May 23, 2013

coresponsibility in communion

This week I was privileged to attend and present at the Great Grace Conference, an event hosted by the Archdiocese of Sydney to commemorate 50 years since the opening of the Second Vatican Council. The keynote address and workshops proved dynamic and engaged head on with the issues that confront the Church and its mission, including the challenge of modernity, the need to address the education of the laity, and issues of authority and power, among others. Thank you to the 100 or so participants who attended my own workshop over the past two days which focused on the theme of ‘co-responsibility’ and lay leadership in the Church.

The conference dinner, held last night, brought together a remarkable mix of delegates, bishops, theologians and lay leaders in the Church. It was good to catch up with new and old friends, including Robert Tilley of the Catholic Institute of Sydney and the University of Notre Dame, Matthew Tan of Campion College, Byron and Francine Pirola of the Marriage Resource Centre in Zetland, an inspiring couple of the Neocatechumenal Way, and the UK’s Jack Valero of CatholicVoices (pictured), a bold and pioneering lay-led media initiative that began in 2010 and that has just established itself in Melbourne (I’ll be blogging more about this initiative in weeks to come). The conference concludes today with addresses from Tracey Rowland and Bishop Mark Coleridge. Next week takes me north to the Gold Coast for the National Pastoral Planners Network Conference where I’ll be presenting on strategic planning within church communities.

For now, here is a summary of my ‘Great Grace’ presentation on co-responsibility which may be of interest to laypersons, religious or clergy in service of the Church (for those who prefer to listen, an audio file of the live workshop is now available here):

Since the Second Vatican Council the concept of ‘collaboration’ has been the dominant framework through which the relationship of laity to the ministry of the clergy has been read. However, that began to change on 26 May, 2009, when Pope Benedict XVI, in an address to the Diocese of Rome, raised the term ‘co-responsibility’ as an appropriate hermeneutic through which to interpret the role of laypersons in the Church.

This concept of ‘co-responsibility’ has surfaced as an explicit theme of the Church’s self-understanding only in recent decades. Even then, the idea appears in outline, and occasionally, rather than in a fully elaborated or systematic manner. When it does appear, the primary contexts in which the term ‘co-responsibility’ is employed in the official documents of the Church include the relationship between local churches, the workings of the college of bishops, the bond between nations, and the relationship of the Church and Christians to civil society. The term appears in the Catechism of the Catholic Church only once, again in the context of the duties of Christians toward the common good (cf. CCC n.2240).

To my knowledge, the first magisterial application of the term ‘co-responsibility’ to the laity appears in John Paul II’s 1988 Apostolic Exhortation Christifideles Laici, Article 21:

The Church is directed and guided by the Holy Spirit, who lavishes diverse hierarchical and charismatic gifts on all the baptised, calling them to be, each in an individual way, active and coresponsible.

The third chapter of the exhortation makes clear the context of this common responsibility – it is for the Church’s mission in the world which includes witness and proclamation of their communion with Christ. The document gives sparse attention to the responsibilities of laity within the Church, more concerned as John Paul II was at the time with a perceived “‘clericalisation’ of the lay faithful” and associated violations of church law.

The term is repeated ten years later in John Paul II’s comments at General Audience on the Holy Spirit. Here he remarked, “[the laity’s] participation and co-responsibility in the life of the Christian community and the many forms of their apostolate and service in society give us reason, at the dawn of the third millennium, to await with hope a mature and fruitful ‘epiphany’ of the laity.” In this instance ‘co-responsibility’ is understood to embrace both the active contribution of laity within the Church’s life as well as their social mission beyond it.

Taken together, these early references do not supply us with a fully elaborated theology of co-responsibility. However, they do express an increasing consciousness of the agency of laypersons in the world as well as some recognition of their involvement in the Church. Laypersons contribute in both spheres, ad intra and ad extra, through their Spirit-led witness and baptismal discipleship.

Benedict XVI’s interventions

It was on the 26 May, 2009, that the term ‘co-responsibility’ first appeared in the thought of Pope Benedict, in continuity with the outline offered by John Paul II but with an added, distinguishing element that raises the profile of the concept for the Church’s self-understanding. The occasion was the opening of the annual Ecclesial Convention of the Diocese of Rome. Expressing the need for renewed efforts for the formation of the whole Church, Benedict insisted on the need to improve pastoral structures,

. . . in such a way that the co-responsibility of all the members of the People of God in their entirety is gradually promoted, with respect for vocations and for the respective roles of the consecrated and of lay people. This demands a change in mindset, particularly concerning lay people. They must no longer be viewed as ‘collaborators’ of the clergy but truly recognised as ‘co-responsible’ for the Church’s being and action, thereby fostering the consolidation of a mature and committed laity.

It’s important to affirm that Benedict’s appeal for a new mentality and recognition of co-responsibility falls within the specific context of lay ministry in the Church, and not simply their involvement in worldly mission. In this statement, Benedict has in mind those “working hard in the parishes” who “form the core of the community that will act as a leaven for the others.” These ideas recur, almost verbatim, three years later in Benedict’s message to the International Forum of Catholic Action.

While, again, no systematic theology of co-responsibility appears in Benedict’s thought, he has introduced a degree of specificity to the term by way of a significant negation. The co-responsibility of the laity is not to be interpreted as a ‘collaboration’ in church ministry fitting to clergy alone, and therefore not as derivative in nature, but as an integral and authentic participation, an ecclesial responsibility, that is proper to laypersons themselves. It is because this contribution of laypersons is real, legitimate and essential to the Church’s life that it is to be given practical support in the form of appropriate structures. The significance of this statement by Benedict is best appreciated in the light of previous statements of the magisterium on the role of the laity vis-à-vis the Church and ordained ministry.

The 1997 Instruction

Pope Benedict’s application of the term ‘co-responsibility’ to laypersons is particularly striking when read beside the 1997 instruction, issued by the Holy See some 15 years earlier, entitled “On Certain Questions Regarding Collaboration of the Lay Faithful in the Ministry of Priests.”

I singled out this document for it well represents the predominant thinking of the magisterium on the relation of the laity and ordained within the Church’s unity. The instruction sought to reinforce the essential difference between the clergy and laity in the light of a perceived blurring of the boundaries in ministry that risked “serious negative consequences” including damage to a “correct understanding of true ecclesial communion.” While the document affirms the common priesthood of all the baptised and sets the ministerial priesthood within that context, the Instruction nevertheless promotes what Richard Gaillerdetz describes as a “contrastive” or categorical theology of the laity.

Specifically, the Instruction defines laypersons from a hierarchiological perspective with their theological status determined by two points of contrast with the ordained – the first, the ultimately secular character of the lay vocation in contradistinction to the ‘spiritual’ concerns of the ordained, and, secondly, the ministry of the baptised is differentiated from the ministry of the ordained by “the sacred power” (sacra potestas) uniquely possessed by the latter. Indeed, as Gaillerdetz observes, the Vatican instruction suggests that the fullness of ministry resides, by virtue of this sacral power, with the ordained alone.

On the basis of these two theological presuppositions – the ascription of laity to the secular realm and the ‘fullness of ministry’ to the ordained – the activity of the laypersons within the Church is cast as a ‘collaboration’ in the ministry of the ordained without a positive or integrated theological basis of its own. It must be said that the absence of such a theology can be explained, in part, by the purpose of the Instruction – it is a corrective, disciplinary document that seeks to uphold, quite rightly, the unique charism of the ordained. Still, as the Australian theologian Richard Lennan observes,

While that concern is proper, [such] documents tend to provide little encouragement to further reflection on the meaning of baptism, the possibility of ‘ministry’ for the non-ordained as other than a response to an emergency or an exception, or the implications of church membership for witnessing to the gospel in the communion of the church, rather than simply ‘in the world.’

The apprehension or hesitancy of this early Vatican instruction toward the status of lay involvement in Church ministry makes the “change in mindset” advocated by Benedict all the more significant. If laypersons are to be viewed not simply as collaborators in a ministry that belongs to another, but genuinely co-responsible in ecclesial life, as Benedict avers, then renewed reflection is called for regarding the positive theological status of laypersons and of their service in the Church, one that stretches beyond the paradigm of ‘collaboration’ that has dominated the lay-clergy relation to date.

I find possibilities for this positive, more constructive, and less contrastive, approach of the laity in the documents of the Second Vatican Council itself. Here we identify sound ecclesiological bases for the form of co-responsibility endorsed by Pope Benedict, flowing from the idea of communion that underpins the Council’s thought.

The Church as Communion

Returning to deeper biblical, patristic and liturgical sources clear of the juridical, extrinsicist tendencies of neoscholasticism, the communio ecclesiology of Vatican II expresses two primary insights. The first, a recovery of baptism as the primal sacrament of Christian life – prior to subsequent distinctions in charism, vocation or office; the second, a renewed appreciation of the Church as an icon of the Trinity, a relationship that promotes a mutuality of exchange between believers as an expression of the unity-in-diversity, the communion, that God is.

Lumen Gentium sought to ground all Christian vocations in what Kenan Osborne describes as a “common matrix” of baptismal faith for it is the entire people of God that are “by regeneration and anointing of the Holy Spirit… consecrated into a spiritual house and a holy priesthood,” “made one body with Christ, sharers in the priestly, prophetic and kingly functions of Christ” and so “share a common dignity from their rebirth in Christ, a true equality.” As Chapter 5 of Lumen Gentium avers, each member of the ecclesial body, baptised and confirmed in the Holy Spirit, shares “the same vocation to perfection” and all people are commissioned to the mission of the Church, not in a derivative way, but as Lumen Gentium 33 emphasises, they are called to this mission “by the Lord Himself”.

However, it is important to note that these gifts – baptismal regeneration, the tria munera of Christ, an equality in dignity and in the call to the heights of holiness – are ascribed to the entire christifideles, to all the faithful or People of God in their Christian vocation, and are not particular or distinguishing of the laity per se.

A Theology of the Laity

In seeking to identify a unique or distinctive element apropos the laity, scholars have pointed elsewhere in the conciliar documents, especially Lumen Gentium 31. This text directs attention to the distinct ‘secular character’ of the lay vocation in contrast to the ‘sacred’ ministry of the ordained: “to be secular is the special characteristic of the laity . . . the laity, by their very vocation, seek the kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs and by ordering them according to the plan of God.”

The overall thrust of this and other documents leads the theologian Aurelie Hagstrom to conclude, “this secular character must be an essential part of any theology of the laity since it gives the specific element in any description of the laity’s identity and function. The peculiar character of the laity is not only a sociological fact about the laity, but also a theological datum.” In short, Hagstrom interprets these documents as raising the ‘secular character’ of the laity to the level of metaphysics, as belonging to the ontological status of the lay vocation as such. To be lay is to be immersed in the secular, or so it is proposed.

However, questions can be raised about the theological adequacy of such a presentation and its support in the breadth of the conciliar documents. For one, the subcommittee responsible for Lumen Gentium 31 – that section of the constitution that refers to the laity’s ‘secular character’ – did not intend this to stand as a reference to their ontology, as pertaining to the core of their being, but rather a ‘typological description’ of the situation of the laity, that is, a description of how lay men and women typically live, but not exclusively so (cf. the relatio of John Cardinal Wright). This original intent of the Council Fathers challenges a view that would limit the proper responsibility of laypersons to the external life of the Church, that is, ‘in the world’ alone.

What is more, as Archbishop Bruno Forte points out, it is in fact the whole Church that the Council situates within the world as a leaven, in both Lumen Gentium and Gaudium et Spes. Forte goes as far as to predicate ‘laicity’ not of a specific subset of the Church – that is, of its non-ordained members – but of the entire Church that serves the world as the “universal sacrament of salvation.” These conciliar perspectives challenge a conception of the Church in dichotomous terms, of clergy as the apolitical men of the Church; the laity as the less ecclesially committed, politically involved, ‘men of the world.’

The heart of the issue is that to define laypersons by an exclusively ‘secular character’ in contradistinction to the ‘sacred’, ecclesial ministry of clergy renders genuine co-responsibility within the life of the Church difficult if not problematic. As intimated, as long as laypersons are defined exclusively by an identity and function in ‘the world’ without taking into adequate account the reality of their witness within the Church, then their involvement in Church ministry can appear only a concession, an anomaly or even a usurpation of Church service that belongs properly and fully to the ordained alone. What is more, the definition of laity by a secular vocation stands in contrast to the pastoral reality of many thousands of laypeople engaged in church ministries which are obviously not secular. As Lennan concludes, the practice of Church ministry by lay men and women, the very reality of their co-responsibility within the contemporary Church, presently outstrips the theology and church policy regarding such matters. Lay ecclesial ministers such as ourselves are doing something in the Church that, ontologically speaking, appears incongruous for their ‘proper’ place has been read as being ‘in the world.’

Co-responsibility of Order and Charism

In moving beyond a “dividing-line model”, a hardened distinction of laity and clergy in isolated realms, it is helpful to consider the place given by the Council to the exercise of charisms within the Church’s mystery. Prior to the Council, the charismatic gifts of the Spirit were treated by theology primarily within the context of spirituality, as the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the human soul of the individual believer. Considered extraordinary, transient and isolated in experience, the charisms of the Spirit were not integrated into a broader ecclesiological framework and so their relation to the sacraments, the life and mission of the Church remained largely overlooked.

Building on the insights of Congar and other proponents of the ressourcement movement, Vatican II witnessed a recovery of the pneumatological foundations of the Church as presented in the writings of St Paul. A strong integration of the activity of the Spirit within the Church can be found in Lumen Gentium 12 with consequence for our theme of co-responsibility:

It is not only through the sacraments and the ministries of the Church that the Holy Spirit sanctifies and leads the people of God and enriches it with virtues, but, “allotting his gifts to everyone according as He wills,” He distributes special graces among the faithful of every rank. By these gifts, He makes them fit and ready to undertake the various tasks and offices which contribute toward the renewal and building up of the Church . . . Those who have charge over the Church should judge the genuineness and orderly use of these gifts and it is especially their office not indeed to extinguish the Spirit but to test all things and hold fast to that which is good.

While it is true that the Council is not here making an explicit link between charism and lay ministry per se, it does provide a foundation for understanding leadership by laypersons as something other than an exception, usurpation or offshoot of ordained ministry. In grounding the life of the Church in the work of the Spirit, the Spirit of Christ who ‘co-institutes’ the Church by the giving of gifts, the Council grounds all ecclesial activity, all “tasks and offices,” in the inseparable divine missions of both the Word and Spirit.

In the post-conciliar era it was Congar especially who would bring out the consequence of this unity of Christ and Spirit in the Church’s being for our understanding of ministry, including on the part of laity. In a 1972 article Congar takes issue with the largely ‘christomonist’ approach of the Church and ministry that had dominated Catholic ecclesiology since the age of high scholasticism. Congar critiques this linear and predominantly vertical perspective with acuity:

“Christ makes the hierarchy and the hierarchy makes the Church as a community of the faithful.” Such a scheme, even if it contains a part of the truth, presents inconveniences. At least in temporal priority it places the ministerial priest before and outside the community. Put into actuality, it would in fact reduce the building of the community to the action of the hierarchical ministry. Pastoral reality as well as the New Testament presses on us a much richer view. It is God, it is Christ who by his Holy Spirit does not cease building up his Church.

This richer view of the ‘building up’ of the Church’s life is indeed offered by Lumen Gentium 12 in its recognition of the Spirit’s bestowal of gifts on “the faithful of every rank,” on the entire christifideles. In renewing and building up the Church’s life, the Spirit is understood to operate throughout the entire community of God’s people, disclosing the Church as other than a pyramid whose passive base receives everything from the apex. The laity are indeed subjects of the Spirit’s action as persons of baptismal faith.

This appreciation of the entire Church as anointed by the Holy Spirit (LG 4), as entrusted with Scripture and tradition as Dei Verbum 10 insists, and with charisms of the Spirit that bear structural value for the Church, opens the way for recognition of lay ministry qua ministry for the life of the Church and its mission. In the light of a pneumatological ecclesiology, the activity of laity surfaces not as derivative, a mere collaboration in the ministry of another, but, as Benedict intimates, a genuine co-responsibility for the sake of communion with God in Christ by the Holy Spirit.

While affirming the Spirit’s guidance by “hierarchical and charismatic gifts”, the Council never successfully integrated these christological and pneumatological aspects of ecclesial life. They were simply placed side by side (cf. LG 4). As long as this integration of hierarchical order and charism remains lacking, the co-responsibility of laypersons within the Church risks being read by Catholics against, or even as a threat, to the unique charism of the ordained who act uniquely “in the person of Christ the Head.” In other words, there is a risk of distinguishing ordained ministries from lay ministries by associating Christ with the former and the Holy Spirit with the latter, a solution that is clearly inadequate. If the co-responsibility of the laity is to be fruitfully realised in the life of the Church, its future theology must hold charism and order, the missions of the Spirit and Christ, in unity without confusion or separation.

It has been suggested by Gaillardetz that the ordained priest, in that “discovery of gifts” described by the Council, directs and oversees the entire local community while, for the most part, the lay minister serves only within a particular area of ministry and does not exercise leadership of the community as a whole. To locate the charism of the ordained in the particular gift of leadership of the entire community upholds the principle that no matter how much pastoral work one does or how competent one becomes, the non-ordained person never ‘forms’ or ‘rules’ a community as a leader in the sense in which a cleric does. However, such an understanding of the unique charism of the ordained still permits recognition of other forms of Spirit-led leadership within the communion, under the oversight and with the encouragement of the ordained.

Though the integration of charism and order within the Council’s document was never achieved, there are within its letter foundations for an appreciation of ordained ministry not in opposition or above the Spirit-filled reality of the body but firmly within it as the apostolic principle of order and oversight of the local community. It is in recognising the Church’s constitution by both the missions of the Word and Spirit, in the ministry of the apostles and the Spirit given at Pentecost, that we can move toward a theology of co-responsibility that supports and extends the reality of both lay and ordained ministry vivifying the life of the contemporary Church.

As a final observation, it may well be the unfolding momentum of ‘the new evangelisation’ that offers the zeal and occasion for co-responsibility to be practiced with greater intensity in the mission and ministries of the Church. The new ecclesial movements, for one, have manifest the way in which the historical shape of the Church can be shaped by a renewed appreciation of the work of Christ and the Spirit, order and charism, clergy and the laity within a communion of faith, as endorsed by my conference paper.

Conclusion

‘Co-responsibility’ remains a developing concept that is to be understood in the context of the Church’s life as a communion. Tracing the appearance of the term within magisterial thought, I see the interventions of Pope Benedict XVI on the subject as particularly significant for the Church’s self-understanding. In differentiating ‘co-responsibility’ from mere ‘collaboration’, Benedict has prompted renewed thinking about the theological integrity of ministry by laypersons and the relationship of this growing service within the Church to divinely-given hierarchical order. It is through ongoing reflection on both the christological and Spirit-filled foundations of the Church, the missions of Christ and the Spirit in the ecclesial body, that the practice of co-responsibility, already growing at the level of pastoral practice, may be matched by a coherent theology that strengthens the contribution of laypersons in the decades to come.

Tagged Benedict XVI, Church, collaboration, communion, coresponsibility, ecclesiology, evangelisation, holiness, Holy Spirit, John Paul II, laity, leadership, ministry, ressourcement, Vatican II, Yves Congar
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May 3, 2013

our Catholic schools

It is conference season with a gathering in the Sydney Archdiocese on Vatican II, clergy formation days, and a meeting of the National Pastoral Planners Network on the Gold Coast, all in the next three weeks. I’ll be kicking it off by travelling to Canberra next week for a keynote address at a colloquium of Marist teachers and school leaders.

It will no doubt be a diverse audience with various experiences and understandings of the Church and the role of schools within its mission. After reading the documents of the Congregation of Catholic Education and bringing to mind the momentum of the new evangelisation, I entitled the address “The Evangelising School: Educating In and For Communion” and aim to present something accessible and personally evocative for the participants. Here are some excerpts from the address which may stir your own thoughts about the role, intentionality and influence of our Catholic schools with regards to faith:

Last year I travelled throughout the Diocese of Parramatta, which encompasses the Western suburbs of Sydney, and spoke with some 2,000 people about their hopes and aspirations for our Church. The role of our Catholic schools in the faith of our children was high on the agenda. What became apparent is that the rationale and expected outcomes of Catholic schools in regards to religion is anything but a settled question.

Is the Catholic school genuinely responsible for the spiritual lives of our children and to what extent? As participation in Catholic parishes continues to decline, how does this position schools as centres of evangelisation for young people and their families? What responsibility lies with school families themselves for the faith of the young, named as they are by the Church as the primary educators and nurturers of baptismal faith? Then there are the increasing numbers of non-Catholic students in our schools. What impact should this phenomenon have, if any, on our goals and self-understanding as Catholic schools, as avowedly Catholic institutions? One suspects that in the face of such questions and the variety of views that surround them that many Catholics, both the loosely affiliated and the deeply committed, are ambivalent about the school as a centre of faith and evangelisation. Indeed, it would be fair to suggest that for some observers the Catholic faith and schools appear a ‘forced fit’, partners that would be better off going their separate ways; still others argue that the divorce has already taken place – schools have left the faith or the faith has left our schools – and we are now left to bicker about the children.

While such a fatalistic reaction is easy, even tempting, demanding little effort or commitment to change, it is as deficient as the ‘spotless sunshine’ of the optimist – both attitudes are too certain of the outcome. The social and cultural context in which we live and teach has changed, irrevocably, and not always in a positive direction. However, the proper Christian response to changing circumstance is hope, recognising the past and present moment do not exhaust all possibilities and that all times and cultures can yet encounter Christ as the path of life. In that spirit, I would like to share a few comments on Catholic schools as centres of evangelisation in the twenty-first century. In particular, I bear in mind our many lay teachers who increasingly shape our Catholic schools once dominated by religious brothers and sisters, and their significant influence in the lives of not only students but school families and indeed colleagues within the learning community.

The Year of Faith and ‘The New Evangelisation’

In October 2012, Pope Benedict XVI inaugurated a Year of Faith to bring the task of evangelisation to the fore. Commemorating fifty years since the opening of the Second Vatican Council (1962-5), the pontiff invited the universal Church to reflect anew on the meaning of faith and the mission that flows from faith – the mission to proclaim the Risen Jesus “to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Pope Benedict and his predecessor, John Paul II, spoke often of ‘a new evangelisation’ that sought to be realised, including within our Catholic school communities which share the joys and demands of faith. To what does this term, ‘the new evangelisation,’ refer and what claim does it make on the life of our Catholic school communities?

While it is anticipated that Pope Francis will soon issue an encyclical on this very subject, we can already detect something of its meaning in the writings of previous popes, including Blessed John Paul II. In 1990, the polish pontiff remarked that the Church directs its missionary activity to basically three situations:

. . . peoples, human groups, socio-cultural contexts in which Christ and his Gospel are not known . . . Then there are Christian communities which have adequate and solid ecclesial structures, are fervent in faith and life . . . Finally, there exists an intermediate situation, often in countries of ancient Christian tradition, but at times also in younger Churches, where entire groups of the baptised have lost the living sense of the faith or even no longer recognise themselves as members of the Church, leading an existence which is far from Christ and from his Gospel. In this case there is a need for a ‘new evangelisation’ or a ‘re-evangelisation.’ (John Paul II, Redemptoris Missio 33).

The ‘new evangelisation’ appeals to an ‘in between’ or intermediate group of people who have indeed heard the Gospel, and so are not new to its announcement, but who nevertheless do not participate actively or regularly in the Church’s life. That is, we could not yet describe this last group of Catholics as intentional disciples of Jesus. By ‘the new evangelisation,’ John Paul II sought to direct the Church toward missionary outreach in traditionally Christian nations to whom the Gospel is known but whose faith nevertheless lacks fervour and genuine witness in life. As the New Testament reminds us, not all those who encounter Jesus find him convincing or compelling as the face of God.

It would also be fair to suggest that this third group represents many of our school families and even teachers – baptised Catholics who no longer feel close to the Church, whose practice is perhaps occasional rather than continuous, and who have become distant from their faith. Australia has certainly been recognised on an official basis as one of those nations where Christian faith has played an integral part in the development of our culture, law and society and yet remains today on the sidelines rather than at the heart of the nation. Pope Benedict himself would aver,

This is certainly a form of suffering which, I would say, fits into our time in history, and in which we generally see that the so-called ‘great’ Churches seem to be dying. This is true particularly in Australia, also in Europe, but not so much in the United States. (Benedict XVI, “Address to the Diocesan Clergy of Aosta: On Critical Issues in the Life of the Church”)

If our Catholic schools are to become centres of a new evangelisation, reaching out to school families, students and staff with the vitality of the Gospel, then we need to acknowledge, with candour, the challenges that face us at this time, both within the Church and in the wider culture.

Challenges and Promise

Of course, the most glaring challenge for ‘a new evangelisation,’ a renewed outreach to others in faith, whether in the school or the parish, is the sexual abuse crisis which has undermined the credibility of the Church not only in Australia but around the world. In an address delivered in Glasgow, Cardinal George Pell noted with realism, “It does not need to be said that this [the sexual abuse crisis] is the most important and powerful barrier to the New Evangelisation” (Address at St Andrew’s Conference, Glasgow).

In the light of terrible crimes committed by some clergy and maladministration on the part of some bishops and religious orders, many Catholics, including our school families, can feel less than inclined to engage with the larger Church or ‘institutional church’ as it is often put. Thus, the divide between what happens in the school and the wider Church can seem unbridgeable, even desirable in the wake of the false witness of a few. The Australian theologian Richard Lennan comments on this situation,

It is surely undeniable . . . that in its structures of authority that the church today seems to be for many people not simply ‘other,’ but alien. It is in its ordained leaders and their actions and decrees that the church seems particularly unattractive: prone to intolerance, authoritarian attitudes, and, most shockingly and tragically of all, even to abusive and corrupt behaviours. As a result it is common for Catholics to group such features together as the expression of the ‘institutional church,’ which tends to mean the church that I do not like and would not want to be a part of. It is, perhaps, a particular temptation for those in schools to think that way: our school community tries to live by Gospel values and to give students a positive experience of discipleship, but it is not our job to promote, to defend, or even to accept a connection with the ‘institutional church’ (Richard Lennan, “Holiness, ‘Otherness’ and the Catholic School,” 404).

Lennan goes on to suggest that the practical upshot of this situation is the neat division between the school and the Church expressed in the claim that “our kids are good kids even if they don’t go to Mass.”

While not denying the reality and scandal of abuse, it is important to underline, for one, that such crimes and violations of trust do not represent a fulfilment of the Church’s nature or mission as Christ’s body but the gravest contradiction of it, an utter rejection and betrayal of the Gospel which the Church has been entrusted to proclaim from generation to generation. It should also be recalled that such abuse does not represent the total sum of the Church’s life. The Church has always done and will continue to do good in the Australian community. Many people still meet Christ in our Church’s life and are supported by our parishes and schools, as well as by the Church’s many works of charity, especially in welfare, health and aged care.

Forgetfulness of this ‘bigger picture’ in the midst of the current crisis can lead to Catholic school families and even teachers to turn away from the wider Church and its worshipping life or to remain silent on, or disengage from, its social advocacy on important issues. However, it is precisely the engagement of everyday Catholics ‘from below’ in the liturgy and the active mission of the Church that is needed now more than ever. In the long-term effort to restore credible witness to the house of God, our schools are critical in fostering future generations of Catholic believers who are not only well-informed, intelligent and critical thinkers but also holy men and women, disciples who bring life to faith and faith to life. The Second Vatican Council well describes this potential of the Catholic school:

. . . its proper function is to create for the school community a special atmosphere animated by the Gospel spirit of freedom and charity, to help youth grow according to the new creatures they were made through baptism as they develop their own personalities, and finally to order the whole of human culture to the news of salvation so that the knowledge the students gradually acquire of the world, life and humanity is illumined by faith. (Vatican II, Gravissimum Educationis 8).

While some Catholics have not lived this faith well, it does not render the Gospel any less integral to the human flourishing of our young people, the formation of their whole person and, indeed, the building up, through them, of what has been described as “a civilisation of love.”

School communities and teachers are well placed to bring about this new creation for it is they who face, firsthand, the array of issues that impact our social fabric. This includes alarming rates of suicide among young people, brought on by depression, family crises and social isolation, and the cult of a dehumanising materialism in which people have never had more but remain deeply and even dangerously unfulfilled.

In the midst of this fragmentation, which reveals a crisis in the idea of the human itself, Catholic schools stand to manifest before the wider community and before its own eyes the true meaning of the human person and the nature of authentic relationship. Grounded in the life of the Trinity, the divine unity of diverse persons, our schools can stand beside the family as a space of communion, characterised by mutual recognition and self-giving love, nowhere more so than in the primary school where young people are being socialised and grafted into concrete relationships with others, both their peers and the adults whom they trust. The stark reality is that for some of our young people the school community may provide a deeper experience of communion and unconditional love than the home, and these children can indeed be more valued here than in the marketplace where they are often regarded only for their status as consumers.

By educating in and for communion, Catholic schools can also serve as an evangelising centre for entire families who may never darken the door of a church or have any other experience of the Catholic faith beyond the walls of the school grounds. As I have proposed elsewhere, it is especially schools such as those of the Marists, filled with charism, an awareness of God’s Spirit manifest in human history, that can bring together the Church and the world. Marist schools can accomplish this by mediating or serving as a bridge between the traditional, mainstream Church and the lives of students and parents who may not be connected to parish or regular practice. As the theologian David Ranson has observed, religious institutes including the Marists are, in a sense, both ‘Church’ and ‘beyond Church,’ working at the margins with those who may never feel comfortable within the ordinary life and structures of the Church. On this note, a school principal once remarked to me that while some of his school families did not identify strongly as ‘Catholic’ they certainly felt ‘Marist.’ Such a sentiment points to the way in which schools can mediate the meaning of Catholic faith and a sense of belonging to a contemporary culture that remains hungry for a narrative by which to live and a community in which to live it.

The Practice of Evangelisation

While affirming all that our Catholic schools promise and already bring about through their care and nurturance of the young, our theme of evangelisation also presents forward challenges for each and all of us who represent the Church, whether we are conscious of this ecclesial witness or otherwise. The new evangelisation is not a phase or moment but the perennial mission of all the Catholic faithful, a deep and abiding responsibility to “speak the truth in love” (Eph. 4:15). In terms of its practice, it has been my experience that among the first responses of schools, as it is for parishes and dioceses as well, is to create appropriate structures to support that goal. This is to be commended. The establishment of committees for evangelisation, dedicated personnel as well as practical resources remind us that wanting to evangelise is never enough. We have to be organised to do so and reveal the power of evangelisation as something other than a Platonic dream. The Great Commission given to us by the Gospel, to “go and make disciples” (Matt. 29:18), should shape all of who we are as Catholic communities, including our structures, budgets, professional development, and the organisation and priorities of our time.

However, it must also be said that evangelisation should not be approached as yet another task of the school community, squeezed in between existing commitments, for such an approach inevitably leads to a rather bureaucratic response to the Church’s mission of outreach. Boxes are ticked and prayers are said, usually before and after meetings, but the deepest meaning of evangelisation can be missed, as a continuing conversion to the Gospel in all aspects of school and professional life. Of course, it is proper for schools and school systems to set benchmarks, to define goals and measures of evangelising activity, but these of themselves cannot ensure fruit without a conversion of heart on the part of teachers and school leaders.

While recognising the importance of structures in coordinating efforts and marshalling resources, the risk is that ‘evangelisation’ comes to be understood by the school community as the responsibility of one person, one group or one department rather than the entire body of students, teachers and parents that form the school community. The adult educator Jane Regan points out that it may be better to speak of the evangelising school or parish, noting,

When we use the [noun] evangelisation, there is the temptation to set it out as another activity the parish [or school] does – catechesis, liturgy, pastoral care, and evangelisation . . . Using the [verb] evangelising strengthens the commitment that who we are as Church – our mission and identity – is rooted in engaging in all activities through the lens of evangelisation (Jane Regan, Toward an Adult Church, 23-4).

Thus, for the evangelising school, the school sports day is not unconnected to the human flourishing which the Gospel promotes, social justice activities are not simply about good citizenship but involve recognising the dignity of others, and ourselves, made in the one image of God, and that the ‘faith of the school’ does not simply refer us to the school motto or point backwards to its origins but also points forwards to its aspiration, its witness of Gospel values as an ecclesial community, and its future commitment to ongoing conversion. The evangelising school will therefore relate all that it is and does to the evangelion, the Good News of the Gospel, which comes to us not only as a gift but an invitation to renewal, even change.

Conversion for each and for all

Ultimately, all discussion of evangelisation is self-implicating in that it presses us to consider the quality of our own discipleship and the extent to which we manifest the holiness that we seek to awaken in others. As Pope Paul VI points out, “The Church is an evangeliser, but she begins by being evangelised herself” (Evangelii Nuntiandi 15). By this statement, the pontiff recognised that we can only share what we ourselves have received into our life, that our own passion for, or else disinterest in, evangelisation reflects the extent to which we have been convinced by the person and message of Jesus of Nazareth, Son of God. The fruits that this self-conversion yields for others are manifold, as Paul VI would note, “Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses.” It is the quality of our Christian discipleship that is the most powerful form of evangelisation that we can offer students, their families and our colleagues, leaving an imprint in the experience and memories of others that can last a lifetime and shape their own discipleship, experience and perception of the Church.

Of course, conversion is never an easy business and demands of us an unvarnished reflection on any gap between who we profess to be as Catholic teachers, and as school communities, and who we really are. It could be suggested that too many of us are admirers of holiness but not enough of us seek to possess it for ourselves. The startling gift and project of ‘the new evangelisation’ is this – to realise that we are the Church we are waiting for.

In Season Four of the American political drama, the West Wing, a young man, Sam Seaborn, is running for a seat in the United States Congress. He returns backstage after an exuberant political rally organised to garner votes and complains to his campaign manager, “I’m preaching to the choir. You had me out there preaching to the choir. Why?!” The campaign manager replies with calm, “Because that’s how you get them to sing.” So it is for the Church – the first who need to hear the call of the new evangelisation are ourselves, those of us closest to the mission of our Church as it is lived in our parish and school communities. The depth of our listening to this call will express itself in the strength of our commitment to proclaim the Gospel to the young people in our care.

Our Catholic schools bear enormous potential as centres of evangelisation, bridging the gap between the traditional Church and those not embedded in parish or regular practice. The new evangelisation calls us to attend especially to those baptised Catholics among us who have lost a living sense of the beauty, goodness and truth of our faith, who no longer recognise the Gospel as the way of life. While structures and committees are a necessary part of this important work, the task of evangelisation ultimately demands something of each of us, our ongoing conversion and willingness to receive the Gospel as the heart of our identity and mission as Catholic disciples and the heart of our life and calling as Catholic schools.

Tagged Benedict XVI, charism, Church, communion, discipleship, evangelisation, John Paul II, leadership, Marists, mission, parenting, Parramatta, Pope Francis, schools, Vatican II
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April 24, 2013

getting started in ministry

Last week I met with a diocesan youth minister who was seeking advice on planning for parish communities and better coordinating their activities toward a unified mission. For me it was an opportunity to learn more about the organisation of other dioceses and their parishes which differ quite considerably across the country.

One of the recommendations that I made was that whether you are working within the context of a parish ministry, a religious order, or for a diocese it is essential to put aside some specific time for planning rather than jumping headfirst into frenetic activity.

Gregory of Nyssa, the fourth century Cappadocian Father, warned that the mere appearance of Christian activity and practice does not mean any genuine progress is being made. He likened directionless activity to

. . . those who toil endlessly as they climb uphill in sand. Even though they take long steps, their footing in the sand always slips downhill, so that, although there is much motion, no progress results from it. (The Life of Moses)

Genuine progress demands beginning on firm ground, including the effort to plan, otherwise we risk expending a lot of energy in ministries that make little progress or have little impact. As it has been put, without proper planning, direction and goals, we can be ‘paying people to be nice’.

Here are a few pointers which may be helpful for those just beginning in ministry as well as those further along in experience. These can assist both lay and ordained ministers to make the most of their opportunities and reduce the amount of energy lost to initiatives that are uncoordinated or ill-conceived from the start:

Understand the ecclesial context, history and organisational structure. One of the first things I did, and found helpful, was to request an organisational map of the diocese before all else. One of the advantages of working within the Catholic Church is that there will be a relatively firm structure, that is for sure! A map of these structures and relevant organisations within your diocese, parish, or religious network will help you identify who the stakeholders are, to identify those who link with your work and help you to avoid stepping on anyone’s toes! It is also important to quickly become familiar with the history of the context you are working in. This helps you understand people’s attitudes, opinions and actions in the present. All of this takes time, though after a year or so you should be picking up the ‘lay of the land’. If you don’t have a clear picture of the ecclesial landscape and dynamics you are working in it can be difficult to make genuine progress. After all, you can’t do it alone and need to collaborate with others.

Ensure ownership of your ministry by those you report to, as well as the provision of adequate resources to fulfil your ministry. This includes the need for your own ongoing formation. Accountability and governance are not only important dimensions of the Church as a human organisation but a part of the Church’s self-understanding as a theological reality. The Church is structured in such a way as to not only safeguard but to strengthen an apostolic proclamation from generation to generation. This means that those you report to, often an ordained minister, a vicar, a head of a religious institute or perhaps even a bishop, need to exercise oversight and take ownership of the work you have undertaken. Sometimes a helpful distinction is made between ‘responsibility’ and ‘accountability’ – you may be responsible for a particular work but someone ‘higher up the chain’ will be ultimately accountable for it. So regular meetings with your superior are a must. Your overseer also has responsibilities and they should support you not only in rhetoric but also in practical resources. All church organisations should be resourcing their people to succeed, not to fail, so it is important to ask for a budget that allows you to get the job done. If they could have done it for less or without expense, they would not have employed you in the first place! Finally, securing resources for your ministry also means ensuring you are not working in isolation and that you have opportunities to network with others and receive formation and/or supervision of some kind. Working in the Church means working with people and there is nothing more rewarding and challenging than that. Good supervision, networking with others and ongoing formation are essential for your longevity as a leader.

Establish a coherent framework for your ministry. Take youth ministry in a diocese for example. Is your ministry going to be parish-based, diocesan events-based, or a combination of these and in what proportion? No one can ‘do it all’ so what will your approach be, your principle message for young people, and what are the three goals you seek to achieve in the first year? Clarifying these basic goals and approaches to your ministry are important. It strikes me that in speaking of a ‘framework’ for your ministry those who take up an existing role often feel an expectation to simply duplicate what was before. However, again, if what had gone before was so successful or sustainable, it is doubtful that your predecessor would have moved on or that the organisation would have employed you to take it up. Once you familiarise yourself with the context and history, have the courage to begin to shape the goals that you discern as critical to the life of your community. You, also, need to own the work if you are to carry it out not only with competence but personal passion.

Build a reliable team throughout the planning process yet still assert leadership. As I’ve mentioned before, often Church organisations have strategic plans that no one really cares about other than its authors. No one else feels invested in the plan and so few are likely to respond to its initiatives. When you start out in your ministry, start collecting names and remembering profiles of good people with a proven record for getting things done. Remember, these may not be the people recommended to you by predecessors or the people currently in place! Ask the skilled and capable people you have identified for their views as you plan for your ministry. Not only are you getting wise advice from a gifted cohort but they may also form a future team that can help you turn the vision of your ministry into a reality. By having their say, people become genuine owners of a plan and you are on your way to building and nurturing a reliable team. Keep in mind this does not mean handing everything over to committee – it remains important to lead from the front and it is indeed an old saying that ‘if you want to kill something off send it to committee’. Work towards a style of leadership that is genuinely consultative but is unafraid to make decisions and exercise leadership when called for.

There are many other dimensions of good planning in ministry and while few of us, including myself, manage to apply or appropriate them all, it is helpful to have them before us as a resource for future thinking.

For those interested in further reflection on ministry, especially since the Second Vatican Council, the Sydney Archdiocese is hosting the “Great Grace” conference next month. It is well worth attending if you can. I’ll be there speaking on the subject of “co-responsibility” and you can read my abstract and those of others here.

As the landscape of ministry develops across our Church, I will be suggesting that it is indeed possible to affirm the integrity of ministry by the non-ordained and uphold the unique charism of the ordained without compromise or a diminishment of either. As so often happens in the Church, the practice of co-responsibility is outpacing the theology and Church policy in this area. Yet this does not necessarily mean a distortion is taking place. In fact, it can herald development that is authentic to our tradition, including our self-understanding as a ‘communion’.

I hope to share more reports on the Conference and reflections on ministry in posts to come.

Tagged Church, collaboration, diocese, discernment, leadership, ministry, mission, parish, pastoral planning, youth ministry
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April 12, 2013

dilemmas in planning

One of the best aspects of my role as a diocesan pastoral planner is the opportunity to meet with others engaged in similar projects, in parishes, ministry groups and ministry networks across Australia and abroad. This week was no different and the experiences that were shared brought home to me the very complexity of planning for church communities.

While pastoral planning sounds terribly bureaucratic and less glamorous than other aspects of ecclesial life, it is important for the reasons I’ve outlined in a previous post – to cultivate a clearly owned vision of identity and mission, to draw on the sense of faith that is given to all members, to match church structures with mission, and to enable faith communities to respond effectively and proactively to change rather than being passively shaped by outside forces.

All communities need to make plans because wanting to grow is not enough. We need to plan to grow and be explicitly organised to grow the faith of our members as well as to evangelise. Indeed, a long line of Church research reveals that making no plans for growth results in little or no growth every time. So without a commitment to planning, church communities and ministries do not grow and, in fact, risk decline.

Though the rationale for planning is clear, the reality is never so simple. Anyone who has attempted to plan for a parish, for youth leaders, youth groups or adult ministry knows how difficult it can be to cultivate ownership, engagement and commitment to a vision with even the best intentions.

So, why is planning in our church communities so difficult? Below are a few reasons that came to mind. If we can name some of these challenges upfront as we prepare to plan for our group or network, we can consider responses and adjust our strategies and expectations along the way.

Negotiating diversity in the group: all parishes, groups and ministry networks are marked by diversity of one form or another, whether it is ethnic background, social or economic status, education, theological literacy, or ecclesiological viewpoints to name only a few. This plurality complicates the pursuit of unitary goals within the group even while it offers a diversity of perspectives on faith and community.

Defining the problem and priorities: it follows from the above that achieving a consensus on the core issue or issues at the heart of the community’s life or, alternatively, the key priorities for its growth can be difficult. Even when a consensus is achieved within a group as to a decision or course of action, it can represent the ‘lowest common denominator’ that is acceptable to all members i.e. it can signify the least we can agree on. For this reason any consultation process on problems and priorities must be paired with leadership for good leaders, whether they be ordained or lay, can challenge communities to look further than they might otherwise be willing to for the sake of a stronger mission.

Cultivating ownership of the vision: too often the only persons truly engaged and who understand the strategic or ministry plan are its authors, usually a small group or select committee, while the community it is intended to serve may be scarcely interested or committed to its vision or contents. Planners cannot afford to be naïve to this reality, that few others are likely to regard ‘your’ plan as important as you do! However, rather than sink into resignation, this gap between the planners and the community provides you with the strongest spur to constant communication, including consultation throughout the process, the provision of regular feedback on progress and proposals, and bringing people ‘into’ the project as early as possible ahead of implementation. The bottom line is that you can never communicate enough.

Recognising limits of planning in an ‘open’ system: solving a problem within parish life is not the same as a problem of mathematics, such as solving an equation, nor is it the same as playing a game of chess. In the latter instances, the ‘mission’ is clear and it also clear when the problem has been resolved – the equation is solved or checkmate is declared. In planning for a church or faith group, however, the ‘problems’ never end because there is always something more that could be done in the name of the community’s life and mission. More realistically, the church leader or planner will say, ‘that’s good enough’ or ‘this is the best we can do for now.’ Those responsible for planning for church communities will tend to disappoint to the extent that they can never ‘solve the problems of the Church’, as it were, that others, somewhat naively, expect them to. Community expectations can be unrealistic and this explains the cynicism that leaders can encounter at the beginning of their planning process. Parishes and ministries are ‘open’ and complex systems, organic networks of relationships, both spiritual communions and human organisations, that are never closed, static or as ‘resolvable’ as they appear.

Before embarking on a planning process, it is good to have in view the many challenges that will arise in cultivating a common vision within a diverse and multidimensional Church. It also underscores the importance of networking with others in the field and sharing approaches in what is an intensely rewarding process that brings ecclesiology together with pastoral practice for the good of Christian faith, discipleship and mission.

Tagged Church, leadership, parish, pastoral planning, research, youth ministry
4 Comments

March 21, 2013

money money money

This week I read an interesting article by Cardinal Timothy Dolan of the Archdiocese of New York. You can read the full version here.

Dolan is a prominent figure in the American Church and a rising star in the universal Church, having made a big impression at the recent conclave (a journalist pointed out that if the cardinal-electors had elected Dolan as pope the other 5,000 bishops of the world might as well have taken the next 15 years off, because they’d never be seen or heard from again. In short, Dolan is incredibly articulate and he also doesn’t have an “off” switch).

Dolan’s article stood out because it provides a helpful insight into the complex issues involved in administering a diocese. Among other things, he underscores the need for parishes to support themselves financially (i.e. pay the bills) and to plan responsibly for their future life.

It makes for good reading. Whether you’re an ordained or lay minister, pastoral life coordinator, finance committee or pastoral council it provides a ‘bigger’ picture of Church than is often kept in view. While all dioceses and parishes differ in their financial resources and arrangements, there are a few points worth noting in Dolan’s article for all Catholic communities.

1. As a general rule, dioceses cannot be expected to carry parishes that cannot carry themselves.

It’s simply unsustainable. Think of your typical (if there is one) American, European or even Australian diocese. There are probably more churches than needed (perhaps stemming from an earlier ‘one village, one parish’ approach) and attendance is likely declining which diminishes financial contributions as well (unless those who remain pick up the slack). Meanwhile the costs of church maintenance continue to increase as historic buildings and facilities degrade. Obviously dioceses do not enjoy an endless supply of funds and risk the patrimony and viability of other ministries if it were to prop up every parish in need. Most dioceses expect their parishes to be largely self-sufficient for these reasons; religious orders usually expect their regional communities to do the same.

It was interesting to read in Dolan’s piece that the Archdiocese of New York has established Inter-Parish Financing (IPF) which enables stronger parishes to aid those in need. This seems like a good idea in principle, a form of distributive justice, just as the Vatican itself redistributes finance from established churches to developing ones. However, it appears from Dolan’s remarks that the IPF has not proven sustainable over the long term and needs reform in their context. Keep in mind that the NY Archdiocese also carries the costs of the upkeep of a great number of schools which is not the scenario for all dioceses. The upshot for Dolan’s archdiocese has been an operating deficit which he intends to address through the measures he outlines in the article (NB: the operating budget of the NY Archdiocese is $87 million which is far beyond the reality of most Australian dioceses!).

2. Dioceses balance significant demands which are not always recognised.

What do dioceses do with the financial contributions of parishes and its investment income? Dolan’s archdiocese is typical in providing pastoral services and resources that parishes cannot provide for themselves, at considerable cost.

There are the expenses of training seminarians and deacons for pastoral ministry, the employment of chancery staff, the financing of social support services not only for Catholics but for the wider community as well (think of our own CatholicCare closer to home), the need to support adult faith education, family and liturgical support, human resources and legal advice for parishes, the support of schools and the need to provide adequate housing for retired priests as well as healthcare, marriage tribunals, evangelisation initiatives, and loan facilities for the establishment of new parishes and the maintenance and upgrade of existing ones. The list goes on. Again, this makes it all the more important for parishes to fund their own activities to the extent that they can so that all can benefit from the greater resources that a diocese holds in trust.

3. Church revenue is a function of the quality of community life

While not addressed in Dolan’s article, it is a well-established fact that dynamic and missionary parishes attract larger and more consistent financial contributions than staid or listless ones. People contribute their time and money to communities that are life-giving, intentional in their mission and that value their belonging in explicit and tangible ways. People also contribute to communities that have transparent, credible and accountable leaders. It is no surprise that the crisis of legitimation experienced by the Church in the wake of the sexual abuse crisis in particular and poor pastoral practice in general has resulted in a weakened sense of belonging and, with that, a decline in the financial resources available to the Church to exercise its Gospel mission. Want to increase your parish revenue? Become a community that people value.

I’ll be keeping an eye on developments in Dolan’s archdiocese as it is a communicative and dynamic one and will share further news as it comes to light. Dolan’s article underlines sound financial governance as a must for every community of faith.

Tagged Cardinal Dolan, Church, diocese, finance, leadership, New York, parish, pastoral planning
1 Comment

March 14, 2013

the great hope of Pope Francis

Some eight hundred years ago a young soldier reposed in prayer at a wayside chapel on the outskirts of Assisi. It was there that the young man, named Francis, heard and heeded the divine will of God, ‘Go, repair my house which as you see is falling into ruin.’ This moment of great faith and also of intense tribulation for the Church of Christ provides a fitting backdrop to the announcement of Jorge Mario Bergoglio’s election as the 266^th Bishop of Rome, with the appellation of Pope Francis.

Bergoglio, until this morning the Jesuit Archbishop of Buenos Aires, presents as an ideal candidate to renew the Church in the present, beset as it is by the ongoing scandal of the sexual abuse crisis and an accompanying collapse of credibility in the public square, widespread persecution in Africa, Asia and the Middle East, the challenge of rapid and aggressive secularisation in the West, and significant issues of church governance that, it must be admitted, have hindered the ability of the Church to respond effectively to these concerns as well as the broader needs of human culture and society.

Of course, it is naïve to assume that any one figure can bring about the conversion that remains the responsibility of the whole body of the Catholic faithful and it can be too easy to either acclaim or criticise those called to a service of leadership from afar while one sits comfortably on their hide. Naïve it would be, too, to assume a simply address of Church structures will provide the necessary medicine for the afflictions suffered by the Church on account of its members who, like the first disciples, know their poverty of spirit all too well.

Nevertheless, it is true that ‘leadership matters’ and it arrives with the responsibility to take up these great challenges with courage and the conviction that the current woes of the Catholic Church are not a fulfilment of its nature but a contradiction to its mission as the ‘universal sacrament of salvation’ (Lumen Gentium 48). In other words, leadership brings with it the demands and gift of hope, a hope that brings the future into the present and affirms that this moment of history, filled as it may be with trial and tribulation, does not exhaust all possibilities.

Doubtless much ink will be spilt about Pope Francis and his capacity to realise these possibilities in the years ahead. Already there has been a positive assessment for his acute concern for the poor, a virtue that is indeed evident throughout his episcopal career in Latin America, and for his prayerful acceptance of the responsibilities of the Petrine Office. The inspiration of Bergoglio’s papal name in the mendicant saint of Assisi augurs well for a pontificate marked by a focus on a renewed mission of evangelisation which responds to the poor, to poverty in its social and spiritual dimensions.

Who are these ‘poor’? There are those poor in spirit who have yet to hear the Good News of the Risen Jesus, sent from the Father and encountered in the Spirit; there are the poor in discipleship who have heard but not received this living Word within the depths of their life; there are the poor in circumstance who cry out for the bare necessities of life and who make a claim on the Church’s faith, and there is the poverty of the Church itself which remains ever incomplete in its human dimension, in need of conversion to the source of its life.

The credentials of Pope Francis to take on this missionary enterprise are certainly in evidence. In an interview with Vatican Insider, a media service run by the daily newspaper La Stampa, Bergoglio called the Church to return to its foundational ‘memory’, the memory of Christ and the urgency of his Gospel message. Reflecting on the current Year of Faith, the then-Archbishop reminded his audience that faith is not given to us for our own consolation or comfort but as a gift for others:

Benedict XVI has insisted on the renewal of faith being a priority and presents faith as a gift that must be passed on, a gift to be offered to others and to be shared as a gratuitous act. It is not a possession, but a mission. This priority indicated by the Pope has a commemorative purpose: through the Year of Faith we remember the gift we have received. And there are three pillars to this: the memory of having been chosen, the memory of the promise that was made to us and the alliance that God has forged with us. We are called to renew this alliance, our belonging to the community of God’s faithful.

It is memory of our election, the promises of God and our communion with Him that reminds us who we as Church. Like those who suffer amnesia, the Church, without this fundamental threefold memory, loses its sense of self, its very identity, and so its purpose. The Archbishop went on to remark,

We need to avoid the spiritual sickness of a Church that is wrapped up in its own world: when a Church becomes like this, it grows sick. It is true that going out onto the street implies the risk of accidents happening, as they would to any ordinary man or woman. But if the Church stays wrapped up in itself, it will age. And if I had to choose between a wounded Church that goes out onto the streets and a sick withdrawn Church, I would definitely choose the first . . .

Bergoglio identifies the need of the Church to resist insularity, to move from ecclesiolatry to a new evangelisation, from fear of the world’s unknown dimensions to an embrace of Gospel life within its very domain. This is the path of conversion that will bring renewed vitality and hope to the Church catholic. It is ‘on the street’ and in the public square that the Church will regain its innocence and vigour; it is in world-engaging mission that the Church grows young.

Finally, the election of a Latin American to the papacy, the first non-European pope for twelve centuries, recalls for the Church its essential universality, a ‘Pentecostal’ breadth and diversity that implies a universality of mission, a mission not only to the West but ad gentes, to the East and global south. While differing in specific contexts, there is a continuity of global need that must enliven the Church’s faith: pressing issues of social and economic injustice, including gross exploitation of women and children, the endangered rights of the unborn and the voiceless, the victims of war and poverty, the spiritual imprisonment of those without hope.

As shepherd and teacher, leader and servant of the Church’s faith, we pray that Pope Francis will be given the courage and succour of the Holy Spirit to fulfil his great responsibilities. As Easter approaches may he, like the first Peter, grow firmly in his role as witness and messenger of Easter faith and proclaim Christ as Risen in humble service of the Church and to the world.

Tagged Church, conclave, ecclesiology, Holy Spirit, leadership, mission, papacy, Pope Francis, Vatican II
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March 11, 2013

the Spirit of the conclave

With the conclave set to begin tomorrow (12 March), it is worth reflecting on one of the underlying themes of these past weeks, or one of the ‘issues under the issues’ as the historian John W. O’Malley would put it.

The issue is the role of the Holy Spirit in the life and renewal of the Church. Of course, following Pope Benedict XVI’s abdication, it is the Spirit’s guidance of the Church in the election of a new pontiff that is at the heart of our prayer at present and for good reason.

As a religious and political institution, the papacy has shaped and re-shaped human history in innumerable ways both positive and notorious (compare the papacy of Gregory the Great in the sixth century and his historic mission to the people of Anglo-Saxon England, worshipping as they were ‘stocks and stones at the edge of the world’ to that of Benedict IX in the eleventh century whose election, the result of systematic bribery on the part of his father, brought only violence, debauchery and shame to the See of Peter).

This uneven history of the papacy and its influence on both the Church and world underlines the importance of the upcoming conclave and the Spirit-led discernment that calls to be exercised by the cardinalate.

The new pontiff will not only need to meet the challenge of the sexual abuse crisis, a scandal that continues to raze the credibility and mission of the Church globally, but also the plight of persecuted Christians in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, the yet-incomplete articulation and direction of ‘the new evangelisation’ aimed principally at the West, and the abiding issues of internal reform, including that of the Roman Curia, that call for address.

While it would be comforting and reassuring to assume that the Spirit’s direction will, and has been, a full triumph in the Church, history has told us otherwise. Indeed, on the subject of papal elections, the then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger made the following, now widely-publicised, remarks on the influence of the Spirit on such an occasion:

I would say that the Spirit does not exactly take control of the affair, but rather like a good educator, as it were, leaves us much space, much freedom, without entirely abandoning us. Thus the Spirit’s role should be understood in a much more elastic sense, not that he dictates the candidate for whom one must vote. Probably the only assurance he offers is that the thing cannot be totally ruined . . .

The Cardinal went on to conclude with stark realism,

There are too many contrary instances of popes the Holy Spirit obviously would not have picked!

Erroneous decisions on the part of the Church, certainly not restricted to the realm of candidates for the Petrine Office, raise the question of the precise nature of the Spirit’s role in ecclesial discernment and decision-making for while Scripture affirms that the Spirit will indeed ‘guide us into all the truth’ (Jn 16:13) it ostensibly does not offer the community of disciples immunity from mediocrity or even calamity.

Certainly, in the Acts of the Apostles the Spirit does appear to intervene at chosen moments in an immediate and decisive manner, leading the nascent Church towards what it should be and what it should do. For instance, we witness the power of the Spirit at Pentecost to bring about a reconciled diversity among Jesus’ disciples and later it is the Spirit who guides the Church into an embrace of the Gentiles, a decision which the apostles and elders attest as having ‘seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us’ (Acts 15:28). For Luke, the author of Acts, the power of the Spirit is at work, guiding and directing the early Church to its destination.

However, other New Testament texts, the dramatic history of the Church and our own personal experience suggest that the voice of the Spirit is not always so clear. The diverse manifestations of the Spirit as expressed in the New Testament communities (1 Cor. 12:28-31, Eph. 4:11-13, Rom. 12:6-8), while a profound gift to the Church, indubitably shape the later Johannine emphasis on the need of discernment to ensure that what has been received, experienced or testified is indeed truly of God. The First Letter of John, clearly acquainted with the experience of community discord, warns, ‘Beloved, do not believe every spirit but test the spirits . . . from this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error’ (1 John 4:1,6).

Indeed, it is ironic that the subject of the Spirit, which ecumenical theology affirms as the principal of unity within the Church, has been at the root of some of the most significant divisions in the history of Christianity – the split of the East and West over the Spirit’s procession from the Father and/or the Son, and the Spirit’s relation to Scripture, tradition, and the sacraments including hierarchical ministry so bitterly contested at the Reformation.

What we can draw from this mixed history and the necessity of the Spirit’s discernment is that the gift of the Spirit – in all of its ‘elasticity’ as Cardinal Ratzinger puts it – does not so overwhelm the Christian that it alleviates or excuses them of the responsibility to evaluate, reflect and decide in faith but rather invites and even necessitates their active participation in that process of decision. This much is clear from the story of the primitive Church as described above (to open the Gospel of Christ to the Gentiles or to restrict proclamation of the Messiah to the House of Israel?)

In other words, the gift of the Spirit needs to be actively and constantly received by the community of the Church as it pilgrims through history, a ‘reception’ that involves the activities of listening, understanding, applying, and so truly ‘making one’s own’ the Spirit of faith and grace so that the community can be faithful to the person and message of Jesus.

The necessity of active human involvement in the Spirit-led decisions of the Church explains not only the emphasis of our tradition on being ‘docile’ to the Spirit (a spiritual tenet emphasised by Benedict XVI himself in his farewell address to the College of Cardinals) but also opens the real possibility for the non-reception of the Spirit by the Church community. This failure to heed the Spirit is evidenced not only in the grand crises and scandals of the past and recent history of the Church but also in the more ‘ordinary’, everyday failing of Christians to live the full meaning of their God-given discipleship.

The Australian theologian Ormond Rush concludes of the Church and the Spirit, ‘the human receivers of revelation are to be portrayed as active participants in discerning the way forward, co-deciders with God’s Spirit’ (cf. Rush, Still Interpreting Vatican II, 87). This ‘co-decision’ with God’s Spirit is a capacity and responsibility not simply of those who exercise authority in the Church but for the whole ecclesial body which shares the task of receiving the one Spirit, the ‘Spirit of Christ’ himself (Rom. 8:9), into its life, structures and decision-making.

Returning to the impending conclave, though the abiding presence of the Spirit in the Church is that which ensures the Church a future as the ‘pillar and bulwark of the truth’ (1 Tim. 3:15), it remains the task of the cardinal-electors, as individuals and as a college, to be open and receptive of the Spirit’s promptings in selecting ‘the first among the successors of the apostles’ to guide the Church into this future.

As for each and every Christian, what is essential to the cardinal’s reception of the Spirit is their own conversion for it is only in holiness that one can recognise the Spirit who is holy. There can be, then, no naïve self-complacency about those Spirit-led decisions which shape our life of faith, whether they are made in the splendour of the Sistine Chapel or the more familiar surrounds of our own dioceses and parishes with their own intimate concerns and hopes for the future. It is only our conversion that enables authentic discernment, a faithful recognition, of the Spirit of Truth as it calls us to respond. As the 14^th century theologian Gregory of Sinai concludes, ‘the understanding of truth is given to those who have become participants in the truth – who have tasted it through living.’ We pray that the cardinal-electors will choose well and in good faith.

Tagged Benedict XVI, Church, conclave, discernment, evangelisation, holiness, Holy Spirit, Jesus, papacy, prayer
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