Contemplative and Prophetic dialogue - the gift that Religious bring to our church and world.
President's Address to the National Assembly of Catholic Religious Australia
June 23, 2009
Clare Condon SGS
Welcome to the National Assembly of Catholic Religious Australia Australian Religious in a Multi-faith Society: Reality, Gift and Challenge.
I welcome our special guests and you leaders who could easily say: "I have too much to do, maybe I'll not come this year". Yet you are here. We have a number of apologies which are noted in our booklet for the Assembly.
I wish to acknowledge the apology from Archbishop Guiseppe Lazzarotto, the Papal Nuncio. I met with the Archbishop during the recent ACBC Conference and he assured me of his love and support for the Religious of Australia. I refer you to his letter at the front of the booklet. At my meeting with him, I indicated our openness and willingness to discuss with him any issues that might arise in regard to religious life in this country.
Last year at our Assembly, we shared perspectives about our place within multi-cultural Australia. During the past year, the Council for Catholic Religious Australia, sought to respond to these perspectives, then to develop, and expand on what was given to us.
In my written report, found in the Assembly booklet, the Council's responses are recorded, particularly in the areas of cross-cultural formation, the facilitation of migration procedures, and relationships with the wider church and society. I will take that report as being read. Any matters that emerge will be taken up in one of the business sessions during these days.
Since our last Assembly, significant events have, undoubtedly, happened in our lives and in those of our congregations. Some of you and your communities were severely affected by the bushfires of Victoria or the floods of North Queensland. We were all called to respond with care and compassion where we were able to do so. Amongst us there is a great network and sense of mutual support.
CHILDREN OF ABRAHAM
Our focus over these few precious days together will be clearly on a significant aspect of this multi-cultural society in which we now live - that of the multi-faith dimensions that this diversity brings into our lives - and it is diverse!
The Council felt we could not do justice to trying to capture the whole array of religious and non-religious belief systems now in our society. So we chose to limit our reflections to the monotheistic faiths - the children of Abraham - to listen, to dialogue, to seek greater understanding of our close relationships with these faiths - the Jewish tradition and the Islamic story. I acknowledge, that as we gather, we come with varied experiences of interreligious dialogue.
There are those whose involvement is extensive and national; those who are engaged at the local level; others in the academic area; some of us with limited interactions. So we hope to respect this diversity among us as we gain new insights during these days.
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.
In his recent visit to the Middle East, Pope Benedict XVI, at a meeting with organisations for religious dialogue at Notre Dame Centre Jerusalem on May 11, said
"While the differences we explore in interreligious dialogue may at times appear as barriers, they need not overshadow the common sense of awe and respect for the universal, for the absolute and for truth, which impel religious peoples to converse with one another in the first place ... They (our differences) provide a wonderful opportunity for people of different religions to live together in profound respect, esteem and appreciation, encouraging one another in the ways of God."
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. Gerard Hall in one of his papers reminds us that "true dialogue thrives on friendship and most importantly on service".
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.
Michael Crosby OFMCap states in his book Can Religious Life Be Prophetic?: "Authentic prophecy flows from the mystical experience" and "that the mystical experience is empty without its proclamation in prophecy".
I am always wary of those who automatically call religious life prophetic. I do believe that it can be who we are and what we do that leads to a prophetic imagination in a world driven by false values of greed, violence and dominance, but it is not automatic and it is not for us to name it as such. True prophecy can only be grounded in the work of the Spirit.
I was struck by the description of Religious Life in the propositions from last year's Synod on The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church, in the following terms:
"Religious life is born from hearing the Word of God, and embracing the Gospel as the norms of life. From the school of the Word, it continually re-discovers its identity and is converted into an 'evangelical witness' for the church and the world. Called to be living 'exegetes' of the Word of God (Benedict XVI), religious life is itself a word which God continues to speak in the church and to the world."
It seems to me this is a clear statement of the prophetic mission of religious life lived fully, and of its very nature within the church.
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.
Crosby further states out of his own American experience that:
"Every form of Religious Life is called to be prophetic in a situation that cannot be generalized to or deduced from some archetypal or abstract context. American Religious at the turn of 21st century, even in a context of galloping globalization cannot be equated with African Religious in a rural village or Asian Religious in a Hindu culture. Solidarity with the people among whom one lives involves one in a specific cultural setting with its specific issues."
Our dialogue is to be within our own specific Australian context. Our visitors from New Zealand, The Pacific and New Guinea will no doubt keep applying our dialogue to their own environments and there can be mutual learning.
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.
SURVEY OF RELIGIOUS
One aspect of the Council's work over the past twelve months that I do wish to highlight at the beginning of this Assembly, is the survey of Australian Religious in 2009.
Each one of you would have recently received a dreaded document called: "Survey of Religious Life in Australia 2009". We have a unique opportunity to capture the shape, the image, and the story of religious life lived now in 2009. The last survey was completed in the 1970's by Carmel Leavy OP. We have lived through extraordinary and radical change within that period of 30 to 40 years.
The idea for such a survey was noted by Mark Raper SJ at the 2008 Assembly. I thank Noel Connolly SSC, in particular, who has worked on numerous drafts with Bob Dixon from the ACBC Pastoral Office in devising this questionnaire. It has been piloted with eight congregations of various sizes. We, the religious men and women of Australia, are a diverse and complex group of people. That is the nature of the charismatic aspect of the church. We thrive on difference.
I plead with you to tackle these pages of questions. While you are here, encourage one another to complete the survey. Give a copy to any leaders who are not members of CRA. We wish to present the broadest possible story of religious life, to capture this moment of great change, transition and mission at the edges that we all sense and know instinctively is happening here in this country.
COVENANT
When I was preparing for these few days, I was delighted to find that the Hebrew Scriptural reading for this coming Friday, 12th week of Ordinary time, which we will use at our closing Eucharist is from the Book of Genesis, the story of Abraham's covenant with God and Sarah's giving birth to a child in her old age.
There would be some in the church, who are skeptical - who believe that religious life has lost its way, because we are no longer the civil service of church agencies as we were for many years in the Australian Church. Perhaps that period was the exception rather than the norm, if we attempt to scan the history of religious life in the church.
Religious life is neither age nor numbers specific. Many of our members although ageing in our communities are vital, energetic, prayerful and faith-filled people as were Abraham and Sarah. As God said to Abraham and to Sarah (I am sure that she too was included). "I will establish my Covenant, a Covenant in perpetuity, to be your God and the God of your descendants after Abraham." (Gen17:21-22).
This is the heritage of the three faiths that we will explore and converse about over these days.
Perhaps it is our time and our gift to be instruments of harmony and peace amongst our diversity in Australia. We can be a small part of the processes for justice, freedom, reconciliation, transformation, living side by side in harmony and respect, overcoming divisions, hatred and suspicion.
Let us be imaginative in our engagement, trusting that dialogue is a "sacred communication in which participants witness to the truth of their own faith as well as being open to a new experience of the truth in the encounter".
photos
top: CRA President Clare Condon SGS delivers her President's Address on the first afternoon of the assembly and (above) speaks with on the the Children of Abraham, Mahsheed Ansari, a young Muslim woman, after a deeply engaging session on the morning of day two.
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