attention has been so drawn to her astonishing political impact on the Europe of her day that she is fre-quently called one of the most influential women of history. Within our own decade Catherine's enduring intellectual and spiritual authority has been heightened through her being declared one of the two women doctors of the Church. Little wonder, then, that the private life of this Sienese woman has escaped widespread notice, and yet in regard to human friendships, for instance, few life histories are as intriguing, both in scope and depth of development. I would like to focus attention in this article on the dominant human rela-tionship of her short life of 33 years, her friendship with Blessed Raymond of Capua. This relationship could be understood adequately on its own merits, but I find that it takes shape so much better within the immediate religious setting of Dominican life in which it was born and flourished. Looking to the Lord Jesus is indeed first; but after this, every religious family that seeks the essential features of its life must turn to its founder. Tempting as it might be, I do not claim that friendship is an essential feature of Dominican life, at least as friendship is ordinarily understood--though there are superb examples of it in the Dominican heritage, past and present. What is interesting though, is that Dominic did give the spirit of friendship to 32 Catherine of Siena and Raymond of Capua / 33 his followers, since his own life was so rich, even overflowing, in friendship, human and divine. A glance, then, at his life, together with what might be termed a theological consideration of Dominican friendship, will form a helpful con-text within which to view Catherine's and Raymond's unique friendship. St. Dominic In spite of popular misrepresentation of St. Dominic in later centuries as a stern, inquisitorial figure, conclusive, historical evidence shows him to be an exceptionally loving person. More than three hundred depositions for his canonization; his first biography written by his friend and successor, Jordan of Saxony; the Lives of the Brethren, collecting eyewitness accounts of the early years from all over the order, all tell of the many men and women in various walks of life who cherished friendships with him. Jordan speaks of Dominic's lifelong, radiant mixture of charm and reserve that attracted and held men's hearts. His best modern biographer in English, Bede Jarrett, puts it this way: "God's greatest gift to man in the order of nature, and almost the greatest even on the supernatural plane, is the gift of making and securing friends; and judged by this, Dominic was indeed blessed by God.'" The first brethren assure us that perhaps no one among them had a greater taste for fraternity than Dominic. He enjoyed friendships of varying degrees with his followers, and, like his Lord, chose from among them a "beloved disciple," John of Navarre. With the many communities of sisters that he founded, Dominic always maintained a personal bond, helping them in temporal but particularly spiritual needs, instructing them so that they absorbed his own spirit and dedication to truth. Besides 16aving us a descriptive portrait of Dominic, Blessed Cecilia kept a valuable record of his Roman ministry. She relates that during his visits to the sisters he either "exhorted them to greater spiritual ef-fort or merely sat among them, refreshing them with the charm of his conver-sation and sharing with them the experiences of the day.''2 The range of Dominic's friends outside the order was extensive. Legendary is his beautiful relationship with St. Francis. TheLives of the Brethren records that the two "became but one heart and one soul in God and enjoined their sons to foster this brotherly spirit until the end of time." Dominic befriended men and women converts; family members of people with whom he worked, such as the two daughters of Count Simon de Montfort; women recluses in Rome; bishops and cardinals--even popes. Gregory IX, in the bull of Dominic's canonization dated 1234, wrote that Domin'ic was ' Bede Jarrett, O.P., Life of St. Dominic (New York: Image Books, 1964), p. 122. 2 See M. H. Vicaire, O.P., Histoire de saint Dominique (Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1957), V. 11, pp. 278-279. 34 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 bound to us by ties of deep friendship, before we were raised to the pontificate; his life carried with it in our eyes certain proofs of heroic holiness . We are convinced, as also are our people, that through his prayers God may do us mercy, and that one who was our friend on earth will still in heaven hold us in no less ~ffection. Wherefore. we have determined to add his name to the number of the saints.~ The prominence of friendship in Dominic's life noticeably influenced his early followers. Numerous touching friendships among them are a matter of historical record: Jordan of Saxony and Henry of Cologne, Jordan and Diana d'Andalo, Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas, and the two Dominicans of particular interest to this article, Catherine of Siena and Raymond of Capua. Theological Atmosphere A certain theological atmosphere has surrounded and, I would say, condi-tioned the development of Dominican friendships throughout the history of the order. This is as it should be, since Dominican life, like Christian life, tends toward fullness of love--primarily with the I ndwelling Divine Persons, but secondarily with all men and women whom God loves. This Christian love, or charity, is the main indicator of vitality and growth in the life of grace. Thomas Aquinas was the first theologian to penetrate into the mystery of charity by way of human experience of authentic friendship, applying his understanding to God's love for us and our love for him.4 A distinctodynamic seems to have resulted, creating the theological atmos-phere to which I refer. Dominicans have looked first to faith for conviction about divine love and friendship with God and God's friends. They have then looked to their personal experience of human friendship with God. They have found, particularly in prayer, that their experience 6f divine friendship served as corrective, if need be, and certainly as goal for their human friendships. These two experiences, the human and divine, mutually illumined and en-riched the other, each according to its competency. I would hazard a guess that a practical result of this theological atmos-phere has been that individual Dominicans were richer or poorer in friend-ships with other Dominicans depending on the age in which they lived. Let me explain. In all ages genuine Dominicans are very discriminating about their friends, owing largely, I think, to this conditioning theological atmosphere. They tend not to let natural instincts for friendship predominate, unless each particular relationship can be harmonized with divine friendship. Authentic charity as their chosen goal must determine everything in their lives. Besides rarely find-ing people enough to their natural liking in the baffling assemblage the Lord calls together in religious communities, their faith and theological orientation ~ See M. H. Vicaire, O.P., Saint Dominique, La vie apostolique Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1965), p~ 90. ¯ See St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, lI-ll, q. 23, a. I. Catherine of Siena and Raymond of Capua / 35 yield such a high ideal that natural potential alone is not enough to satisfy them. But in ages when many members of a Dominican community or province or the worldwide order are deeply one in mind and heart about essential goals and ways of Dominican life, friendships abound, even without much founda-tion in natural similarities. Close bonds are formed on the basis of similarity of thought, love for and dedication to the highest, most valuable, and most permanent of realities. On the other hand, history indicates that Dominican friendships are rare in times of wide diversity in mind, heart, and life concerning essentials of a com-mon calling. In these circumstances, with little in common by nature or by grace, profound friendships are the exception. Masculine-Feminine Complementarity in the Order of Preachers Before focusing on the profound relationship between Catherine and Raymond of Capua, let us look at an additional feature which Dominic built into the very structure of his order, namely masculine-feminine complemen-tarity. In Dominic's mind, the men and women of the order were each to con-tribute something essential to the order's goal of contemplating and spreading sacred Truth. His plan was that the nuns should pray and do penance, and the friars should preach. With this complementary power, no obstacle could pre-vent the accomplishment of goals. To assure from the beginning this complementary feature of the order, Dominic established at Prouille (southern France), in 1207, an arrangement he had known from his years as a canon regular in Spain: the "double-monastery" where friars and nuns lived side by side, each in separate convents yet joined in one common life. Later, wherever he had men, Dominic himself established the feminine counterpart: in Madrid in 1217; in Segovia, Saragossa, and Palencia in 1218; in Rome in 1221. He intended the same in Bologna with Diana d'Andalo and a group of her friends, but died before doing so. This planned masculine-feminine complementarity was emphasized throughout the order by the custom of calling the friars "Preachers" and the nuns "Sisters, Preachers, or Preacheresses.' '~ Saint Catherine, Doctor of Friendship Our context is now sufficient for turning to Catherine and Raymond, two Dominicans who personified in their friendship the masculine-feminine com-plementarity of their order. In her writings, Catherine was such a preacheress that, as noted above, she has been declared a Doctor of the Universal Church. Happily enough, she has See Paul M. Conner, O.P., Celibate Love (Huntington, Indiana: Our Sunday Visitor Press, 1979), pp. 54-56. ~16 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 left explicit teaching on human friendship, particularly :in Chapters 41-44 of her famous Dialogue. Briefly, she sees positive temporal and eternal benefits as well as distinct dangers. An enduring benefit is that we do not lose human friendships at death. Rooted in happiness in God, the saints in heaven also share one another's hap-piness and so color their own beatific joy with "more abundant., delight and contentment." Catherine looks at friendship on earth as "consolation, sweetness, com-fort, and joy." Friends here help one another "grow in grace and virtue," and they provoke each other to honor and glorify the heavenly Father. A serious danger arises from human friendship which begins primarily as spiritual love but slowly becomes predominately sensual. To bring con-secrated persons to this end, Satan will insidiously engender a distaste for religious life, inducing them to search for pleasurable compensations in friendships. Prayer is judged in terms of self-satisfaction and is eventually dropped. "Worldly conversations" become more and more appealing and help stifle former desires for prayer, purity of spirit, suffering for God, and fraternal charity. Why does God permit this outcome? It is because he desires to purify the person from his unrecognized imperfection of loving creatures with a love mainly "passionate" or "sensible." After a friendship becomes established, the person might observe, for example, that his friend pays more attention to others than to him. He experiences disappointment and suffering. There are, then, two possible outcomes. His suffering can bring the deepened awareness that he has been seeking self in a love he thought wholly generous--the Father's hoped-for outcome. This insight will give birth to healthy "distrust of self" and to a more perfect love, charity, for all persons, including his par-ticular friend. This happy result, Catherine asserts, can occur only i.n someone "enlightened by faith," who desires "to walk in the virtues.especially prudence and discernment." A person, however, who is "ignorant in the faith" and not striving to walk in virtue, a person who "has no life," as Catherine puts it, will find the experi-ence of diminishing sensible satisfaction in prayer a great danger. He may well follow Satan's lead and give himself up to "confusion, tedium of mind and sadness of heart, abandoning any virtuous exercises." To such a person, friendship will eventually mean ruin and inner "death." Despite her medieval view and expression of things, Catherine's general teaching on spiritual friendship stands clear: it is good if the result is authentic charity, not self-love. Catherine lived her teaching, filling her short life with an amazing range of men and women friends. One among them was unique. Catherine and Raymond Born of the noble Delle Vigne family of Capua in 1330, Raymond entered Catherine of Siena and Raymond of Capua / ~17 the Dominican Order at age seventeen. During studies at .Bologna he excelled in scripture and patrology before obtaining the lectorate degree in sacred theology. He taught in Dominican priory schools between 1358 and 1362, and for the next four years served as spiritual director to the nuns of his order at the monastery of Montepulciano. In 1367, he was elected prior of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, a principal Dominican community of men in Rome. Raymond was sent to Siena some six years later to be Regent of Studies for the young men of the order in training there. And so it was that this man of extensive education and experience came to meet Catherine in 1374, the consequence of both her praying for a confessor capable of guiding her in her evolving mystical experience, and of the order's appointment of Raymond tO investi-gate and direct her life. Catherine promised Raymond obedience, and after some time of testing her authenticity, he came quickly to understand her and her spirituality. From the beginning they admired each other, Raymond recognizing in Catherine a woman of fine intellect, intense striving for sanctity, and tireless apostolate; Catherine in Raymond, a man of intelligence, tact, breadth of understanding, and development in virtue. Upon this basis their friendship grew firm and profound. Frank admission~ in their writings and biographical events reveal that they came to know each other intimately. Catherine opened her whole soul to Raymond, who by his counsel and authority over her, helped her come to full self-knowledge. In four short years their relationship had become very important to both of them. When the pope called Raymond to Rome in 1377 to be prior again of the convent of the Minerva, Catherine's letters speak of her "torment" and the "particularly hard and painful" experience this first separation from her "intimate friend" occasioned. She asked the Lord, who had "imposed upon me a royal and very poignant trial., to strengthen me in this privation which language is so incapable of expressing.''6 Understandably, news from Raymond alwaysbrought her joy. Later correspondence gives further indications of the quality of their love. Once, when Raymond had turned back from a papal mission to Avignon because of impending ambush, Catherine affectionately reproached him. He misread her intention, and so she wrote: "You have thought that my affection for you had diminished; but you are mistaken . l love you as I love myself; and I have hoped that the goodness of God would also make your affection perfect.-7 In her numerous letters, Catherine customarily addressed Raymond as her ~ See Letter 119 quoted in Johannes Joergensen, Sainte Catherine de Sienne (Paris: Editions Gabriel Beauchesne, 1929), p. 187. 7 Josephine Butler, Catherine of Siena (London: Horace Marshall & Son: 1894), pp. 289-290. 38 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 "beloved Father," or "friend of predilection," or by the pseudonym that so pleased her, il mio Giovanni singolare--presumably in comparison to the Lord's preferential friendship for St. John. During the last months of her life, in extreme weakness and suffering, Catherine wrote a long report of her mystical experience to Raymond,. ad-dressing him lovingly over and over again: "My most sweet Father." In Letter 232 she tells him of a vision wherein she saw .herself entering by love and desire into Christ through the wound in his side, "accompanied by my Father St. Dominic; Giovanni, my friend of predilection; and all my spiritual children." It had been revealed to Catherine that the pope would send Raymond to King Charles of France and that she would die before his return. Raymond relates that she took him into privacy and "talked continuously, her large eyes shining., saying such strong and beautiful words." Often she "grasped his hand and smiled beautifully." Then, accompanying Raymond to the port of Ostia, she "knelt,., and crying, made the sign of the cross.''8 In their few years together, Raymond and Catherine collaborated in many undertakings, helping each other both naturally and supernaturally. Raymond, for example, was cured through Catherine's prayer from the plague which decimated Siena in 1374. He then joined her in relief work among the city's victims. Afterwards they went together in retreat to the tomb of St. Agnes of Montepulciano. Later in Pisa, Raymond was with Catherine in the Church of St. Christina when she received the stigmata. She prayed that the wounds be made invisible, and so it was that Raymond was the only person to bear public witness to the miracle. In 1376, the two met in Avignon in a successful attempt to persuade Pope Gregory XI to return to Rome. They traveled back to the Eternal City together, spending some time there with each other before Raymond's final departure. During their political actiQity, Catherine and Raymond turned to each other for support. She admired his political wisdom, most often following his advice which opened up new dimensions and possibilities to her. Together they promoted the crusades and prayed and worked for the reform of the Church. To counter a fear and reluctance in his character, Catherine would urge Raymond, when events demanded, to act bravely and with courage. In-deed, they cooperated in every way, so much so that one biographer con-cludes: "Catherine and Fra Raimondo were both working for the same ends, and aided each other with a mutual exchange of ideas, energies and counsels.''9 In the realm of grace, Raymond received instruction from Catherine for his spiritual progress. She was ever mindful of him in prayer, and even after See Hyacinth M. Cormier, O.P., Blessed Raymond of Capua (Boston: Marlier, Callahan & Co., 1900), p. 58. Arigo Levasti, My Servant Catherine (London: Blackfriars Publications, 1954), p. 140. Catherine of Siena and Raymond of Capua / 39 her death, Raymond testified that his spiritual stamina came from his con-tinued communications with Catherine in spirit. Before their final parting, Catherine wrote to Raymond: "1 beseech you to collect into your own hands any writings of mine which you may find and the book (the Dialogue); do with all of them whatever you deem is most for God's honor and glory.'''° Even in his overbusy life as Master General, Raymond worked successfully to promote Catherine's canonization, gathered and preserved all her writings, and found time to compose her first biography, a task that took him fifteen years. Dealing principally with her personal rather than public life and bringing to light the most touching incidents and her most characteristic traits, Raymond's is a surprisingly objective account. From it all later biographers have drawn their material. Conclusion Without doubt, in their close knowledge and love of one another and in the cooperative ministry they exercised, Blessed Raymond of Capua and St. Catherine of Siena exemplify the masculine-feminine complementarity of the Dominican Order. Their friendship helped each of them, as well, toward sanctity. We began by saying that Catherine's personal life could be better understood within its Dominican context. It has also become clear that through her own personification of the spirit of St. Dominic and of the charism he gave to the order, the latter itself stands better revealed. Friendship between Dominicans may not be an essential feature of Dominican life, but throughout the last seven hundred and fifty years, few friendships recorded by history surpass those between Dominicans. The order is fertile soil for close ties between persons fired by its goals and fully given to its ways. Could one not even say that the more Dominicans are Dominican, the greater the likelihood, today as in past centuries, of Dominican friend-ships? Letter 102 cited in Cormier, op. cit., p. 134. Service of the Heart: The Quest for Authentic Prayer in Judaism Michael Maher, M.S.C. Father Maher teaches Scripture at the Mater Dei Institute of Religious Education in Dublin. His last article appearin.g in these pages was "Old Testament Poetry and Religious Experience Today" (March, 1979). Father Maher's address is Woodview; Mount Merrion Ave.; Blackrock, Co. Dublin; Ireland. Everyone who has made an effort to develop a meaning,ful prayer-life knows how easy it is to allow regular prayer to become a mechanical ritual rather than a vital and elevating experience. But the danger of allowing prayer and worship to become a perfunctory recitation of hallowed formulae or a conventional performance of traditional rituals is not special to our age. The problem seems to be permanently contemporary, and Jewish religious tradi-tion seems to have been continually on guard against it. Ever since Isaiah sternly chided his co-religionists who honored the Lord with their lips while their hearts were far away (see Is 29:13), the leaders of Israel continued the prophet's task of safeguarding the truly spiritual and per-sonal character of the people's devotional life, and of ensuring that the indi-vidual's prayer should always be animated by a living faith, should always be the expression of sincere love, and should always involve deep feelings and devotion. The rabbis, and their successors right down to our times, used the word kavvanah to express the attitude of interior devotion and personal involvement that should accompany every prayer and every religious observ-ance of the devout Jew. Directing the Mind The word kavvanah which became part and parcel of Jewish devotional 40 Service of Heart / 41 literature is derived from a verb meaning to direct, and implies directing the mind to God, concentrating the attention on the prayers being recited, saying them in a spirit of devotion, and excluding thoughts and feelings that distract one from the experience of encountering God. When one prays with kavvanah one's heart and lips agree, and one's whole person is involved in the awesome act of appearing before one's Creator and Lord. This is what the Talmud' means when it says that "when a man prays he should direct his heart to heaven" (Berakoth 31 a). Another Talmud text declares that if a man does not put his mind to the performance of a religious duty his act is not a religious act at all (Rosh ha-Shanah 28b). These same ideas find another formulation in Pirke Aboth or the Sayings of the Fathers, a compendium of maxims that have been popular among all Jews since the early Christian centuries. Here the sage's warning runs as follows: "When you pray do not make your prayer mere routine, but a plea before God for mercy and grace" (PirkeAboth 2:13). To avoid the routine against which this saying warns the reader, and to minimize the danger of prayer becoming a merely mechanical recitation, the rabbis of the Talmud urged that something new should be introduced into one's prayer every day (Berakoth 29b). These and similar declarations created among the Jews an awareness of the importance of personal involvement in prayer, and by the Middle Ages the statement that prayer without kavannah or concentration is like a body without a soul or a husk without a kernel, had become proverbial. The Shulchan Aruch, a sixteenth-century law book which was regarded by all Jews up to our day as the authoritative guide to religious living, stated that "a little prayer with kavvanah is better than a lot without it." Although this declara-tion did nothing to diminish the prolixity of Jewish prayers or to shorten synagogue services--the Sabbath morning service, for example, lasting more than three hours--the spirit behind it continued to motivate pious Jews in their quest for sincerity and moral earnestness in their prayer. Just as the prophets of old rejected prayer that did not come "from the heart" (Ho 7:14; see Ps 108:1), the.rabbis o f the Talmud regarded prayer and worship as"a ser-vice of the heart" (Taanith 2a; see Sifre on Dt 10:12), and the Jews in general knew that prayer which was not a heartfelt, experience was not prayer at all. ' The word Talmud means "teaching," and is the name given to a body of writings that incor-porates what were at one time the oral traditions of Judaism. The Talmud records the laws that regulated the daily life of the Jews, as well as the general lore, legendary and otherwise, that formed popular Jewish culture. One version of the Talmud developed in Palestine from about the year 200-350 A.D., while another version was formulated in Babylon in the period between 200 and 500 A.D. The'Talmud is a commentary on the Mishnah (see next note), and like the latter is divided into six orders, which in turn are divided into tractates. Both Mishnah and Talmud are quoted according to tractate. Each tractate deals mainly with one special topic. Thus, for exam-ple, the tractate Berakoth--the word means "blessings"--deals largely with prayer matters. 42 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 Calm and Composure However, if the teachers in Israel regarded kavvanah as an indispensable quality of true prayer they realized that it was not something that can be easily acquired or retained. A text which has come down to us from about 200 A.D., and which is recorded in the Mishnah,' declares that "none may stand to say the Tefillah3 save in sober mind" (Mishnah, Berakoth 5:1). The text then goes on to say that "the pious men of old used to wait an hour before they said the Tefillah, that they~might direct their heart to God." The Talmud commen-tators on this passage remarked that one should not say the Tefillah while im-mersed in "idleness or laughter, or chatter, or frivolity or idle talk" since these are obvious impediments to the concentration and composure that should characterize one's communion with the Holy One. So important was this concentration and composure in the eyes of the rabbis that they recom-mended that one should not attempt to pray at all when one is agitated or preoccupied by distracting thoughts. They state, for example, that one should not pray on return from a journey in case one might not be able to give proper attention to prayer (Talmud, Erubin 65b). Another text which dates from the early Christian centuries declares that "One whose dead relative lies unburied before him is exempt from reciting the Shema" and the Tefillah . Because when a man sees his loss before him he is distraught" (Dt Rabbah 9:1). These recommendations convey the idea that one must control one's mind, one's imagination, and one's feelings before engaging in prayer. This teaching of the rabbis was to be expressed by Maimonides (died 1204), the great Jewish philosopher of the Middle Ages, who wrote as follows: Before engaging in pra'yer one must free one's heart from all preoccupation~s, and regard oneself as standing in God's presence. It is therefore proper to sit a while before praying in order to direct the heart and then pray calmly and devoutly. However, the Jewish teachers realized that the proper dispositions for prayer cannot be acquired during a few moments of concentration before ac-tually beginning to pray. The quality of one's prayer is greatly influenced by 2 The Mishnah, literally "repetition," is the name given to a collection of teachings that are attrib-uted to rabbis who lived in the period between 150 B.C. and 250 A.D. These teachings were codified by Judah the Prince in the middle of the third century A.D. However, in the compilation of~his Mishnah, Judah used earlier collections of rabbinic teachings. ~ Tefillah, meaning "prayer," is the name given to the Jewish prayer par-excellence which con-sisted of eighteen benedictions or petitions. The Tefillah was recited three times daily, in the morning, in the afternoon, and in the evening. Those who attefided the synagogue recited it there, while others recited it in private. The petitions of the Tefillah substantially go back to New Testa-ment times. ¯ The word Shema simply means "hear." It is the name given to a prayer traditionally recited in the morning and in the evening by every male Jew. The prayer, or rather confession of faith, begins with the passage, "Hear, O Israel." (Dr 6:4-9)--hence the name--and continues with Dt. 11:13-21 and Nb 15:37-41. Service of Heart / 43 the whole tone of one's daily life. Nahmanides, a thirteenth century Jewish mystic and scholar of Spain, was aware of this when he wrote: When you pray, remove all worldly considerations from your heart. Set your heart right before God, cleanse your inmost thoughts, and meditate before uttering your devotions. Act thus all your days and in all things, and you will not sin. By this course your deeds wil! be upright, and your prayers pure and clean, innocent and devout, and acceptable before God. Know Before Whom You Stand When Amos wished to warn his fellow-Israelites about the punishment that awaited them because of their infidelity he said simply: "Prepare to meet your God!" (Am 4:12). These blunt words were given a broad interpretation and the rabbis applied them to the preparation needed for prayer. Such an interpretation of the text is by no means unreasonable, because prayer is a meeting with God, and as such it cannot be lightly undertaken. Prayer for the rabbis in particular was a matter of what they called chutzpah, that is, an act of, boldness, even of impertinence. For who can have a right to appear before his creator and Lord, to address him, and to expect an answer? Yet the Jewish sages knew that prayer was part and parcel of Israelite life, and that the great heroes of old, like Moses, David, Jeremiah, had all prayed. Therefore, although the rabbis spoke of God as ".the Holy One, blessed be he," and addressed him in prayer as "Lord, King of the Universe," they never hesitated to present their every plea before him. The Talmud teaches explicitly that "'chut:&ah, even against God is of avail," meaning that God cannot resist one who prays, and that the Lord of Glory does not rejec~ his servants who approach him. Yet, lest the chutzpah involved in prayer go beyond boldness and con-fidence, and become insolence and offense, rabbinic tradition was careful to insist on the reverence and respect that should characterize one's attitude in God's. presence. The rabbis recalled tha,t when the Israelites saw the glory of God on Sinai "their souls fled" and the~, trembled in holy fear. If Moses and the generation of the Exodus who had experienced so many manifestations of God's power and goodness were unable to stand with confidence in his presence, how much more should the less privileged generations of the people feel overcome by his might and majesty? Rabbi Eliezer (c. 100 A.D.) gave this advice to his disciples: "When you pray, know before whom you stand, and in this way you will win the future world" (Berakoth 28b). A slightly modified version of this text became known to generation after generation of Jews who read the words "Know before whom you stand" inscribed in many synagogues over the ark which contained the scrolls of the law. Such an inscription reminded the worshippers of the awesome meaning of prayer, and forcefully suggested that all levity and casualness were inappropriate in the praying congregation. Other synagogue inscriptions that conveyed the same message were Jacob's words as recorded 44 / Review for Religious, Volume 40, 1981/1 in Gn 28:17: "How awesome is t his place! This is none ot her than t he house of God, and this is the gate of heaven," or the psalmist's declaration "1 keep the Lord always before me" (Ps 16:8), or the well known verse from Isaiah, "Ho-ly, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts," which was also to have an important place in Christian churches and in Christian prayers. These, or similar words, were continual reminders of synagogue worshippers that an attitude of flip-pant self-assurance or a casual or indifferent mood are unbecoming in one who genuinely strives to enter into communion with his God. However, lest the dignity of God and the serious nature of prayer frighten off the would-be worshipper, other texts which instill an attitude of trust in God's presence were at the disposal of those who went to the synagogue to pray. The Jerusalem Talmud laid down the general principle that the Jew need never hesitate to approach God in prayer: "When a man is in trouble let him not cry out to the angel Michael or to the angel Gabriel, but to me, and I will answer immediately" (Berakoth 9, 1.13a). The traditional Jewish Prayer Book began with a series of biblical texts which were designed to create an atmosphere of adoration and devotion in the worshipping community. Texts such as "O Lord, I love the habitation of thy house" (Ps 26:8), or "But as for me, my prayer is to thee, O Lord" (Ps 69:13) were calculated to set the scene for serene reflection, and to express an awareness of God's love and goodness without which prayer is impossible. So while the Jew's attitude to God contained an ingredient of reverent fear, and while his approach to his Lord was characterized by a sober recogni-tion of the divine majesty that 'cannot be flouted, his relationship to God was also marked by trust in a personal Being who, far from being an arbitrary despot, is a God in whom power and love are one, and who cares for those who approach him with faith. The Talmud taught that "one cannot deal familiarly with heaven" (Berakoth 33b-34a), but it did not set God outside the reach of the average Jewish believer. Gestures of Reverence In Old Testament times the temple in Jerusalem was for the Israelite "the house of the Lord" (Ps 27:4). The perpetual lamp which burned in the temple (see Lv 24:2f) was for the rabbis of later times a witness to mankind that God dwelt among his people (Talmud, Sabbath 22b), and the religious leaders of Israel strove to instill into the people a deep respect for the place where God had set up his abode. The Mishnah records the following prescription that was framed in order to ensure that the biblical command to "reverence the Sanc-tuary" (Lv 19:30) would be fulfilled: A man should not behave himself unseemly [in the temple area]. He may not enter the Temple Mount with his staff or his sandal or his wallet, or with dust upon his feet, nor may he make it a short by-pass; still less may he spit there (Mishnah, Berakoth, 9:5). Of course the ultimate aim of this prescription Was to honor the God who Service of Heart / 45 was worshipped in the temple~. The rabbis are explicit about this when they state that just as one does not revere the Sabbath but him who commanded the observance of the Sabbath, so one is not to revere the sanctuary but him who gave the commandment concerning the sanctuary (Talmud, Yebamoth 6a-6b). The authors of these rabbinic statements understood the importance of an aura of sacredness that can help to make one conscious of being in the divine presence, and that can help to generate the I~avvanah that makes prayer meaningful. Biblical tradition prescribes no particular postures or movements for prayer. But we do find mention of several physical postures that are meant to give expression to one's spiritual and menta