Suchergebnisse

This report reviews the status of Maghreb countries' economic integration with the world, with the Arab world, and within the Maghreb itself. It focuses on trade in goods and services, labor and capital flows, financial integration and cross-border infrastructure integration. It discusses the potential benefits of and key constraints to greater integration. The focus on trade liberalization with the European Union (EU) provides an opportunity for individual Maghreb countries to lock in policies that would eventually help them harmonize policies within their own region. The same argument can be made regarding accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO). The Maghreb countries would reap significant additional benefits if, in parallel to reforms undertaken to improve trade liberalization with Europe, they improved conditions for streamlined trade among themselves. There is significant potential for trade in services in the financial sector, transportation and logistics, and communications and information, among other sectors. According to some studies, comprehensive services reforms that involve increased competition and regulatory streamlining would yield benefits that are at least twice the magnitude of those achieved through tariff removal alone.

This paper analyzes the relations between leadership, the policy making process, policies and institutions, and development results in Chile. It starts with a stylized model for the dynamics of development that derives a Kuznets type relation between growth and distribution of income, determined by the quality of leadership, the policy making process, institutions, and policies. This framework is applied to Chile, identifying the features of the policy making process and leadership that allowed for continuation of growth enhancing reform, with a stronger focus on equity goals, since the transition to democracy. As a result of three decades of reforms, Chile has recorded a quantum leap in economic growth, which is traced down to specific reforms. Yet Chile's equity experience is much more mixed: poverty has declined massively but income remains highly concentrated, a likely result of shortcomings in the quality of education and in labor markets. The paper reviews the major risks to the country's future development pace and points out the main reform challenges faced by policy makers.

The objective of this paper is to share the experiences and good practices of early business registry reformers who implemented web-enabled and automated electronic business registries (e-BRs). These lessons are hoped to be of help to EU New Member countries as they embark on delivering EU-conformant e-BRs. At the same time, policymakers in other developing countries may also find these lessons of use. This paper cites examples of good practices rather than best practices. As elsewhere in the development agenda, solutions that have worked well in some countries may not work in other local circumstances. In the case of e-BRs, success depends on a broader set of reforms; as will be discussed in a subsequent chapter, e-BRs require a supportive legal and regulatory infrastructure, such as electronic signature laws and document authentication. A needs assessment and analysis of the options in the local country context need to be conducted in order to find the most relevant best practice options for a specific country. Nevertheless, a number of practical good practices can be identified and are presented in this paper for consideration.

The Philippine economy has emerged as one of the fastest growing economies in East Asia, with growth accelerating to 7.1 percent in the third quarter. The acceleration of domestic demand since the first quarter of 2012 reflects the country's strong macroeconomic fundamentals, stronger government finances, and high confidence in the Aquino government's commitment to reform. Sound macroeconomic fundamentals, as seen in low inflation, and large current account surpluses and foreign exchange reserves, have continued to shield the economy from external headwinds, while a more diversified export basket allowed total exports to grow, despite the decline in electronics exports. Overall, the economy is expected to expand by over six percent this year, up from 3.9 percent last year. However, more structural reforms are needed to create more and better jobs, as the overall labor market outcome has been less responsive to the higher economic growth. The economy needs to shift from consumption towards investment, both public and private. The special focus sections of this update demonstrate that the implementation of such reforms can have high payoffs in terms of jobs and inclusive growth. Finally, by scaling-up and broadening several open government/open data initiatives in the country, the strengthening of inclusive institutions would be greatly enhanced, in line with the core principles of this government.

The rapid growth in Islamic Finance Industry such as in Islamic banking, takaful, waqf, and sukuk gain more awareness and interest from around the world including Islamic countries and non-Islamic countries such as Singapore, South Korea, Japan, Europe, Australia, Brazil, and America Latin. Based on Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB) and Ernst & Young Report in 2016 it stated that Islamic finance industry had reached a gross value USD 1.88 trillion in 2015. In addition, it also maintained double-digit growth rates despite sustained low energy prices, geopolitical conflicts and economic uncertainty. Meanwhile, Global Islamic Finance Report 2017 reported that in December 2016 global Islamic financial service industry stood at USD2.293 trillion. According to El-Qorchi (2005) that highlights there have three motivation of shifting to Islamic finance because strong demand for Shariah compliant products and services, demand from Gulf region or oil rich nation for Shariah compliant investment and lastly non-muslim investor also attracted with competitiveness of Shariah compliant products and services. Furthermore, there have numerous capital structure modern theories that have been developed since 1958 begin with MM Irrelevance Theory and continue with Trade-off Theory, Pecking Order Theory, Agency Theory and Market Timing Theory. As an example, trade-off theory is encouraging the firms to use debt financing rather than retained earnings and equity financing in order to utilise the tax deduction benefit from interest on debt financing. Each of this theory has different vi approach to manage and oversee the capital structure decision. Unfortunately, not all these theories explain adequately the effect of capital structure on corporate performance for Shariah compliant companies. Therefore, the question that can been arisen which is the most appropriate and suitable capital structure theory under Shariah principles? Firstly, this study intends to determine until to what extent the capital structure of Shariah compliant companies (SCC) can be different from Non Shariah compliant companies (NSCC). Many studies have been done on capital structure. However, most of the studies focused on the capital structure determinants, impacts of capital structure on financial performance, how the tax affected capital structure and short-term debt during financial crisis period. All of these past studies using financial institution, small and medium enterprises (SME) and public listed companies (PLC) as samples in their study. Nevertheless, there are few studies relate to the impact of capital structures on corporate performance during financial crisis. Shariah compliant companies presume to be more resilent during financial crisis based on their characteristic. However, there is no study on how SCC manages their capital structure during financial crisis period. Therefore, in order to fill the research gap, it is necessary to carry out a study on impact of capital structure on corporate performance during financial crisis by using SCC as sample. The main objective of this study is to investigate the impact of capital structure on corporate performance of SCC predominantly during financial crisis period. To the best of our knowledge, there is no such empirical study that has been conducted until nowadays. As information, Shariah compliant companies (SCC) are deemed to comply with Shariah principles, rules, values and restrictions when dealing with the financing activities. In order to ensure SCC comply with all the Shariah principles and free from prohibited elements such as interest (riba), gambling (masyar) and speculation (gharar), Shariah advisory board (SAC) are established to monitor the SCC's activities. Besides, before being listed in Islamic index all the firms must be complying with the qualitative and quantitative criteria for screening process that are set by the index provider. This study will take the sample from FTSE Shariah global index series, therefore under this index provider, Yasaar Ltd is an impartial consultancy and leading authority on handling Shariah matters including the screening process. Under quantitative screening, there have several financial vii benchmarks that the firms need to follow in order to acquire the shariah-compliant status. According to Haron and Ibrahim (2012) due to the benchmark that are set by index provider, it leads SCC to raise capital via equity financing. Empirically, firms that rely more on equity-based financing tend to be more resilient during financial crisis period. Gitman and Zutter (2012, p.508) defines the capital structure as "the mix of debt and equity maintained by the firm". Thus, the main concern is how the firm decision to optimize the capital structures by combining debt and equity financing. There have a number of previous studies that explored how the firms or financial managers determine the optimum capital structure to ensure they can maximize the firm's corporate performance. Based on the empirical results it shows that there has numerous factor that influenced the firms and financial manager in order to make the capital structure financing decision such as profitability, growth, size, tangibility, tax, leverage, liquidity, and industry. Meanwhile, this study will focus on some financial benchmarks in order to achieve the objective of this study. Such example this study uses corporate performance, debt to equity ratio, debt financing ratio (short-term debt ratio and long-term debt ratio), tangibility ratio, cash plus account receivables ratio, growth ratio, and size ratio. Corporate Performance In this study, two proxies will be used to measure the corporate performance of the firm. Firstly, this study decides to use profit before tax and zakat over total asset or it called pre-tax return on assets (Pre-tax ROA) to measure the firm's corporate performance. This ratio is to measures how the efficiency of the firm can earn on its investment in its assets. In other words, how the firm used its assets effectively to generate the income or profit from that assets. Like the previous study that have been used earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) over total assets and profit before interest and tax to measure the firm's corporate performance. Initially, this study intends to show the different significant impact to the firm's corporate performance if the firm paying taxes or zakat or both. It is due to the SCC has special taxes that are called 'zakat' under Shariah term and it viii has fixed-rate 2.5 percent from the net profit or income. However, until nowadays zakat still voluntary basis in most of the Muslim countries. Based on the sample in this study, Malaysia is the only country that implemented zakat system however it based on voluntary basis and none of the samples shows the zakat amount in their financial statement. The second proxy in this study for dependent variables that represents for firm's corporate performance is return on equity ratio (ROE) ratio. Based on the previous studies, there has been used net income after tax over total equity to measure the ROE in their studies. Therefore, this study also decides to use the same measurement as the prior studies. This ratio will measure by the firm's profitability using net profit after interest, tax and preference dividend divided by ordinary share capital plus reserves at the end of the financial year. ROE ratio is one of the main profitability ratios that concentrate on the firm's ordinary shareholders and compares the profit that has been earned and its capital. Some of the investors are using this ratio to measure the firm's ordinary shares desirability. Debt to Equity Ratio Some of the Islamic index provider set the financial benchmark that the total debt must be less than 33 percent from the total equity. Such an example, Dow Jones Global Islamic Index (DJIM) set the debt to equity ratio as one of their financial benchmarks. However, FTSE Global Equity Shariah Index does not include this benchmark under their screening process. Therefore, this study intends to use this benchmark to see whether there have significant differences between SCC and NSCC. This study decides to use total debt divided by total equity as a measurement of debt to equity ratio. It supported by other studies such as Margaritis and Psillaki (2010) and Memon et al., (2012) that also used the same measurement in their studies. This ratio is to evaluate a firm's financial leverage by measuring the degree of firm financing based on debt to equity or wholly-owned funds. In case if the company downturn, it measures the ability of the shareholder equity to cover all the debts in the firms. ix Debt Financing Under FTSE Global Equity Shariah Index quantitative screening, the debt ratio must be less than 33 percent of total assets. Due to this study's objective to determine the impact of capital structure on corporate performance during financial crisis, therefore the debt ratio divided into two categories, which are short-term debt financing and long-term debt financing. Based on Fosberg (2013) conducted a study on public listed companies in US and found that short-term debt financing increased from 1.3 percent in 2006 to 2.2 percent in 2008 which represent $34 million increase due to the financial crisis that are happened in 2008. It supported by numerous studies (see Brealey et al., 2008; Almeida et al., 2011; Federal Reserve, 2012; Fosberg, 2013) that during the stock market collapsed in 2008, the borrowing power of firms becomes fewer than before due to the credit supply was limited. Therefore, firms intend using more STD financing during financial difficulties. Hassan and Samour (2016) added that it highlighted that capital structure financing decision were impact during financial crisis period. Cheema et.al (2017) and Shahar and Shahar (2015) found that SCC using long-term debt (LTD) financing more than short-term debt (STD) financing. It might be due to the restriction for limited interest and risk sharing under Shariah guidelines. However, for NSCC, they are using more STD in order to meet the working capital requirement. On the other hand study by Sahudin, Ismail, Sulaiman, Rahman, and Jaafar (2019) found that SCC using more STD financing compared to LTD financing. STD financing is more widely used compared to LTD financing by the SCC in Malaysia because the majority of Islamic debt instruments issued short-term debt rather than long-term debt (Aggarwal & Yousef, 2000). This also supports agency theory whereby it justifies the function of STD financing as a mechanism to control the debt and mitigate the agency problem. Therefore, this study intends to examine the significant differences in financing patterns particularly before, during and after the financial crisis period. x Tangibility Ratio Tangibility assets become more popular as a measurement for bank viability after the financial crisis occurred. Bank viability means the bank's judgment on the ability of the firms to meet ongoing financial obligation with the additional investment and financing such as from the banks and investors. One of the reasons because tangible assets are liquid compared to intangible assets. It supported by Charalambakis and Garrett (2012) that stated tangible assets are the main point in explaining the capital structure within the firms. As a result, tangible assets have a higher value in the market and even if firms have financial problem or going to bankrupt, the firms can easily and quickly in selling their tangible assets. Scott (1977) and Titman and Wessels (1988) stated that less profitable firm intends to have a high value of tangible assets and the firms will use tangible assets as collateral in order to get more debt financing. Therefore, any firm that has higher tangibility ratio will issue more debt financing. This is in line with trade-off theory that highlight, firms need to enjoy the advantage of tax with issuing more debt financing while having more profit to the firm. Ahmad and Azhar (2015) added that this would give assistance to the firms that have default in their debt to use the tangible asset to avoid being bankrupcy. Cash plus Account Receivables Ratio Most of the previous studies used the liquidity ratio in order to measure the firm's ability to meet the short-term financial obligation. Even Thabet and Hanefah (2014) found in their study that liquidity were one of the factors that have the impact on the corporate performance to the firm. This ratio is important to ensure the firms have cut limit for total cash and account receivables in one time in order to avoid excess or lack of cash in the firms. In addition, it also to reduce the agency cost. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that examines the impact on total cash plus account receivables over total assets (CashAR) to the corporate performance. This variable is chosen as an independent variable for this study due to the characteristics for SCC must be following and passed the benchmark in order to be listed in the Islamic index. Farooq xi and Alahkam (2016) also mentioned that the Islamic financial system was more stable and resilient because of the economy based on Islamic guidelines. Growth Ratio This study decides to use the different amount of this year sales minus last year sales divided by this year sales as a proxy of firm growth ratio. It is supported by prior studies (Salim and Yadav, 2012; Bundala, 2012; Proença et al., 2014; Cheema et al., 2017) that are also used the same measurement for growth ratio in their studies. According to Titman & Wessel (1988) and Rajan & Zingales (1995) shows that the firms with high future growth turns out to be used less leverage in the financing decision. It is because the firm will shift from debt financing to equity financing. In addition, growth ratio are influence by the profitability of the firm. This study will be focused on selected countries from Southeast Asia, which are Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Singapore, and Thailand. The selection sample is justified that Southeast Asia is the most progressive region in the Islamic capital market in the Asia region (Yakcop, 2002). Initially, this study has identified 595 samples of Public Listed Companies under industrial sector in Southeast Asia. Nevertheless, 114 samples have been excluded due to the several reasons such as incomplete financial statement and change of accounting year during the period of study. Thus, the final samples selected are 197 PLC from Shariah-compliant companies and 284 PLC from Non-shariah compliant companies. All the sample are collecting through DataStream that is published by Thomson Reuter Eikon. This study gathers all the financial statements such as balance sheet, income statement and cash flow statement in order to achieve the objective of this study. The unique for this study, the data is analyzed using Python Pandas programming software. This is the first study using Python Pandas to analyze the impact of capital structure on corporate performance during the financial crisis. As information, Pandas are the software library written for the Python programming language for data manipulation and analysis. Undoubtedly, Pandas offer data structures and operations for manipulating numerical tables and time series. Therefore, the first step to do to analyze the data by creating the coding system that is xii required for this study. In order to accomplish the objective in this study, the regression equations have been developed as follows: 1. Y (Pretax ROA) = β0 + β1D/Eit + β2Tangit + β3STDit + β4LTDit + β5CASH/ARit + β6GRWit + β7SIZEit + β8(X) + ε 2. Y (ROE) = β0 + β1D/Eit + β2Tangit + β3STDit + β4LTDit + β5CASH/ARit + β6GRWit + β7SIZEit + β8(X) + ε Whereby: Pre-tax ROA = Return on asset before tax ratio ROE = Return on equity ratio D/E = Debt to equity ratio STD = Short term debt ratio LTD = Long term debt ratio TANG = Tangibility ratio CASHAR = Cash plus account receivable ratio GRW = Growth ratio SIZE = Size ratio ε = Error term X = dummy variable 0: Non-Shariah Compliant Companies (NSCC) 1: Shariah Compliant Companies (SCC) The analysis begins with the multicollinearity test and the purpose of this test to ensure there is no problem of multicollinearity among the variables. Based on the result, none of the tolerances value is less than 0.2 and none of the Variance Inflation Factor (VIF) is greater than 10. As a result, it found that there is no multicollinearity problem in this study. The analyses continue with the descriptive statistic analysis that found the corporate performance of Shariah compliant companies (SCC) is higher than Non Shariah compliant companies (NSCC) during the financial crisis and after the financial crisis for both proxies, pre-tax return on assets (Pre-tax ROA) and return on equity (ROE). However, for independent variables those are debt to equity ratio, short-term debt ratio, long-term debt ratio, cash plus account receivables ratio shows that SCC has lower ratio through out the periods which are before, during and after financial crisis. These results have been expected due to the benchmarks that are set xiii by index providers during the quantitative (financial) screening process. Furthermore, SCC requirements to follow all the time the benchmark in order to be listed in Shariah index and maintain as shariah status. Due to this reason, we can observe that SCC always has a lower leverage ratio compare to NSCC. In addition, firms that have lower ratio are better because high leverage ratio or debt financing ratio contributes to the high risk of solvency and instability of the firms. Tangibility ratio for SCC is higher than NSCC before, during and after the financial crisis period. This ratio becomes more important after the financial crisis period. It is because it uses as a measurement for bank viability and indicate the firm's collateral level. Therefore, SCC with a higher tangibility ratio can issue more debt financing. It becomes more secure in case of bankruptcy; the firm can sales its tangible assets in order to pay their debt financing. Cash plus account receivables ratio is lower than NSCC before, during and after financial crisis period. Even though high liquidity can attract more lender and manager to make investment easily however there have high risk of bankruptcy and high risk of non-payment. Besides, the lower liquidity can contribute to the lower agency problem. Growth ratio shows before and during financial crisis period NSCC have higher ratio than SCC. However, after financial crisis period, SCC demonstrates higher ratio than NSCC. It indicates that SCC's growth better after financial crisis period. In addition, it proved that SCC gets more attention from the investor after financial crisis period. The second major finding are from multiple regression analysis based on pre tax ROA as the first proxy for corporate performance. It found that all the independent variables are significant except for debt to equity ratio before the financial crisis period. However, during the financial crisis period, only long-term debt ratios not significant and after the financial crisis period both short-term debt and long-term debt do not significant. Shariah-compliant companies only have a significant level after the financial crisis period. The impact of capital structure on corporate performance, pre-tax ROA for SCC is 1.6617 times higher than NSCC after financial crisis period. xiv Second proxy of corporate performance is a return on equity (ROE). All the independent variables are significant with the ROE except for debt to equity ratio and cash plus account receivable ratio before the financial crisis period, while long-term debt ratio during and after the financial crisis period. SCC significantly with ROE before the financial crisis and it shows that the impact of capital structure on SCC for corporate performance, ROE is -2.9264 times lower than NSCC. However, after the financial crisis period, the impact of capital structure on corporate performance, ROE for SCC is 4.3171 times higher than NSCC. The findings in this study posed an important implications for academicians, researchers, regulatory bodies as well as the management of the firms particularly Shariah compliant and non-shariah compliant companies, as they pave for further exploration. It offers knowledge to the regulatory bodies and related government agencies to come out with the guidelines and framework regarding shariah compliant status. Therefore, in order to set up with the new regulations and guidelines, these agencies need to understand the needed of investors and the characteristics of SCC itself in order to develop new guidelines to attract more investors. Such cases in Malaysia, the government give incentive to the new shariah compliant companies with five years tax exemption. Other, in UK and France they have amended their tax structure to compatible with Islamic finance guidelines. There have several limitations encountered in conducting this study. This study did not take into consideration the effects of the Asian financial crisis because there have different impact between the countries due to the different level of development in the financial market, the policies of the government and the sensitivity of that country to external incidents. In addition, due to this was the cross country study, therefore the differences are expected due to difference law system and regulation, bureaucracy, dissimilar costs and benefits that the companies face in each country. These limitations have paved the way to future research. Therefore, in the future it hopes to take consideration for these limitations in order to fill the research gap in this area ; slami finans özellikle son zamanlarda, İslami bankacılık, tekaful, vakıf ve sukuk gibi bir çok alanda hızlı bir büyüme göstermektedir. İslami finans İslam ülkelerinin yanında, Singapur, Güney Kore, Japonya, Avrupa, Avustralya, Brezilya ve Amerika Latin gibi İslami olmayan ülkeleri de kapsayacak şekilde dünyanın dört bir yanından, gittikçe daha fazla farkındalık ve ilgi kazanmaktadır. İslami Finansal Hizmetler Kurulu (IFHK) ve 2016'da Ernst & Young raporuna dayanarak, İslami finans sektörünün 2015 yılına kadar brüt 1,88 trilyon ABD doları değerine ulaştığını belirttimektedir. Üstelik bu sektörün büyüme hızı, düşük enerji fiyatlarının sürmesine, jeopolitik çatışmalara ve ekonomik belirsizliğe rağmen, çift haneli büyüme oranlarını korumuştur. Örneğin, 2017 yılına ait Küresel İslami Finans Raporunda, Aralık 2016'da küresel İslami finansal hizmet sektörünün 2,293 trilyon ABD doları bulduğu raporlanmıştır. El-Qorchi'ye (2005) göre İslami finansa geçiş konusunda üç motivasyon bulunduğu vurgulamaktadır: Şeriat uyumlu ürün ve hizmetlere yönelik güçlü talep, Körfez bölgesindeki petrol zengini uluslardan gelen Şeriat uyumlu yatırım için talep ve ve son olarak Şeriat uyumlu ürün ve hizmetlerin rekabet gücünden etkilenen gayrimüslim yatırımcıların ilgisi. Ayrıca, 1958'den bu yana geliştirilen ve MM Teorisi ile başlayan ve Takas Teorisi (Trade-Off Theory), Finansman Hiyerarşisi Kuramı (Pecking Order Theory), Vekâlet Maliyeti Teorisi (Agency Theory) ve Piyasa Zamanlama Teorisi (Market xvi Timing Theory) ile devam eden çok sayıda sermaye yapısı teorisi vardır. Örnek olarak Takas teorisi, firmaları borcun faizinden faydalanmak için birikmiş karlar ve özkaynak finansmanı yerine, borç finansmanı kullanmaya teşvik etmektedir. Bu teorilerinin her birinin sermaye yapısı kararını yönetmek ve denetlemek için farklı bir yaklaşımı vardır. Bu çalışmanın temel amacı, finansal kriz döneminde sermaye yapısının kurumsal performans üzerindeki etkisini incelemektir. İlk olarak, bu çalışma Şeriat uyumlu şirketlerin (ŞUŞ) sermaye yapısının Şeriat uyumlu olmayan şirketlerden (ŞUOŞ) ne kadar farklı olabileceğini belirlemeyi amaçlamaktadır. Sermaye yapısı üzerinde çok sayıda çalışma yapılmıştır. Bununla birlikte, çalışmaların çoğu sermaye yapısı belirleyicileri, sermaye yapısının finansal performans üzerindeki etkileri, verginin finansal yapıdaki sermaye yapısını ve kısa vadeli borçları nasıl etkilediğine odaklanmıştır. Bu geçmiş çalışmalarda örneklem olarak, finansal kurumlar, küçük ve orta ölçekli işletmeler ve halka açık şirketler kullanmaktadır. Ancak Şeriate Uygun Şirketlerin sermaye yapıları ve sermaye yapısının finansal performans üzerindeki etkisi konusunda az sayıda çalışma vardır. Özellikle ŞUŞ'lerin sermaye yapıları göz önünde bulundurulduğunda, bu şirketlerin kriz döneminde daha avantajlı olmaları beklenmektedir. Ancak ŞUŞ'lerin finansal yapılarının, fiannsal kriz döneminde onlar için nasıl bir avantaj sağladığı bugüne kadar bir araştırma konusu yapılmamıştır. Bu nedenle, araştırma boşluğunu doldurmak için, ŞUŞ'lerin örnek olarak kullanıldığı, finansal kriz sırasında sermaye yapısının finansal performans üzerindekini araştıran bir çalışma yapılması gerektirmektedir. Bildiğimiz kadarıyla, bugüne kadar yapılmış böyle bir ampirik çalışma yoktur. Şeriat uyumlu şirketler (ŞUŞ), finansman faaliyetlerini yürütürken Şeriat ilkelerine, kurallarına, değerlerine ve kısıtlamalarına uymaktadır. ŞUŞ'in tüm Şeriat ilkelerine uyması, ayrıca riba, masyar ve gharar gibi yasaklanmış unsurlardan arındırılmasını sağlamak için, Şeriat Danışma Kurulu (ŞDK) ŞUŞ'lerin faaliyetlerini izlemek üzere kurulur. Bunlara ek olarak İslami endekste listelenmeden önce, tüm şirketler, endeks sağlayıcısı tarafından belirlenen tarama süreci için nitel ve nicel kriterlere uymalıdır. Bu çalışmada kullanılan örneklem, FTSE şeriat küresel sermaye endeksinde yer alan şirketlerden oluşturulmuştur. Bu endeks sağlayıcısı altında, xvii tarama süreci de dahil olmak üzere Şeriat konularının ele alınmasında Yasaar Ltd. tarafsız bir danışmanlık ve lider otorite olarak kabul edilmektedir. Şirketlerin Şeriat uyumlu statüsünü elde edebilmesi için, nicel tarama başlığı altında, uyması gereken bir dizi finansal kriterler de vardır. Haron ve Ibrahim'e (2012) göre, endeks sağlayıcı tarafından belirlenen kriter nedeniyle, ŞUŞ'ler sermaye arttrırımı yoluyla finansmanı tercih etmek durumunda kalmaktadır. Ampirik olarak, özkaynağa dayalı finansmana daha fazla ağırlık veren firmalar, finansal krizler sırasında daha dirençli olma eğilimindedir. Gitman ve Zutter (2012, s.508) sermaye yapısını "firma tarafından tutulan borç ve özkaynak karışımı" olarak tanımlar. Bu tanım doğrultusunda asıl amaç, borç ve özkaynak finansmanını çeşitli bileşimleri ile sermaye yapılarının nasıl optimum hale getirileceğidir. Ayrıca, sermaye yapıları aslında borç sahiplerini borç sahipleri olarak, özkaynakları ise hissedarlar veya hissedarlar olarak temsil etmektedir. O halde ortaya çıkan soru, şeriat ilkeleri uyarınca en uygun sermaye yapısı teorisi hangisidir? Firmaların veya finansal yöneticilerin, şirket performansını en üst düzeye çıkarabilmelerini sağlamak için optimum sermaye yapısını nasıl belirlediğine dair daha önce yapılmış çok sayıda çalışma vardır. Ampirik sonuçlar, kârlılık, büyüme, büyüklük, maddi varlık, vergi, kaldıraç, likidite ve sanayi gibi finansman kararını vermek için firmayı ve finans yöneticisini etkileyen çok sayıda faktöre sahip olduğunu göstermektedir. Bu arada, bu çalışmada, çalışmanın amacına ulaşmak için bazı finansal ölçütlere odaklanılacaktır. Bu örnekte, bu çalışmada kurumsal performans, borç / özsermaye oranı, borç finansman oranı, maddi duranlık oranı, nakit artı hesap alacakları oranı, büyüme oranı ve büyüklük oranı kullanılmıştır. Kurumsal Performans Bu çalışmada, kurumsal performansı ölçmek için iki bağımlı değişken kullanılmıştır. Şirketin kurumsal performansını ölçmek için il olarak vergi ve/veya zekat öncesi karın toplam varlığa olan oranıyla elde edilen ve varlıkların vergi öncesi getirisi (Vergi Öncesi Varlık Getirisi- Pre-tax Return of Asset) denilmektedir. Bu oran, işletmenin varlıklarına yaptığı yatırımdan elde ettiği getiri ile işletmenin xviii etkinliğini ölçer. Diğer bir deyişle, işletmenin varlıklarını gelir veya kârı elde etmek içine ne kadar etkin kullandığını gösterir. Önceki çalışmalarda olduğu gibi şirketin finansal performansını ölçmek için toplam aktifler üzerinden faiz ve vergi öncesi kazanç (faiz ve vergi öncesi kâr) kullanılmıştır. Öncellikle, bu çalışma, şirketin vergi veya zekat veya her ikisini birden ödemesi durumunda, işletmenin kurumsal performansının bundan önemli derecede etkilendiğini göstermeyi amaçlamaktadır. ŞUŞ'lerin Şeriat yönergelerine göre 'zekat' olarak adlandırılan, kâr veya gelirden yüzde 2,5 sabit oranda ödenen özel vergilere tabidir. Ancak, günümüze kadar zekat Müslüman ülkelerin çoğunda hala gönüllü olarak kullanılmaktadır. Bu çalışmadaki örneklem ile ilgili olarak, zekat sistemini uygulayan tek ülke Malezya'dır. Ancak burada da gönüllülük temeline dayanmaktadır ve örneklemdeki şirketlerin hiçbiri mali tablolarında zekat miktarını göstermemektedir. Bu çalışmada, firmanın kurumsal performansını temsil eden ikinci bağımlı değişken, özkaynak karlılığı (ÖKK) oranıdır (Return Of Equity-ROE). Önceki çalışmalara dayanarak, çalışmalarında ÖKK'nı ölçmek için vergi sonrası toplam özsermaye üzerinden net kar kullanılmıştır. Bu nedenle, bu çalışma daha önceki çalışmalarla aynı ölçümü kullanmaya karar verilmiştir. Bu oran, faiz, vergi ve imtiyazlı temettü sonrası net karın kullanılması suretiyle şirketin kârlılığına göre hesaplanır. ÖKK oranı, firmanın olağan hissedarlarına odaklanan ve kazanılan kar ile sermayelerini karşılaştıran ana karlılık oranlarından biridir. Bazı yatırımcılar bu oranı firmanın adi hisse senedinin cazibesini ölçmek için kullanmaktadır. Borç / Varl k Ora Bazı İslami Finans Endeksleri, örneğin Dow Jones Küresel İslam Endeksi (DJIM) tarafından yapılan nicel gözetimde, finansal kriterlerden biri özkaynak oranıdır. Toplam borç, toplam özkaynağa göre % 33'ten az olmalıdır. Bununla birlikte, bu çalışmanda kullanılan 'FTSE Global Equity Shariah Index' serisi bu oranın gözetim sürecine dahil etmemektedir. Bundan dolayı, bu çalışmada, ŞUŞ'ler ve ŞUOŞ'ler arasında önemli farklılıklar olup olmadığını genel olarak görmek için, bu oranın kullanılmasına karar verilmiştir. Toplam borcun toplam özkaynağa bölünmesiyle bulunan özkaynak oranını, bağımsız bir değişken olarak çalışmada yer xix almıştır. Margaritis ve Psillaki (2010) ve Memon ve diğerleri, (2012) gibi diğer bazı çalışmalar özkaynak oranı için, aynı ölçümü kullanmışlardır. Bu oran, borç / özkaynak veya tamamen sahip olunan fonlara dayalı şirket finansman derecesini ölçerek, bir şirketin finansal kaldıracını değerlendirmektir. Bu gösterge, şirketin bir finansal sorun yaşaması halinde, özkaynakların şirketteki tüm borçları karşılama kabiliyetini ölçer. Borç Fi a s a FTSE Global Equity Shariah Index nicel gözetimi kapsamında borç oranı, toplam varlıkların yüzde 33'ünden az olmalıdır. Bu çalışmanın amacı nedeniyle, finansal kriz sırasında etkisini daha ayrıntılı görmek amacıyla, borç oranı ikiye ayrılmıştır. Nitekim Fosberg (2013), ABD'de borsada işlem gören şirketler üzerinde bir çalışma yürütmüş ve kısa vadeli borç finansmanının 2006'da yüzde 1,3'ten 2008'de yüzde 2,2'ye yükseldiğini ve bunun 2008'de meydana gelen finansal kriz nedeniyle 34 milyon dolarlık bir artışı temsil ettiğini bulmuştur. 2008 yılında borsada çöktüğünde, kredi arzının sınırlı olmasından dolayı, şirketlerin borçlanma gücünün daha önce olduğundan daha zayıf hale geldiği sayısız çalışma ile desteklenmiştir (bakınız Brealey ve ark., 2008; Almeida ve ark., 2011; Federal Rezerv, 2012; Fosberg, 2013). Bu nedenle, firmalar finansal zorluklar sırasında KVYK finansmanını daha çok kullandılar. Hassan ve Samour (2016) sermaye yapısı finansman kararının finansal kriz sırasında etkili olduğunu açıkça belirtmişlerdir. Cheema ve arkadaşları (2017) ve Shahar ve Shahar (2015), ŞUŞ'lerin uzun vadeli borç finansmanını kısa vadeli borç finansmanından daha fazla kullandığını bulmuşlardır. Bunun nedeni, Şeriat yönergelerine göre sınırlı ilgi ve risk paylaşımının kısıtlanması olabilir. Bununla birlikte, ŞUOŞ'ler, işletme sermayesi ihtiyacını karşılamak için daha fazla KVYK kullanmaktadır. Ancak Sahudin, Ismail, Sulaiman, Rahman ve Jaafar (2019) tarafından yapılan çalışma, ŞUŞ'lerin UVYK'a kıyasla daha fazla KVYK kullandığını buldurmuştur. Malezya'daki ŞUŞ'ler uzun vadeli borcuna kıyasla daha yaygın olarak kısa vadeli borç kullanılmaktadır, çünkü İslami borçlanma araçlarının çoğu uzun xx vadeli borçtan ziyade kısa vadelidir (Aggarwal ve Yousef, 2000). Bu aynı zamanda, kısa vadeli borç fonksiyonunun, borcu kontrol etme ve acente sorununu azaltma mekanizması olarak haklı kıldığı kurum teorisini de destekler. Bu nedenle, bu çalışma özellikle finansal kriz öncesinde, sırasında ve sonrasında finansman modellerindeki önemli farklılıkları incelemeyi de amaçlamaktadır. Maddi Varl k Ora Maddi duran varlıklar, bankaların finansal krizden sonra işletmelerin yaşayabilirliğini ölçtükleri için daha popüler hale gelmektedir. Bunun nedeni maddi duran varlıkların maddi olmayan duran varlıklara göre daha fazla likidit olmasıdır. Charalambakis ve Garrett (2012) maddi duran varlıkların firma içindeki sermaye yapısını açıklamada ana nokta olduğunu belirtmiştir. Sonuç olarak, maddi duran varlıklar piyasada daha yüksek değere sahiptir ve firmalar finansal problemleri olsa veya iflas ederse bile, firmalar maddi varlıklarını kolayca ve hızlı bir şekilde satabilmektedirler. Scott (1977) ve Titman ve Wessels (1988), daha az kârlı firmanın maddi duran varlıkların yüksek değerine sahip olma eğiliminde olduğunu ve firmaların maddi duran varlıklarını daha fazla borç almak veya daha fazla borç almak için teminat olarak kullandıklarını belirtmiştir. Bu nedenle, daha yüksek somutluğu olan herhangi bir firma daha fazla borç alacaktır. Bu işletmenin daha fazla borç finansmanı sağlayarak verginin avantajından faydalanması gerektiğini vurgulayan değiş tokuş teorisine uygun şekilde, işletmenin daha fazla kâr elde etmesini sağlar. Ahmad ve Azhar (2015) bunun borcunda temerrüde düşüren işletmelere, iflastan kaçınmak için bu maddi varlığı kullanmaları için bir seçenek oluturduğunu eklediler. Naki e Alacak Topla Ora Önceki çalışmaların çoğu, işletmelerin kısa vadeli finansal yükümlülüğünü yerine getirme kabiliyetini ölçmek için likidite oranını kullanmıştır. Thabet ve Hanefah (2014) da çalışmalarında likiditenin işletmelerin kurumsal performansı üzerinde etkili olan faktörlerden biri olduğunu bulmuşlardır. xxi Bu oran, işletmenin aşırı nakit veya nakit eksikliğinden kaçınmak için, nakit ve alacakları için bir limit belirlemek açısından önemlidir. Buna ek olarak, temsil maliyetini de düşürmektedir. Bildiğimiz kadarıyla bu çalışmamızda, nakit ve alacaklar toplamı, toplam varlıklar içindeki yerinin (CashAR) kurumsal performansa etkisini inceleyen ilk çalışmadır. Bu değişken, ŞUŞ için İslami endekste listelenmesi için yerine getirmesi gereken bir ölçüt olduğu için, bu çalışmada bağımsız bir değişken olarak seçilmiştir. Farooq ve Alahkam (2016), İslami esaslara dayanan ekonomi nedeniyle, İslami finansal sistemin daha istikrarlı ve dayanıklı olduğunu çalışmalarıyla desteklemişlerdir. Büyüme Ora Bu çalışmada, cari yılki satış eksi geçmiş yılki satışların cari yılki satışlara bölünmesi, işletme büyüme oranının bir göstergesi olarak kullanılmıştır. Çalışmalarında büyüme oranı için aynı ölçümü kullanan önceki çalışmalar (Salim ve Yadav, 2012; Bundala, 2012; Proença ve diğerleri, 2014; Cheema ve diğerleri, 2017) bulunmaktadır. Titman & Wessel'e (1988) ve Rajan & Zingales'e (1995) göre, gelecekteki büyümesi yüksek olan firmaların finansman kararlarında daha az kaldıraç kullanıldığını göstermektedir. Çünkü firma borç finansman yerine özkaynakla finansmanı tercih edecektir. Ayrıca, büyüme firmanın karlılığını etkileyecektir. Bu çalışma Güneydoğu Asya'dan Malezya, Endonezya, Vietnam, Singapur ve Tayland gibi seçilmiş ülkelere odaklanacaktır. Örneklem seçimi, Güneydoğu Asya bölgesindeki İslami sermaye piyasasının en ilerici bölgelerini içermektedir (Yakcop, 2002). Bu çalışmanın başlangıcında, Güneydoğu Asya'da sanayi sektörü altındaki Halka Açık Şirketlerden 595 örnek tespit edilmiştir. Bununla birlikte, tamamlanmamış finansal tablolar ve hesap dönemi boyunca muhasebe yılı değişikliği gibi çeşitli nedenlerden dolayı 114 şirket, örneklemden çıkarılmıştır. Bu nedenle, seçilen son örnekler ŞUŞ'lerden 197 ve ŞUOŞ'lerden 284 halka açık şirketten meydana gelmektedir. Tüm örnekler, Thomson Reuter Eikon tarafından yayınlanan DataStream aracılığıyla toplanmıştır. Bu çalışma, amacına ulaşmak için bilanço, gelir tablosu ve nakit akım tablosu gibi tüm finansal tabloları bir araya getirmektedir. Bu çalışmada veriler, Python Pandas yazılımı kullanılarak analiz edilmiştir. Bu, sermaye yapısının xxii finansal kriz sırasında kurumsal performans üzerindeki etkisini analiz etmek için Python Pandas'ın kullanıldığı ilk çalışmadır. Pandas veri işleme ve analiz için Python programlama dili için yazılan yazılım kütüphanesidir. Pandas sayısal tabloları ve zaman serilerini değiştirmek için veri yapıları ve işlemler sunar. Bu nedenle, bu çalışma için gerekli olan kodlama sistemini oluşturmak, verileri analiz etmek için ilk adım olarak gerçekleştirilmiştir. Bu çalışmada amacına ulaşmak için regresyon denklemleri aşağıdaki gibi geliştirilmiştir: 1. Y (Pretax ROA) = β0 + β1D/Eit + β2Tangit + β3STDit + β4LTDit + β5CASH/ARit + β6GRWit + β7BOYUTit + β8(X) + ε 2. Y (ROE) = β0 + β1D/Eit + β2Tangit + β3STDit + β4LTDit + β5CASH/ARit + β6GRWit + β7BOYUTit + β8(X) + ε Vasıtasıyla: Pre-tax ROA = Vergi oranından önce varlığın getirisi ROE = Özkaynak karlılığı D/E = Borç / Özkaynak oranı STD = Kısa vadeli borç oranı LTD = Uzun vadeli borç oranı TANG = Maddi varlık oranı CASHAR = Nakit artı alacak oranı GRW = Büyüme oranı BOYUT = Boyut oranı ε = Hata terimi X = kukla değişken 0: Şeriat Uyumlu Olmayan Şirketler (ŞUOŞ) 1: Şeriat Uyumlu Şirketler (ŞUŞ) xxiii Analiz, çoklu doğrusallık testi ile başlar ve bu testin amacı, değişkenler arasında çoklu doğrusallık sorunu bulunmadığından emin olmaktır. Sonuçlara göre, tolerans değerlerinin hiçbiri 0,2'den az ve hiçbir Varyans Enflasyon Faktörü (VIF) 10'dan büyük değildir. Bu nedenle, bu çalışma için çoklu bağlantı sorunu yoktur denilebilir. Analizlere, tanımlayıcı istatistik analizleri ile devam edilmiştir. Şeriat uyumlu şirketlerin (ŞUŞ) kurumsal performansının mali kriz sırasında ve her iki bağımlı değişken için de, vergi öncesi varlık karlılığı (vergi öncesi AK) ve özkaynak kârlılığı (ÖKK), finansal krizden sonra şeriat uyumlu olmayan şirketlerde (ŞUOŞ) daha yüksek olduğu tespit edilmiştir. Ancak bağımsız değişkenler, borç / özkaynak oranı için kısa vadeli borç oranı, uzun vadeli borç oranı, nakit artı hesap alacakları hesap oranı, SCC'nin finansal öncesi, sırasında ve sonrasındaki tüm dönemler için daha düşük bir orana sahip olduğunu göstermektedir. Bu sonuçlar, niceliksel tarama işlemi sırasında endeks sağlayıcı tarafından belirlenen koşullar nedeniyle beklenen bir durumdur. Ayrıca Şeriat endeksinde yer almak ve Şeriat statüsü kazanmak için bir ŞUŞ'in, her zaman söz konusu koşulların yerine getirildiği takip etmesi gerekir. Bu nedenle, ŞUŞ'lerin ŞUOŞ'lere kıyasla her zaman daha düşük kaldıraç oranına sahip olduğunu gözlemleyebiliriz. Bu oranların düşük olması daha iyidir, çünkü yüksek kaldıraç oranı veya borç finansman oranı, şirketin ödeme gücü ve istikrarsızlık riskini arttırabilir. ŞUŞ için maddi varlık oranı finansal kriz öncesinde, sırasında ve sonrasında ŞUOŞ'lerden daha yüksektir. Bu oran mali kriz döneminden sonra, daha da önem kazanmaktadır. Çünkü, bankalar şirketin yaşama yeteneği için bu oranı dikkate alırlar ve şirketin teminat seviyesinin göstergesidir. Bu nedenle, daha yüksek maddi varlık oranına sahip ŞUŞ'e daha fazla borç verebilir. İflas durumunda daha güvenli hale gelir, şirketler, borçlarını ödemek için maddi duran varlıklarını satabilir. Toplam nakit ve alacak oranı, finansal kriz öncesinde, sırasında ve sonrasında ŞUOŞ'den daha düşüktür. Her ne kadar yüksek likidite ile daha fazla kredi hacmine ulaşmayı ve yöneticilerin yatırım yapmasını kolaylaşsa da, bu durum yüksek bir iflas riskini ve yüksek ödeme yapmama riskini beraberinde getirir. Ek olarak, düşük likidite temsil sorununun artmaması açısından bir avantaj sağlar. xxiv Öncesinde ve mali kriz döneminde ŞUOŞ'lerin ŞUŞ'lerden daha yüksek bir büyüme oranına sahip olduğunu göstermektedir. Ancak, mali kriz döneminden sonra ŞUŞ'ler, ŞUOŞ'lerden daha yüksek bir büyüme oranına sahiptir. Finansal kriz döneminden sonra ŞUŞ'lerin daha iyi büyüdüğünü göstermektedir. Ayrıca, finansal kriz döneminden sonra ŞUŞ'lerin yatırımcıdan daha fazla ilgi gördüğü kanıtlanmıştır. Kurumsal performans için ilk bağımlı değişken olarak, vergi öncesi AK'na dayalı çoklu regresyon analizinden elde edilen ikinci önemli bulgu, finansal kriz döneminden önceki borç / özkaynak oranı hariç tüm bağımsız değişkenlerin istatistiksel olarak önemli olduğunu ortaya koymuştur. Ancak finansal kriz döneminde sadece uzun vadeli borç oranları anlamlı değildir ve finansal kriz döneminden sonra hem kısa vadeli borç hem de uzun vadeli borç değişkenleri istatistiksel olarak önemli değildir. Şeriat uyumlu şirketler ancak finansal kriz döneminden sonra önemli bir seviyeye sahiptir. Sermaye yapısının vergi öncesi AK için ŞUŞ üzerindeki etkisi, finansal kriz döneminden sonra ŞUOŞ'lerden 1,6617 kat daha yüksektir. Kurumsal performansın ikinci bağımlı değişkeni ÖKK'dır. Finansal kriz döneminden önce borç / özsermaye oranı ve nakit artı hesap alacak oranı hariç, finansal kriz dönemi içinde ve sonrasında uzun vadeli borç oranı hariç tüm bağımsız değişkenler ÖKK açısından istatistiksel olarak önemlidir. Finansal krizden önce ÖKK ile ŞUŞ önemli ölçüde artmakta ve sermaye yapısının ÖKK için ŞUŞ üzerindeki etkisinin finansal kriz döneminden önce ŞUOŞ'lerden -2.9264 kat daha düşük olduğunu göstermektedir. Ancak, finansal kriz döneminden sonra, sermaye yapısının ÖKK için ŞUŞ üzerindeki etkisi ŞUOŞ'lerden 4.3171 kat daha fazladır. Bu çalışmada elde edilen bulgular, akademisyenler, araştırmacılar, düzenleyici kurumlar ve özellikle ŞUŞ ve ŞUOŞ gibi şirketlerin yönetimi için daha fazla araştırma yapmalarının gerektiğini sonucunu doğurmuştur. Bu çalışma düzenleyici kurumlara ve ilgili devlet kurumlarına, şeriat uyumlu statüye ilişkin yönergeler ve çerçeve çıkarmaları rehber olabilir. Bu nedenle, yeni düzenleme ve kılavuz ilkeler oluşturmak için, bu kurumların daha fazla yatırımcı çekmek için yeni kılavuzlar geliştirmek amacıyla yatırımcıların ihtiyaçlarını ve ŞUŞ'lerin özelliklerini anlamaları gerekmektedir. Malezya'da hükümet beş yıl vergi muafiyeti ile yeni xxv ŞUŞ'lere teşvik vermektedir. Ayrıca, İngiltere ve Fransa'da ŞUŞ'ler de dahil olmak üzere İslami finans sektörü için vergi yapılarını değiştirdiler. Bu çalışmanın yürütülmesinde bazı sınırlamalar bulunmaktadır. Bu çalışmada, finansal piyasadaki farklı düzeylerde gelişme, hükümet politikaları ve o ülkenin dış olaylara duyarlılığı nedeniyle Asya'daki finansal krizin ülke genelinde farklı olduğu göz önünde bulundurulmamıştır. Buna ek olarak, ülkeler arası bu çapraz çalışma nedeniyle, farklı hukuk sistemleri ve düzenlemeleri, bürokrasi, şirketlerin her ülkede karşılaştığı farklı maliyetler ve faydalar nedeniyle farklılıklar beklenmektedir. Bu sınırlamalar gelecekteki araştırmaların yolunu açmaktadır. Dolayısıyla, gelecekte sermaye yapısı alanındaki araştırma boşluğunu doldurmak için bu sınırlamaları dikkate alınmalıdır

Issue 43.3 of the Review for Religious, May/June 1984. ; Volume 43, Number REVIEW FOR REI.IGIOI~S (ISSN 0034-.639X). published every two months, is edited in collaboration with the faculty members of the Department of Theological Studies of St. Louis University. The editorial offices are located at Room 428:3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108. REVIEW EOg REI.IGIOUS is owned by the Missouri Province Educational Institute of the Society of Jesus. St. Louis, MO. © 1984 by REVIEW FOR REI.IGIOI,~S. Composed. printed and manufactm:ed in U.S.A. Second class postage paid at St. Louis, MO. Single copies: $2.50. Subscription U.S.A. $10.00 a year: $19.00 for two years. Other countries: add $2.00 per year (postage), For subscription orders or change of address, write REVIEW VOlt RELIGIOI~S: P.O. Box 6070; Duluth, MN 55806. Daniel F. X. Meenan, S.J. Dolores Greeley, R.S.M. Iris Ann Ledden, S.S.N.D. Joseph F. Gallen, S.J. Jean Read Editor Associate Editor Review Editor Questions and Answers Editor Assistant Editor May/June, 1984 Volume 43 Number 3 Manuscripts, books for review and correspondence wilh the editor should be sen! 1o REVIEW rolt RELIGIOUS; Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108. Questions for answering should be sent to Joseph F. Gallen, S.J.; Jesuit Community; St. Joseph's University; City Avenue at 54th St.; Philadelphia, PA 19131. Back issues and reprints should be ordered from Rt.'vlt:w !'on RELIGIOUS; Room 428; 3601 Lindell Blvd.; St. Louis, MO 63108. "Ou! of print" issues and articles not published as reprints are available from Universiiy Microfilms International; 300 N. Zeeb Rd.; Ann Arbor, MI 48106. -A Revealing. Light to the Gentiles John Paul H At the beginning of February of this year, Pope John Paul invited religious throughout the world to join him in spirit at a special celebration for religious of the Jubilee Year of Redemption. The celebration was concluded by a liturgy held at St. Peter's Basilica on February 2, in which 25,000 religious participated. During the Mass, the pope delivered this h~omily, inviting the participants o to renew their religious profession. Today, dear brothers and sisters, 1 want to borrow these words of the old man Simeon in order together with you to adore the Light: Christ the Light of the World! We are gathered in St. Peter's Basilica in the Year of the Redemption, in the year of the extraordinary Jubilee. We are meeting in that great and multiform community which you all make up, brothers and sisters, from so many religious orders, congregatio.ns and institutes: Individuals and com-munities that are consecrated to God! This meeting brings together the representatives of the religious families who live in Rome and, at the same time, extends to all those fellow brothers and sisters with whom the oneness and the identity of your vocation unites you. Through this same oneness and identity you are also bound together by a specialunion of mission in the Church--a mission in the midst of the People of God in every country and on every continent, to the ends of the earth. Today, in this great, universal community, you join the Bishop of Rome and the Successor of Peter to proclaim, in the spirit of today's liturgy: A revealing light to the Gentiles! The light is Christ, the Light and Glo~:y of the People of God throughout the world! It is with this proclamation that you desire to respond to the meaning of tile liturgy on this feast of Candlemas, and at the same time you want to give expression to that which constitutes the interior mystery of each and every one of you. In fact, by reason of your vocation; you walk in this Light which is 321 322 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 Christ in a special way, and you bear witness to it also in a special way. Today this is made evident by the lighted candles which in a short time you will be holding in your hands. Each of these candles recalls, above all else, the Sacrament of Baptism, through which Christ began to illuminate your life with the light of the Gospel and with the light of his Redemption--Christ, whom you received through faith within the community of the Church; Christ, handed on to you from day to day in the Christian life of your family, your surroundings and your school. The full flowering of baptism is the Eucharist; and at the same time, the constant renewal of its purifying power is the Sacrament of Penance and Reconcilation. These candles that you hold, then, remind you, in the context, of today's feast, of the moment of your consecration, your religious profession, your choice of this way of life that is based on the evangelical .counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience. The ligh~t of Christ shone at that moment with an especially brilliant flame. The.Oarries of fait.h and hope joined the vivid flame of charity and focused on the Heart of your divine Spouse, which at the same time itself opened wide because of this focusing--just as this divine Heart opens widely in the mystery of our redemption which, as we know, is universal, embracing everyone and everything. " Depth and universality: these ar~ the two characteristics of the religious vocation which attest to its being ro0tedqn the mystery of the Redemption and in the light of Christ. Today's liturgy, on the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, leads you toward this light. So you may enter the temple, just as Mary and Joseph once did when they took Jesus to JeruSalem to offer him to the Lord (see Lk 2:22). The law of the Old Testament provided that every first-born son be consecrated to the Lord (see Lk 2:23), and this consecration Was accompanied by a sacrifice of a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons. Today, beloved 'brothers and sisters, you enter this temple to renew, in the light of Christ's Presentation, your' own offering to God in Jesus Christ, your own consecration to be his exclusive property. F~:om the depths of the mystery of consecration springs this particular way of belonging to God himself--a belonging of which only the person, the knoWing and free subject, is capable. This belonging has the nature of gift. It responds to"a gift and at the same time gives expression to a gift. In the light ~of Christ, each one of you perceives with penetraiing clarity that all creation is a gift. You perceive in creation the special gift of your own humanity. And with the gift of this entire and indivisible humanity, you desire to respond ~to the gift of your Creator, of your Redeemer, of your Spouse. In this way,' there is inscribed in the huma0 "I" of each one of you a special bond of communion with Christ ahd, in him, with the Most Holy Trin!ty:~ the Father, the Son, find the Holy Spi.rit. Revealing I~ght to the Genliles / 323 Entering~the temple,, th~en, along with Mary and Joseph--where the rite of the Presentation of Jesus provided for by the law is to take place--we encounter two persons, Simeon and Anna, who are wholly consecrated to God, dedicated to the expectation of Israel, or rather, to, mankind's greatest hope of all time. Simeon, having been inspired by the Holy Spirit,~had gone to the temple (see Lk 2:27). Does this not perhaps bring to minda similar "inspiration" with which you were once moved., itself an inspiration of the Spirit? Yes, for the Holy Spirit, in the power of Christ's Redemption, is the author of all sanctity. So.is he also.author of that~ special call on the way to sanctity that is contained in the religious vocation. Today, when you renew your profession, in your hearts, remember that interior "inspiration" of the Spirit which was at the beginning of your path. Remember how this "inspiration" began, how it grew stronger, how it may perhaps have returned again after a period of time.until finally you recognized in it the clear voice of God, and the power of the nuptial love of the Lord who was calling you. Remember this today in order to give thanks with a renewed heart, in order to profess "the marvels of God" (Ac 2:ll). This inspiration from the Spirit cannot be extinguished. It must endure and mature, along with your r~ligious vocation, throughout your entire lives. You can nev.er separate yourselves from this salvific "inspiration from the Spirit," caring for it in the interior temple that each of you is! How eloquent are the words concerning the Prophetess Anna in today's Gospel: She was constantly in the temple, worshiping,day and night in fasting and prayer. Coming on the scene at this moment, she gave thanks to God and talked about the child to all who looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem (Lk 2:37-38). Simeon leans over the child and utters prophetic words: This child is destined to be the downfall a~d the rise of many in Israel, a sign that will be opposed so that the thoughts of many flearts may be laid bare (Lk 2:34). He addresses these words to Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and addS: "And you yourself shall be pierced with a sword" (Lk 2:35). A strange prophecy! And yet perhaps it is at once the most concise and the most comPlete synthesis of all Christology and of all soteriol0gy. Dear brothers and sisters! May this prophecy reach your souls t6day with new strength. Welcome Christ, who is the ligh't of the world: Christ in whom God ~"has prepared his salvation in the presence of all peoples" (~see Lk 2:31). Welcome Christ, who is also a "sign that will be opposed." This "opposition" is engraved into your vocation. Do not try to remove it or to erase it. This "opposition" has salvific significance. The salvation of the world is achieved precisely along the path of this opposition that is offered by Christ. And so you, by welcoming Christ~ are also a manifestation of this 324/ Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 salvific opposition. It cannot be otherwise: It is precisely in 'the name of this saving opposition that there is engraved upon your Christian and religious "I" the profession you have made of poverty, chastity and obedience. The world needs the authentic "opposition" of religious consecration as a constant leaven of salvific renewal. You will be carrying in your hands the lighted candles of today's liturgy. They say that Christ is the Light which enlightens every man who comes into the world. They are the testimony of your entire dedication to Christ and to God; they are the testimony of your consecration. These candles also illuminate the meaning of human life, the life of each one of us. As the candle gradually burns, the wax melts and the candle is consumed. May your lives burn in ~the light of Christ! May yours be lives of total nuptial dedication to his service! May the life-giving current of the mystery of our redemption pass through this life, reaching the world and man and directing all our human existence toward~ the eternal light: the light of vision and glory. Simeon said to Mary, Mother of Jesus: "And you yourself shall be pierced with a sword!" Dear brothers and sisters, receive Christ from the hands of Mary. May the mystery of your redemption reach you through her soul. May all the salvific plans of consecrated hearts always be manifest before the heart of the Mother! Be united with her, with your glance focused on her. In her is there a special resemblance to Christ who is the Spouse of your souls. Formula for the Renewal of Vows This formula was used by the Holy Father on February 2, during the liturgy in which the religious addressed by him renewed their vows. Dear Brothers and Sisters: in answering the call of the Lord, you have risen with him and have died to.sin. Through your baptism and your perpetual commitment you have been consecrated to him. Do you wish to reaffirm your desire to follow Christ chaste, poor, and obedient, in imitation of his Holy Virgin Mother? R. Yes, l do. Do you wish to persevere in your commitment to'follow the Gospel of Jesus, and to observe the rule of your religious family in order to live in evangelical comm~union with God and with your brothers and sisters? R. Yes, I do. With the grace of the Holy Spirit, do you wish to dedicate your whole life to the service of the Peopli~ of God, and above all, tO the very poor? R. Yes, l do. May God, who has begun this good work in you, bring it to completion until the day of the Lord Jesus. R. Amen. Amen. Amen. On Choosing Religious Life Today Sallie Latkovich, C.S.J. Sister Latkovich is presently nearing the completion of her noviceship in Cleveland. Sister may be addressed at St. Joseph Convent; 3430 Rocky River Drive; Cleveland. OH 44111. ~ ~klong with the obvious aspects of the renewal of religious life, in local living situations, in diversity of ministries, and in community structure and govern-ment, there has also been renewal in initial formation. To be sure, there is a newness about those who enter religious life, a newness about their very choice to live in community, and a newness in'the process of initiation into existing community structures and traditions. AS one new member, I'd like to share my reflections on coming to com-munity: at age thirty, degreed in education and theology, having been a teacher and department chairperson in a Diocesan high school, and a pastoral associate in aparish. ' About one year ago, I participated in a federation event for novices of the Sisters of St. Joseph. The meetings were held at De Mattias Hall on the campus of St. Louis Univ.ersity, where th~ sister-student~ shared their dormitory, dining room, and meeting area. I rode the elevator with bne of the resident sisters, a Golden Jubilarian, who asked how the meetings for the novices were going. After my enthusiastic reply, the sister touched my arm warmly, assuming that l was one of the directors, and said: "This is so good for the~young ones." I chuckled and responded to my dear and special elevator companion: "I am one of the young ones!" This incident challenges us all to take a good look at the new realities which have emerged past some of the old stereotypes, including the age and life-experiences of new members, the process of initiation into-and bonding with community, and the preparation for vowed commitment. There undoubtedly is something shared by all individuals who discern 325 326 [ Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 religious vocation and respond to the mysterious call from God. The very choice, however, takes on different dimensions today from the time when the choice was made by young people of high school age who came to community from their parents' homes. In my perception, the women who choose to enter religious life today are fairly self-identified, at age 25, 30, or 40 years old; they come with education, credentials, work experience, achievements, and "street smarts" that come from self-support; they have had the experience of adult human relationships, and an important growing relationship with the Lord. Thus, for the new member to community today, the adjustment involves several major changes: from single living to community living, taking seriously and publicly the values and lifestyle of the vows, and sharing their life's journey with one person as director during the time of initial formation. In the past, a person entered religious life, and the entrance carried with it obvious signs and restrictions. This is a source of some confusion today, both for the new member and for family and friends. Looking and acting the same after entrance as before leaves one hard put to describe the inner transformation that is happening in surrendering one's life to the Lord and in bonding with community. Those who entered at a young age grew into adulthood as religious; many who enter today face the conversion of integrating their adult identity with religious identity. For most who come to community today, the single life has been a life of their choice, and seemingly, of their control. There has been the responsibility and enjoyment of a home, furnished according to taste and budget. One's budget has been determined by one's employment and salary, and has included the management of credit cards, checking, and savings accounts. Regarding employment, one's functioning and achievement on the job have likely been very significant, as our society places so much emphasis on the work/productivity ethic. One has probably owned a car, thought of as a "freedom-mobile" as one gives up that ownership. Though most who choose community are highly principled and have made decisions based on good valiaes,,there has been no accountability aside from self and God for schedule, activities, involvements, for decision-making in general. When persons actually enter community, they appeal to be the same as before; and yet, not. one part of each new member's life remains the same. Living poverty leads one to relinquish ownership of possessions, Some held dear. Though the anticipation of that was much worse than the reality for me, I was surprised to discover how attached I was to my own wondeff~ul doub.l~ bed! There is a real adjustment as one begins to rely on a relatively small monthly allowance for one's personal needs; and to rely on the community for other more major expenses. The importance of my self-sufficiency was very striking the first time Ihad to present my dental bill to the community treasurer, having paid those bills myself for the last ten years. These obvious, external changes seem fairly easy by comparison ~o the less obvious, internal transformation. For a .single woman to survive and to On Choosing Religious Life Today /327 succeed in this culture, she needs to compete in the male system, which demands independence and control of every aspect and detail of herqife; and thus, to be recognized as a responsible adult.'There is a great and sometimes awe-full experience of poverty in rei:ognizing the falseness, the illusion of all that, in coming to the truth of our own gifts, but also our limitations and weaknesses. Recognizing ourselves as responsible adults.involves faith that God is the One who is in control, and our dependence is on him. One then begins ~to experience the Gospel truth: "in .weakness, power reaches perfection." Options have been open for relationship for the single woman in today's world. Being atti'active to others and being attracted by them is a dynamic which doesn't change with community membership. Soon after 1 moved into community, I attended a surprise birthday party for someone I had dated and with whom I had remained friends. When his new dating relationship came in the door, 1 was surprised:~at my jealous reaction. A sister,with whom I lived answered my own questioning with: "Welcome to the human race." Indeed, I was and am human. What does change upon entering religious life is one's availability to pursue exclusive relationships. Of course, intimacy in human relationships remains an important value; but, the expression of intimacy may undergo some change or redirection as one approaches the vow of .celibacy. Living in a homogenous community of women is a drastic change for one who has led an active life in a heterogenous setting. Families and friends have had experience in how to celebrate and live with one's marriage commitment; they fumble a bit at understanding, much less celebrating and living with one's celibate religious commitment. Obedience is difficult for one Who has made decisions singly, privately, and well for a number of adult years. Sharing discernment and decision-making is fundamental and necessary to community life, but it can feel like regressing to an earlier parent-child situation--the last~experience of consulting with an authority. That very feeling of regression was the source of my own difficulty with simply sharing with my director the Choices or plans I had made; and learning to distinguish between decisions that warranted discussion and those that did not. Along with this sharing of .significant decisions, following the proper channels and the time it takes to do so may seem very long and unnecessary as compared to spontaneous choices made .previously. Thus, beginning to live obedience demands patience and focus on integrating one's life and choices with the very life and direction of the community. ~ In communities today, there is usually one person designated as director of the new members. Perhaps this responsibility is handled in a team approach. What an important position this is, ,both for the individual new member and for the whole larger community. 1 think, however, that'in light of the role, the title "Director" is a misnomer, as the directio.n of the phase of initial formation is a joint effort as opposed to "director" and "direction-taker." 321~ / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 In my experience, this person has been one who has shared a precious space of my life's journey; she has been mentor, counselor, and most importantly, model. Though she necessarily becomes the new member's primary contact person, she is representative of every other member ~of community who have individual responsibility to welcome the new member in the bonding/belonging .process. The new member's relationship with the director is unparalleled and unprecedented in previous adult life. Mention mtist be made, too,.of the other professed members who live with those in formation. °Their presence in local community only enhances the bonding/belonging process. Their own lives, ministries, and stories of com-munity history are a significant contribution to the new member. Occasionally, one becomes aware of an unconscious, unintended stigma attached to the "formation process" which looks backto the days when the present professed community were in formation themselves; the time when new members were young and inexperienced, not allowed to speak with professed, much less participate in community affairs, or even ,be present for chapter proceedings. The ghosts of those times come out of the closet when new members today are welcomed with rhetoric but subtly held at a distance from the professed community, not actually excluded but neither included, or not taken seriously because of a "hangover attitudi~" that they are just novices. It is especially difficult when a new member feels or experiences a separation, one that is hard to articulate or explain, from professed members of community who may be the same age, have common interests, or like experiences. To be truly welcomed is the beginning of bonding and encouraging of self-investment. The choice for religirus life in community is just that: the choice to invest. oneself in response to a call from the Lord, to join together" with others for the sake of the kingdom. The choice is full of hope, expectation, and celebration. Like the Gospel grain of wheat, there is death, there is loss. We mourn every loss, and experience pain in that; pain that deserves to be named in order to be a source of growth, of resurrection to new life. Just so, the grain of wheat produces much fruit. The dynamic of community life is like being planted in good, rich soil, which nourishes that growth: in the sharing of life and prayer, in gathering around the eucharistic table and the supper table, and in mutual support and challenge. In conclusion, one might look at the numbers of people who are entering religious life today, and despair that so many fewer are choosing community than did some years ago. On the other hand, there can be. i~ause for great rejoicing that people are attentive to the Lord's call, seek to respond, and so choose--in many cases, a choice that is clearer and freer than in previous times because there is an understanding and experience of options and of life. When we take stock of the renewal that has taken place and continues in religious communities, let us include the new experience of those who come. What Is a Novitiate For? DonaM Macdonald, S.M.M. Father Macdonald has been a frequent contributor to REVIEW FOR RELIGIOUS, He has served his congregation as master of novices while in India. Presently Father Macdonald resides at 'St. Joseph's; Wellington Road: Todmorden: Lancashire 0114 5HP: England Roberi Bolt's play A Man for All Seasons. a young man called Richard asks "Thomas More for a job. "Employ me" he says, "I would be steadfast." To this °Mo~:e replies: "Richard, you couldn't answer for yrurself even so far as tonight."~ These proved unhappily propheti6 words, as Richard was to perjure himself later at the trial of the saint. All generalizations are false to a degree, but More's comment is true of ~o many today under the age of thirty. There is good will and idealism in ,~arying degrees, but little internal cohesion. Too many are too soft centered. One cannot take too. seriously, therefore, much of what such people say or do. Equipped though tohey may possibly be for ~a short run, one would be ill-ad~; ised to bet on their stamina over a longer distance. If on(~ takes Bophoeffer's de's~riptior;~ of maturi.ty as an acceptable criterion the maiure per'son is one 'whrse center of gravity is always where he or, she actually is2--then clearly many ~n this age group are immature. The a'doleffcent, by definition, has n6 central reference point, in some cases starting each day with a clean slate. The commitments of yesterday ark behind him or forgotten. He is, after all, trying' tO form an independent character. Considered in law to be adult at eighteen or so, by any other criterion he might not be so viewed. Quite often he is an emotional mess moving in a world where so much is relative and little seems meant to last. Entering into adult commitments with the mores Of an adolescent, the miracle is that so many make i,.t in view of the numbers who do not.ln the contemporary jargon, young people are today subject to so marly presstires. One pressure notable by its absence, is the need to accept 330,/ Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 personal responsibility for decisions taken. There is no c~iiter of gravity in the present moment. The effects of this paradox of persons being legally adult and emotionally adolescent, are seen in every walk of life, not least in their seeming inability to fbim a permanent commitment. So harmful are the general ~effects of this in marriage, for example, that it is now being seriously canvassed whether there is such a thing as an automatic right to marry. As society has to pick up so much of the failure and casualities, has it not the right to take out preventative inSurance? , All of this is relevant to religious life find to the admission and formation of young candidates. "Am I dealing with an adult or an adolescent?" is an ever-present question for anyone working in formation. The pattern sketched earlier is valid for the young religious and young priest as well as the young married. One °has had similar conversations, hearing an uncannily uniform vocabulary, with all three categories of young people facing difficulties over their commitments. ~ Whether speaking~to married, priest or religious among the young, one so often hears "The magic has gone. ~.," "It does nothing for me . "':l've reached a dead-end . .," 'Tm too young for responsibility~:.," "Surely God doesn't want this.!" Against the wider canvas of feeling that the world owes them a living--or at least that it should play fair--the underlying thread seems to be that since the commitment made to marriage, priesthood or religious life no longer does anything for me, I owe it to myself to get out from under this yoke. Less often does one hear: "! gave myself to this commit/hen! expecting it to demand the best f, rom me; here, then, is my center of gravity. I Stand, thbyefore, on this gift of myself. What, then, is to be done within this situation?" 'The Church is coming to see this. Increasingly, dioceses are ,sl~eqif~,ing s~x-months' ~otice, with genuine preparation, for a.nyone° wishing to be married in a Catholic Church. Students for the priesthood are invited to take ,t~eir prepaEation more seriously, and encouraged to live and work for a while away from ~he 'tmmed~' a~te support of a seminary or °religibu~s dommunit~,.3 Yo~ng~people today often come to seminaries and religious houses to work odi" the problems of adolescence. Are they, then, in the wrong place for wrong reasons? Is this the point of religious initiation? Quite~genuinely, a ni~vitiate may have to decide wheth~r to offer an a~olescent formation pr~ogram, or an adult course for approaching God in community. Individual no,vices may have different needs,.so it is a very. difficult questipn to answer. But the results of our failure to resolve itare all about us. Immature Formation : An implicit d~cision in favor' of adolescence is sgmetimes taken in an attempt to offer Ypung can, didates a congenial environment for,~their early What-~4s a Novitiate For? / 33"1 formative years. They are kept-very much with their peers. Tho~e guiding formatioffare chosen because of their alleged ability to mik with yogng peol~le. Older religious either fight shy of their company or~are carefully screened or shepherded away from them. With such mentors one _sometimes observes in formation the pooling of insecurity. The adolescent candidate is reflected in his guide, with the formation community sharing the ethos of a studi~nt hostel. One has been at prayer in such company with their leaders, and heard the spontaneous reflections of a ,young religious ono~the,Pau, line view that '~those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh With its passions and desires" (Ga 5~.2.4), virtually reduging it to t!~ezlevel.of occasionally doing without sugar in one's ~.tea. The sense of the prayer me.eting seemed to second this interpretatio.n, and the lifestyle of th~ young religi.o~u~.did nothing to challenge it. Similarly, listening to a lunchtime discussion on,where a religious ought to I~b buried whefi he digs, .of several pos_sibilities, argued over. no one suggested. even as a debating point, t.hat, as" religious are p.o0r, the question ought scarcely arise; poor people have'no choice. Time spent with novices, young Yeligious and their gu!des, reinforces this impression, all the more revealing because it is patently unconscious. Nov~ unless some adult shows them otherwise, they~will spend their early formative years in at,least a lower.middle~class lifestyle, in the free association character-istic, ofa comfortable student.hostel and develop~such patterns of thought and behavior in the name'of the~Go.spel and of the~ charism of their founder. In one sense they have it m~de. Yet sooner or~later a price has io be paid:~ One cannot keep playing guitar in a.student group forever: T~here is a, ,big, wide,world out there whic.h .will .not accept their premises. Nor will the GospeL.It is better to glimpse this sooner rather than.later. Ultimately.one,has to choose fgr one, self and take the consequences. A formauon program should,at least enco.ur~ge this.~ - ~ .~ ¯ Challenge the Candidate~ _ . ~ There is here an interesting contrast with the armed forces when they advertise for officer recruits. Appealing to the same age group as do religious, the individual is aske~l, for e.xample, "Did you. spend three years at university to spend twenty years sitting.behind a desk"?. The armed forces have .much to offer but.the individual must choose, and-this to~ an~ age group readycfo_r a~job. but not always for a career. Having taken a decision to inv~estigatefurther, it is~- never suggested that they are being offered a soft option The be~;t.thing about initial basic training, oit is said, is when it, stops.AL will be physically and intellectually demanding but not pointless. The emphasis is on demanding the best to enable the recruits to receive the best that can be given the.re. "We will use qualities you do not know you have" says the Navy. Responsibility will be real and given early. "Earn the right to wear these wings" is part of the al~peal of the air force. Pilots wings are not given lightly. They are something we value and you have to earn. Once you do that. they are yours by right. The army 332/ Revie~wfor Religious; May-J.unel 1984 explains t'hat, it can:pick and choose--and it does. It .d0es'not want just anybody. !t wants the best; particularly men and women who really want it. You may ,not' be good ~enough, but if yomthink you~a~e, please apply for an interview.~You may fail the interview as many do, b~t we can promise you that any subsequent interview .you take Will be easier. All advertising is partial and selective but the. overall pattern here may be worth considering;by those working in formatio'n. Do we believe that we have much'to offer? Can people glimpse this inwhat we do and who we are? Do we ask the best of young people? ~ The initial dynamic of religious founders isnot in.question. Their appeal is clear-cut. But in ~ost cases they are dead. They "live"at second hand, through us. Their once sharp insightfinto the Gospel may well have died the death of a thousand qualifications, blurred and out of focus as~ pres6nted in chaptersl constitutions and'personal living. This,iS inevitable and need cSause no surpris& After all, even theGospel,was dilutedwith'the call of the first apostle. What is to be done? Personally Responsible - lfthe candidate' is 16oking for short term canonization material in those he ,meets he will. in .the main, be dis~ppointed~ He~might:filso reflect that such company ffould probab~ly exclude him. Rather is the".novitihte Best used by someone Who can tak~ a dec'isioh and st~, with thecons~qu~nces, able to give himself to something c~ther than himself:The program th~n" is basically one of self-developmen~t, .u~ing whatever physical, emotional,, intellectual, spiritual qualities are there. The individual has't6 do it himself, and the progi'am should allowhim scope: To be.effective, the no"vice has to give himself to whatever he is doing, trying always to k¯eep it simple. Part of himself, for part.of thetime, will produce a hybrid character unable to identify with what he is doing. .Spontaneity is usually at its best when underpinned.by assiduous practice. The sportsman~who shirks training is usually, found wanting on the day of the. competition:~ qs this not unrealistic if not plain silly? An earlier generation spoke ofa "second conversiori" in religious life. One made profession, but to the degree that one W;,s~faithful to.that initial commitment. God might well-extend the invitation one tiay'to~move out of Second gear, to go de~per. Can one, ~therefore, ~a.sonably ask of the novice what may not be found in his guide? Further, young people today are from an environment where commitments to marriage, priesthood and religious life are not kept for all manner of reasons. Th'ere are of course marvelous instances of fidelity, but found alongside a very strong contrary'c,urrent. But is there any choice? Thomas More's daughter Margaret~ in Bolt s play, begs him as a skilled lawyer to find a form of words to Save himsi~lf from igrison and death. More answers her: "When a man takes an oath. Meg, he's-holding his own self in his own hands like water. And if he ope6s his fingers then--he needn't hope to find himself again. Some men What Is a Novitiate .For?/333 dren't,capable o£thi,s, but I'd be loathe to think your fathe~r~ one of them" (Act 2). This may not be the point of arrival of someone com, in~ .to a novi.tiate, bot surely it points the direction in which he must'travel? How else could he:say yes or no to anything? How form a permanent relationship with anything e!se?, "Freedom from the contemporary" is one of the rarest freed0ms0today. A novitiate could offer that; in-the exercise of personal, responsibility. ~ .l,n practice, this needs littl~e theoretical discussio.n. The can.didate,is urged to do_whatev.er ought to be done. Living this way in'the present moment,,it, has the added value, of helping the noOice come!to :terms, with ,boredom, routine and drudgery, without which he will make little-of permanent c6mmitment. "It's~boring" iS a universal escape clatise from responsibility in the age group we are considering, Living like this, he. may or ~ay not fifid thi~t theJife is for him--but at least he has a hope of a genuine ans,.wer to a question he really asked. A Minimal Frameworl~ The novice should be awa~ of a minimal framework in which the bench marks lie in his observed approach to God and thec6mmunity.~As far as God is concerned, worship may well have to be taught today in the western world, where there is little innate .reverence or sense of wonder before ~the holy. A tabernacle, set in.a corner alcove over a radiator beside a window, where an earlier generation might :have put a statue, will hardly foster worship in a novitiate chapel: The young person who is rarely seen in ~chapel other than at a community celebration, who never genuflects or bows before° the Blessed Sacrament, but immedi,ately sits down in a relaxed, leisurely position, might be indicating limitations in his awareness of God which Isaiah 6 might usefully help. The assumption that "that was a lovely Mass" indicates an objective value may have to be examined. According to his capacity, the novice may be introduced to Scripture and some of the. classical Christian writings. There is a clarity, warmth and centr.a!ity, about them that can scarcely be foun~t in contemporary spiritual writing, some of which is both popular and effeminate, neither~one thing nor the other. Self-evidently the God of'.the mys.tics may not be well,known, but novices could with pr,.ofit b.e- given a glimpse of what those closest to God in the Jewish, Christian and oth~er-'traditions have felt. This can both encourage him to widen'his horizons, and unsettle any complacen~y,.realizing perhaps that no one can program God .into any personal equation. ¯ The novice may simply be challenged by :a library. He is not asked to assimilate much, just spen~l some time~ in the.company of men and women who knew God as perhaps he never will. Is there any need to claim more for a novitiate than its offer 6f an initial thrust towards God and community living? It is for his guide :to give basic instruction on basic truth, whether the novice reads a page or not. Almost certainly at the beginning of a novitiate, novice. and mature guide Will not live in the same Church in any real sense. 3~1~1 / Revikw for Religious, °May-June, 1984 Living in the-Eresent will be equally'reflected in the novice's obse~e~t relationship'with th6Se amoi~g Whom he'lives. Again the accent is best placed on where he finds himself. Anxiety over poor water supply in a Third World ,village, while good in'itself if expressing genuine concern, rings hollow in the person~hnwilling t6 use w~te~r available to' him to wash the community ~tishes. Unlike the .man whose one acknowledgment to democracy waTs to ride in the same car as fiis chauffeur, young religiohs (or would-be religious) are not to be too choosy about the~c~)mpany they k~eep. They should'~htti~mpt to" build community with what is"given~. ,The moody young person is better elsewhere. Good manners and politeness, sometimeg ridiculed as outworn con~,entions, can at base be a genfiine regard for~ th~ feelings ~of others, particularly those outside on6's own group. They are a ,protection for the shy and the weak. Imagination is necegsary to see that one cannot live within one's pee? group forever. Ultimately, the novice should reflect trust. This is the one thing he can really give to his community. He cannot speak for anybffe else', but he can for himself: "You can trust mb." If there is.someone in the house unable to trust him, this should concern him. He tries to be honest. One °has been present at liturgies and pra~ers'in the age group we are considering, and heard sentiments expressed and gestures made that'would have made 1 Corinthians 13 read like a'chiid'sessay,'while feeling one-~ould be more at home with Bogart, Cagney, and0Edward G. Robinson. With them; you knew where you were: you did not turn your back. Young ,people may be mesmerized by words, mood and music. Truth is not ,that important for some. Again, this'may not be'a starting point, but it points the direction the novice should travel. Unless Someone Show.Me oo ~ Of ~ourse, if this i~ expected! in the candidate, it must be seen in his guide. Integrity is caught and taught, which is why, ideally, young people need to mix with adults~ There is no point in expecting honegty, if, in one's company, people feel that the~, should begin c0unting the spoons. To expect to r6ceive a confidence one should be seen to respect a ~onfidence'. Or~e wins respect and trust. Responsibility must not be a burden for the candidate and an option for his guide. Without trust one cannot build.~ A base like thfit, though~ ca~ support an encouraging amount of human weakness in the guide: ~ In earlier times novitiates were found at the end,of.long driveways or behind high wallsin buildings where the,windows were often°opaque. This cut off novices and their mentors from everyday life, and °more particularly, from their families. Yet the unpretentious pdrents of many ainovice or'guide made a more successful:job of integrating life and God than .did their sons or daughters in religioUs congregations. Yet it was made difficult f6r them to visit ~their children. Soa formation was attempted with often~no real roots in human nature and familylife. What Iso, a Novitiate~For? /~ 335 I am simplifying but not, I think, falsifying a Process which,produced many excellent religious but also. by common observ~atibn, left numbers of ,religious and their guides floundering in a no-man's,land. They could not, synthesize God and life: they often lacked human warmth and,commonsense:~' unlike many of their parents. We may make the same mistake today, unlesswe~ test the lecturer's idea against ttie lived experience of the genuinely Christian. man or ~woman. ~, .~, Maturityocan show something of human nature and off, God. Even,if.the ink is dry on the diploma, the guide may still be wet behind the ears. because what :is wanted in a guide is wisdom: knowledge asiimilated, not just knowledge acquir~'d. The availability of lecturers iniseveral disciplines for the formation team is excellent, but the mature novice needs more. What he wahts is God in the present, and the gift' of wisdom alone cambest direct him.oA university, for '~xample could give him all the knowledge her-.is capables.of receiving regarding the text of the Sermon on the Mount. but some,xriight agree with Bonhoeffer when he set up his seminary Lha_t the univ.ersity could never provide the context for living it.~ In the last anal~,sis. ~vhile properly emphasizing that formation is chiefly based on self-development, equally:,~fov the Christian, it must reflect wholly the ideal of Christ. Under The Influence of an Idi~hl Ul"timately what is off~ered in religious life? A candidate is offering himself or herself to a community of men or, women at whose hea'rt is one who has sa o, am the bread of life; he who comes to me shali not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst" (Jn 6:35). Whaiever th~ young perso~ wants from life is to be found in Christ. the Lord 9f ihe community. To be really,alive is to be really Christian, drawing life from Christ as the body does fr~om food. Whatever their capacity for love and so for giving,~all that is deep~;t ih candidates can be met in (~hrist. T.hey shall never thirst in his company is his claim. He above all can use qualities they do not know they have. The young person's thirst for life and love can be satisfied and more°i~'they ~ome- to Christ in faith. In the fourth gospel we are told, faith is used some ninety eighi times-- always as a verb. never a noun. Thus it indicates a personality, trusting, believing in, relying on, wh'olly given to God in Christ. The verb in the text~e have q uoted,is particularly strong. "To believe" means.io hold on to, like a .~ice or cla~p, and never let go. The Christ of the °i~ommunity a.[one can make demands like that. and his words will take flesh oi~l~.,t,,o, the degree that'ihe candidate has such~faith. This contrast between the promises of our Lord and the lives of some of his religious will pose questions for the youngcandidate. Evidently, the novices' guides are tobe seen as men and women of. genui.ne faith. Again it is a world only for the mature. The fourth gospel is a marvelously practical place to explore the implica- 33~ /~ Review for ~Religious~ ~lay-June, 1984 tions 0f formation in, Christ, but.the merest sketch can be "given here. The gospel.'s earlier chal~te~S can be seen a.s signs illustrating what was promised to our Lord's first followers in chapter one: "You will see heaven opened and the :~ngels~of God a~_cending and descending on the Son of Man"-(Jn 1:51). In Christ's company they~wiil see God present and active among them "angels oof~God ascending and descending"---as Jacob once understood from his dream to his. utter astonishment. The subsequent challenge of the gospel is to re'~ognize this. and s6 be given "power to become children of~God" (1:12). ¯ .The sixth ~chapt'er, from which we took our original text, is really an extended plea for faith in Christ to the exclusion of all else. Despite pitiful res,our~es "whaVare they among so many?"(6:9) Christ fed thousands, and so won their allegiance to .the point of their wishing to make him King, "because you ate ,your~ fill of the loaves" (6:26): Since they thus misread the sign, "Jesus'°withdrex:v again to .the mountain by himself" (6:15) a,n enigmatic and-~far from'obvious figure. He is insistent that they look deeper: "Do not labor for, the food, tha_t perishes, but~ for the food which endures to eternal life which the Sbfi .of Man will give~ you" (6:27). With all the Old Testament overtones of the God-given. manna feeding Israel. our Lord is inyiting them a~nd us to see this in himself, and so "believe in him whom he [God] has sent" (6:29). This is extraordinary language on the lips of someone from nondescript Nazaret.h in Galilee. Persons are to cling to Christ as to food from God. This insight is progressively and shockingly deepened until, for many, it was]ust too much:. "'This is a hard saying and who can listen to it?. After this many of his disciples'drew back and no longer went about with him" (6:60, 66). ThOse who stayed perhaps saw bettei" men and women than themselves ¯ walk away from ChriSt.°Thry, too. possibly, were in the position of a marginal minority. But they must take a personal decision: "Do you also wish to go away?" (6:67). Others have voted with their feet: What will they do? They decided: "Lord to whom shall we go?., woe have b~lieved and have come to know . .~ " (6:68-69). In accepting what Peter says on the disciple's behalf, Cl~rist's words seem to cut like a slap in the face: "Did I not choose you, the twelve, and one of you is a devil?" (6:70). He is of ~ourse speaking of the one who "was to betray him" (6:7.1). This tension runs throughout the gospel our Lord rubbing shoulders with his offn yet so unlike them. They think they at last underst~.nd him only for him to escape their grasp yet again. Undeniably attractive. Christ has'drawn human nature~ at its finest: generous, trusting, ~ivingTand at ~he'sarfi~imel tirash, fearful, faithless. No one's faith in Christ is ab~blute, but must'ever~ynature as the disriples found in the crucifixion and death of their Lord wheri,they had lost all reason to ho pc. But in the.situation, its low~est point outsi~l~ of an empty grave when there was not ever/a dead body,?to~clifig to with its past remembered hopes, they once again hear tllemselves pesonally addresseff by Christ: "Mary . ""Thomas . ""Peter . " Signs which gave glimpses of God in Christ in their frrmative years are now eclipsed in the wonder of fiis resurrection presence.oHaving practically despaired What Is a Novitiate For? / 337 of life and its meaning as centered on Christ, they are now men arid women reborn. They now know :frorfi experience, that. no one need ev~e.r-hunger and thirst coming to Christ. But to attain that belief they had t0 loseMrt.uall)~ every rational indi~tion that made such a belief credible.~.They, too, died with Christ. ¯ This experieni:e is enshrined in the fourth.gospel, which, while taking the reader to the heights in God, will no less really.take him to the depths of human experience. The adolescent's faith can mature in such company or he will hurriedly leave it. It is so fearfully honest: "One of you is a devil . Do you also w~sh to go away? . Is not this the man whom. they seek to kill?. So they took up stones to throw at him, but Jesus.hid himself . I lay down my life " . Let us go that we may die with him . If anyone knewwhere he was, he should let them know, so that they might'arrest him., . He knew who was to betray him . The cock will not crow till you have denied me three times . Standing by the cross, of Jesus [was] his mother . It is finished; and he bowed :his head and gave up his spirit." All o~" this takes place in the presen.ce of God among real and, for the most part, ostensibly good people.,The signs have to be read in circumstances of everyday life and an adult response given: These are the signs of faith to which the novice's guide must point, and both of them must follow, the whole illumined by the gloriously effective sign. of the crucifixion, death and resurrection of their' Lord. "It isoa fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God~' says Hebrews (10z31), but, realistically, where else can one live? Faith will mature nowhere else. Beyond All Meaning ,, ., Itis for this reason, surely, that the contemplative side of a religious vocation must be stressed. Here truly lies the specific difference in our way of life. One may debate religious life as being primarily .a group of people trying to live the gospel under one roof, and expressing this in the outreach of an apostolate; or perhaps seeing community chiefly as an effective tool, stripped down to whatever best serves human need; but underlying it all, there has to be a hunger and thirst for God. Genuinely-chaste, poor and obedient living may seem simply odd otherwise. However imperfectly it is lived, this is what is seen. Marginal men and women living at odds with, what makes life livable for most people will need "guts," courage and conviction to keep faith with their commitment. It will all take place first and foremost within the individual man or woman. Following the gospel pattern it may mean at times looking for the living among the dead, heartbroke ~n and terrified, ofitside an empty grave. The logic of the gospel is not naturally~ours. Under GOd, only those closest to him in the contemplative tradition in every walk of life can guide us through it. To be introduced to this (or to continue in it) the novice and young religious need to be shown an uncluttered lifestyle. It is surprising .how little is needed if one's eye is kept on the one thing necessary. God and human warmth are needed in formation but little else. ~31~ / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 Humor is~a marvelous teaching and growing mediumoable, to-both humanize and divinize. The vows are meant to free the human personality, to admit the love of God and so make one fully alive. For any of this to have an effect it will need to be. made part of oneself. If conversion to God in Christ is to happen it must be in the human heart. This is why silence, both external and internal, is necessary. One has, therefore, to be trained to be still and to listen, or one will,continue to live by external stimuli, equating immediate satisfaction from what is there with authenticity. Though young people today may sing of the gentleness of silence, few find it so. Yet an introduction to it during formation can offer' still another priceless "freedom from the contemporary." How, in fact, one can mature and hope to hear God in daily life without an understanding of silence, I do not know. In this context, a relatively recent, urgent recommendation from the Congregation for Catholic Education to those in charge of seminaries, is of particular value to persons charged with initial religious formation. Students, the Congregation maintains, "must receive an experience of interior silence. They must acquire a genuine sense of it. They must become capable of communicating it to others . [The] main task of those responsible for the running of the seminary is the formation of the students in interior silence. They must make continual and concerted efforts in this undertaking,ns This article has attempted to pursuebut one thread in the complexfield of initial religious formation--the exercise of personal responsibility in both novice and guide. Those who know something of what interior silence is are best placed to exercise responsibility in freedom, and respond in faith to wherever God will take them. NOTES ~R. Bolt, A Man for All Seasons (l~ondon: 1960), Act I. ?D. Bonhdeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison (London: 1971), p. 233. a'Experience shows that a period of'preparation for the seminary, given over exclusively to spiritu~.l formation, is n.gt only not superfluous but can bring surprising results., is welcomed by the students., insist., that th!.s suggestion be tried" (Sacred Congregation for Catholic Education: Circular Letter[Rome: !980. CBCI, New Delhi], p. 24.) *"God hates visionary dreaming; it makes the. dreamer proud and pretentious. The man who fashions a visionary ideal of community demands that it be realized by GOd, by others and by himself . When his ideal .picture is destroyed, he sees the,community going to smash. So he becomes. ~ an accuser of his brethren., of God. of himself'(D~ Bonhoeffer, Ltfe Together [London: 1970], p. 16. ~E~ Bethge, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, (London: 1970), p. 334. 6Sacred Congregation for Catholic Education, op. tit., pp. II, 14. The Charism of the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati John~ Miriam Jones, S.C. Sister Jones is Assistant Provost at the University of Notre Dame. Regarding the topic of her article, Sister wrotei "Whilethere is a uniqueness about each charism, there is also a universalitY recognized by. many wom~n religious." Originally a talk delivered to her own sisters, Sister Jones intended as well to address this universality of value and goal. She may be addressed at: Office of the Provost; The University of Notre Dame; Notre Dame, IN 46556. We Sisters of Charity are called to be faith-filled women of the Church (Charism of the 'Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati). This simple, short sentence has four pieces that describe most of what is so central to our lives: Sisters of Charity, women,faith, and .Church. By God's grace we live out our womanhood as Sisters of Charity, and so these two pieces of the statement describe the essence of our very being, containing as well our vocation from the Lord. The other two pieces of that statement call us t~pfaith, lived out as part of the Church--and so they describe our relationship with our God and with his People. This paper is an attempt to touch upon that core experience, to fan its fire and thus cause it to burn more brightly. The' Charism of the Sisters of Charity 'Our consideration together of a part of our ~harism launches congrega-tion- wide four-year emphasis on our newly crafted charism statement. Our ability to put .words to ~hat charism comes at the end of a lengthy road. We have traveled that road now for nea.rly twenty years at the bidding of Vatican II. In the early 60s we were asked, as women religious, to discover again the spirit of our foundress and to adapt that spirit to the times in which we live: The council's document, Perfectae Caritatis, told us in 1965: 339 340 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 It serves the best interest of the Church for communities'to hax~e, their, own .special, character and purpose. Therefore loyal recognition and safeguarding should be. accorded to the spirit of founders. Over these years we have strugigled with that first,mandate: recognition of the speciai character and purpose of the Sisters of Charity. If your memory of that struggle matches mine, you will agree that in the beginning our effort to give words to the spirit that drove us seemed to be a rather frustrating one because initially it seemed to reveal more the commonalities of religious life than the uniqueness of our congregation as compared with any other. We went through a time when there seemed to be an almost interchangeability to the self-definitions of the Sisters of Charity or Of the Sisters of Mercy or of the Sisters of Loretto. But within the last few ~,ears our special character has indeed come into focus as we prayed over it and talked about it in an effort to express what it is that makes us unique. Finally in the Chapter of 1983, we as a congregation could, at long last, put into just four sentences what we believe to be our lifeblood. Thus, our coming to a recognition of that lifeblood has been for us all a long, but very rich discovery process--o~- perhaps better, a rediscovery process. Secbndly, Perfectae Caritatis ~dmonished"us to :,~afeguard our charism. That is what we are about in today's Church. But if the word "safeguard" seems a bit static, put it another way. We protect a treasure for the Church in our living out the graced vision of Elizabeth Ann Seton. Father John Futrell has defined charism as "simply a graced way of seeing and following Jesus for the service of the whole Church . "1 Elizabeth Seton saw Jesus, and she followed him; so the grace, the vision was initially .hers. It was her vocation, her mode of participation in the mystery of God. But at some historical moment over the years, each of us has received the same gift. Mother Margaret Cecilia George and many others before us have treasured it and lived it. And now it is ours to protect. The.word charism, as you know, comes from the Greek ~'ord for.gift. "Gift" not only means something freely given--that is, a grace--but "gift" .can also mean a special ability, as a gift for art~ or music, or dance, or numbers. Such a gift is recognizable in a person. In our case the gift is to be recognizabl~ not only in each of us, but in the corporate person, the Sisters of Charity 6f Cincinnati. But as with any gift, musical or otherwise, it will thrive only if it is used. And that is our challenge. A few years ago in an article in REVIEW FOR-RELIGIOUS,2 Norman Brockman, in dealing with some of the aspects 6f"charism, indicated that charism is khe very reason for a congregation's existence. The group has been given a particular graced vision for the sake of the Chiarch, and as'its member~ gather to follow their foun.d.ress anew, there comes a point where they incarnate this gi]'t, they express it, in new ways andin new forms of life. The group prays the gift, ponders'ii, witnesses it, comes to a communal realization of the charism. The Charity of the Sisters of Charity .' Our identity then as "faith-filled women of the Church" is indeed our treasure; As, with any treasure it surely needs active attention. The remaining three.sentences of our charism statement tell us somelhing of what that active attention ought to be so as to nourish the very marrow of our life with our God. But my current focus is on "faith-filled women of the Church" and will consider each of its three components: the aspect of our gift attribute to our being women; a consideration of what it means to be faith-filled women; and our call to be women of the Church. Gift We Offe.r as Women It is only in ihe last fifteen or twenty.years that we might be tempted to focus on the gift we offer to the Church as women,,to suggest that the nature of womanhood might be of specia! significance to the Church. We have ,no evidence that in 1809 Elizabeth in. Emmitslsurg; or in 1852 Margaret in Cincinnati, had an~, such realization. But the gift was there. Both those. women, those giants who preceded us, had qualities that could have been developed only in the best of women. While I doubt that either of them sensed that reality, all the years of our history give ample evidence of the qualitiesand contributions which women uniquely bring. What is it about womanhood that can be of such basic significance to the Church? At the very root of it all is something quite fundamental. God is so entire that his creation can~reflect.only bits and pieces of his goodness and his wonder: The best qualities of humans are, indeed, those piecemeal reflections. There is a great variety of these: kindness, consideration, gentleness, strength, truthfulness, honesty, all somehow reflecting in bits and pieces the wholeness of God. But consider this: there is a whole set of human qualities best reflected through .the feminine mode Of, humanity. If this is true, then inversely there mustbe another whole set of qualities that is reflected by the masculine mode. Ideally, then, it takes both those sets to come anywhere near reflecting the whole . Because historically the institutional Church is predominantly masculine and patriarchial, there has been scant opportunity in some arenas for one whole set of values to be operative. There is an increasing agreement today that the Church, as with most of society, needs to complement such male traits as rationality, aggressiveness, competitiveness, and control with a female approach that is intuitive, collaborative, egalitarian, holistic, integrative. Lest there be misunderstanding, let.it be recorded that neither approach has a monopoly on these qualities. It would be faulty reasoning indeed to suggest that women religious alone bear the burden of.bringing a feminine .counterbalance to the Church. All women of the Church are called to that. Also let .it be said that God need not be limited by structures. All of us know many a layman, priest, bishop who has a gentle, caring, contemplative side. through which those aspects of God have been reflected and taught to others. We also know .many women, through ~142 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 history and personally, who have brought the feminine to bear in Church matters--in ministry of every sort, and in the daily living out of their faith. While it is true that women religious are a very small part of the feminine side of the Church I want to suggest that because of our opportunities we bear a disproportionate obligation for feminine influence and for public representation of those facets of God which we perhaps have special capacity to understand. Daniel O'Hanlon, a Jesuit from Berkele3~, suggests that a Western world and Church suffer from the lack of the feminine.3 He calls on women to portray--and the Church to acknowledge and relate to--traits of God which he describes as feminine. They are lovely traits and we khow them, tro. He names God's compassionate, unconditional love for us; his nourishing and life-giving care for us; his presence in mystery to be found not by "rational effort but through loving contemplation; he names God's gentleness and .his sensitivity toward our every need; he describes God as an~intimate friend and companion, much more than a Master and a Lord. And capping his list, he describes God's unyielding fidelity. Those. insights invite us to contemplate God anew, to search more deeply to understand this magnificent Person. Ought we not then talk to one another about him? Help one another as sisters to plumb his depths? What an adventure is in store for those who, perhaps through us, experience those lovely feminine aspects of their God and thus know new energy and completeness in the Church. What a source of gratitude if, perhaps because of us, people's needs are served with the tender, empathic, patient touch that is especially present in women. ,~ " Faith-filled Women What does it mean to be faith-filled women? That is a powerful phrase, a phrase without which Elizabeth Seton would remain undescribed. It desi:ribes not an attitude, but an interaction that took place between God and a woman. That interaction was an integral, inseparable part of her fabric. She spoke of it as, "My blessed faith: all that 1 possess., so dear to me." It is obvious that faith was her driving force. From very early days, for her to live meant to be faith-filled. As she matured in faith it came to be synonymous with her very being, Consider the time frame. Her journey in the Catholic faith was less than twenty years, as a religious, about a dozen, but that faith journey was intense and profound.~, It pervaded the very marrow of her bones. I have chosen to dwell on three remarkable manifestations of Elizabeth Seton's faith°: her attention to the presence of the Lord, her surrender to his Providence, and the place of sorrow in her maturation in faith. Among her words are these: "The. daily lesson: to keep., quietly in his presence, trying to turn every action on his Will . "This was a lesson she offered freely, often, and to many. Again, expressed not in her words, but in a phrase from our 1979 Mission Statement, this was an experience of the "active The Charity of the Sisters of Charity / 343 presence" of an initiative-taking Lord. For her, God was the reality in life. Her awareness of him was unfailingly demonstrated in her words, whether they were written or spoken, in her daily actions, in her propulsion toward eternity. It was clear that she experienced God and that her experience was personal, intimate, confident, consuming. ~ That was one hundred and fifty years ago, when life was less hectic. And so we need to ask whether that kind of experience is affected by the passage of time, by a change in the pace of life? Is being that faith-filled a possibility in the twentieth century? The answer is visible in our midst. The manifestations, the circumstances may differ from those of Elizabeth, but if you look around at those for whom God is real, you will find women whose consciousness of their God is a twenty-four-hour-a-day affair. We constantly rub shoulders with our own sisters who bear the spark of God in their lives. We converse with' these women whose lives are fueled by a realization of God and of his loving initiative toward them. All of us need to talk more with each other about such a wonder so that we will become increasingly filled with faith in the God we love but cannot see. The second manifestation of Elizabeth's faith was in her surrefider to his providence, to God' loving arrangements in her life, to a~ God whom she personified as "The Will." Remember her zest for life, her affection for dear and' loved ones, her tendency to hope and to 0ptimism. Contrast that with the untimely deaths of William, Annina, Rebecca, Cecilia, Harriet, many of the early sisters of Charity, with her early struggles over conversion, with rebuff fro~ the Seton family, with misunderstandings from Church representatiyes, her' uncertainty about the future and the welfare of her children, her own ill health. And then hear her say, "As Sisters of Charity we should fear nothing . You must, must leave Jail] to the dearest, kindest, best of Fathers." And again, "His dear, adored; blessed Will be done! I have none, and if he but continues to give himself, 1 am blind tO everything else." In all of this, there was struggle and pain, but she surrendered to such evidence of his "active presence;" not in fatalism,~but as Jesus did, as part of the mystery of love. For her it was all or nothing. 'There is no painless path to God. She taught us the truth~ of what Kierkegaard wrote: "When God calls me,' he bids me come and die." Kierkegaard spoke of love as "passion for God" and for him an intrinsic part of that passion was obedience. In such passion there can be .no effort to control the rdationship. In his book When the Well Runs Dry, Thomas Green, in speaking of total response to the love of God, said: "It's not so much to do something a.s to allow something to be done to us.'~ In the bool~'s context that statement is describing prayer--but living in surrender to Providence is very much a lived prayer. In the third place Elizabeth Se~on matured in faith througti the place of sorrrw in her life. And sorrows there were. There was a spate of illness:death, financial struggle, two sons unresponsive to her example and urgings, ~1~14 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 complications created by her clerical superiors. All of those were accepted with graciousness and with unwavering love, but at greatcost. Her surrender became a transforming~force. In a few years she moved from an uncertain groping toward faith to an absolute spiritual mastery. At the time of Annina's death she described her anguish as a "grief of the heart--never a grief of the soul." That composure no doubt resulted from her manifestation of faith through surrendering to God's will. But with no less surrender at a later point she came to kno~w what grief of the soul meant. In her writings one can detect the presence of a dark night, a great dryness of spirit. In discovering that she suffered from such dryness w,e ought to take great solace because that is a sorrow which all of us share. Few of us know, or will know, any equal to her personal hardships. We find her endurance and equanimity marvelous and are tempted~otO think those characteristics more within the grasp of a saint than of ourselves. Nor are we very anxious to be tested. But all of us who have come beyond the earliest stages of our journey toward God know something about darkness and dryness. So here is an experience that we do share with Elizabeth. Do you recall in .your formative years in the Community any instructions on the meaning or purpose of. darkness or how to handle it? 1 don't. Yet that pattern comprises a large part of our prayer life. Elizabeth wrote about it: "This sadness of mine ~I cherish as a grace." Precisely! When we common folk can come to recognize our' darkness and dryness in prayer as God's choice for the present moment, and to surrender to that choice, we too can know the grace of transformation. That isa humbling experience and a thrilling one. Father Green says that the major part of the work of transformation in the life of a pray-er isaccomplished by surrendering to this dryness, this darkness.S The darkness is a grace. It calls us to.yield our very selves, and to be acted upon by a loying God. As prayer appears fruitless and we learn the lessons regarding .this new way to pray, we have to let go of control, words, formulae, comfort. We must learn simply to attend and yield to God. That is what prayer is all about. It can bring us to love even as we speak we desire to love: Surrendering to what ~is.happening to us in prayer can result in surrendering our whole life. Understanding this experience of apparent distance from God as proof of his very presence and of his wanting to strip and transform us, allows the experience to ready us for eternity, and allows us to yearn for him with realism. Here. indeed, We are,,one with our foundress, who matured in faith through sorrow and surrender. Lest emphasizing those three facets of Elizabeth's faith obscures the whole, let us look at the woman whom faith ~brought Elizabeth Seton to become, the whole woman, and examine her as described by Joseph Dirvin.6 Toward the end of her twelve years in religious life, Dirvin says of her, "Elizabeth had balance, a superior c, ommon sense--divine and human that puts everything in its place,unerringly, tidily." Dirvin speaks of her spirituality a.s "wide, warm, 7he Charity of the Sisters of Charity / 345 sunny, practical, generous, informal, American." He describes her as "romantic, poetic, tender," yet a realist; efficient in her work, simple, down-to-earth, a "woman of hope and unconquerable optimism."? Who: wouldn't appreciate being so described? One concludes that the faith that filled and drove her, brought her to wholeness, holiness, at its loveliest, its feminine loveliest. Women of the Church Finally, we are called to be Women of the Church. This realist whom we emulate spoke deathbed words which have clearly echoed in Charity hearts for more than one hundred sixty ybars: "My Sisters, be daughters of the Church; be daughters of the Church." It was always with great affection that she spoke of "our Church in America" and believed in its future greatness. She whose entry into that Church was such a struggle became an intimate part of a young American Church, saw its strength and dreamed its dreams--including a role for her Sisters of Charity. She also saw its unsteady side, the fragility of its human component. She herself was a victim of that weakness. It seems safe to claim that the pronouncement of Vatican II concerning the Church a century and a half later, and the thrust that the Council initiated would have delighted Elizabeth Seton and would have been in tune with her understanding of what she called "the mystery of the Church." Vatican II called it that also. The dogmatic constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, described the Church as a kind of sacrament of salvation, the way to ultimate union with the God of our faith. The Council Fathers took pains to show two aspects of that sacrament: the one--institutional, structural; the other--the Church as ~ gathering of a messianic people, of God's people. Lumen Gentium begins, not with the treatment of structures and government, but with the aspect of the people of God. It views his people in terms of dignity, witness, .ministry, and relationships to one another. When the Council Fathers develop the concept of the institutional Church, they do so in terms of service to God's people, never domination. They identify the aim of the structure to nurture, to contribute to the growth of God's people, to serve the human family through the various functions of authority, teaching, governing, sanctifying. But the Council Fathers also make clear that both aspects of the Church are made up of frail and sinful people who are in constant need of forgiveness and renewal. In that post-Vatican Church Elizabeth Seton would feel very much at home. She grasped its mystery, on the one hand with great affection, service, loyalty, respect; on the other, with a sympathy for human frailty and at times, with loving criticism. She complained to Church authority when she saw decisions impeding the good that she felt God intended, or interfering with freedom of conscience--the conscience of others, never her own. Archbishop Carroll received many a letter from her bemoaning decisions made by Sulpician superiors, asking him to adjudicate their propriety. However, the content of those letters always testifies to her understanding of authority, and to her loyalty. As Dirvin says, "She knew when to fight and when to submit."7 3t16 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 Struggling for that kind of balance is a lesson for her twentieth-century daughters in a time which Jesuit Avery Dulles described as the "century of the Church.TM We as women of that Church must breathe its air, think in its terms, identify with its people, be involved in its struggles, fine tune the voice of God's Spirit, so that our convictions and subsequent struggles are devoid of self-interest or personal causes. True women of the Church are first faith-filled women in love with their God. Only from that perspective can we be genuine leaven in ~society, agents of transformation. Whatever else it is, the Church to which our foundress commended us is charged with the revelation of God's mystery. It is to be the agent of our meeting God, of bringing him to men and women, and of bringing men and women to him. Our Church is a universal church. In today's world communi-cation, transportation, international attitudes join people in every segment of the globe. All peoples deserve our prayers, our concern and some of our service, but our compelling charism is to be women of the American Church, just as it was Elizabeth's in her brief time. Elizabeth Ann Seton had a particular understanding of that American Church which grew out, of her understanding of both American Protestantism and Italian Catholicism. Long before its time, she seemed to understand both aspects of Vatican ll--the mystery of the Church as God's people in their journey toward him, and the structured Church, the various levels of which she dealt with in a very personal way during the twelve years she gave life to the Sisters of Charity. Her hope for our Church and her fidelity to it was not blind. She knew human frailty--her own, her sisters, the clergy; she experienced a lack of understanding personally and on behalf of the congregation. If justice were impeded or good thwarted she spoke and wrote with conviction and with a marvelous mix of humility~ courage, frankness and reverence. Regardless of our point of view, I daresay that each of us is troubled in some way about today's Church. We may have misgivings about the place of American women religious, about official or semiofficial positions takeri or not taken, or about the expectations of the hierarchical Church vis-a-vis our renewal experience of the last twenty years. Sixteen decades after she asked us to be women of this Church, what would be Elizabeth Seton's advice to us today? With no claim that 1 have heard her accurately I do want to share with you what 1 believe 1 heard. I believe that her advice would be voiced with enthusiasm for post-Vatican life in the Church and in religious life; that with us she would find these times of change and uncertainty rich, growthful, challenging. I think her advice would go something like this~three categories, three points under each: Advice for the Head I. Keep recalling the nature of the Church. Have sympathy and patience with the human element, with the need toaddress diversity and to learn The Charity of the Sisters of Charity 34"/ 2~ from it. When there are differences, know, always that there are two sides to the issue. Appreciate the good will of those who judge the position differently, and think very long thoughts about its being God's Church and about the ultimate direction being in his hands. As women with gifts in their heads, continue to probe and to learn. Having limited vision makes us part of the problem. The total truth resides in no one human being, but the more of that truth which we possess the more we bring God's mind to the task. Recognize the importance of bridgebuiiding for effectiveness. If one spans a spectrum, no "we/they" division becomes possible. Advice for the Heart i. Foster positive emotions so as to outweigh negative ones. Our love for God's people should tip the balance against any cynicism about the institution. Our gratitude for mystery should outstrip any impatience with human limits. Our hope for the Goff of our faith is more powerful than any kind of discouragement. There are all sorts of wisdom afloat about what can be accomplished by light hearts as opposed to heavy ones. 2. Let your hearts be governed by your experience of the Lord. Yearn for him and his kingdom as the very framework for your life in the Church. That kind of perspective enables "living with" a great deal which we may find frustrating. 3. Stretch toward an unyielding, full-hearted commitment. Expect to pay the price to accomplish that good. Elizabeth Seton taught us that. Jesus Christ taught us that! If things go smoothly, it might just be because they are going our way. Advice for the Person I. Elizabeth Seton anticipated that Sister-of-Charity presence would effect good in the Church. We, as individuals and as a congregation, should make decisions about our service on the basis of contributing toward a stronger, healthier American church. In a time of lessening numbers, it is critical that we target strategic areas of service with special concern for the ne~ds of the poor, whether that poverty be of body, of mind, or of heart. 2. The gifts of our women are our greatest resource. Developing those gifts, preparing for ministry and choosing that ministry become the joint responsibility of congregation and sister. 3. We represent and participate in both aspects of Church. We are part of the People of Ggd; we are, as women religious, some part of the structure of the Church. We therefore have two kinds of loyalty, two kinds of understanding, we must strive to balance those two parts of the Church as she did. 1 believe that Elizabeth might hope for us to do so 34~1 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 with the feminine traits we have. learned from our God: compassion, gentleness, patient fidelity, the urge to give life. We will make a real difference among Grd's peopl~ and ifi the institutional Church, and therefore in the to~tal, Church, only if weare deeply of God. Only as ]'aith-filled will we be impelled to be women of the Church. And so, as was stated in the beginning, "We Sisters of Charity are called to be faith-filled women of the Church." It is our heritage and vocation. It is a mark by which we are to be recognized. It is our gift, the treasure we keep alive, for those who also will come to be Sisters of Charity. NOTES ~John Carroll Futrell, S.JL "Some Reflections on the Religious Life," Review for Religious, 28, pp. 705-718. 2Norbei-t Brockman. S.M., ~The Shadow Side of Charism," Review for Religious, 35, pp. 229-231. -~Catholic Theological Society of America's convention, reported in National Catholic Reporter, July 15. 1983. 4Thomas H. Green, S.J., When the Well Runs Dry (Ave Maria Press, 1979). Slbid. 6Joseph I. Dirvin, C.M., Mrs. Seton (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1979). 71bid. ~Avery Dulles, S.J. "Introduction to the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church," in" The Documents of Vatican 11 (Guild Press, 1966). Marriage and Continence Complement Each Other Jesus did not say that marriage was inferior to celibacy in itsel£ He recommended celibacy only for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. The two forms of life are complementary. The Christian community witnesses to the eschatological dimension of the kingdom through celibacy for its sake. Married love must be marked with the fidelity and total self-giving that are the basis of religious and priestly celibacy; and continence for the sake of the kingdom of heaven must lead to parenthood of a spiritual kind (John Paul ll, General Audience, 19 April, 1982; L'Osservatore Romano, 19 April, 1982). Bonding Together for Mission Melinda Roper, M.M. Sister Melinda Roper has been president of the Maryknoll Sisters since 1978. This article is based On an addres~ given by her to the Sisters of St. Joseph of Cleveland in preparation for their Chapter of November, 1983. Sister Melinda may be addressed at: Maryknoll Sisters; Maryknoll, NY 10545. ~am happy to be able to share with you some of my reflections and experience on mission. I would like to talk about how mission is a source of energy and commitment in community and how commfinity is a source of energy and commitment in mission. Where we begin to discuss such a theme is important. My starting point is the recognition of a fundamental tension which permeates both mission and community. This tension is described by the following phrases ih John's gospel: "They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world,"(Jn 17:16), and "As thou didst send me into,.the world, so I have sent them into the world," (Jn 17:18). The everlasting kindness and faithfulness of God's love for the world is condemned and crucified by that same world: "And the world has hated them because they are not of the world, even as | am not of the world," (Jn 17:14). Why does this happen? Why must it happen? Is there any way for Christians, the Church and religious communities to evade conflict and confrontation with the world? Today, as in the histo~'y of the Church, there are two principal routes of escape: isolation and aloofness from the world is one; the other is through compromise with the world. Each route is paved with fear whose source is self-interest, be it "eternal" self-interest, or the temporary security of power and comfort. If we opt for one of these routes, there are many scenic side paths along the way which subtly distract us from the isolation or compromise we may have chosen. We thus elude this fundamental energy and tension in the life and person of Jesus to which John refers. 350 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 As we read the letters of Paul to the early Christian communities, we can trace these same tendencies to escape the radical implications of.believing in Jesus Christ: Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age who are doomed to pass away. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glorification. None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory (I Co 2:6-8). As I look at many groups within the Church in the United States today, I perceive that we have moved from a spirituality of flight from the world into the arena of public issues to a degree that had not been part of oi]r recent past. We have moved into the world. As we continue to become involved in public issues, especially those which deal with economic and political policies and structures, we must be keenly aware of the radical differences between the wisdom and tactics, strategies and ideologies of the world and the wisdom of God in Jesus Christ. Our temptation today may be to seek change by compromising the wisdom of God with that of the "rulers of this age." Most Christian communities today have given much time, effort and prayer to social justice, solidarity with the poor and world peace. Our intention and motivation are in harmony with our great biblical tradition. Yet, how frequently do we find ourselves co-opted by the ways of the world when it comes to action toward a future world of peace with justice. It seems that there are at least five considerations we must address if we are not to be coerced and co-opted by the world: ~ 1. The Christian community dreams of and envisions, the reign of God together. How do we concretize our vision of the kingdom or reign of God today? Each culture and society will descri6e the fullness of life or the reign of God with different images. The biblical images with which we are familiar range from a land flowing with milk and honey, where no one is in need, to the heavenly Jerusalem coming out of heaven, with God dwelling among us and wiping away all tears, death, rriourning and pain. The quality of our relation-ships will flow from a superabundance of love and understanding; there will be no inequality among nations,, races, men and women, rich and poor. Today, what are the concrete images tliat we in a technological culture visualize for ourselves and our sisters and brothers around 'the world as we move in hope towards the reign of God? How much does the "great American dream" of our ancestors--freedom, liberty and justice for all--influence our vision of the reign of God? Perhaps we have increasingly greater difficulty concretizing our ~,ision of the fullness of life for all peoples. I believe this is also one of the greatest challenges for us rdigious today regarding community, living. What are the concrete images and vision~ we have of community in terms of thee reign of God? It 'seems tO me that the twff Bonding Together for Mission / 351 are intimately and intrinsically ,bound up in each other. Our religious communities can only exist for and within the reign of God, not for themselves. What is our vision? It is not sufficient for individuals to articulate a vision. Communities of believers must share a vision. 1 believe that shared reflection moves us more deeply into the wisdom of God. As our ability to listen,becomes more sensitive, we enter into the harmony and paradox of our world and of~our God. We will become communities Of contemplation; From this contemplation together will flow a vision for tomorrow. The most concrete question I can put before you is: Do we take the time? 2. The Christian community discerns and selects together those ministries which will move it toward its vision. How do we move from where we are today towards our vision? This question is a bit easier to comment on because we can deal directly with where and how we expend our time and energy. We do make choices and organize our lives and communities in order to effect change in our world. For most of us, our ministries or apostolic works are key indicators .as to how we see the reign of God coming about, and this is also where we can easily slip into the coercion~of the world of which John and Paul wrote so much. Iwill use one example of this coercion which I judge to be very subtle in our society, culture and Church, namely: professionalism. It is a two-edged sword because, on the one hand, the skills and knowledge we can acquire in order to better serve others in the spirit of the Gospel are extremely useful. On the other hand, the systems, institutions and values within which a profession is learned and exercised are frequently fundamentally opposed to the Gospel. Perhaps the old American dream was envisioned as coming about through competence and hard work, but that is not sufficient for the coming of the reign of God. Some of the mechanisms which keep our systems going are: competition, prestige and achievement rewarded by salary, benefits and promotion to positions of greater control and management. We become immersed in bureaucracy instead of in the life of the world. Once,we begin to take all these on as signs of success and even as sources of our identity, we are being co-opted by the world, and, before we know it, we begin to accommodate ourselves, our institutions and the Gospel to the standards and values of the world. Let no one deceive himself. If any one among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is folly with God. Forit is written: "He catches the wise in their craftiness," and again: "The Lord knows that th~ thoughts of the wise are futile" (I Co 3:18-20). I believe thav'0ne of thekey functions of the religious commu.nity today in the United States is to reflect and discern together those ministries and works which ate most in tune with the spirit of the Gospel. At the same time, we challenge each other and our ihstitutions to a keen awareness of the great possibilities of being coerced and co-opted by those values and standards 352 / Review for. Religious, May-June, 1984 which demand that the Gospel be accommodated. What procedures and criteria do we use in order to set directions or priorities in ministry? 3. The Christian community chooses a lifestyle which contradicts those values in a c~lture which undermine the Gospel There is a ,.fundamental tension in most religious communities today regarding lifestyle, especially concerning material goods. In most .of the great religious traditions, including the Christian tradition, there is a stream of asceticism and spirituality which advocates simple or austere living .in the pursuit of truth. There is also the fact that most organized religions, at one time or another 'in their history, have become wealthy and powerful according to worldly values. In terms of their purpose, this is frequently evaluated as a time of decadence. The Catholic Church in the United States has moved from being a Church of the poor immigrant to one having social acceptability and even prestige. We religious have moved right along with this change. Our expectations of material comfort, from health care to diet and entertainment, have blended pretty well with those of our society. In one sense, this may not be so bad in that we are no longer traveling an escape route of isolation and aloofness. In another sense, though, it is time to examine the invasion of materialism and consumerism into our values and understanding of the Gospel. To the degree that our economic structures, which both support and export materialism, undermine our vision of the reign of God, we who form Christian communities must be a living sign of contradiction. We must remember, however, that we, as Jesus, are sent into the world, not away from it. We will be tempted to compromise. Living community today means that we can both affirm and challenge each other to become living signs of contradiction to our unjust, materialistic society. ,, 4. The patterns o~f relationship in the Christian community contradict the fear and defensiveness in United States society. Again, ~we must look at the reality of our society and culture .and .be sensitive and insightful in order to clearly distinguish that which is of the world and that which is of the Gospel. Examples abound--and I will select just one for comment: our system of defense in the name of national security. Any defense system is based more on attitudes and values than on dollars and weapons. First of all, it requires an enemy and a threat. It necessitates sufficient fear in order to mobilize resources to destroy the enemy, in this case, communism. Aititudes of defensiveness and fear permeate our society to such a degree that "an eye for an eye"is not even held up as an acceptable basis for action. Through fear, we have created an enemy who is ,so monstrous that the only acceptable posture of defense is the capability and willingness to totally destroy it. Followers of Jesus are sent into this world to live according to radically different attitudes and values: love your enemies, forgive those who offend Bonding Together for Mission / 353 you, pray for those who persecute you. These teachings are not meant solely for isolated communities of believers. They are meant to be announced and lived in the market places, court rooms, Congresses and White Houses of the world. Paul gives a lot of advice to the early Christian communities. To the community in Corinth, he writes: "When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we try to conciliate; we have become and are now, as the refuse of the world, the offscouring of all things" (I Co 4:12-13). As we attempt to move toward our vision of the reign of God, we will, without doubt, be slandered, persecuted and ridiculed. This will happen because, according to the defensiveness and fear of our woi-ld, we have nothing to defend and nothing to fear. We have a source of hope and truth which makes us free. This freedom is perceived as subversive and as a threat by those who control and operate within the psychological, political, economic and cultural structures and systems of defensiveness and fear. It is neither easy nor simple to be sent into the world with these values. The Christian community and, therefore, the religious community must become a place that is radically different from the world. Our communities challenge the hostility of our society with hospitality, welcoming the refugee and the outcast. We will become a source of courage for each other and for the world. We will also become a sign of contradiction to the world. 5. The Christian community lives and celebrates a universal Eucharist. When we gather in table friendship with the poor, the sinners, the refugees and the outcasts of our society and of our world, we do so in memory of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. As a community of faith, we share his body and blood in forgiveness and in hope of the fullness of life for all peoples. As Eucharist becomes the strength of our unity, it also becomes the energy of our mission. We know that worship without justice is blasphemous; we must come to understand that there is no justice without worship. As communities in mission, we pursue truth and justice with forgiving hearts. As fear disappears from our lives, we become the living memory of Jesus. We celebrate salvation in harmony with all of creation, and in communion with all peoples. 1 have given them thy word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I do not pray that thou shouldst take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; thy word is truth. As thou didst send me into the world, so 1 have sent them into the world (Jn 17:14-18). This is Jesus' prayer for us. He not only prayed for us, but he himself experienced what he prayed. He calls and sends us into the world to be the living memory of that prayer "God so loved the world . , May our communities move freely into the world to announce and live the Good News of the reign of God. Mission as Communication: A Marginal Note Anthony J. Gittins, C.S.Sp. Father Gittins, who has had "mission experience" in the conventionally accepted sense of the term, is now a member of London's The Missionary Institute and resides at the Chaplain's Residence; 34 Adolphus Road; London N4 2PP; Engl.and. Contraries and Contradictories The Church is missionary by nature; we are coming to the end of missionary work. Missionaries are special people who go overseas to preach the Gospel," you can be a missionary from a hospital bed. Every Christian is a missionary; we can't all be missionaries. A few people have a special missionary charism; if you are not a missionary, you are not a Christian. Today is the age of mission on six continents; today we must have a moratorium on missionary activity. "I work in a London parish, but I'm a missionary," . I'm not really a missionary, but l~n working here in Tanzania for a few years." "This is a comfortable, urban parish--it badly needs a missionary; . This middle class, comfortable parish is not for me--l'm a missionary." One could easily multiply these antithetical and seemingly contradictory statements, all of which are easy to elicit these days. I list them only as a reminder that the notions "mission" and "missionary" are still emotive terms and not amenable to a simple, acceptable definition. If we were to look at the usage of the word "pastoral," we would find similar problems of definition and clarification; and any discussion which tries to contrast the notions "missionary" and "pastoral," and to reach satisfactory and agreed conclusions on the distinctive and common features of each, is almost certainly bound to end in an impasse. Each of those opening statements contains some truth, indeed some important truth; but each too contains either some gross oversimplification or 354 Mission as Communication [ 355 some very dangerous implication. Could we not simply reach a careful and common definition of mission, and solve the ambiguities? In the following pages 1 will consider the question: "how can one be a missionary?" and avoid the questions: "what is mission?" and "what is a missionary?", since to attempt to do the latter would be to fall into the trap of defining mission and missionary, which is impossible; the words "define" and "definition" contain the notions of "limits" or "limitations," and derive from the Latin verb "to set bounds to." Yet the word mission comes from the verb "to send," and in some sense at least, the missionary is someone who is sent without limit, to the ends of the earth if necessary. So let us not define mission; let us not set bounds to the ends of the earth. Identifies and Differences If there is no useful reason to attempt an etymological definition of mission, and no theological reason either, why, we may ask, is it so fashionable to try to define the concept? And why has so much ink been recently spilled, on this issue? Do missionaries need to define themselves? I suggest that there is, and has been for some time, a tendency, inhibiting and unhealthy--a tendency both in conversation and in print, and illustrated in part by some of the statements with which I started--to overanalyze the concept of mission, to the point where missionaries have become self-conscious and apologetic or aggressive. Do missionaries need to prove that they are different from everyone else, somehow special? Do they need to be assured like James and John, that they will sit by the side of Christ in his glory (Mk 10:35-37), or to be told that they are the greatest (Mk 9:33-34), even though they should be very familiar with the mind of Christ on these matters? Do the professional missionaries, whose identity was once unquestioned and unchallenged, now feel peeved that they have borne the burden and heat of the day only to find latecomers equally acknowledged and rewarded (Mr 20:1 !-i6)? Is this not what Christ warned us against? When you have done all you have been told to do, say "We are merely servants: we have done no more than our duty" (Lk 17:10). So long as any missionary is basically insecure and needs to be accepted as "special," he or she simply cannot fulfill the missionary and Christian vocation. What is needed is a strong sense of identity and self acceptance, certainly: a sense of purpose and a sense of vocation. But if the identity of the missionary vocatipn is unclear, how is the individual missionary to cope? And if missionaries cannot cope with themselves, how can they cope with others? A strong self-image and self acceptance are prerequisites for authentic service, and need to be nurtured through parents and family or through other forms of community. Religious or apostolic communities are, theoretically, ideally constituted to provide affirmation, solidarity and support, yet many such communities are notoriously poor at reinforcing and encouraging their members, whether 3[i6 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 through rivalries within or uncertainty and disagreement about the nature of their apostolate and lifestyle. Anyone with an underdeveloped sense of identity or selfworth, is hardly going to be able to affirm others, because such a one feels threatened; and anyone without a conviction about the nature of mission, is not going to be able to challenge or share with others. While some individuals search for their vocation anew, and institutes try to rediscover their charisms as though they were some pot at the end of the rainbow, many missionary institutes settle unhappily or unknowingly into a terminal stage of their existence, and other individuals agonize over their loyalties to their communities and their own integrity. And all the while, "mission" remains an imperative of the Church, generous souls seek an authentic experience of this reality, and new shoots are to be seen tentatively pushing through the earth's mantle into another spring. Exclusion and Inclusion The different Christian denominations have moved increasingly--on the individual and community level--towards identifying and exploiting what they have in common rather than isolating themselves in their differences. But whilst there has been undoubted progress and marked goodwill among the denominations, there remains much work to be done within them. I can and will speak only of the Catholic Church when I say we have sometimes seemed to overemphasize the difference between us, on an individual, parish or religious-institution basis. And, admittedly justifiably on occasion, we have made a virtue out of pluralism and variety, where a greater virtue might have been discovered in exploiting areas of similarity and examining possibilities for collaboration. Why should we make lines of demarcation and distinction unless we are certain they are necessary? Why foster an exclusive mentality when an inclusive invitation is central to the Gospel? Why distinguish what is pastoral from what is missionary, unless to do so is to discover a great truth? What is devalued if we say that all pastoral activity must be missionary, and that all missionary activity must be pastoral? We can argue that there is a real distinction to be carved out between what is pastoral and what is missionary,I but less and less is there any justification for defining them in exclusive terms, as either/or. Far more important than a terminological issue is a psychological issue? how can we make mission work more pastoral and pastoral work more missionary: to put it another way, how can the universal Church be localized, and the local Church be universalized? And how can we break away from a narrow parochialism of ecclesiastical structures if our minds, however putatively missionary, are parochial? If the pastoral and missionary dimensions of the Church cannot be dynamically interrelated, it is difficult to understand how the outcome of apostolically oriented undertakings can build up the body of Christ which is the Church. To say that everyone is called to take some part in the mission of the Mission as Communication / 357 Church, is surely not so much to devalue mission as to value each Christian; it is to challenge the secure ahd the complacent, and to encourage the fainthearted and timid; it is to see the call of Christ as inclusive rather than exclusive. So what is this call of Christ? It is something so powerful that a matter of an hour or two after having borrowed the boat of a fisherman and preached from it, Jesus had Peter, a bluff fisherman, agreeing to fish where he had spent a fruitless night, and with his partners James and John turning his back on the security of his fisherman's business, leaving everything he had, and following the stranger. That is the call: as stark and unqualified as: "come, follow me." This, essentially, is what characterizes the Christian; essentially it is what characterizes the missionary: the response to the call of Jesus, wherever that call may lead. Jesus himself did not go far from his home, but his mission was from his Father to the whole of humankind. Our participation in that mission is more important than any location, and it is as possible to be missionary on one's doorstep, as it is to fail to be missionary ten thousand miles from home. Our only objective should be to be included in the Mission of Christ, not so much by where we are as by who we are. Apostles and Apostils An apostle is someone who is sent out with a mandate; an apostil is something in the margin, an e×empIification. Just as the Son of Man was not called to be served but to serve (Mt 20:28), and as the servant is not above the master (Jn 13:14-15), so we are called to serve (Lk 22:26). So the Christian, being a missionary, is sent out with a mandate, and the mandate is "to serve." The one who serves is a server or a servant, an.d the word servant comes from the Latin for a slave--a person legally owned by another: one with no freedom of action or the right to property, or, in a very accommodated sense, one who works in very harsh conditions for very little remuneration. Jesus came to serve (Mt 20:28), and of his own lifestyle he remarked: Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head (Mt 8:20). So what are we called to, if we follow Jesus? Though it is rapidly becoming a clich6 that it is more important for us to be than to do, I would like to reflect on the truth therein and say further that for missionaries it is more important to be than to go; if we solve thefirst problem or rise to the first challenge, the second will not frighten or confuse us. What we are called to do is to become marginalized; otherwise we cannot follow Jesus, since he went to the "lost sheep" of the house of Israel. He was himself sent to bring the good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives and to the blind new sight, to set the downtrodden free (Lk 4:18). But the point is not so much what he did, as who he was, and in looking at 35~1/ Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 what he did, we see what he was: pushed to the margins of society. There is little point in one's going to a foreign country if one cannot communicate. I may go to France or Germany with no French or German, and provided there is someone who is linguistically competent in my language, we can communicate. And we have been reminded a thousand times of the necessity of language-learning for missionaries; I am not going to repeat that reminder. But if one is to go to the margins of society--to the poor, the prisoners, the blind, the downtrodden and dispossessed--how is one to communicate? Since by definition they are not able to communicate in terms of the rich, the free, the sighted, the emancipated and the privileged, there is only one way. If they are like French or Germans who speak no English and cannot hope to, then the English must learn French or German. And if we are to be missionaries in the spirit of Jesus, we must not only realize that we must become marginalized; nor is it sufficient to want to become marginalized; we must learn to become marginalized. Some missionaries certainly realize that they must become marginalized, and of those, some certainly want to. But how many really learn to become marginalized, and how many don't see the problem? It is not for me to point the finger or to make judgments; I am having enough of a problem recognizing the issue. It is not possible to be an apostle without being an apostil: out on the margin--an example. Missions and Margins One of the popular definitions of mission is the following: "a group of people sent by a religious body, especially a Christian Church, to a foreign country to do religious and social work." It is the "foreign country" that characterizes this definition, and many people would accept this without demur. It may be argued that this is a necessary element; but it is certainly not a sufficient one. The missionary must in some sense be on the margin of society. But how can one accept a marginalized status (surely this is a "cross-cultural" dimension of mission?) if one cares overmuch about defining oneself as special? And if a person does not have a strong sense of identity, belonging, and self acceptance, how is it possible to embrace others at the margin of society and not be crushed and destroyed? We need to be trained to be marginalized since most of us have no idea what it is like. We are secure, fed, housed, privileged; we need to be "conscientized" before it is too late and we react with incredulity to the burning accusation: I was hungry and you never gave me food; I was thirsty and you never gave me anything to drink; 1 was a stranger and you never made me welcome; naked and you never clothed me, sick and in prison and you never visited me (Mt 26:41-44). If we are not trained we will make dreadful and culpable mistakes, for goodwill is not enough. Without training we will not be able to localize the Mission as Communication / 359 Church--make it relevant to the people of God. And how can the local Church localize, unless we marginalize? Otherwise we are perpetuating an unwholesome and stifling universalism. Without training we will try to perpetuate a Church "always and everywhere the same," with no idea of the forces of social change and the real problems of real people. Without training we will not be walking with the poor and the disenfranchised and the marginalized--we will be walking by them, and maybe even on them. The real meeting to be effected is not, 1 suggest, between us--English, American, Italian--and them--African, Latin American, Hispanic: us and therh in this context are almost totally other, almost alien to each other. That kind of meeting would be like the meeting between tourists on a round-the-world trip, and the Mud-men. of Papua New Guinea or the dancers of Bali. No, the real meeting, the model for which is Jesus (see Lk 7:22-23), is between the marginalized: the 1--by choice not quite part of the value system of a dominant culture, wherever it may be, and the Thou--by necessity not quite part of the value-system of a dominant culture. Whether at home or abroad, the apostle with the true missionary spirit, will become inculturated at all levels, not only by learning the language and culture but by taking the mission of Jesus seriously (Lk 4:18), to the point of insecurity, unpredictability, discomfort, and the rest--not because these things are good, but because they are the burden of the children of God, and that burden has to be lifted by strong hands lest it crush the weak. Only when we share the burden can we begin to walk together--otherwise we exploit or patronize those we are sent to serve. It does not really matter how we are described on our passport or on immigration papers; it doesn't matter very much what actual job we do. But it matters a great deal who we are and who we are becoming. Not everyone can be as visibly marginalized as everyone else, but we can all be detached from things and attached to people. A simpler lifestyle is mandatory, otherwise we are guilty of injustice; and the cultivation of a "marginalized mentality" would seem to be demanded. Whoever is not this much marginalized is not missionary. And whoever is not missionary is not yet fully Christian. Communication and Context The first letter of Peters provides a context of hope and an eschatological dimension for our reflections. Christians are urged to animate society by the witness of good works and their general lifestyle (1 P 2:12, 14; 4:!9), not in order to proselytize but to communicate to the people the promise of God, to receive his glory (I P 4:7-11). They are to be involved(I P 2:11-35: 5:5-8), and to be filled with hope. The letter develops a theology of vocation, and in our own day we surely need to continue, in our programs of formation and beyond, to tease out a theology and praxis for communicating the Good News in an appropriate context--not from ivory towers or groves of academe alone. 360 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 Communication is only possible when there are interlocutors who have not simply a code in common but find the context in which that code can be transmitted and received with minimum interference. First there has to be a meeting; then reciprocity; and finally comprehensibility. Only if we are trained, only if we learn the code and are prepared to listen as well as speak, can we hope to have any communication. But at least the marginalized can begin to talk to the marginalized; they do speak the same language. NOTES ~Decree on the Missionary Activity of the Church, n. 6, in The Documents of I/atican IL W. Abbott (Chapman, 1967), p. 592. 2A helpful article for further reading is: B. A. Joinet, "Integrating the Mission Societies into the Local Church," esp. pp. 271-272, in Mission in Dialogue, edited by Motte and Lang (Orbis Books, 1982), pp. 264-281. 3For this section I have referred to D. Senior and C. Stuhlmueller, The Biblical Foundations of Mission (SCM, 1983), pp. 300-302. Theology and the Magisterium ¯. be faithful to your faith, without falling into the dangerous illusion of separating Christ from his Church, or the Church from her magisterium. "Love for the concrete Church includes fidelity to the testimony of faith and the ecclesiastical magisterium and does not alienate the theologian from his proper task nor deprive it of its irrenounceable consistency. Magistcrium and theology have different functions. Therefore, one cannot be reduced to the other" (Discourse to Theologi-ans of Germany. Alt6tting. Nov. 18, 1980. n. 2: cited in John Paul I1: Address to Theologians ~f Spain. November I. 1982. n. 5). On Being an Ex-Superior Roland J. Faley, T.O.R. Father Faley served as Vicar General (1971-1977) and as Superior General (1977-1983) of the Third Order Regular of St. Francis. During his earlier term, he wrote "Generalates and Social Justice," which appeared in the issue of May, 1976. Currently he is an associate pastor at St. Michael Parish; 3713 Harwood Road, Bedford, TX 76021. ~n the post-conciliar Church considerable attention has been given to the continuing formation of almost all segments of religious life. Little has been said, however, of the lot of the ex-superior. The term is used here in the sense of the major superior in a religious order or congregation. The person who is called to leadership in a religious community today is faced with many difficulties which are unlike those of former times. Authority is called to be more dialogic which can be psychologically draining and certainly more time absorbing. There are new "crises" with which he or she is faced: diminishing vocations, overworked religious, new directions in the community's apostolic thrust, not to speak of the personal problems, brought about by the winds of change, faced by religious of the institute. Major superiors in most communities have a limited term of office. An initial three or four year term is the usual minimum which in many instances leads to reelection. This means a mandate of service of six to eight years. A superior general may very well serve double that length of time. Since there is not usually an apprenticeghip for this type of service (at least prudence would seem to dictate the contrary!), this means that the initial adjustment can be, if not traumatic, at least very demanding. During the length of the term of office it is very difficult for the major superior to meet the need for her or his continuing education, at least over any extended period of time, because of the weighty responsibilities inherent in the office. Vacation time is usually kept to a minimum. Moreover a great deal of mobility is required with superiors dividing their time between the central office and the various houses and 361 362 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 missions of the institute. It is probably safe to say that even the most insensitive religious today, who may have all sorts of difficulties with authority, is forced to admit that this is a service to the community which exacts a very high price. Today men and women are called to leadership roles within an institute at an increasingly earlier age. This of course brings vitality and thrust to the office, but it also means that these religious finish their term of office with a consider-able life span still ahead of them. This is not so in the case of many other eccle-siastical officeholders who hold a position until retirement, at which time they are physically and psychologically at a point of decline. How is the ex-major superior to deal with the future? How is she/he prepared to deal with it? The issue needs to be addressed. The necessity of showing special concern for the psychic health and well-being of religious is today much to the fore and this demand is placed squarely on the shoulders of major superiors. Yet how much attention is given to the superiors' own spiritual, intellectual and psychological needs? Many religious presume that all goes well at the top and never take the time to verify their conclusion. It should be noted that affirmation is not solely a felt need of the people in the ranks. The simple fact is that there is little attention given the major superior, who is presumed to be self-assured, full of confidence and capable of operating somewhat as a robot. Such is not the case. His or her needs are no different from those of others. While seeking to avoid overstatement, one need only reflect on the number of times the major superior becomes the automatic.target for all the ills of the community. More than one person in a leadership role has been subjected to a heated diatribe simply because of the position he or she holds. Moreover their peer group within the institute (other major superiors) are usually far removed geographically and not readily available for consultation and support. It is true that they receive valuable assistance from other major superiors who belong to the national conference of superiors. However, this is often limited to the time of annual meetings or other such gatherings. It is not available on a continuing basis. In recent times much has been done to afford local superiors the chance to meet together regularly. This is becoming increasingly common within institutes today and is helpful in many ways, not the least of which is the decree of peer support which it affords. However, it should be remembered that major superiors do not usually enjoy that same possibility. Members of a provincial or general council can offer a certain measure of support. For this reason it is important that at least some members of the council live in community with the major superior. This affords the major superior someone with whom he or she can share concerns and be assured of confidentiality. But even then it should be noted that people are often elected to the council (and not ordinarily selected by the major superior) for a variety of reasons. Ability and expertise are front and center; compatability with the major superior is not always one of the criteria. In fact, in more than one instance it is sorely lacking. While allowing for exceptions and inevitable variations on the theme, it On Being an Ex-Superior / 36~1 can be said that those called to religious leadership are called to a life of considerable loneliness. They carry much of the burden of their office alone, and, of course, theirs is always the relatively ultimate responsibility. It might well be argued that such isolation should not be the case. Experience however, shows that such does occur and often to the spiritual and human detriment of the person. It should be noted that the office of superior is not that of a professional person who works a nine-to-five day. Many people in society cope with their problems on the basis of the compartmentalization of their life. The hours and locale of work and rest are clearly separated and delineated. In religious life, the role of leadership demands an almost constant availability, the heroics of continuous performance. The needs of religious do not follow the horarium of an ordinary work day. This writer was once told by a former provincial, that after his term of office ended, even the sound of a telephone during the night meant the loss of an entire night's sleep. The crises of night calls had sunk deep into his psyche. State of Mind In what state of mind do superiors reach the end of their mandate? Admittedly for some the transition to a new way of life presents no noticeable difficulty. They move into new assignments with no apparent stress. There are others who evidence no exterior dramatic change but internally suffer a great deal. Still others, after the initial sigh of relief, begin to experience very evident psychological problems. If it can be reasonably posited that most major religious superiors finish their term of office well in advance of retirement age, how are they to address their own future? "Burnout" has become an "in" expression and points to a reality that has become all too common. Many a major superior finishes the term of office in such a state. These persons feel that they have no more to give; they suffer from a pronounced weariness and are psychologically, if not spiritually, drained. The whole experience has proved to be too much. Very often their "wind-down" begins a year before their term ends, during which time the mach!nery of office, for all practical purposes, grinds to a halt. Important decisions, as well as some which are less important, are left to "my successor." There is a pattern of withdrawal from all except essential duties; the only thing anticipated is a "smooth transition." This is a sad picture. It is even sadder when one stops to think of the youth and vigor with which the incumbent began office and then compare it with the signs of age and exhaustion which have come to the fore as the "twilight~ approaches. No new ideas are being generated. The only desire is to leave the office and extend a heartful word of congratulations to the next incumbent. It should be noted well that such a state of "burnout" can have serious spiritual repercussions, even in virtuous and stalwart souls. On the other end of the spectrum are those per,dons who at the end of their ~!64 / Review for Religious, May-June, 1984 term of office still have a very high level of effectiveness. They are so psycho-logically geared to decision making, to generating ideas, and to the overall role of government that they have trouble bringing themselves to the inevitable "slow down." The adrenalin is still running high. A swift transition to a position wherein there is drastic deescalation in authority almost overnight can produce seriously adverse effects. It is not a question of being hungry for power. It is simply that the sustained level of operation to which the person had become accustomed has suddenly ceased, and this in many instances at a relatively early age. Such a person has specific needs to be addressed which are different, but no less pronounced, than those of the person suffering from "burnout." The Period After Leadership It is the writer's conviction based on experience that an extended period of time should be given an outgoing major superior for spiritual and intellectual renewal before any new assignment is made. It is a principle which is valid quite independent of one's character or personality. For legitimate reasons the person has a need for time and space for readjustment and reentry. A sabbatical year is not in any way excessive. This affords a relaxed atmosphere in which the ex-superior is being revitalized and is not called upon to revitalize others. The interests of individuals certainly will vary. Some ex-superiors may feel strongly the need for spiritual renewal; others may see the need for a return to studies in theology or perhaps the discipline which was pursued prior to major superiorship. Still others will sense a need for pastoral "retooling." In all of this a person should be given as much latitude as needed, with as little external pressure as possible. Not infrequently this period of renewal will be pursued away from the houses of the institute. This can be salutary and whol

Issue 58.3 of the Review for Religious, May/June 1999. ; f 0 r relig i ous Christian Heritages and ,Contemporary Living MAY-JUNE 1999 * VOLUME 58 ¯ NUMBER 3 Review for Religioug is a forum for shared reflection on the lived experience of all who J~nd that the church's rich heritages of spirituality support their personal and apostolic Christian lives. The articles in the journal are meant to be informative, practical, historical, or inspirational, written from a tbeological or spiritual or sometimes canonical point of view. Review for Religious (ISSN 0034-639X) is published bi-monthly at Saint Louis University by the Jesuits of the Missouri Province. Editorial Office: 3601 Lindell Boulevard ¯ St. Louis, Missouri 63108-3393. Telephone: 314-977-7363 ¯ Fax: 314-977-7362 E-Mail: foppema@slu.edu Manuscripts, books for review, and correspondence with the editor: Review for Religious ° 3601 Lindell Boulevard ° St. Louis, MO 63108-3393. Correspondence about the Canonical Counsel department: Elizabeth McDonough OP P.O. Box 29260; ~,rashington, D.C. 20017 POSTMASTER Send address changes to Review for Religious ° P.O. Box 6070 ¯ Duluth, MN ~5806. Periodical postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri, and additional mailing offices. See inside back cover for information on subscription rates. ©1999 Review for Religious Permission is herewith granted to copy any material (articles, poems, reviews) contained in this issue of Review for Religious for personal or internal use, or for the personal or internal use of specific library, clients within the limits outlined in Sections 107 and/or 108 of the United States Copyright Law. All copies made under this permission must bear notice of the source, date, and copyright owner on the first page. This permission is NOT extended to copying for commercial distribu-tion, advertising, institutional promotion, or for the creation of new collective works or anthologies. Such permission will only be considered on written application to the Editor, Review for Religious. Editor Associate Editors Canonical Counsel Editor Editorial Staff Advisory Board David L. Fleming sJ Philip C. Fischer SJ Regina Siegfried ASC Elizabeth McDonough OP Mary Ann Foppe Tracy Gramm Jean Read James and Joan Felling Kathryn Riehards FSP Joel Rippinger OSB Bishop Carlos A. Sevilla SJ David Werthmann CSSR Patricia Wittberg SC Heritages and Contemporary Lfiv~ng MAY-JUNE 1999 * VOLUME58 * NUMBER3 contents 230 251 women religious Charism or Deep Story? Towards Understanding Better the 19th-Century Origins of American Women's Congregations Margaret Susan Thompson suggests that emphasis on "charism" may not be helpful in explaining the ,founding experiences of many women's communities in 19th-century America, and identifies some of the reasons why "deep stow" may be a more usable concept. The Need for Self-Criticism: Affirmative Comments Elizabeth McDonough OP suggests that the time has come for United States religious women to initiate some possibly difficult but genuinely constructive self-criticism and some corrective change of course in various aspects of postconciliar renewal. 261 266 women and the church The Annuario Pontificio: The Vatican's "Pontifical Yearbook" and a Recent Editorial Decision Larry N. Lorenzoni SDB updates a bit of history about who are included in the Vatican's "Pontifical Yearbook." Women and Canon Law Joan A. Range ASC investigates the extraordinary recent history of women entering the field of canon law. Review for Religious 286 295 mary Five Faces of Mary Robert P. Maloney CM offers five Marian faces as a way of meditating on the rich, varied tradition surrounding the Virgin Mary. The Temple and the Journeying: Mary of Sorrows Joel Giallanza CSC draws directions for our spiritual life's journey from reflecting on the traditional seven sorrows of Mary. 3O5 314 witnessing Blessed Maria Droste: A Good Shepherd Motif in Sacred Heart Spirituality Juliana Devoy RGS tells the story of Blessed Maria Droste, which gives witness to her vision of God's merciful love reflected in Sacred Heart spirituality. Echoes from My Fifty-sixth Annual Retreat Robert F. Drinan sJ shares reflections on God!s grace stirring thoughts and feelings in a retreat. 228 32O 325 departments Prisms Canonical Counsel: Visitation by External Authorities Book Reviews May-.~une 1999 227- Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. --John 14:9 Wean talk about God in some very un-Christian ways. As we "dress up" God in the various cultural and time-bound categories of our human world, we are inevitably limited, in both our reasoning and our imagining. When we get swept up into a highly intellectualized philosophical approach, we find our-selves projecting a vague abstract and sometimes fright-ening power and a childishly understood world. God without a face. Although Jesus lived within human limitations of time and culture, he dared to speak "with authority" about the reign of God in images and parables that tore down the temple curtain of separation to let people catch some glimpses of God that are new. The synoptic Gospels--Mark, Matthew, and Luke--talk of a celebra-tory invitation to a banquet, of a shepherd doggedly searching out a lost sheep, so that we come to know and relate to God with fresh affective response. But the Gospel of St. John stands out as the Gospel of the God revealed to us by Jesus as "Father." Few are the chapters in John's Gospel that do not have explicit reference to God as Father. The qualities of this Father-God tumble out. This God is the God of life: "Just as the Father who has life sent me and I have life because of the Father." Jn 6:44. This is a God who works: "My Father is at work until now, and I am Review for Religious' at work as well" Jn 5:17. This is a God who teaches: "My doctrine is not my own; it comes from him who sent me" Jn 7:16; "I say only what the Father has taught me" Jn 8:28. This is a God who cultivates growth: "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine-grower" Jn 15:1. Above all, this God is the one who loves: "The Father loves the Son and has given everything over to him" Jn 3:35; "the one who loves me will be loved by my Father"Jn 14:21. In retreat notes published as a book, The Ignatian Exercises in the Light of St. John, Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini SJ reflects that a way of considering the Fourth Gospel is to see it as a gospel of prayer, It is prayer not just from people responding to Jesus as we do so often in our prayer lives, but prayer also from Jesus to the one he lovingly calls Abba-Father. From Jesus We learn how we are meant to grow in our relationship with God. And so this Gospel, in teaching a way of relating to God for the mature Christian, is paradoxically the Gospel most insistent in remind-ing us that we are still "children" who have--and who need for our very existence--a Father. We are called, in imitation of Jesus, to relate to a God from whom we have everything--all that we are and all that we would call "our own." This is the God that Jesus describes as the One apart from whose words he himself has nothing to say, the God apart from whose works he has no work to do. As Christian evan-gelizers, then, we need to follow the example of Jesus so that what we say flows from our union with this God. As Christian ministers we need to strive that all our deeds and good works flow from the baptismal grace given by God that makes us all very special children, God's sons and daughters. It is from this God we have come--a Source we call by Jesus' word Father-- and it is to this God we direct our whole life as the One we, with John, identify as Love. If we let the words of St. John enter more deeply into our very being, we will find ourselves being shaped and molded by the reality behind our personally limited understandings of God as Father and God as Love. This is the revealed God of Scripture we seek to know and make known ever better in this year dedi-cated to God the Father. David L. Fleming SJ '229 May-June 1999 MARGARET SUSAN THOMPSON Charism or Deep Story? Towards Understanding Bett@r the 19th-Century Origins of American Women's Congregatigns Since the Second Vatican Council, the term charism increasingly has become associated with the identity, and .even the integrity, of religious congregations.1 Literally dozens of published essays explore the term's meaning and significance~ A substantial number of the community websites created in recent years contain a page about-- or at least an allusion to--the group's "charism," as do postconciliar constitutions, mission statements, and voca-tion paraphernalia. The hierarchy of the Catholic Church has not been silent either, particularly during the current papacy. For example, in its 1983 document "Essential Elements in the Church's Teaching on Religious Life 'as Applied to Institutes Dedicated to Works of the Apostolate," the Sacred ~Congregation for Religious and Secular Institutes used ~the term ten times, and it shows up a whopping eighty-six times in//Tta con-secrata, John Paul II's apostolic letter in response to the 1994 Synod on Religious Life. . Ironically, the word itself is not: to be found in Perfectae caritatis, the council document which treats the Margaret Susan Thompson PhD has written and lectured extensively on the history of women religious in the United States. She is associate professor of history and political sci-ence at Syracuse University; Department of History; 145 Eggers Hall; Syracuse, New York 13244. Review for Religious "Adaptation and Renewal of Religious Life." In fact, its first appearance in a magisterial treatise seems to be in 1971's Evangelica testificatio. Addressing religious themselves, Paul vI speaks of the "charisms of your founders" and the "charisms of the various insti-tutes" (§§11, 32), assuming, probably with justification, that the terminology would be familiar to his intended audience. But, for those in doubt about this nomenclature, Paul cites Perfectae cari-tatis §2b, which calls upon members of religious institutes to respect their "particular characteristics and work" and "their founders' spirit and special aims" as they proceed with their groups' renewal. Paul extends the discussion in Mutuae relationes (1978), using the term nineteen times and declaring, among other things, that "the very charism of the founders (Evangelii nuntiandi, §I 1) appears as an 'experience of the Spirit'" and that "every authentic charism implies a certain element of genuine originality and of special initiative for the spiritual life of the church" (§12). By now, therefore, one would assume that the meaning of a term so widely and authoritatively used would be clear, and one might also assume that the reality of the thing known as "charism" would be easily identifiable and inherent to religious life. Indeed, this seems to be implicit in various references from the two doc-uments of the current pontificate mentioned above. The first para-graph of "Essential Elements" refers to "the founding charism of a particular institute" and later even says that, through its appro-bation of a community's canonical status, the "God-given ministry of the hierarchy" has ratified the "authentic discernment of its founding charism" (§41):2 The references in Vita consecrata are too numerous even to summarize, but here are a few of them: "charisms proper to the various institutes," "fidelity to the found-ing charism," "[an institute's] Rule and constitutions [are approved] in accordance with a specific charism confirmed by the church," and "the uniqueness of their different ~harisms' (§§19, 36, 37, 53). Surely, then, "charigm" is intrinsic to religious life. Every con-gregation must have one, unique to that particular institute and traceable directly to its individual founder., But the rationale for this essay is precisely that none of the assumptions above seems necessarily to be the case. It is my con-tention that, in much of its current usage, charism is a term of such vagueness and ambiguity as to be almost meaningless. More impor-tantly, even if we can accept the connotations that John Paul II apparently regards as definitive (and he is hardly alone in this atti- May-~tune 1999 -231 . Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? tude), I would argue that a good many of the women's apostolic congregations that ministered in the 19th and early 20th century in the United States have no such thing as a "charism" according to this understanding. Thus, if, as John Paul II suggests, "charism" is an "essential element" of religious life, the very legitimacy of these congregations seems to be east into question--surely a seri-ous, perhaps even disastrous, consequence for the groups involved. What is needed, therefore, is some alternative to charism, some concept that is more in accord with the historical reality of many institutes and legitimates their experience and continued existence. It is unlikely that my consideration here will arrive at any defini-tive conclusions, but I hope to suggest some alternative ways of thinking that may prove useful in framing the historical and cur-rent context of sisters' experiences and perhaps assist in the pro-cess of religious revitalization and renewal. At the very least, from my ongoing research into women's religious life in the 19th-cen-tury United States, I think I can explain why the emphasis on "charism" in contemporary thinking about religious life is prob-lematic and historically unjustified, at least as a universal norm. Before we proceed, a few assumptions need to be made explicit. First, I believe that some congregations do have a charism and that in some cases it is traceable, at least in some degree, to an individual "founder." In other instances, its origin may lie with a founding group of individuals (a "founding generation"), while in still others a charism may have emerged later in a community's history--or a buried, neglected, or even repudiated charism may be discerned or refurbished by subsequent generations. Second-- and in this I am confirmed by the usages of several scholars as well as by both Paul vI and John Paul II--I believe there is also some-thing generic that can be called "a charism of apostolic religious life." Third, the lack of a particular charism does not render an institute (or its members or ministries) less significant, "spiritual," or legitimate than those which do have such a "gift":--just as the existence of one does not indicate superiority or greater validity. Indeed, given that the use of the term charism in connection with religious life is of such recent provenance, its application to past experience--particularly if it is considered to be some sort of uni-versal norm--actually may be ahistorically anachronistic. The word charism, of course, is Greek and means "gift." In contemporary Christian usage, it refers specifically to a spiritual gift, that is, "a free gift of grace." Moreover, virtually all Catholic Review for Religious scholars agree that a charism is not solely for the benefit of its direct recipient; rather, "it is a supernatural gift bestowed by the Holy Spirit for building up the body of Christ" or, in simpler terms, a "divine spiritual gift to individuals or groups for the build-ing up of the community." Within the context of religious life, the charism presumably is received initially by an institute's founder, who transmits it on to her followers. It is this "gift of grace" which is to imbue the community with its unique character or identity; as Richard McBrien puts it, "the unique gift of the founder., is given to every member from one generation to the next."3 Between 1727 and 1917, at least 422 Catholic apostolic con-gregations of women religious were active within the United States.4 Some were short-lived, but four hundred of them contin-ued to exist in 1917, and the overwhelming majority are extant today. Of the 422, a total of 273 belonged to one of ten large reli-gious "families," each of which could trace its birth to a particu-lar founder or pair of founders (see Table 1). Thus, each of these could be presumed to be a beneficiary of the. "charism" of the per-son or persons with whom that family began. Moreover, many of these groups also regard themselves as having their own particular founders, who "re-visioned" the familial identity in some way that imparted a special or distinct character to it.s Table 1 U.S. Al~ostolic Women's Communities andTheir Religious "Families" . FAMILY FOUNDER(S) NO. OF COMMUNITIES Benedictine Benedict, Scholastica 32 Carmelite (reform) Teresa of Avila 3 Dominican Dominic 30 Franciscan Francis 54 St. Joseph Jean Pierre Medaille 27 Mercy Catherine McAuley 65 Presentation Nano Nagle 7 Ursuline Angela Merici 30 Vincentian Vincent de Paul and Louise de Marfllac 10 Visitation Francis de Sales and Jane Frances de Chantal 15 May-June 1999 233 Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? No one can or will deny that these communities have---since their founding, in most cases--been known by one of these "fam-ily names." Still, this begs some important questions. How many of even these congregations can be said to have been "birthed" into the charism of their family forebears? How many incorpo-rated themselves into a particular family with explicit awareness of the spiritual and ecclesial consequences? How many can assert with confidence that their history is one of explicit and consistent acknowledgment of and fidelity to that charism? In other words, to what extent did "charism" traditionally play a part in shaping the identities of at least some of these institutes? Alternatively, how many of them became, in fact, "generic" apostolic entities doing good work, composed of good (even holy) people, but ~undistin-guished by any familial or "particular" spiritual identity that would differentiate them clearly from others of theoburgeoning number of women's religious orders that came increasingly to "do their thing" in the United States in, the 19th and 20th centuries? Finally, most of the nearly one hundred fifty other women's congregations I have studied also assert that they have particular "founders' charisms." Are all of them justified in their claims? It naturally is impossible to provide in one article definitive answers to any of these questions. Instead, I intend to offer some representative examples from the histories of the communities I have studied, examples that I believe will demonstrate some of the major problems with the assumptions about charism that charac-terize so much of what has been said about religious life in the past quarter century. Let me emphasize thavnone of these exam-ples is unique; rather, each is suggestive of all-too-typical congre-gational experiences. Each indicates some aspect of why I believe that the notion of a "founder's?' or "founding" charism is so prob-lematic and why the notion may, in fact, do more to obscure the realities of women's religious history than to illumine it. The Most Common Scenario: Instrumentalism Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, the Catholic population of the United States exploded. As early as 1850, Catholics constituted the largest single body of believers in the nation, a ranking they have maintained ever since. But, hardly monolithic, they consisted of an ecer growing number of proudly distinct (and sometimes mutually antagonistic) ethnic groups, many Review for Religious of which came to the New World specifically to escape religious persecution or to preserve their cultural identities. Most were poor when they arrived in their new nation; few except the Irish spoke English. Their secular and Protestant neighbors greeted them with suspicion and often with overt hostility. Clearly, these were peo-ple with numerous and diverse needs to be met, and church lead-ers, beleaguered and fearful of "leakage" from the faith, sought ways to respond effectively. It is not surprising, therefore, that dozens of institutes were started in or brought to the United States to provide practical ser-vices, often to specific subgroups of Catl~olics. Both individual community histories by the score and various more com-prehensive works attest con-vincipgly-- and, before 1965, unapologetically--to what I call the instrumental motivation for so many foundations: to teach the ever growing number of school-age children,6 to provide healthcareand relief (primarily, of course, but not only to Catholics), and, increasingly, to work with persons from partic-ular immigrant groups who needed ministers who understood both their languages and their traditions and could both foster cultural survival and ease the pro-cess of Americanization. Others were started for equally functional purposes: to do housework for priests or to offer catechetical instruction to children outside the parochial schools. Consider, for instance, the following accounts of foundings, taken almost randomly from the 1964 edition of Thomas McCarthy's Guide to the Catholic Sisterhoods of the United States-- perhaps the most successful comprehensive "vocation book" ever published in this country:7 [Sisters of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin:] A school, but no teachers, and none to be had from any religious commu-nity in spite of numerous requests by Father Jean Harper. ¯. He decided to act upon his curate's suggestion: "We can-not obtain nuns? Then, let us make some!" And so the con-gregation came into existence . . (p. 192). Dozens of institutes were started in or brought to the United States to provide practical services, often to specific subgroups of Catholics. 235--- May-~une 1999 Thompson * Charism or Deep Story? [Franciscans of Tiffin, Ohio:] Father Joseph L. Bihn . . . founded this Franciscan community to help him care for the many children orphaned as a result of the Civil War. Three of his parishioners, Elizabeth Schaeffer, a widow, and her two daughters, formed the nucleus of this congregation. (p. 271). [Sisters of Sts. Cyril ahd Methodius:] The early 1900s was a critical period for the many immigrants from Slovakia who setded in the United States. Father Matthew Jankola of the Scranton diocese was keenly aware that this adjustment required not only the building of schools but also of secur-ing sisters to staff them. As a result of his efforts, this dioce-san congregation was established in 1900 (p. 189). [Sisters of the Holy Family, San Francisco, California:] "I have another work for you to do," Archbishop Joseph S. Alemany OP said to young Elizabeth Armer when she came to consult him about entering a contemplative order. The archbishop unfolded to the future Mother Dolores his plans for an insti-tute to give religious instruction to children who could not attend Catholic schools. (p. 295). [Little Daughters of St. Joseph:] Father Antoine Mercier, a Sulpician priest., who desired to establish a congregation of nuns who would consecrate themselves to the spiritual and material welfare of the clergy and seminarians, founded this community with the assistance of Miss de Lima Dauth, the co-foundress. On April 26, 1857, both began this eminently apostolic work of helping priests and seminarians by means of a life of prayer, self-denial, and manual labor (p. 36). [Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, Houston, Texas:] "A multitude of sick and infirm seeks relief at your hands" was the irresistible plea of Rt. Rev. C.M. Dubuis when he went to France to seek volunteers to help him in his missionary labors in Galveston, Texas. Three young women answered his appeal and with these he founded the congregation in 1866. The community, which built the first Catholic hospital in the state, has papal approval and conducts twenty-six insti-tutions. (p. 120). 236 Where, in any of these stories, can one discern a charism? Ministry, yes; inspiring service to needy people, certainly. But two obstacles to discerning a "charism of the founder" recur in each instance. First, the reason each community came into being was functional, not charismatic. And, second, at least as these accounts would have it, the initiating impulse came not from the women who would offer to respond, but from clerics--men who, by def- Review for Religious inition, were persons outside of the community itself and thus hard to recognize as part of the group's intrinsic "lived tradition.''s Random Rule Selection and the Problem of Charism Every autonomous congregation has its own constitution, but, properly speaking, only four Rules (St. Basil, St. Augustine, St. Benedict, and St. Francis) were approved by Rome, and every com-munity had to select one of these as the basis for its organization and gov-ernance. 9 This helps to explain, for example, why so many women's con-gregations belonged to the Franciscan "family"--generally speaking, it was considered the most "flexible" of the four and therefore the easiest to adapt to a variety of instrumental purposes. To assume, then, that every commu-nity designated as "Franciscan" also and intentionally embodied a Franciscan charism requires an enor-mous leap of faith; in fact, even some founders who wanted to be "Franciscan" sometimes began by organizing themselves by another Rule. Two contrasting examples will illustrate the problem. First, there is that of the Sisters of St. Francis of Perpetual Adoration, originally founded in Olpe, Westphalia, in 1859 (and eventually established in the U.S. in 1875). The founder, Mother Mary Theresia (Aline) Bonzel, had great devotion to St. Francis and wanted to be Franciscan, but one of her co-founders, Clara Pfaender, had previously belonged to a con-gregation which followed the Augustinian Rule. We may let the community's first historian, an unusually forthright individual, take the story from there: Aline Bonzel wanted the Franciscan Rule by all means. But seemingly she was not well acquainted with the basic Rule of religious orders . Clara Pfaender knew the Augustinian Rule from her convent days with the Sisters of Christian Charity. She felt she could write a constitution based on that Rule. Since she was the superior and responsible for admit-ting candidates into the community, it s~emed advisable, in this very beginning, that she have the liberty to employ her To assume that every community designated as "Franciscan" also and intentionally embodied a Franciscan charism requires an enormous leap of faith. 237 May-June 1999 Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? full experience in religious life. Only on this basis can one explain how a community which uniformly desired to live according to the Franciscan Rule began with the Augustinian Rule, but with the intention of later converting to the Franciscan Rule. In this procedure the character of the times can readily be detec(ed. Many most likely saw basically lit-de difference whether one lived according to the Augustinian or the Franciscan Rule. The development of a specialized spirituality came later and in many instances vqry much later. As this author put it elsewhere: So many religious congregations came into being in the 19th century, and many chose their Rule by chance. Charitable activity called, and congregations were founded to fill the need to serve God and man. With some it seemingly made no difference what religious Rule was followed, for all were good and sanctifying~ . . . Foundations flourished which at first simpl); set up the aciivities and objectives of the apos-tolate and later wrote the rule and constitutions. Often enough at the very beginning it was purely accidental rather than a conscious effort that one or the other rule took hold.l° Contrast this with the experienqe of the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Third Order of St. Francis (SSJ-TOSF). Their history has been recounted superbly in two volumes by Josephine Marie Peplinski; basically, the group owed its origins to ethnic conflict within the School Sisters of St. Francis. The School Sisters were predominantly German, and the founding SSJ-TOSFs were Polish members who, after many incidents distressing to them, decided in 1901 to break off and found their own congregation. They took the Rule and name of "Franciscan" with them, but their self-claimed identity was fundamentally Polish. Indeed, as Peplinski has docu-mented, part of the problem was that, for its first few decades of existence, the community's leadership was passed back and forth between two very different individuals, one of whom (Mother Mary F~licia Jasku, lski) had a real devotion to St. Francis, while the other (Mother Mary Boleslaus Rybicki) "moved the congre-gation toward a popular Jesuit interpretation of obedience and authority--military in tone." As Peplinski puts it, "She exerted great influence in developing the spirituality of the congregation throughout her lifetime . . . and afterwards through those who adopted her ideals. It is ~v0rthy to note that until 1940, fourteen years after Mother Mary Boleslaus's death, almost all of the retreat masters invited to th~ congregation were Jesuits." Peplinski describes tlie congregation during its first sixty years as a Review for Religious "Franciscan sisterhood adapted to the post-Tridentine paradigm of religious life serving the American immigrant church . A basic problem was that canon law rather than the gospel law of love was set up as the ideal." In fact, not until after Vatican II, under Peplinsld's own leadership (she led the congregation 1968-1976), did the SSJ-TOSFs make a concerted and systematic effort to dis-cover what "bein~ Franciscan:' was all about. But, while they in fact embrace a Franciscan spirituality as they enter into their sec-ond century, is it at all accurate, despite their name, to regard it as their "founding charism"?II What Happened to the Benedictines? .Peplinski's congregation was not the only one "adapted to the post-Tridentine paradigm of religious life serving the American immigrant church." What happened to the Benedictines was equally dramatic and potentially of even more profound conse-quence to what they were supposed to be all about. It is a com-plicated story, ably told from somewhat different perspectives by Judith Sutera, M. Incarnata Girgen, and Ephrem Hollermann.12 The first nuns came to St. Marys, Pennsylvania, in 1852 from Eichst~itt, Bavaria, where they had lived in a way that permitted full cenobitic, monastic observance, including recitation of the Divine Office and solemn vows according to the Benedictine formulary: stability, conversatio ("conversion of life"), and obedience, However, within less than ten years after their arrival in the United States, a complicated series of events ensued, resulting in fundamental alterations to their tradition. Stated simply, the right to take solemn vows was abrogated (because the women were unable to observe strict enclosure), pressures of "life in mission territory" (as well as the elimination of solemn vows) led to "permission" to miti-gate the requirement to recite the full Divine Office (allowing substitution of the Little Office of th~ Blessed Virgin Mary, parts only of the Divine Office, or ~ven rosaries and other devotional practices), the jurisdiction of community leaders was made sec-ondary to that of diocesan, bishops (who could, among other things, approve or reject the election of prioresses and the admission of new members--something unheard of, normally, in Benedictinism). Even the simple vows the women now professed wer~ not neces-sarily the Benedictine ones. As Sutera explains, some took the tra-ditional vows, some took the three vows common to other May-June 1999 Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? communities (poverty, chastity, obedience), Others took five vows and some four (not stability, because there were rumors that the women were to be reorganized into a large congregation complete with provinces, regional novitiates, and so forth). She summarizes the consequences this way: "What Rome had done was to create a canonical anomaly, a group of unenclosed monastic women who retained the right to the designation of 'O.S.B.' This right implied some recognition that they were nuns of the ancient order rather than sisters of a later congregation despite their simple vows. However, it left them as technically neither one nor the other. [Practically speaking,] they faded into the mass of apostolic orders." 13 Sutera and Hollermann's books, especially, are potent wit-nesses to the extent to which American Benedictines struggled over the following century both to respond 'to the ministerial and apostolic demands placed upon them and to remain as faithful as they could to their Benedictine heritage. Both accounts verify the existence and persistence of Benedictine charism, however "re-visioned" in the American context, despite the many and substan-tial obstacles put in the sisters' way. Thus, when Vatican II came along, with its call for renewal in the spirit of the founders, the Benedictines had a strong foundation on which they could rely. Nonetheless, the disparate experiences of the various autonomous foundations during the years between their foremothers' arrival in the U.S. and the postconciliar period raise important questions about how, and the extent to which, "fidelity to charism" shaped the historical reality of American Benedictine sisters. If one reads the descriptions of them in McCarthy's 1964 compendium, for instance, they seem virtually indistinguishable from the plethora of apostolic institutes that surrounded them.14 "Charisms" Buried, Repudiated, or Denied At least the Benedictines had a strong tradition, never com-pletely lost, that they could revitalize when called to do so by the Second Vatican Council, Others, however, were not so fortunate, The situations of those who chose their traditions randomly, or who were founded for largely instrumental purposes, have already been discussed. But what about those who did have more charismatic founders, whose legacies, for various reasons, were obscured or even rejected? Probably the most famous such case is that of the Institute Review for Religious of the Blessed Virgin Mary, founded by the remarkable Mary Ward in 1609; not until the papacy of Pius XI! were they able to claim her officially as the founder of their congregation. But other instances pertain more directly to the U.S. Catholic experience; here I will refer to just three of them (by no means the only ones). As late as McCarthy's 1964 Guide (p. 317), the sisters founded by Margaret Anna Cusack in 1884 were identified unqualifiedly as the "Sisters of St. Joseph of Newark" and were described as having been founded by "Bishop Bagshawe of Nottingham, England . . . in 1888." Then, we are told, Bishop Michael Wigger of Newark, New Jersey, "received the community into his dio-cese shortly after its establish-ment." The latter sentence, technically, is true, but the foundation was in 1884; by 1888 the controversial Cusack had left both Newark and the Catholic Church. The myth of Bagshawe's role, as well as the rather skewed chronology, evolved largely to bury the fact that this group's founder--a woman who did, I believe, have a charism and who had a very revolutionary vision for her community--was regarded at the time of her death as an "apostate." Dorothy Vidulich has provided a first-rate account of how Cusack's community rediscovered her in the aftermath of Vatican II, officially reclaiming her in 1970 as their founder and reclaiming, too, her original name for the congregation: the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace. Since then, the group has devoted enormous effort to uncovering and taking ownership of her and their charism; nonetheless, the fact that her very connection with the institute was buried for eighty-five years (starting less than four years after it began) makes it difficult to discern the extent to which her charism ever played a meaningful role in its earlier historical expe-rience. Is the identity of this community primarily traceable to Cusack? Or, like an adopted child, must this group, like it or not, acknowledge that other "parents" may actually have been more significant in shaping their ongoing lived reality? 15 American Benedictines struggled both to respond to the ministerial and apostolic demands placed upon them and to remain as faithful as they could to their Benedictine heritage. May-June 1999 Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? Which person or persons must be acknowledged as having contributed-- and how--to the congregation's actual history ? The founder of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, of Monroe, Michigan, was never, stricdy speaking, denied; her central role in the congregation's founding was, how.ever, unde-niably minimized and obscured. Theresa Maxis Duchemin was the offspring of an unwed "woman of color." Both her "race" (her mother was an immigrant to the U.S. from what now is known as Haiti) and her "illegitimate" parentage were, of course, problem-atic. So was the fact that she obscured both of them when she came to Michigan in 1845 to found the congregation ("passing" as "white")--in doing so, she left the commu- 'nity she had belonged to since 1829, the Oblate Sisters of Providence. (This group was the first African American con-gregation in the history of Catholicism. Duchemin was one of its first ,four members, its only American-born founder, and was onetime superior gen-eral of it. In the 1830s her mother, too, joined the community.) What perhaps contributed most, however, towards her role in Monroe IHM history becoming "shadowy" were her ongoing con-flict with Edward Joos (an early spiritual father assigned to the congregation by the bishop), her decision to establish a foundation in Pennsylvania (which the bishop did not approve of, and which soon turned into two), her subsequent conflicts with the .authori-tarian bishop of Philadelphia who succeeded Duchemin's beloved John Neumann, and tier resultant eighteen years of exile in Canada, during which she was forbidden contact with any of the three IHM communities she had founded. Eventually Duchemin was allowed to return to the Philadelphia foundation; ironically, however, only the Scranton one has always acknowledged her role in its begin-nings, In Monroe, meanwhile, Mother Mary Joseph Walker, who succeeded Duchemin as superior in 1859, was becoming regarded as the group's "true foundress," while Joos, who served 'as its eccle-siastical superior from 1857 to 1901, was referred to as the "beloved father." 16 How is a grouplike this to return to the "charism of the founder"? Even in the 1990s the Monroe community is ambivalent Review for Religions as to how it should refer to Duchemin: was she their "founder," their "co-founder" (along with Louis Gillet, the Redemptorist who called her to Michigan in 1845 and departed' abruptly two years later), or simply one of the "first four"? What about the "found-ing" and "formative" roles of Walker and, especially, Joos? At the time of the latter's death, his loss was apparently considered so traumatic that the then general superior "had to assure the sisters that it was possible for the congregation to continue without him." True, Margaret Brennan IHM has documented the persistence of certain very specific elements of Duchemin's spiritual legacy, even through the decades when her contribution was denied, but impor-tant questions still remain.~7 As with the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace, which person or persons must be acknowledged as having contributed--and how--to the congregation's actual history? "The Most Reverend Archbishop William Gross CSSR of Oregon City founded [the Sisters of St. Mary of Oregon] in Sublimity, Oregon, in 1886 . A vastly scattered flock, with . only a few religious to care for them, made Archbishop Gross determined to establish his own community of sisters."18 It seems a typical 19th-century story; unfortunately, it has almost no basis in reality. The real root of this community is a group of lay peo-ple who more than a decade earlier followed a schismatic priest of the Congregation of the Precious Blood, Charle~ Albrecht, out of Ohio into exile in Wisconsin and Minnesota (where Albrecht died) and then moved (with Albrecht's body) on to rural Oregon. There a young,girl in the group--who had been "bequeathed" to the cultish "trusteeship" of a trio of laymen ("devotees" of Albrecht, whose body during many months after his death,was kept in a cof-fin mounted above the dining table in the group's community room in Minnesota and then, quite ossified, was transported illegally to Oregon)--sought help from some Benedictine monks of Mount Angel Abbey, who put the future Mother Wilhelmina Bleily in touch with Gross, who eventually "regularized" the status of those who sought it and provided official recognition for the "sisters." Shortly thereafter he deposed Wilhelmina from the superiorship to which she had been duly elected, brought in a sister from Wisconsin to provide "formation" for the. community, and reshaped its identity completely. Although the original sisters had retained a strong devotion to the Precious Blood from their Ohio heritage, for instance, Gross refused to allow them to include this in the name of their congregation. By the 1960s, after decades of denial, May-June 1999 9A2 Thompson * Charism or Deep Story? Inappropriate reliance for spiritual grounding upon "a" founder and her or his significance can lead to a spirituality that is static or reactionary. Wilhelmina's contributions had been forgotten (and her diary, which recorded all that had happened, both before 1886 and after, lay gathering dust in the community's attic, not to be rediscov-ered until a new motherhouse was constructed in the 1970s), and the only things that remained from their roots were a red cord (on which they wore a crucifix around their necks) and a vague acknowledgment of a "devotion to the Precious Blood," one among many devotions that had been accepted without explanation for several generations29 More than either of the other two groups dis-cussed. here, the SSMO's decision to bury its past (not to mention Albrecht's body) certainly is understandable. It is also under-standable that, because of their "rescue" from the "trustees" by Gross, this really rather remark-able group has always prided itself on its loyalty to and reverence for the hierarchy. But how to imple-ment that loyalty whe, n the hier-archy charges one with "restoring the founder's charism"? In this case, what are they to do with Albrecht, with the trustees, with years of schismatic and extremely odd cultic spirituality, with the deposing of Wilhelmina, and with the clearly subordinate status that "in gratitude" the SSMOs were expected to tolerate in the Portland Archdiocese for most of the yea.rs of their existence? In this paper I have offered reasons why emphasis on the founder's charism--which has characterized so much of post- Vatican II religious renewal--deserves reexamination regarding its relevance and utility to the histories (and subsequent revitaliza-tions) of many religious congregations. Clearly, in many cases it is not something that can be easily identified, and, in some cases where it can be, that very recognition leads to problems of a dif-ferent sort. I could have discussed other issues as well: that certain congregations owe their origins to groups rather than to individ-uals, that emphasis on "formal" founders (founders who have offi-cial canonical recognition from the [male] prelates charged with 9rid "verifying" the "authenticity" of a congregation, and many of Review for Religiotts whom, for women's congregations, have erroneously been identi-fied as men) tends to obscure the cumulative and ongoing respon-sibilities that all community members have for their collective spirituality, and that inappropriate reliance for spiritual grounding upon "a" founder and her or his significance can lead to a spiritu-ality that is static or reactionary. All of these matters deserve explo-ration; unfortunately, constraints of space in the present circumstances prevent their serious consideration here. What I do offer for present consideration is an alternative approach to "charism" that may prove of value to communities that recognize some of their own histories in what I have been able to include in this essay. It is developed most fully, perhaps, in a 1989 article in Review for Religious by Bernard Lee SM.2° Lee begins with a clear assertion: The "recovery of charism" may be one of the most unsup-portable and unnecessary burdens a religious institution has ever been asked to bear, because it cannot be done. Charism is not a property. It is not a possession. It is not transfer-able, not transmittable, and not controllable. Charism is a deeply historicized social phenomenon. It cannot be dupli-cated in any other time or place. Charism has never been a movable feast. (p. 124) Instead, Lee suggests the notion of "deep story" as an alter-native to the emphasis on charism. He defines this as a category of interpretation that comes out of structuralism, which is a method for interpreting group identity. It pre-supposes that group identity is rooted in a narrative structure, that is, in recurring patterns of relationships and social activ-ities. The narrative structure of any complex and interesting group, however, is extremely elusive because it is instinctual and unconscious even more than it is deliberate and self-conscious . Deep stories are exhibited in rituals that cel-ebrate them (for example, rituals of profession), in special words and phrases that belong especially to them. Stephen Crites says that all of these things are elusive expressions of deep stories (he calls them sacred stories) "that cannot fully be told, because they live, so to speak, in the arms and legs and bellies of the celebrants. These stories lie too deep in the consciousness of a people to be directly told: they form con-sciousness rather than being among the objects of which it is directly aware." (p. 126)z' What Lee intends to suggest by all this, I think, is the con-tinuous and cumulative process of a community's identity forma- Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? tion--its spiritual nature (my term), its history--which, of course, in sacred time and space, encompasses the present and future as much as the past. Thus, to turn to Lee once again, "the founder's or foundress's gift is not a community's charism. The real found-ing gift is a narrative structure that supported and reflected a charismatic event in the foundation's birth, and may do so again" (p. 129). But, as I understand this, it cannot remain static; instead, a "community of memory"--while "creatively rooted" in, or faith-ful to, its deep story--must always be on its way to the realization of a new charismatically gifted reality, one in which all members must participate and assume responsibility. I believe that the notion of deep story--as a paradigm--can help all of us cope with ongoing foundings and refoundings in religious life. Seen as participants in deep story, Wilhelmina Bleily, Charles Albrecht, and William Gross, Theresa Maxis Duchemin and Mary Joseph Walker and Edward Joos, Mary Felicia Jaskulski and Mary Boleslaus Rybicki, Margaret Anna Cusack, Theresia Bonzel, and Clara Pfaender, countless Benedictines, and tens of thousands of others, living and dead, can all find space and be "at home'--not comfortably, perhaps, or e~sily, but the Christian story, the deep story, is never easy or comfortable. It is, however, real, as real as the ongoing spiritual "gift" (dare I, after all this, say "charism"?) that has called so many over the centuries to fol-low the path of religious life. Notes ~ This essay was presented originally at the 1998 History of Women Religious Conference in Chicago. Though not every point is supported by refei'ences, this essay rests upon my decade-long research into the history of American women religious, including work in the archives of about seventy-five congregations and familiarity with virtually all the published materials on this subject, including historical and biographical works on over three hundred individual communities. On the subject of charism, I read all Vatican documents dealing with religious life, as well as approximately three dozen articles directly or indirectly on this sub-ject that have appeared in Review for Religious (U.S.A.) and Religious Life Review (Ireland). Many of the incidents and ideas recounted here are developed more fully in some of my previous publications; see, in par-ticular, "Discovering Foremothers: Sisters; Society, and the American Catholic Experience," U.S. Catholic Historian 5 (Summer/Autumn 1986): 273-290; "To Serve the People of God: Nineteenth-Century Sisters and the Creation of an American Catholic Religious Life," Cushwa Center Working Papers, Series 18, no. 2 (1986); "Women and American Review for Religious Catholicism, 1789-1989," in Perspectives on the Catholic Church in America, 1789-1989, ed. Virgina Geiger and Stephen Vicchio (Westminster, Maryland: Christian Classics, 1989), pp. 123-142; "Sisterhood and Power: Class, Culture, and Ethnicity in the American Convent," Colby Library Quarterly 25 (1989): 149-175; "Women, Feminism, and the New Religious History: Catholic Sisters as a Case Study," in Belief and Behavior: Essays in the New Religious History, ed. Philip VanderMeer and Robert Swierenga (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1991), pp. 136-163;."Cultural Conundrum: Sisters, Ethnicity, and the Adaptation of American Catholicism," Mid-America 74 (1992): 205-230; "The Validation of Sisterhood: Canonical Status and Liberation in the History of American Nuns," in A Leaf of the Great Tree of God: Essays in Honor of Ritamary Bradley SFCC, ed. Margot H. King (Toronto: Peregrina Publishing Co., 1994), pp. 38-78; and "Concentric Circles of Sisterhood," in Building Sisterhood: A Feminist History of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1997), pp. 1-21. For their insights into this subject, I offer my thanks to Ritamary Bradley SFCC, Thomas J. Costello, Barbara Garland SC, James Hennesey SJ, Mary Ann Hinsdale IHM, Elizabeth A. West ICM, and many of the participants in the Sister-L internet discussion group 2 In this, SCRIS reiterates a point made in a document it issued five years earlier, Mutuae relationes: "Bishops, in union with the Roman pon-tiff, receive from Christ the head the duty (see LG §21) of discerning gifts and competencies, of coordinating multiple energies, and of guid-ing the entire people in living in the world as a sign and instrument of salvation. They, therefore, are also entrusted with the duty of caring for religious chariSms" (§9); and "It is .the duty of bishops as authentic teach-ers and guides of perfection for all the members of the diocese (see CD §§12; 15; 35, 2; and LG §§25, 45) to be the guardians likewise of fidelity to the religious vocation in the spirit of each institute . Bishops, along with their clergy, should be. firm guardians of the specific character of each religious family both in the spiritual and in the apostolic field" (§28). These passages, as well as that from EssentialElements (§41), raise some serious questions about the autonomy and integrity of religious charisms, since the implication is that they cannot be presumed to exist "authentically" until those in (external) hierarchical authority say they exist. Certainly, this is a matter deserving of substantial Consideration; but, unfoi'tunately, that is outside the scope of this paper. 3 Wilfrid Harrington, "Charism," in A New Dictionary of Theology, ed. Joseph A. Komonchak et al. (Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1987), p. 180; The HarperCollins Encyclopedia of Catholicism, ed. Richard E McBrien (HarperSanFrancisco, 1989), pp. 299-300. 4 These figures, as well as information included in Table 1, are derived from a detailed listing of all Catholic women's apostolic communities that I have located to date that existed in the United States between 1727 and 1917. Included in this list are com.munities which, for most or all of their existence, engaged in some form of active ministry. Thus, for May-June 1999 247 24S Thompson ¯ Charism or Deep Story? instance, contemplative Benedictines are omitted, as are purely contem-plative Visitation monasteries. In compiling these data, principal sources were: Elinor Tong Dehey, Religious Orders of Women in the United States, rev. ed. (Hammond, Indiana, 1930); Joan M. Lexau, Convent Life: Roman Catholic Religious Orders for Women in North America (New York, 1964), pp. 209-387 (Index of Orders); and Evangeline Thomas, Women Religious History Sources: A Guide to Repositories in the United States (New York, 1983), pp. 169-176 (Table of U.S. Founding Dates). Some information came from other sources, which are identified on the comprehensive list in my possession. s In that respect, they bear a similarity to the rest of the 149 U.S. con-gregations that have more individualized origins and have "founders" that they share, if at all, with only a handful of others. I shall return a bit later to the question of charism as it affects them. 6 All eight of the first indigenous communities of women studied by Barbara Misner in her landmark work, "Highly Respectable and Accomplished Ladies": Catholic Women Religious in America, 1790-18Y0 (New York: Garland, 1988), devoted most or all of their early ministerial energies to teaching. So did the vast majority of foundations initiated from abroad-- including the first in what is now the United States, the New Orleans Ursulines (founded in 1727). By 1884 the U.S. bishops, gathered at the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore and extremely concerned about "leak-age" from the faith, paid tribute to the success of these pioneers (and to their belief that the education of youth was the best way to keep people within the church) by their declaration that every parish in the country should establish at least one school within the next two years. That, in turn, increased the demand for religious teachers (the overwhelming majority of them women, and sisters), just as the "new immigration" (c. 1880-1917) from heavily Catholic eastern and southern Europe was get-ting underway. See also Gerald Shaughnessy, Has the Immigrant Kept the Faith? (New York: Macmillan, 1925); "The Pastoral Letter of 1884," in The National Pastorals of the American Hierarchy (1792-1919), ed. Peter Guilday (Washington, D.C.: National Catholic Welfare Council, 1923), pp. 280-282; Thompson, "Women and American Catholicism," p. 125. 7 This Guide (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1964) appeared in six editions, the first in 1952 and the last in 1966. The 1964 edition was selected for use here because it appeared only one year before Perfectae caritatis called upon religious to renew themselves "in the spirit of their founders," thereby initiating the whole postconciliar emphasis on "charism." It should be noted that McCarthy acquired his information from the communities; therefore, these are the founding stories that the sisters themselves had identified and transmit-ted to him for inclusion. s I have written extensively elsewhere about the fact that many of these stories bear little or no resemblance to reality. That is, communi-ties which traditionally cited clerics as founders have, since Vatican II, in quite a number of cases, identified and reclaimed women as their prin- Review for Religious cipal initiators. Nevertheless, we cannot dismiss the significance of these founding stories (often recounted and thereby reinforced for several gen-erations) either. Whether or not men actually took the principal initia-tive in founding particular communities, it did affect the self-understandings of hundreds of sisters who were taught, and who believed, that the men had done so. 9 William Humphrey SJ, Elements of Religious Life, 2nd ed. (London: Thomas Baker, 1903), p. 164. 10 p. Lothar Hardick OFM, He Leads, I Follow: The Life of Mother Maria Theresia Bonzel, Foundress of the Sisters of St. Francis of Perpetual Adoration, trans. Sisters M. Honora Hau and M. Clarahilda Fischer (Colorado Springs, I971), pp. 23, 30-31, 185-186. Ironically, perhaps, Pfaender later separated and founded her own religious congregation, which also was Franciscan (known in the U.S. as the Wheaton [Illinois] Franciscans): M. Brunilde Probst, The Burning Seak Mother Mary Clara Pfaender, 1827- 1882 (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1960). n The founding of the community is recounted in great detail in Vol. 1 of Josephine Marie Peplinski SSJ-TOSF, A Fitting Response: The History of the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Third Order of St. Francis (South Bend, Indiana: priv. pub., 1982, 1992); material here is taken specifically from Vol. 2, pp. ix, 49-50, 239 (italics in the original). Jaskulski was superior general for 1902-1908, 1918-1928, 1940-1942 (when she died); Rybicki was superior general for 1908-1918. Both were perpetually in leader-ship, either as head of the congregation or on its council, from its foun-dation until their deaths (Ryb!cki died in 1926); their lives, spiritualities, and contrasting administrations are described meticulously in chapters 1, 4, and 5 of Vol. 2. I also have written about the SSJ-TOSF story; see esp. "Sisterhood and Power" and "Cultural Conundrum" (see note 1). 12Judith Sutera OSB, True Daughters: Monastic Identity and American Benedictine Women's History (Atchison: priv. pub., 1987); M. Incarnata Girgen, Behind the Beginnings (St. Joseph, Minnesota: priv. pub., 1981); Ephrem Hollermann, The Reshaping of a Tradition: American Benedictine Women, 1852-1881 (Vv'inona: St. Mary's Press, 1994). ~3 Sutera, True Daughters, esp. chaps. 4-5 and pp. 38, 42, 53-56. 14 McCarthy, 1964 Guide, pp. 195-197. ,s Dorothy A. Vidulich, Peace Pays a Price: A Study of Margaret Anna Cusack, the Nun ofKenmare, 2nd ed. (Washington, D.C., priv. pub., 1990; orig. 1975); see also Irene Ffrench Edgar, Margaret Anna Cusack (Dublin: Women's Press, 1979); Margaret Anna Cusack, The Nun of Kenmare: An Autobiography (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1891). 16 The Monroe IHM story is told in fascinating detail throughout Building Sisterhood (see note 1, above); see, in particular, Marita-Constance Supan IHM, "Dangerous Memory: Mother M. Theresa Maxis Duchemin and the Michigan Congregation of the Sisters, IHM," pp. 31-67; Suzanne Fleming IHM, "She Who Remained: Mother Mary Joseph Walker and the 'Refounding' of the IHM Congregation," pp. 69-92; and Thompson, May-Jutte 1999 Thompson ¯ Cbarinn or Deep Story? "Concentric Circles," esp. pp. 5-8, and "Part l:The Context," pp. 25-28. L7 Fleming, "She Who Remained," p. 91; Margaret Brennan IHM, "'No Two Exactly Alike': IHM Spirituality," in Building Sisterhood, pp. 95-109; see also Rosalita Kelly IHM, No Greater Service: The History of the Congregation of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Monroe: priv. pub., 1948), esp. p. 132. L8 McCarthy, 1964 Guide, p. 325. ~9 The SSMO story is told with honesty in Wilfred P. Schoenberg SJ, These Valiant Women: History of the Sisters of St. Mary of Oregon, 1886- 1986 (Portland: priv. pub., 1986)~ I also have read Wilhelmina's diary in the SSMO archives, Beaverton, Oregon. Three of the original members of the Ohio group left it during the days in Wisconsin and became found-ing members in 1869 (one of them first superior when the group was of officially established) of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity in Manitowoc; see M, Teresita Kit~:ell OSF, Refining His Silver: Pioneer Days of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity, Manitowoc, Wisconsin, 1866- 1911 (Manitowoc: priv. pub., 1979). This, among other things, serves to document the length of time that the: schismatic "cult" was in existence before the SSMO's "founding" in 1886. 20 Bernard Lee SM, "A Socio-Historical Theology of Charism," Review for Religious 48, no. 1 (1989): 124-135; see also Doris Gottemoeller RSM, "Befriending the Wind," Review for Religious 53, no. 6 (1994): esp. p. 811. n See also Stephen Crites, "The Narrative Quality of Experience," Journal of the American Academy of Religion 39 (1971). Open Wounds Be bold, twin brother. Probe the wounds doubt demands to see. The gash is but entrance to his heart. Pry it wide to penetrate the core. Review for Religious Demand and desire, too, are twins that seek to let his hallowed, hollow hands transform old hurts to quiet awe. , ~Eugene Cartier ELIZABETH McDONOUGH The Need for Self-Criticism: Affirmative Comments I n the United States the precipitous decline in numbers of postolic women religious since Vatican Council II will surely have far-reaching consequences for all segments of the church as the third millennium begins. Church-related educational and healthcare institutions will probably continue to be transferred to nonecclesial and sometimes for-profit auspices, and many Catholics may grow up unaware that apostolic congregations of women reli-gious exist as ways of life that could have appealed to them. ~ Recently, in commenting on the years of renewal in religious life since Vatican II, Sister Doris Gottemoeller RSM noted that "for the most part we have not identified and reflected on the learnings" from this experience and that "critical reflection on our present reality" has been lacking.1 She is currently president of the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas, is a recent past president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), was a participant in the 1994 Synod on Consecrated Life, and is one of the original members of the Catholic Common Ground Initiative. Her comments may represent a pivotal change in perspective by someone in an influential leadership position. And, since critical self-appraisal has been neither prevalent nor popular among American women religious since Vatican II, her comments may also represent a significant change at this time. Elizabeth McDonough OP has written the Canonical Counsel column in this journal since our issue of July-August 1990 and has contributed several other articles as well. Her address is P.O. Box 29260; Washington, D.C. 20017. ,~'h~y-~une 1999 McDonougb * The Need for Self-Criticism Though voices of criticism have consistently been raised about the postconciliar renewal efforts of religious life--by members of the hierarchy, by diocesan and religious clergy, by lay people, and by sisters themselves--critical reflection from without or from within has frequently been openly excluded Or quietly ignored in many, and perhaps most, women's apostolic communities. Over the years, members of women's religious communities have, in both speech and writing, lodged various objections to the general direction the path of postconciliar change was taking, a path that people now see as leading to pos-sible demise. The objections made over the years concerned, among other matters, the tendency towards having women religious governed by groups or by intermediate administrative personnel rather than by specific individuals elected to particular offices; the steady move-ment towards (so-called) total-participation chapters, which fre-quently exclude actual participation for many sisters; the general abandonment of easily recognizable identity symbols, along with the failure to maintain various community practices that many found meaningful; the increased use of open placement regarding sisters' employment, with the concomitant results of expanded apostolic diversity, an inability of congregations to make or meet institutional commitments, and the lessening of opportunities for community living. But in many women's congregations such objec-tions have not been well received by leadership or by segments of the membership. Moreover, although explicit internal objections regarding prevalent renewal patterns seem to have diminished over the years and to be somewhat rare now, it seems that members who still wish to embrace a renewed but traditional form of religious life (and who may be in their sixties, seventies, or even eighties) now channel their efforts elsewhere because of their experience of func-tional or systematic exclusion from effecting changes in internal governance. Many now direct their energies to living the remain-ing years of their vowed life by witnessing simply to the values they have consistently embraced but felt circumstantially unable to practice during much of the course of renewal. That is, they now consciously seek opportunities to live in common, to share com-munity prayer, and to minister in an apostolate traditionally related to their charism. Meanwhile, younger members--that is, mem-bers mostly under fifty--have initiated regular intra- and inter- Review for Religious congregational gatherings and networking in search of mutual sup-port and deeper religious meaning. Regarding various community renewal policies and proce-dures, then, numbers of community members have voiced explicit criticism--and by their practice have made some implicit criticism unmistakably clear too. Beyond this criticism arising from within apostolic communities of women religious, critical assessments have come also from people outside these communities. These assess-ments have been met with a similar pattern of rejection. Comments that even border on being critical have been categorically discountenanced as arising variously from arrogant, intemperate, shallow, uninformed, traditionalist, or ignorant sources. Criticism from the hierarchy and diocesan clergy seems often to have been excluded because they are regarded as hopelessly embedded in patriarchy. Criticism from religious priests seems to have been judged unacceptable because they are con-sidered to be unduly influenced by their experience of clerical advantage. And criticism from lay people seems to have been readily rejected because many of them are viewed as harboring unrealistic expectations of a lifestyle in which they do not share. Indeed, a pattern of negative reaction to critical assessmentsof what has happened since Vatican II is evident in responses to a recent article concerning possible causes for the current dearth of religious vocations in some communi-ties) It often appears that only certain internal, ostensibly self-perpetuating authorities or select special-interest groups are judged as adequately expressing the renewa! process among women reli-gious. Any suggestion from any source that any viable religious life in the future might diverge from the direction envisioned by the prevailing progressive model seems to be all too readily con-sidered as patently reactionary, as categorically negative, as arro-gantly uninformed, as judgmentally ignoring women's unique lived Any suggestion from any source that any viable religious life in the future might diverge from the direction envisioned by the prevailing progressive model seems to be all too readily considered as patently reactionary. ;'~,lay-JuJle 1999 254 McDonough ¯ The Need for Self-Criticism experience, as unfairly critical, or as an emotionally immature attachment to a former way of life) Furthermore, as postconciliar renewal has continued, it is not only critical observations that have been shunned .by women reli-gious in this country. Significant research data and pointed rec-ommendations from comprehensi'be sociological studies have also been embraced only selectively and implemented only sporadi-cally. Results from the ongoing, multifaceted, and controversial "Sisters' Survey"--as formulated and conducted under the direc-tion of sociologist Marie Augusta Neal SNDdeN--were systemat-ically distributed to participating congregations, published in several books~ and regularly reported at national meetings of major superiors from 1967 through the late 1980s. In stark contrast, amazingly little attention has been given to the more recent findings of psychologists David Nygren CM and Miriam Ukeritis CgJ. These researchers surprised participants at a 1992 Chicago workshop when, in presenting data from their study on the Future of Religious Orders in the United States (abbreviated as FORUS), they announced that many religious communities in this country had only a "ten-year window" in which to alter the present course of decline if they wished to perdure many years into the third millennium. The conferences of major superiors (CMSM and LCWR) were directly involved in the planning and execution of the FORUS study, which rendered some startling results about reli-gious in the United States. Included in these discoveries were. a lack of role clarity among religious (especially in apostolic groups of women), a high degree of cultural assimilation by religious, a general ministerial invisibility of religious, a relative dearth of effec-tive leadership in most religious communities, an apparently less-ened inclination to sacrifice among religious, and a widespread loss of institutional commitments by religious congregations.4 More than half a decade has passed since Nygren and Ukeritis projected that there was only a "ten-year window" of opportunity for the viability of religious institutes in America. During this time the FORUS findings seem to have gone largely unheeded or to have been relegated to convenient oblivion. Could it be that this study was greeted with a less than enthusiastic response precisely because its findings were unpopular among the group being assessed? For, indeed, the FORUS results did not shower unbounded accolades on the postconciliar transformation of reli-gious life in America; did not unquestioningly advocate contin- Review for Religious ued pursuit of the progressive model of renewal, and did not offer unrestrained optimism for the future prospects of religious insti-tutes. Or could it be that the FORUS findings, perceived as being all too accurate, were simply too painful to accept and conse-quently were met with at least unconscious denial at individual and collective levels in most congregations, particularly those of women religious? Over the years, religious in several areas of expertise have also sounded calls for critical reassessment of current practices in light of the manifest patterns of continuing decline in religious institutes. These calls, too, seem largely unheeded. The historical and sociological analyses of Raymond Fitz SM and Lawrence Cada SM, which appeared in the mid 1970s, got little attention after several months of popular discussion. Their work said quite clearly that probably only a small fraction of the then extant communi-ties would successfully negotiate post- Vatican renewal efforts,s Might the brief notice that Fitz and Cada's anal-yses received.be due, at least in part, to their intimation that religious con-gregations over the centuries have had identifiable lifespans, that many con-gregations did not last long after a per-vasive experience of absolute doubt regarding purpose, and that this seemed to be precisely the situa-tion at that time for thousands of religious in America? In 1983 CARA (Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate) in Washington, D.C., published a translation of the 1972 land-mark monograph of Raymond Hostie SJ, Vie et mort des ordres religieux, on which the Fitz and Cada material was directly based.6 The introduction to this booklet, by historian Dolores Liptak RSM, explains its significance, its application to ~enewal among American religious and specifically women religious. But this, too, appears to have received only scant attention within women's communities in the United States. All through the early 1990s, Eleace King IHM, of CAR& pub-lished data about--and reasons for--the steady decline in voca- Religious in several areas of expertise have also sounded calls for critical reassessment of current practices in light of the manifest patterns of continuing decline in religious institutes. 255 May-,]une 1999 McDonougb * The Need for Self-Criticism tions to progressively oriented communities along with parallel data about the constant flow of vocations to traditional groups.7 Little note, however, has been taken of these results. At the beginning of this decade, David O'Connor ST offered a balanced and readable summary of the various cultura!, eccle-sial, theological, and ideological shifts that may be contributing to the (possible) disappearance of many religious institutes in this country; but his work is rarely cited or even referenced in reli-gious- life circles.8 In 1991 I myself published what the editor of America magazine referred to as a "trenchant critique" of the then prevailing trends in religious life, while the editor of First Things described it as "a first-rate analysis of what has gone awry in the many worlds of American religion."9 This analysis and critique received an overwhelming positive response from members of reli-gious communities around the world, but it was simultaneously greeted with resounding silence from those in leadership. Albert DiIanni SM has offered thoughtful considerations based on his experience of the renewal of religious life as it currently relates to religion, to modernity, to modern psychology, to com-munity, to decreasing vocations, and to certain laicizing trends in the post-Vatican II era; but his observations have been met with either studied unconcern or strident rejectionJ° And little heed has been paid to the recent, assessment of sociologist Patricia Wittberg SC that the future of most religious communities is severely limited--if not rather bleak---precisely because a coinci-dence of internal and external factors has resulted in a collapse of their ideological framework and a lessening or elimination of their functional supports.~ Regarding postconciliar religiousqife trans-formation, are only laudatory comments able to be perceived as having any meaning and value for communities of women reli-gious in America today? In many of these communities, a pattern of dismissing with studied disdain or even open derision any factual data that leads to disconcerting conclusions about their lives has been ill too evi-dent in the response to Ann Carey's recent book, a book (widely conceded to be well documented) that details decisions and actions taken in the decades since Vatican II within the conference of major superiors for women's institutes.~2 Note, hbwever, that Lora Ann Quifionez CDP and Mary Daniel Turner SNDdeN published a book earlier in the decade that traced precisely the same era of transi-tion and detailed most of the same topics, but from a different Review for Religious perspective and with less specific documentation.13 In contrast to Carey's work, the Quifionez-Turner book was well received and has been highly touted as an accurate portrait of renewal. Yet both books present renewal as deliberately intended and carefully planned. Both books address the influence of cultural context, the impa6t of the Sisters' Survey, the effect of feminist initiatives, the disruption from internal conference conflicts, the consequences of hierarchic confrontations, and other such topics in reference to postconciliar religious life. Both books name those who were instrumental in the renewal process at national and local levels in this country. And the authors of both books offer assessments of what has actually occurred. Could the disparity in recep-tion of these two works be due at least in part to the fact that the Quifionez- Turner book evaluates these happen-ings positively while the Carey book views the results as more than slightly wide of the mark envisioned by Perfectae caritatis? To be sure, journalist Carey is a laywoman who judged the evidence she amassed as anything but complimen-tary to the renewal process and those who directed it, and she called for critical reassessment of renewal results. On the other hand, Quifionez and Turner are women religious--both former executive secretaries of LCWR and both instrumental in effecting the postconciliar transformation--who judged the results thus far as entirely positive and urged further development along the same course of renewal. It is a truism of historical scholarship that those attempting an analysis of a set of events need a realistic broad familiarity with the historical context. But does this explain why the perspective on religious-life renewal presented by those who guided it should so readily be judged more accurate or more objective or more accept-able than the perspective of someone who has carefully pored over official documentation and verifiable data and has her own lived familiarity with post-Vatican II renewal? Could it be that negative assessments of religious-life renewal from whatever source are Could it be that negative assessments of religious-life renewal from whatever source are simply unacceptable to women religiousm for whatever reason ? 257 May-June 1999 McDonougb ¯ The Need for Self-Criticism t_g_ 1 simply unacceptable to women religious--for whatever reason? For an explanation of the present situation of decline and demise, are many women religious simply incapable of looking further than a speculatively fascinating and vaguely consoling convergence of sociological circumstances that impact religious life fr0m outside? Is none of the decline and demise of the past thirty-three years attributable to decisions made and actions taken within religious communities? Have dispersed ministries and secular attire (with lapel pins) and apartment living had absolutely no detrimental effect, whether expected or not? Are women religious able to look at none of the above? And, if so, why? Though the suggestion made ten years ago by sociologist Wittberg that the behavioral patterns among congregations of women religious might "actually be dysfunctional for organiza-tional survival" appears to have been effectively ignored, it may well identify a pertinent reality that needs to be at least acknowl-edged- if not directly addressed--by religious congregations of women today.14 And perhaps women religious would also do well to attend to the warning, offered in 1988 by psychologist Donna Markham OP, that the positive perception they had of themselves did not match the perception of others--something that did not bode well for vocations.~s Indeed, with rare exception, vocations have declined steadily throughout the decade since Markham's observation, and in most communities of apostolic women reli-gious the median age has gradually increased. " True enough, religious life is not merely a functional institu-tion, and it certainly ought not to be reduced to a numbers game. But is it unrealistic to suggest that a minimal number of members is needed for a community to perdure, to serve effectively, and to hand on a religious tradition? And, when women religious look over their shoulder for younger women walking in their footsteps and see no one there, is it really unfair to surmise that what they have been fashioning since Vatican II may not be a viable form of future religious life after all? Or, again, when congregations begin realistically to project that by the year 2010 fewer than ten percent of their members will be under sixty-five years of age, is it unduly critical to suggest that someone somewhere somehow may have made some decision(s) in the three-plus decades of post-Vatican II renewal that ought seriously to be reassessed and perhaps even altered? I think not. Review for Religious Indeed, on the part of women religious in America (and per-haps elsewhere in the world, too), some possibly difficult but gen-uinely constructive self-criticism and some corrective change of course in various aspects of postconciliar renewal ought to be hon-esdy welcomed.'6 And both may be long overdue, because the real-ity at issue has import far beyond the ever-dwindling numbers of ever-aging apostolic women religious themselves. Notes 1 Doris Gottemoeller, "Religious Life: Where Does It Fit in Today's Church?" in Review for Religious 57, no. 3 (March-April 1998): 146- 160. 2 Albert Dilanni, "A View of Religious Vocations," America 178, no. 6 (28 February 1998): 8-12. 3 See various responses to the Dilanni article (note 2 above) among letters to the editor in the March and early April issues of 1998. 4 David J. Nygren and Miriam D. Ukeritis, "The Religious Life Futures Project: Executive Summary," Review for Religious 52, no. 1 (January-February 1993): 6-55; also. Origins 22, no. 15 (24 September 1992): 257-272. s Lawrence Cada and Raymond Fitz, "The Recovery of Religious Life," Review for Religious 34, no. 5 (September-October 1975): 690-718. 6 Raymond Hostie, /,qe et mort des ordres religieux (Paris: Descl~e, 1972), translated for a limited English edition as The Life and Death of Religious Orders (Washington, D.C.: CAP, A, 1983). 7 See the CARA Formation Directory for Men and Women Religious (Washington, D.C.: CARA) as edited by Eleace King IHM for the years 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1994-1995. s David O'Connor, Witness and Service (New York: Paulist Press, 1990), pp. 145-162. 9 See, respectively, Elizabeth McDonough, "Beyond the Liberal Model: Quo Vadis?" Review for Religious 50, no. 3 (March-April 1991): 178-188; editorial in America for 13 July 1991; and "The Public Square," First Things, no. 17 (November 1991). ,0 Albert DiIanni, Religious Life as Adventure (New York: Alba House, 1994). " Patricia Wittberg, The Rise and Fall of Catholic Religious Orders (New York: SUNY Press, 1994). ,2 Ann Carey, Sisters in Crisis (Huntington, Indiana: Our Sunday Visitor, 1997). ,3 Lora Ann Quifionez and Mary Daniel Turner, The Transformation of American Catholic Sisters (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1992). ,4 Patricia Wittberg, "Outward Orientation in Declining 259 May-June 1999 McDonough ¯ The Need for Self-Criticism Organizations: Reflections on LCWR Documents," in Claiming Our Truth, ed. Nadine Foley (Washington, D.C.: LCWR, 1988), pp, 91-105. 15 Donna Markham, "The Decline of Vocations in the United States: Reflections from a Psychological Perspective," New Catholic World 231, no. 1381 (January-February 1988): 13-17. 16 See, for example, the recent comments of Doris Gottemoeller, "Religious Life in Crisis," Origins 28, no. 36 (25 February 1999): 634- 638. The Treasure Long ago a rainbow arc'd my storm-tossed sky, and the pot of gold I found then is still bottomless. Since that serendipitous moment, faith has claimed its reality. I see with clarity--over the clouds, beyond the rains--that joy and pain alike qualify to mine the treasure, provide the coin to buy the Kingdom, here on the green earth for a time, and there in the meadows of Eternity. Anna Marie Mack SSJ Review for Religious LARRY N. LORENZONI The Annuario Pontificio The Vatican's "Pontifical Yearbook" and a Recent Editorial Decision Fourteen years ago the Religious Life Review, edited in Dublin by Father Austin Flannery OP, published an arti-cle with the catchy title "The Single Sex Church of the Annuario Pontificio." Its opening paragraphs noted the almost total absence of women's names in the church's official directory. The same article was later reprinted in Sisters Today with a milder title: "The Annuario Pontificio and Women in the Church." The Annuario Pontificio is the 4.25"-by-6.5" 2500- page yearbook of the Roman Catholic Church. Bound in red cloth with a golden papal coat of arms on the cover, it contains annually updated information about the College of Cardinals, all archbishops and bishops (with basic facts about their respective dioceses), all prelates and abbots, the secretariat of state, the Roman tribunals, congregations, councils, and commissions, the Vatican Library, the church's worldwide diplomatic representa-tives (nuncios and pronuncios), all the ambassadors accredited to the Holy See, the administration of Vatican City, all officially approved religious orders of men and Larry N. Lorenzoni SDB, a Salesian priest, served in the late 1980s as director of the documentation, information, and press office of Caritas Internationalis in Rome. Currently director of development for his province, he may be addressed at Salesians of St. John Bosco; 1100 Franklin Street; San Francisco, California 94109. 1999 261 A former noteworthy feature of the Annuario was the almost total absence of females in its pages. 262 Lorenzoni ¯ Tlse Annuario Pontifido of women, academies, atheneums, pontifical universities (six: Gregoriana, Lateranense, Urbaniana, San Tommaso d'Aquino [Angelicum], Salesiana, and the new Santa Croce), a number of seminaries and colleges, and various other institutes and cultural organizations. The Annuario closes with a hundred pages of historical notes and six hundred pages of alphabetical lists: names of all the dio-ceses, prelatures~ and titular dioceses (in their Latin adjectival form, Latin noun form, and modern Roman-alphabet form) and the names and page references of some 25,000 persons. It is a fascinat-ing book. Of the 151 living cardinals listed in the 1997 Annuario (to cite a rather significant fact one can easily cull from its pages), 4 were created by Pope John xxIII, 31 by Paul vI, and 116 by Pope John Paul II. A former noteworthy feature of the Annuario--it used to distinguish it from virtually eve .ry other directory in the world--was the almost total absence of females in its pages. The alpha-betical list at the end of the directory was conse-quently 99.99 percent male. Historical, doctrinal, and traditional considerations are essential for a proper understanding of this situation. One page from the 1985 article (in RLR) found its way to the Vatican underground and quickly became the subject of some interesting conversa-tions during my four years (1986-1990) at Caritas Internationalis, the church's worldwide charity wing. In the penthouses of Palazzo San Callisto, where the Caritas offices are located (near Santa Maria in Trastevere), lived a number of active and retired cardinals (Roger Etchegaray, Bernardin Gantin, Paul Poupard, Ferdinando Antonelli, Francesco Carpino, and Francis Arinze). I came to know best Cardinal Francis Arinze, from Nigeria, the genial president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. Occasionally I see him mentioned among the papabili and featured as a speaker on Mother Angelica's EWTN television programs. He is keenly intelligent and friendly, a good listener, articulate and ever an opti-mist. Open to new ideas, he weighs carefully all arguments against the truths of the faith and then follows them courageously t6 their logical conclusions. I remember in particular one conversation I had with him at Review for Religious Palazzo San Callisto, a conversation occasioned by some para-graphs from that December 1985 article (of mine) in RLR, which some friend had shared with him. The paragraphs are these: One glaring lacuna [in the Annuario Pontificio] is hard to understand, and even harder to accept, because of the anger it is likely to provoke today when everyone is being increas-ingly sensitized against all kinds of discrimination. I am refer-ring to the omission of the names of the superiors general of women religious where the individual congregations are listed with the address of the generalate and current information as to the number of foundations and of professed members. .This anomaly came to my attention when I needed to check the spelling of the name of the new mother general of our Salesian sisters. I had just looked up the name of the superior general of the Fathers of Mercy (whose ad I had seen in The Wanderer), so I turned instinctively to the Annuario for the answer to my question. It was not as sim-ple as I thought. For every male congregation, the name of the superior general is invariably given (and, in 99 percent of the cases, also that of the procurator general). One learns, for instance, that the Very Rev. John O'Brien is the superior general of the Fathers of Mercy (an order founded in 1808), even though the order has only seven members worldwide. Fifty-four religious orders of men have less than I00 pro-fessed members, seven have 25 or fewer, but in each case the name of the general is prominently displayed. I was chagrined to discover that in the case of the orders and congregations of women one looks in vain in the Annuario for the names of the mothers general. Some 120 of those congregations have a membership of over 1000 sis-ters. In vain did I look for the name of the superior general of the Salesian sisters, even though the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, as they are officially known, have a worldwide membership of nearly 18,000. They are the sec-ond largest congregation of women in the church, after the 34,000 Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul. Such a discriminatory omission tends to reinforce all the worst stereotypes one hears about the institutional church and its treatment of women, since it conveys a number of admittedly unintentional but nonetheless inescapable mes-sages: (1) Women are of little consequence in the church. (2) The father superior of ten men is more important than the mother superior of I0,000 women. (3) Names of females, no matter how important, need not be listed in the Annuario because the church does not discuss matters of consequence with them anyway. (4)Male religious superiors are routinely consulted, and hence it is necessary to have their names listed May-June 199.9 Lorenzoni ¯ The AnnuarioPontificio in the Annuario, but listing the flames of the superiors gen-eral of women does not serve any useful purpose since very rarely does one need to know who they are and even less deal or correspond with them. (5) Sisters are supposed to accept obediently and without too many questions whatever Holy Mother Church says. Unfortunately, in the thinking of many, Holy Mother Church is often equated with male power structure. No dissenting voice was heard from those who had joined our conversation. Both retired Cardinal Francesco Carpino (a man of rare nobility, who died 5 October 1993) and Cardinal Francis Arinze agreed that the Annuario should at long last join the mod-ern age and list the names of women religious superiors alongside those of their male counterparts. But Rome moves slowly. The 16 December 1994 issue of Commonweal carried this item under its Et Cetera rubric: Speaking in support of requests by women's religious orders for an end to discrimination by the church against women, Archbishop Maurice Couture of Quebec pointed to the 1993 Vatican Yearbook (Annuario Pontificio); it lists the names of the superiors general of all institutes of men, but none of the names of the superiors general of women (Origins, November 3). Good for the archbishop, but he's ten years late. Writing in Religious Life Review for November-December 1985, our correspondent Larry Lorenzoni SDB [Correspondence, November 18] recalled turning to the Annuario to find the name of the superior general of the Fathers of Mercy, an order founded in 1808 which has seven members worldwide. The name was there: the Very Rev. John O'Brien. He also looked for the name of the superior general of the Salesian sisters, the second largest congregation of women in the church: nearly 18,000 members. No name. Some of the mes-sages conveyed (Father Lorenzoni, a kind man, says they are "admittedly unintentional but nonetheless inescapable"): "Women are of little consequence in the church; the father superior of ten men is more important than the mother supe-rior of 10,000 women; there's no point in publishing the names of women superiors because who needs to know them." I have before me the 1997 edition of the Annuario Pontificio. I see with some personal satisfaction that each religious congrega-tion of women now routinely carries, as an additional entry, the name of the mother general. The change can safely be labeled "routine" since it started with the Annuario's 1996 edition. Review for Religious No doubt, some gentle nudging by a few highly placed mem-bers of the College of Cardinals, as well as by bishops convinced that the previous practice was clearly discriminatory, helped level the field. Word eventually reached the offices of the Vatican sec-retariat of state, on which the Annuario Pontificio depends, and suitable action followed with the publication of the 1996 edition. A recent phone call to the secretariat of state enabled me to reach Angela Zanetti, a most personable and knowlegeable lady who was for twenty-six years connected with the production of the Annuario. Her new supervisor, Monsignore Fermenti, intro-duced her to me as a "walking encyclopedia on the history of the Annuario Pontificio." Here are some interesting facts from our con-versation: ¯ The first list of male religious orders (Istituti Mascbili) appeared in the 1838 edition of the Annuario. ¯ The first list of female religious orders (Istituti Femminih) appeared 98 years later, in the 1940 edition, without the name of the mother general. ¯ The two lists continued to be published (Ordini Mascbili first, Ordini Femminili second) in the years following, each order of men shouting prominently the name of the general, each order of women lacking that particular information. * At last, in the 1996 edition, for the very first time, the information concerning each religious order of women included also the name of the mother general, as had previously been done for even the smallest reli-gious orders of men. I am reminded of what Pat Paulsen, the late tongue-in-cheek presidential candidatei once said with his usual aplomb: "No one should be denied equal rights because of the shape of their skin." Subs'criptions to Review for Religious can flow b~ ordered,or renewedoby FAX; and paid forby Ma~terCard ~o'r Visd. FA~ the order form inside the back cover, or cALL our o~c~ ~wi~ "th your credit card number: IF~: 31z~-977~7362 0, ~'HONE: 314-977-7363 1999 JOAN A. RANGE Women and Canon Law Cbanon law, as a support for the life of the community of elievers, that is, the church, has a history almost as old as the community itself. Over the centuries, its formulation has not been the work of women, a fact that is readily understandable. Women did not have the status nor society the liberality for that kind of contribution. Women were, however, a vital part of the church and society: in the church as members of the various ordines that supported the living community and in society as wives and mothers2 History witnesses to this fact and those roles. Women's lives, moreover, were guided by the protection, pre-scriptions, and sanctiohs of the church's law. In church courts of the ¯ Middle Ages, women were parties to suits brought against alleged violations and also were sued for alleged violations of others' rights. The activity of women in the world of canon law is well attested to in the church's history.2 But as members who formulated the law or who addressed the church's courts (defending others or doing advocate work for oth-ers) or judged cases (even as collegiate judges), all this women never did until this century. In this century women have performed all these functions in their own right as members of the church and as canon lawyers. The future is clear for their continued func-tioning to be even more vigorous. This rather astonishing fact needs consideration. Given the absence of women in all these roles before this century, how did this change come about? Joan A. Range ASC is associate professor in the Department of Theological Studies at Saint Loui~ University. Her address is Humanities Bui_lding; 3800 Lindell Boulevard; St. Louis, Missouri 63108. Review for Relig4ous Women's Status in Canon Law ~ Before this century, as a rule women's status was that of persons limited before the law. Mostly, women were considered--as were minors and the mentally incompetent--unable in their own person and name to bring a case before the court. This reflected Roman law, from which much of canon law is derived. When, however, asso-ciations of women became moral persons with rights and duties in the law, they were able to bring cases to court, as history shows. Besides bringing cases to the church's tribunals when their rights were being infringed or violated, women were also sued by others if the petitioner felt that his own rights were being infringed or violated by women. This was often a matter of property rights. As time progressed it might also be a matter of marriage rights as well, especially when it concerned the legitimacy of children and their right to inherit. Other than these cases, however, women's presence in~ the laws themselves usually had to do with their status within the church and society, that is, as daughters, wives, moth-ers, widows, nuns, or women of ill repute. Beginning early in the church's history, the protection of wid-ows and orphans was a great concern since these groups were socially the most vulnerable. As time passed and Roman law found its way into the church's mentality, other laws concerning women were developed to protect the virgin from marriage if she resisted, from abduction and rape, and later as a member of a community of consecrated women) Most of the legislation had to do with the women as wives and mothers, however, and especially with their ability to bear children. Laws agains.t adultery, contraception, and abortion were the most prominent since they infringed upon the husband's potency, paternity, or virility.4 Apart from these matters, women as individual persons were not dealt with in the church's laws. The 1917 Code did not always treat women equally with men, as studies testify.5 The 1983 Code, in contrast, states that the "there exists among all the Christian faithful a true equality with regard to dignity and the activity whereby all cooperate in the building up of the Body of Christ in accord with each one's own condition and function.''6 The excep-tion to this is when the nature of the case clearly indicates other-wise, such as the laws having to do with ordination.7 Women began to engage themselves in the activities of the Canon Law Society of America (CLSA) since about the middle of this century. It is that story upon which we now focus. May-June 1999 ,267 Range * Women and Canon Law Women and the Canon Law Society of America The pivotal event for the growth in female membership in the CLSA was the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965).8 Before that event there were clear hints that the status of women in the world and in the church needed to be addressed.9 The council documents, too, indicated those concerns,l° In the United States, women's professional involvement in canon law began in the mid 1960s. Clara Marie Henning, the first woman to become a member of CLSA, applied for membership in 1968. She was then a student in the School of Canon Law at the Catholic University of America, from which she later received the licentiate in canon law (JCL). Other women were members of the CLSA, but their reason for membership was their position as supe-riors of religious orders, not their status as canon lawyers. Even before Vatican II, beginning with Pope Pius XrlI, efforts had been made by the church to bring about a simplification and an updating within the various orders and congregations of women religious worldwide.~ This was a remote cause for interest in canonical matters and membership in the CLSA. After the documents of the council and the implementation decrees of Pope Paul vI had been issued, there was a need and desire to learn about canon law and its usefulness in the efforts of religious congregations toward adaptation and renewal. These efforts had a significant effect on the work during the 1970s toward formulating the new and revised Code. Initially, then, the impetus for women to become members of the CLSA was that congregations of women religious might derive more benefit from canon law. Another reason for women to begin studying canon law and to become members of the CLSA was an academic one. As Catholic universities opened graduate programs in theology for lay people, some women students became interested in pursuing degrees in canon law. This interest included both the relation of canon law to theology and the historical development of canon law. The membership records of the CLSA are limited in a number of ways. For many year~ the records were the responsibility of the coordinator and were not kept in a permanent office. It was only in 1980 that a full-time director and staff began to have an office (with a permanent place for records)at the Catholic University of America. The records up to 1979 were given to the Cushwa Center for .the Study of American Catholicism and are available there as archival records. The membership records are incom- Review for Religious plete, however, because they were not systematically kept, a not uncommon omission when an organization's importance is not understood in its early days22 Nevertheless, the records show a remarkable growth in female membership after the mid 1960s. In 1968 there were hardly five women members. In 1971 the first woman was elected to national office in the CLSA.13 This event witnessed to a movement within the society to include women as active members. In 1976 there were 38 women members; by 1984 there were 139. The 1990 directory lists almost 200 women members.~4 At' the time of the 1996 direc-tory, the female membership stood at 223 out of a total of 1557 members, or about 14 percent. The history of the growth of the membership of women in the CLSA is part of the growth of la~Yomember-ship. Already in1,37 the CLSA's committee on membership was concerned with appropriate criteria. The concern was not specif-ically about women, but about qualifications that would assure that interested persons, lay or clerical, would have knowledge about the science of canon law. Before this point a potential mem-ber was sponsored by a current member and his name given to the committee on membership for its approval before being voted on by all those gathered at the national convention. That this rather cumbersome way of enrolling new members needed to be revised was a common opinion at the time. Thomas J. Lynch,~5 chair of the committee on membership, wrote in a report to the board of governors that, in the proposed revision of the constitutions (1967), the CLSA will "rid our con-stitution of any unnecessary clericalism and will also insure that the active and voting membership of the society will be composed of persons whose professional qualifications give them a special com-petence in matters of renewal and revision of law." ,6 As executive secretary, after receiving increased correspon-dence from many interested parties, James Provost laid his con-cerns about qualifications for membership before the board of Initially, the impetus for women to become members of the CLSA was that congregations of women religious might derive more benefit from canon law. Mt{y-June 1999 Range ¯ l, Vomen and Canon Law governors.'7 In 1980 a constitutional amendment was finalized requiring a person to have a degree in canon law in order to be an active member. Others could be associate members, but without the right to vote at the conventions.~s In 1995 a survey was distributed to women members at the annual convention held in conjunction with the Canadian Canon Law Society in Montreal. Its purpose was to discover the experi-ence of women as members of the CLSA. One hundred three responses were returned, with seventeen women indicating asso-ciate membership, the rest active membership. The responses demonstrated a positive experience within the society; there were a few exceptions, but even they did not indicate major difficulties. One commented that the CLSA was "one of the best kept secrets of the American Church." A tone must have been set many years ago, another respondent speculated, to be inclusive of women.19 Although there is no documentation of a policy decision that ver-ifies that statement, the facts sifice 1968 attest to its reality. The inclusion of women on committees, their election to national posi-tions as officers and consultors, and their presentations at plenary sessions and seminars during regional and national conventions-- all this has been remarkable over the last thirty years. Already in 1971 a woman was a member of the religious-affairs committee; in 1972 a woman was on the legal-council committee as well.2° Twice women have been elected vice-president/presi-dent- elect and have assumed the full responsibility of that office. This office is a challenging one for its incumbent, whether male or female, and certainly for a nonordained female. In addition to chairing the board of governors, the president's responsibilities include communications with the hierarchy of the United States, with the various dicasteries of the Vatican, with the canon-law societies of other countries, and with the members of various dioce-san offices throughout the country. The leadership of the society is challenging internally also, since most of the members are still clerics, including bishops, archbi.shops, and cardinals. Besides the increased membership of women in the society and their activity within it, the agendas of the CLSA have been modified because of the interests of the women members and the" commitment of the leadership and membership to women's issues. Already in 1970, at the national convention in New Orleans, a resolution was passed that stated: "The Canon Law Society of America instructs the subcommittee of its task force on the revi- Review for Religious sion of the Code of Canon Law to study the canonical institutions concerning the dignity, freedom, rights, privileges, offices, and obligations of women in the church and to propose those changes necessary to ensure the equitable consideration of all persons regardless of sex by the law of the church.''2~ In 1973 the society cosponsored with the Adrian Dominican Sisters a meeting of canonists and theologians at their college, Siena Heights, to address the question of the ordination of women from a variety of per-spectives?~ In 1972 the board of governors established an ad hoc com-mittee on the status of women in the church; it became a regular committee in 1973.23 At the conven-tion of 1975, Margaret Brennan IHM presented a major address titled "Standing in Experience: A Reflection on the Status of Women in the church." In 1976 a symposium was held at Rosemont College in Pennsylvania on Women and Church Law; in view of the revision going on at the time, it studied how the law addresses women. It published a con-sensus paper, signed by the twenty-four participants, with sug-gestions concerning how the church in the United States might address some of the inequities from which women suffered.24 In 1987 the members of the committee on women raised the question of its future viability. Even though it regularly invited the society's membership to present it with significant issues, the committee had little business to deal with, This was the reason for the eventual elimination of this committee. Its concerns were taken up by a new committee on the laity in the church?5 From 1988 on, some members of the CLSA were involved with the canon-ical dimensions of the U.S. bishops' Letter on Women that was eventually published in 1990.26 A resolution was taken by the society in 1992 to study the question of the diaconate for women. In 1995 the report by the ad hoc committee, "The Canonical Implications of Ordaining Women to the Permanent Diaconate," was presented to the national con-vention and accepted by the membership.27 This document received a wide distribution to other professional societies and to the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB). A resolution was taken by the society in 1992 to study the question of the diaconate for women. 271 May-.Tune 1999 Range ¯ Women and Canon Law With the promulgation of Pope John Paul II's apostolic let-ter Ordinatio sacerdotalis stating that the church has no authority to ordain women, the activity of the society on some of these issues perforce ceased, and no new initiatives on this issue have been forthcoming. Some study is being done on the question of the laity sharing in the power of jurisdiction, obviously an important issue, for .lay people function more and more in various offices in the church, It remains to be seen, however, if gender-specific issues will continue to inform the society's agenda. Participation in the annual conventions also reflects the change in the presence of women. In 1967 there were no women at the national convention. In 1968 the female participants were superi-ors of religious orders. In 1969-1970 some women religious were present as well as some major superiors.2s In 1971 there were 9 women registered at the convention in Atlanta, out of 224 partic-ipants. As more and more women begame members of the CLSA, more and more of them have attended both the regional and national conventions.29 In the women's responses to the question-naire mentioned above, they noted the quality of exchange at both regional and national conventions. They are a continuing educa-tional experience for the female membership, as they are for oth-ers who attend these meetings. 272 Women's Education in Canon Law It is clear that many of the women members of the CLSA are active members with degrees in canon law. The obtaining of these degrees is a completely novel achievement in the history of women and canon law. In North America there are two schools from which a woman can receive a degree in canon law: the Catholic University of American in Washington, D.C., and St. Paul University in Ottawa. Most U.S. women have chosen one of these two schools for their canonical education. Among the European schools, most women have chosen the Angelicum, which teaches courses in English, and a few the Gregorian, which until onl~ recently taught its courses in Latin. In 1990 John E. Lynch CSP published an interesting and infor-mative article about the history of the Department of Canon Law at the Catholic University of America, "Laying Down the (Canon) Law at Catholic University.m° The occasion for the article was the centenary of Catholic University. In it he remarked that in Review Jbr Religious 1959 women were enrolling in canon law in Rome.3' That had not yet occurred in North America and not at Catholic University, but it would occur in 1967. The first woman to enroll was Clara Marie Henning, a native of Germany. After that, the numbers of women students increased gradually and now have remained con-stant for some time. The first women students, except for Ms. Henning, were women religious.32 The topics of their theses and dissertations represented the concerns of women in the early 1970s, after the close of the council: religious formation, authority, the LCWR, the legal status of women, the pastoral nature of canon law.3~ Besides this continued interest in the concerns of women religious, later tides indicate an interest in the position of lay people in the church: for example, participation in the munus sanctificandi, and ministry and the layperson.34 Still later tides indicate a broadening of inter-est: for example, the relation of canon law to civil law, and the relation of bishops to diocesan church institutions. Licentiate (JCL) theses usually presaged what those who con-tinued on to the doctorate in canon law (JCD) would write their dis-sertations about. Many of the topics arose from the first draft of the soon-to-be-revised Code: lay employees, rights and obligations of Christian parents, tribunal personnel. Also, a number of theses compared the historic 1983 revision with the 1917 Code. When women first entered Catholic University's Department of Canon Law as students, it could be presumed that they would make a difference in the classroom. After the early wave (women religious, all but one), a number Of lay women as well (and men, too) entered the ranks of students. To assess this presumption of difference, I seized an opportunity to interview the faculty of the department in December 1996: Father James Provost (chair), Father John E. Lynch CSP, Father Thomas Green, Father Edward Pfnausch, Sister Rose McDermott ssJ, and Father John Beal.3s Their reflections on the difference women make are interesting and substantiate what I consider an exceedingly important dimen-sion of women's contribution to canon law, that is, women's human-izing effect. Every one of the faculty indicated that the presence of women made the conversation within the class richer; the questions they asked and their observations were different from the ques-tions of the traditional clerical students.36 At first the women stu-dents did not know some of the vocabulary (nor did entering laymen). One of the faculty recalls mentioning the title "vicar May-ffune 1999 273 Range ¯ Women and Canon Law forane," a term completely unfamiliar to the women. But, when this and other technical phrases were learned, the difficulty was sur-mounted. Women and men, according to ~he faculty members inter-viewed, are equally intelligent. A number of them indicated that women seem to work harder, perhaps to catch up with the clerics because of the unfamiliar discourse, perhaps because of a greater personal commitment to learning the field. By and large women are eager students and indicate an appreciation for the dedication of their ifistructors. They suffered from some rather mediocre teaching, but the men suffered from them equally with the women.37 No resentment toward women students precisely because of their gender, however, seems to have marred their educational experience, Women have been elected to leadership within the student body and have functioned well in those positions. They quickly initiated social events that, rich in student exchange, aided schol, arly interests along with providing amiable relaxation. The male students in those same positions of leadership had not been as cre-ative in these important social dimensions of student life. The mission of the faculty in this department derives from their conviction that canon law is g/tided by its theological and pastoral nature. This conviction permeates the curriculum and challenges the students to understand it as an ecclesial discipline, a sister to scriptural, systematic, moral, and church-history stud-ies and influenced by the conclusi6ns of those studies, even as canon law has an influence on them. This understanding of the nature of canon law informs the entire curriculum and therefore shapes the intellectual formation of the students for their future careers as canon lawyers. In my discussions with the faculty, the question arose about the influence of feminism on canon law. In general, the faculty agreed that the agenda of feminism, as various as it is, does not signifi-cantly influence either the students or the classes. Earlier on, given especially the newness of women to the field, the place of women in the 1917 Code, and the questions about women's place in the revised Code, women's'issues had more sig-nificance than they currently have. At that time (through the 1970s) some of the female students manifested some anger due to these issues. Today, however, the nature of law seems to move the direc-tion of the students' questions and concerns much more than gen-der issues do. The women students are not angry, nor are their Review for Religious instructors. Rather, they are typical students focused on complet-ing their studies and finding positions that fulfill their educational goals. The question of secure employment in the church, with its attendant concerns, is more of an issue with them, women and lay men alike, than gender issues. However, as justice issues, gender concerns remain for both instructors and students, now usually subsumed in the issues of the role of the layperson in the church. Women's Involvement in. Writing Canon Law Perhaps the most original activity that women have engaged in regarding canon law is the actual writing of legislation intended to be incorporated within the revised Code of Canon Law. Whether or not the canons made their way into the final text of the 1983 Code is not the point here. Rather, it is the activity itself, utterly newin the history of the church as far as I have been able to determine. How did this creative effort on the part of women begin? Sister M. Luke Tobin SL, president of the CMSW from 1964 to 1967, was invited in 1964 to be an official observer at the Vatican Council during the 1964 and 1965 sessions. This invitation itself indicated that the council fathers wanted the participation of women in the process of developing the church's self-understand-ing in the modern world?8 The law of the church, canon law, needed to express this new self-understanding ,as well. In the United States, women religious felt that their experience of their own lives as women religious was an important contribution towards an appropriately revised Code of Canon Law. This activ-ity would engage many of the members of the CMSW during the late 1960s and the 1970s. The board of CMSW began in 1965 to consider writing the regulations for ~governing the lives of women religious in the Code of Canon Law)9 It initiated a project for accomplishing this. Committees were formed in the several regions to write proposed canons dealing with the various aspects of religious life: the vows, authority, community life, formation, apostolate, prayer, and so forth. At the annual conventions of the CMSW from 1967 to 1971, the committees gave reports about the progress of their work. Eventually the conference published a document containing the proposed norms. It received a wide distribution in this country May-June 1999 275 276 Range ¯ Women and Canon Law and abroad, going to all the religious congregations and to the bishops.4° As this endeavor continued, the confidence of the women grew; they recognized the possibilities of the project. Moreover, they sought assistance from canonical experts to assist them in this unique activity. The CLSA was instrumental in assisting the various committees in this endeavor. Father Paul Boyle CP, a canon lawyer, was out-standing in his leadership in this area for women religious.4' Already as president of CLSA, he had communicated his vision of including women in the revision process. Later, as executive sec-retary, he increased his activity along this line. The recognition by the canonists of women's lack of education in canon law led to the establishment of summer institutes for a number of them. Certificates were earned and credit gained for these educa-tional endeavors. Father Kevin O'Rourke OP assumed the respon-sibility for these institutes by sponsoring them, developing them, enlisting the faculty for them, and negotiating their locations. They were held in different Catholic colleges in the country. A number of the graduates of these programs later completed their education in canon law at pontifical schools of canon law. Besides this educational assistance, the CLSA, following Paul VI's Ecdesiae sanctae (1966) implementing the conciliar document Perfectae caritatis, developed institutes to assist women religious in managing the process of renewal in their congregations. Pope Paul's decree instructed communities to hold general chapters to write their constitutions and to somehow engage the entire con-gregation in that effort. Experimentation, too, was mandated. Experimentation and writing canonical documents were some-thing for which most religious communities needed assistance. These endeavors of the CLSA were empowering experiences for the women and their religious communities. Hitherto the women were by and large ignorant of canon law and canonical procedures. They were, however, well-educated, intelligent, competent leaders within their religious congregations and deeply committed to the renewal that the church had mandated. The assistance of the CLSA empowered them and many other women in their congregations. Enthusiasm to recover the origins of their congregations, to learn about the remarkable women who had founded them, to encounter the Word of God through a knowledge of the Scriptures, and to assess the needs of the world through a study of the "signs of the times" generated an enormous energy within these communities.42 Review for Religious The results of this monumental effort have not yet been com-pletely assessed. Many studies today record it, some positively, other negatively, but it is still too close chronologically for it to be judged adequately.43 The energy, however, remains within reli-gious communities, smaller and older though they may be. Initiatives in forming new kinds of religious communities con-tinue in the church as well.** The renewal enterprise conducted among the CMSW, the reli-gious communities, and the CLSA is one of the finest stories to come out of the post-Vatican II Church. It included not only these organizations, but also the hierar-chy of the United States. There was an extraordinarydemonstra-tion of mutual encouragement and support among these diverse orga-nizations regarding the revision of the Code of Canon Law. The pos-sibility of participating together in the revision of the canons that governed the life of women reli-gious was realized through this " effort. The Conference of Major Superiors of Men (CMSM) was obviously interested in the same endeavor.4s The Canon Law Society of America responded to the announcement by Pope John XXIII as professional canon lawyers whose expertise was not sim-ply in the practice of law, but in developing it through the proposed revision process.46 These three organizations joined in this endeavor with an unusual demonstration of cooperation. Besides these, the bishops' conference in the United States became the conduit through which the efforts of the organiza-tions were channeled to the Pontifi(al Commission for the Revision of Canon Law, whose responsibility it was to finally formulate the revision. Communication among these organizations was full of enthusiasm and respect. There was no hint of competitiveness, no turf war, no condescension toward women, who were at that time uneducated as canon lawyers. What was desired from the women was the expression of their experience of their own lives and their reflection upon that experience. The mutuality of this common endeavor is one of the finest examples of how women and men can work together to accom- Experimentation and writing canonical documents were something for which most religious communities needed assistance. 277 May-.~une 1.o99 Range * Women and Canon Law plish something for the benefit of all. As the process of revision continued, difficulties emerged, of course. When the canonical text, the Code itself, and the communities' constitutions were finalized and promulgated, the energy that had informed the orig-inal process waned. The vitality of experimentation, of developing powerful and inspiring texts, of consulting all the members of communities in that effort, of creating a vocabulary that resonated with the language of the documents of Vatican II and with the pat-rimony of individual communities--all this vitality wound down as perhaps it inevitably had to after final, authoritative texts were promulgated. As rdigious communities developed their constitutions during these years, their experience shaped their identifies in a remarkable way. The expressions within many of these constitutions were utterly original as documents for identifying and regulating the lives of women religious. In the process of havin~ their constitu-tions reviewed, both the Congregation. for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life and the individ-ual congregations had much to learn. Although by now most of the problems have been resolved, there are still some communities that do not have their constitutions approved. This phenomenon bears the marks of the encounter between creative initiatives, orig-inal expressions of religious life, and traditional modes of canon-ical expression. The Code defines the constitutions of religious communities as' their particular law. The universal law within the Code presents the guidelines for the constitutions, but does not provide their content. Nevertheless,.the originality of many of these documents from religious communities presented new difficulties for both the congregations themselves and the Vatican officials, who had never seen such documents before. This encounter has been very instructive for all the institutions involved. With the promulgation of the revised Code of Canon Law in 1983 and with the finalization of their constitutions, women are no longer engaged in writing the law that regulates their lives. Periodically constitutions need to be resubmitted to the church for approval. Calls for change and for dispensations are part of the regular communication between the Vatican and women's con-gregations. But creativity and initiatives no longer inform the legal expressions of women religious. Extraordinary documents, though, still emerge from congregational meetings addressing the issues Review Jbr Religio~ts that women religious face at the end of the second millennium. How these documents influence the legally binding texts remains a question for the future. Past, Present, and Future This article has investigated the extraordinary entrance of women into a