INTERVIEW GIVEN TO “VIDA RELIGIOSA”

1. What kind of analysis does Fr. Pascual Chávez offer of consecrated life as we begin 2010?

As John Paul II said, consecrated life not only has “a glorious history to remember and to recount, but also a great history still to be accomplished! ”¹. Therefore, while conscious of the difficulties it is experiencing, especially in Europe, given the unremitting ageing of personnel, the diminished flow of vocations and the new social, cultural and ecclesial context, I believe I can say that the commitment to renewal of Orders, Congregations and Institutes since Vatican Council II has not been useless and has in fact born fruit.

It is certain that consecrated life in Europe has been weakened and finds it difficult at present to respond the needs and demands of the Church. It is also certain that in his time Paul VI asked its help in Latin America, especially following the CELAM Conference in Medellín and, later, John Pau II similarly for Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe. So, on both occasions our Institutes responded generously, by sending missionaries from Europe. Today we need to emphasise the notable support that religious from Latin America, Asia and Africa are offering Churches of other continents.

And we should add to that the well-felt need to accompany the new situation of consecrated life which is developing in Asia and Africa and the efforts that Orders, Congregations and Institutes are carrying out in this sense. Certainly, we would be happy to find a deep and convinced understanding of consecrated life on the part of the Bishops and their support in offering solid formation to new generations of religious men and women.

But in real terms, beginning with the Congress in 2004, we would like to interpret and live out our new consecrated life with a great passion for Christ and a great passion for humanity. Therefore our priorities are:

• spirituality: the Word and the Eucharist really need to be at the centre of the life of the consecrated person and the religious community, called to be a sign and living memory of the transcendent dimension which is in the heart of every human being;

• community: we are aware that the witness of a community open to all, especially to the needy, is fundamental in building our world;

• mission: consecrated life is called to go to the frontiers of mission such as exclusion, poverty, secularisation, culture, formation and education at every level; these are the “places” where it needs to be in order to express the missionary dimension of the Church; mission however is also “passion”, understood as the suffering or infirmity, of many religious who pray for the Church and for vocations, and “passion”, understood as martyrdom, imprisoned or worn out for the Kingdom; they are the greatest expression of the Gospel.

2. The review of position or restructuring of religious institutes must suppose, above all, a spiritual process, a reading of the present moment as a sign of the times... Are we focused on this effort?

Of course! The USG has already dedicated its half-yearly Assembly, in November 1998, to this task, with the theme "Outlining presences and locating charisms". “Presence” effectively immediately shows the identity and vitality of a charism or form of consecrated life; it is its visible realisation.

Many elements of significance refer to “presence” or, better, the juncture of fundamental aspects of consecrated life. Individuals above all influence this by their tone of life, what they believe in and what they do, their choices in the face of culture, what they propose to be and succeed in communicating. While the “charisms” in how they appear and describe themselves are tied to a “personal” experience, “presence” is strictly tied to the life of the community: its style of relationships, its capacity to act and participate, its involvement in the context, its closeness to the people, manifestations of its choice of God. The community, in effect, is placed as a sign of fraternity, ecclesial communion, the presence of God in the human family.

The image that “presence” gives of itself depends on the class of service it offers, the mindset it transmits, where it stands in the social and cultural context, the means it employs. In discerning how to draw up and trace presences certain of these elements can be favoured, particularly those most relevant to the charism, such as for example fraternity, mission..., or those that can be considered as “generators” of new attitudes, relationships or ways of thinking.

Local presences, by linking amongst themselves, offer a particular image if they become an expression of a form of consecrated life. We exist in broad intercommunicating spaces; images and messages are spread all around, confront one another, and all add up; initiatives are fulfilled mutually and are integrated. To have impact teamwork and networking are advisable’. It is essential today to also consider the broader presence of a province in its area, the institute and consecrated life considered as a whole, at least in reference to certain positioning. This opens up interesting perspectives.

In our particular time, marked by social communication, it is particularly necessary for the charism to be currently “visible”, in order to pass on in immediate fashion our reasons for our hope and the meaning of our choice.

The process of discernment then brings us to discover and give name to the elements which cause rupture in what we say, do and are and what the people sense and imagine regarding our words and kind of presence, life, work. In effect it is necessary to be very close to the people and how they understand us, however without diluting the “difference” that distinguishes consecrated life. It ought not only respond to challenges, but launch new signs for myopic viewpoints, the desire for possession, the seeking of immediate pleasure. It has to enter into dialogue with today's mentality, but also infuse that mentality with elements which are not part of its logic.

What ought guide the process is not only a restructuring in order to reorganise reduced forces, but new ways of being present and of acting which respond to current sensitivities and needs and which are, because of their significance, also capable of engendering new resources. Besides, while selecting priorities must be carried out according to a charismatic reference, we also have to take into account variables of an organisational kind, like time, availability of people, resources, etc.

The experience of various Institutes shows that at the same time it is possible:

• to achieve internal restructuring of presences by changing aim, giving attention to new beneficiaries, proposing new services, redefining the role of religious and the way they are the “animating nucleus” with greater responsibility given to lay people, changes in forms of management, cutting down in sectors found to be less fruitful;

• to redistribute forces in existing presences following an evaluation of their meaningfulness, in order to give strength to some while lessening others;

• open new presences in areas judged to be more fruitful and according to more appropriate circumstances for their significance;

• to close those which because of their purpose, personnel needs or difficulty in managing no longer respond to the current circumstances of consecrated life, the people involved and the demands.

design presences involving a community process of shared responsibility, a specific recurrence to discernment and decision, preparation of personnel for new commitments, and a process which is gradual without being slow because of that .

3. There is much talk of the ageing of consecrated life, but there are young consecrated persons. What do they offer that is new to consecration?

Here too we find ourselves with a topic that the Union of Superiors General has confronted following the Congress of Young Religious. In effect, the Assembly in 1997, which bore the title “Towards the future with young religious – Challenges, proposals and hopes”, tried to better understand the new generation of religious. We can add to this the reflection then made in the International Congress on Religious Life organised by the USG and the UISG in November 2004 on the theme of “Passion for Christ, passion for humanity”.

The USG Assemblies which followed focused on the topics of: “What is emerging” (May 2005); “Fidelity and those who abandon Consecrated Life” (November 2005); “For a faithful Consecrated Life” (May 2006). As you can see, there has been an effort to understand and better accompany the new situation that Consecrated Life is experiencing in general, and which is represented particularly by young members.

I would like to sum up this new situation of younger members in three ways: a deep search for the experience of God, a desire for communion which is not always accompanied by a desire for community, commitment to the poor and marginalised. Tese features are often joined to psychological fragility, vocational inconsistency, and a marked subjectivism.

This threefold challenge can be positively resolved through a formation that takes each person's story and makes it the horizon and path to authentic human self-realisation. Formation besides must understand and accept that freedom is the supreme value for human realisation as a “terminus a quo”, as a point of departure, but not as a “terminus ad quem”, because at the end the only absolute value able to bring about the marvellous work of complete human transformation, is love. Formation must know how to demythologise experience, this recurring magic word, since what is important is not the value of experience, but experiencing value which must be internalised and assimilated.

Finally, one has to speak of a reality that in our time implies going ‘against the tide’: formation and renunciation. Speaking paradoxically, we have to foster the experience of renunciation. Even more, playing with words, I would say that we should not limit ourselves just to proposing the experience of renunciation, but also in many circumstances, there is a need to renounce experience, one of the most difficult things to understand and accept today. Here we see the urgent need of forming to inner freedom, which permits one to make worthwhile and gospel-based choices and order one's life around them.

4. Multiculturalism is a global fact. Consecrated life is multicultural. We see this from the significant contributions we get from consecrated life in the Americas, Africa, Asia, Oceania and Europe.

In the half yearly Assembly of the USG in May 2009 we sought to dedicate our reflection to this topic, with the theme: “Geographical and cultural changes in Institutes of Consecrated Life: challenges and perspectives”.

There was double justification for the theme, one occasional the other substantial. The occasional motivation was determined by the Continental Synods, beginning with Africa: through our reflection we expressed a commitment to more closely follow the Church's journey today. The substantial reason was suggested by the acknowledged need to reflect on a new reality, meaning the decentralisation of the Church and Consecrated Life on the periphery

The topic is especially interesting, because definitions are not always clear as to what changes, geographical displacements and cultural balances are taking place in Consecrated Life; therefore we see it as more than necessary to begin describing and understanding these. We can say in effect that Institutes are not always aware of the changes that are taking place. There are demographic changes going on in continents that have consequences for vocational growth; then there is the reality of ageing, to which we can add the scarce flow of vocations in countries that traditionally had many vocations.

Nor is it easy to identify the challenges which are challenging consecrated life. One clear example is the growing number of tribal vocations coming to consecrated life. The candidates have a weak family and cultural background and at times can find themselves working in places in their Institutes located in the cities or, well out of their cultural context, without due preparation or inculturation.

besides it is without doubt that at this time community needs new models of incarnation; consecrated life is ever more presenting new multicultural situations within it. The government of Institutes is seeking new ways to foster, along with cultural balances, unity and communion, result of an authentic and mature 'interculturalism'. It is also at this level that we come across new problems of inculturation of a charism and of formation.

It goes without saying then, that the changes impose decisions on which we have not always adequately reflected. To support activities and works or carry forward processes of evangelisation, for example, there has been the temptation to import vocations into Europe from other continents, then discovering, however, that the solution was not an appropriate one. Decisions in the face of change, then, demand great enlightenment.

Our reflection has sought to focus attention on two realities, with which consecrated life today is measured: displacement from the centre to the periphery and the intercultural nature which is ever more a feature of religious communities. If the first factor makes reference to the universality of the Church, and therefore of consecrated life, called to insert itself into every culture, the second is evidence of an element which is not accidental, since the same way of being of consecrated life brings different people to live together, united by a charism as a sign and witness of communion which is at the service of a shared mission.

Faith in the Lord Jesus, who calls us to live the Gospel in a specific charism and mission of an Institute, allows people who are very different in character, formation, age, expectations and cultures, to make up real communities of brothers and sisters united in Love. The “truth of the Gospel” is therefore the key to interpreting consecrated life in the diversity of contexts and in the intercultural nature of communities, its criteria of evaluation being the authentic rule of life.

In effect, fraternal love in community is not the result of mutual sympathy, but the result of a journey of conversion in which religious men and women learn to love the Lord above anything else, through visible signs of fraternal communion. This is why they promise to recognise the value of diversity which emerges in relationships, by together nurturing the qualities which help to bring about “a concrete synthesis which is not only an evangelisation of culture but also an evangelised inculturation and an inculturated evangelisation"².

5. Consecrated life in the Church is convinced of its service in favour of communion... How is communion supported in the midst of diversity? How to overcome the temptation to uniformity?

In view of a major social, cultural and political significance and also spiritual, pastoral and vocational fruitfulness, communion is a gift to accept, but also a mission entrusted to consecrated persons not only in a silent witness, but also through intentioned action. Motivated by personal experience of fraternity that is God's gift, consecrated persons, as individuals and as a community, are called to spread, strengthen or set about creating communion: they become “experts in communion”³, a leaven of unity, practitioners of reconciliation.

We often take for granted the role of communion to which religious are called in the universal Church and in particular Churches. This role can have new expressions in a more visible insertion in these Churches through specialised services and witnesses of the way of universality which comes about naturally in religious institutes

The mission of communion also refers to relationships between consecrated persons. “By always remaining faithful to one's charism, but keeping in mind spiritual friendship which frequently brings together different founders and foundresses here on earth, these are called to demonstrate an exemplary fellowship, one which serves to stimulate other ecclesial components in the daily task of giving witness to the Gospel”⁴.

And thanks be to God there is no lack of new initiatives in this regard. To the active participation in animation, communication and coordination bodies, in trying “to discern God's plan in this troubled moment of history, in order better to respond to it with appropriate works of the apostolate"⁵, we can add the possibility of establishing systematic and stable collaboration between different Institutes for specific initiatives which demand convergence of competencies and resources. This is something already tried out in study centres. The complex of the actual context and new needs of evangelisation lead not only to agreement on focus and approaches, but also to planning initiatives together.

Always at the heart of ecclesial communion, but also transcending it, religious are invited to begin broad “movements”, “aggregations” or “families” of and with lay people. The binding factor can be to take part in the spirit and mission of the Institute in the case of “volunteers and associates”⁶, a common cultural or social interest (peace, ecology, human rights, volunteer movement...), a concrete initiative. In these groupings religious take a sincere part in action on behalf of just causes and offer the specific support of reflection and solidarity.

There is also greater enthusiasm and conviction desired, besides, in creating international and inter-cultural communities which, acting out of this experience, become workshops of acceptance and the value of diversity.

The Apostolic Exhortation “Vita Consecrata” also saw religious life as a privileged place for dialogue between the great religions⁷,because in its origins there is an option that, in general terms, all deeply religious people accept. This attention therefore becomes a mentality to acquire, a practice to put into place in every presence, and room to place communities with specific purposes.

6. Finally regarding the celebration of the day of Consecrated Life, What message is there from the President of the USG?

In its fifty three years of life⁸, the USG has had to confront constant and rapid changes in the Church,consecrated life and society. After the 1994 Synod and the post-synodal Apostolic exhortation “Vita Consecrata” (1996), and keeping to the publication of the Instruction “Starting afresh from Christ – A renewed commitment to consecrated life in the third millennium” (2002), we have gained new awareness of the significance of our charisms, the mission we have in the Church, the commitments that emerge from fidelity to Christ, the People of God, new Institutes and men and women today⁹.

Also for us today's culture, particularly in the world of social communication and globalisation, open up new perspectives and present new problems. This requires that the USG have a renewed will to serve consecrated life. We must return to launching in creative fidelity, the energy and audacity of the Union in its beginnings, so it can continue to be a lively and active presence in the Church, at the service of a spirituality of communion and participation. We are called too discover new ways of more effective dialogue with the Apostolic See and with Episcopal Conferences, for greater collaboration amongst our institutes and with national or continental conferences of religious.

Each Institute of consecrated life is profoundly aware that the processes of renewal demand responses that work via: 1) an uninterrupted return to the sources of all Christian life; 2) an uninterrupted return to the original inspiration of the Institutes; 3) an adaptation of the Institutes to the changing conditions of our times. However, observing above all the following criterion as a norm: the three should in practice be held together, at the same time!. There can be no adequate renewal with just one of these perspectives. besides, given the growth of our Institutes in Asia and Africa, inculturation and inter-culturalism become urgent. In the same way we strongly sense commitment to evangelisation in Europe. It is in these perspectives that Consecrated Life is called to a rebirth.

Thank you.

Rome, 1 January 2010

Fr Pascual Chávez V, SDB