OPENING PRAYER SERVICE
left and below: welcome to country by students from St Scholastica's College, Glebe.
left: the detail in the assembly candle
left: Maureen Andrews, leader of the Missionary Franciscan Sisters (from Brisbane, Queensland) processes the Koran to a place of honour.
Each of the sacred texts of the three Abrahamic faiths which formed the focus of the assembly - the Bible (Christian), the Torah (Judaism) and the Koran (Islam) - was given equal prominance as it was taken to the liturgical table where it remained throughout the assembly.
right: Bernard McGrath, Sylvestrine Benedictine Monks, Arcadia, NSW (left) and David Tomlins, Cisterians, Tarrawarra, Vic, during the opening prayer service.
left: Jennifer Clarke, Missionary Sisters of the Society of Mary, Sydney, takes a candle back to her table to the end the prayer service.
from the PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS
... It is of interest to note the changes that have taken place in our society since the days of our founders here in this country, or the days when the first members of many congregations came to Australia in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
In 1911, Australia's population was 4.4 million with 95.9 per cent Christian in religious affiliation. In 2006 that population had grown to 19.8 million with 63.9 per cent Christian, 17.4 per cent of other faiths, and 18.7 per cent of no religion. This is the society in which we now live and minister.
If we are to fulfill our contemplative and prophetic role in the church and in society, I believe we are impelled to be positioned at the cutting edge of this diversity and to seek to understand what form the common values that we share and what are the challenges we face...
We state that religious life has both contemplative and prophetic dimensions.
It is the aim of Catholic Religious Australia to support the contemplative and prophetic aspects of our lives.
True dialogue comes from a contemplative spirit, not from a purely discursive perspective. Contemplative living is a way of being; it cannot be switched on when convenient. It is a way of life whereby we come into touch with our own expectations, prejudices, fears, shadows and compulsions. It is not always an easy place to be.
For inter-religious dialogue to happen, self-awareness is fundamental - personal and individual awareness, but also ecclesial and communal self-identity...
During these days we are invited to touch into our deepest selves, our identity, to listen profoundly to the deepest selves of another and to understand the identity which is the other. These days will call forth from us an understanding which comes from the contemplative, rather than from a purely rational discursive approach to issues and problems...
Hopefully we will engage in the art of spiritual communication, where we can respectfully hold together the tensions, the questions, the hopes and the aspirations that our dialogue calls forth from us.
What of our prophetic calling during these days?
Walter Brueggemann in The Prophetic Imagination describes the task of prophetic imagination as one of cutting through the numbness, of embracing the pathos and pain of the people and of bringing people to engage in the promise of newness that is at work in our history with God...
To be evangelical witnesses, is to be witnesses to none other than Gospel imperatives. We, as part of the "charisma" of the church, have both the responsibility and the privilege to be radical disciples of the Gospel - to both critique and to energize by the quality of our lives and our dialogue - to stand at the crossroads by our very being, by our lives of prayer, and communal focus as well as by our ministries and our engagement within the social and political arenas.
As leaders in these times, where often our daily experiences are addressing diminishment, the care of the frail and vulnerable amongst our own membership, or the pains from past realities in our orders, we have this time together in these days in anticipation of re-igniting the flame for mission amongst us...
So I believe our mission over these days is not a "talkfest", but one of significant engagement amongst ourselves and with other seekers of God, who, combined as the monotheistic faiths, constitute more than half the world's population. Our small efforts can change us and our relationships within our cities and our local communities, and so contribute towards a new way of being together in hope.
and from the PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL REPORT
The report outlined the action and steps have been taken to address recommendations from the 2008 Assembly which met under the theme of Our Australian Multicultural Church: Reality, Gift and Challenge. The information was given under the following headings:
Initial and ongoing formation in Australia and the Pacific and identification of resource people on cross-cultural issues
Facilitation of migration procedures for religious and candidates into Australia
Undertaking an audit of ministries/resources that have a multicultural focus
Leadership in the education for a multicultural church for Religious, Bishops, Priest and Pastoral Leaders
Intentionally supporting smaller Congregations
Sr Clare reported on relationships with the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference and activities associated with Professional Standards. She also highlighted details of a reviewed Education Committee and its new mandate; unexpected but welcome Government funding for $250,000 the work of ACRATH (Australian Catholic Religious Against the Trafficking in Humans); the excellent enrolments of the 2009 section of a three-year cycle Canon law course, sponsored jointly by the Canon Law Society of Australia and New Zealand and CRA.
She concluded:
The year has offered us much to reflect upon and then to act. I thank the council members for their commitment of time and collaborative team approach. The demands on us as leaders at this time in the history of the church and religious life are significant. Thanks go especially to Laurie Needham CFC who is unstinting in his commitment and attention to the tasks at hand. I thank all those leaders and members who have accepted representation on a number of church bodies. It is a privilege for me to represent you all as members of CRA. I believe that the prophetic and contemplative call of religious life is alive and well in our society.
ADDRESS given by PATRICK McINERNEY SSC
In the past, during the age of divergence, we could live in isolation from each other; we could ignore each other. Now, in the age of convergence, we are forced to live in one world. We increasingly live in a global village. We cannot ignore the other, the different. ... Hence, we humans today have a stark choice: dialogue or death! [1]
The crucial importance of dialogue was highlighted by Pope Benedict in August 2005 when he stated:
Interreligious and intercultural dialogue between Christians and Muslims [we can extend that to include believers from other religions] cannot be reduced to an optional extra. It is in fact a vital necessity, on which in large measure our future depends. [2]
In 2007 138 Muslim scholars wrote A Common Word. It is an open letter to the Pope, to the leaders of the Orthodox Churches, to the leaders of the Protestant Churches, and to "Leaders of Christian Churches, everywhere" ...The signatories raise the importance of interreligious dialogue to an even higher level when they state:
And to those who nevertheless relish conflict and destruction for their own sake or reckon that ultimately they stand to gain through them, we say that our very eternal souls are all also at stake if we fail to sincerely make every effort to make peace and come together in harmony. [3]
And so began Fr Patrick's address, Why Dialogue?
I have deliberately delayed on what dialogue is for two reasons. First, I want to ensure that we are all talking about the same thing.
Second, I want to reassure you that, despite its novelty, interreligious dialogue is not exotic, or esoteric. It does not require lots of specialised training (though solid formation in attitudinal change is surely and sorely needed).
It is in fact very ordinary, something you are all familiar with. It is fulfilling the Golden Rule common to all religions: "do to others what you would have them do to you" (Mt 7:12, Lk 6:31). But because it is with believers from other religions, it has wide-reaching implications that touch virtually every aspect of life, church, and society.
A Native American grandfather was talking to his grandson about how he felt after a tragedy had occurred.
He said: "I feel as if I have two wolves fighting in my heart. One wolf is the vengeful, angry, violent one. The other wolf is the loving compassionate one."
The grandson asked him: "Which wolf will win the fight in your heart?"
The grandfather answered: "The one I feed."
If you feed on ignorance, stereotypes, fears and suspicions about the 'stranger' among us who follows another religion, then there will be a clash of civilizations, but if you feed on knowledge, getting to know and appreciate your neighbour from other religions, cooperating with them, and they with you, then peace and harmony will flourish, "the developing history of humanity [will] be: a fraternal journey in which we accompany one another towards the transcendental goal which [God] sets for us." (Dialogue and Proclamation, 79)
references
[1] Leonard Swidler, Khalid Duran, and Reuven Firestone, Trialogue: Jews, Christians, and Muslims in Dialogue (New London, CT: Twenty-Third Publications, 2007) 1
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