pathways, July 09
The following is taken from my President's address to the 2009 Catholic Religious Australia National Assembly. Although it speaks of what the leaders might hope to achieve during the four days of the assembly, I now offer these hopes to the wider audience of pathway readers for deep reflection and action.
Our pursuit of religious understanding and respect extends beyond the leaders of our congregations into every far-flung religious community in this vast country and beyond - but also into the heart of every person of good will, especially those who call themselves Christian and live by the gospel values of Jesus Christ.
As you read these words, I invite you to interpret the four days of the assembly as your own life and the challenge to the leaders as a personal responsibility in your own faith journey. Even small efforts at engagement with other seekers of God can change us and our relationships and so contribute towards a new way of being together in hope.
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 (CRA) 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 fulfil 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 have 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.
Clare Condon SGS
President
further coverage of the CRA Assembly 2009 can be found in the other articles of the July edition pathways
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