FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE
The reflection proposed by the Fr. General on the prophetic community is particularly interesting and is, in fact, deeply rooted in a lasting tradition which is both scriptural and ecclesial. Particularly important and just is the reflection which the Fr. General presented regarding the fact that "the religious life goes into crisis and dies when it is not open to the distant and ad gentes missions, when it is neither in the desert nor on the periphery, nor on the frontiers of humanity". It is therefore a question of "going to the people, of coming out of the sacristy, of preferring the places which are difficult and arid... where gratifications are less... It is therefore necessary for the superiors to have the courage to suggest these commitments".
Daring To Send
This last point is obviously essential: the prophetic, and therefore missionary, dimension of the communities which "live on the frontiers of humanity" takes a difficult road by necessity; one which is in part that of Calvary, but one which also leads to the morning of Easter. It is thus that these communities participate in the mission and in the prophetic function of Christ. "Christ is the great prophet who proclaimed the kingdom of the Father both by the testimony of his life and by the power of his word. Until the full manifestation of his glory, he fulfills this prophetic office, not only by the hierarchy... but also by the laity. He accordingly both establishes them as witnesses... so that the power of the Gospel may shine out in daily family and social life" (Lumen Gentium 35). Thus, these communities are prophetic and missionary because they participate in the prophetic mission of Christ and of His Church. They are Dehonian in that our Constitutions invite us "...to bear prophetic witness by our religious life; by involving ourselves without reserve for the coming of the new humanity in Jesus Christ" (Cst 39).
The demands which seem to mark these communities are seen negatively and in terms of suffering only by those who are outside, those who cannot see that the love of the mission and of the people, in the midst of which these communities live, transfigure these demands into joy.
In spite of their apprehensions, it is necessary to dare to send young people into such communities. It is necessary to dare to encourage them to come, to see and to experience. In these places there is a spiritual and human experience which to a certain extent is untranslatable precisely because it is existential, because it is in the order of love. The same sort of thing happens in the life of a couple or in the responsibility of parents: the constraints which each one imposes on himself, to make it so that the couple or the family may live, can be seen negatively from the outside when one considers the freedom and the independence which each person seems to have lost. In fact, these constraints are the expressions of a love which opens to joy, to happiness. There is no word to express it. It lives, it is experienced and it germinates through long and difficult paths, like the grain of wheat that has been placed in the earth.
Daring To Go To The Frontiers Of Humanity
This is also a fundamental aspect of the missionary prophetism of the communities. However, the mission ad gentes is only one of the ways of taking oneself to the frontiers of humanity.
In our rich societies, poverty and exclusion exist massively as much on the spiritual plane as on the material and social plane. Men, women and children who live in the heart of our big cities, and equally those who live in the suburbs or in certain country districts, are so dehumanized that they can no longer be confronted by traditional structure. The family, the educational system, and the associations have shattered in the face of poverty, exclusion, racism, individualism the law of the clan, dehumanization...
In this shattered and bruised world which no longer has a human face, peoples, cultures take sides and confront each other. Pseudo-religions, sects are born, mislead and chain those who are most desperate.
Being there in religious communities, without having even the possibility of educating; being simply there, trying to strive with those who are trying to walk; being there in order to declare that the whole world deserves to be loved and can love. It is there that one finds the sign of the first proclamation of the Good News. A first proclamation which can hardly be conveyed except though the religious life and, in a particular way, by the heirs of Fr. Dehon as they live the incarnation of the Lord in their daily lives and bring to Him, as a painful and silent offering, the poverty and the hopes of those with whom they live, among whom they live.
The prophetic sign is there. Let us dare to go and live in these spaces of the poor and deprived, let us go without a strategy of conquest but as witnesses of a love which is possible for all, of a love which we have the grace to experience.
This sign is prophetic because it implies the conviction that it is not us who give faith. That is a gift from God and from Him alone. At the most, through our lives which are radically given and lost, we show that there is a meaning to life and a road towards happiness. God does not ask us to make people believe. He asks us to bear witness to the Love which dwells within us and which makes us function.
This sign is prophetic because on the one hand it essentially necessitates accepting to live a community plan of presence, sharing, accompanying and accepting the compromises with the poor, with the excluded, with the despised and with the voiceless. On the other hand it is a community plan of reflection on this life, of contemplation of the Lord at work in this life and of the suffering in this world, in order to bring all of these realities into the religious community as the bread and the wine of the Eucharistic offering, so that they may become the Body of Christ... "In our manner of being and acting, by participating in constructing the earthly city and building up the Body of Christ, we should be an effective sign that it is the Kingdom of God and His justice which should be sought above all and in all" (Cst 38).
This sign is prophetic because the community inscribes itself without time limitations, and this raises an essential question: "Why do you stay here in the midst of we who are rejected, despised, voiceless?" The reply is that of the Incarnation: every man is so loved by God that God Himself became man and His Incarnation today can only continue by the gift of ourselves. God loves through us and He sends us to bear witness that every man can be loved and can love!
In International Communities
What stands out most today is not the fact of having different nationalities in the same community. The international dimension in effect is part of the daily reality of our dwelling places, as it is of our work environment. In my enterprise there were more than 40 nationalities, more than 50 in my living quarters, and many families lived this reality.
What provokes some questions about my religious fraternity is not the fact that there is a Spaniard among us, but rather the fact of our Incarnation, our tenacity, our brotherly love and our community capacity to welcome and make our own the cares, the joys and the struggles of those with whom we live.
The international dimension of our fraternities can be a plus in terms of the prophetic mission. Without exception it is neither a sufficient or even a necessary condition.
Obviously there are some exceptions which can color this statement: in the north of France there are approximately 20 Carmelite Nuns from Rwanda who are currently living together. Some are Hutus and others are Tutsis. This is a true prophetic sign being presented in time and space, because today it is impossible to live this situation in Rwanda itself. But this is a very exceptional situation.
As far as we are concerned, it does not seem to us that the community of La Capelle will think that just by being international they will be prophetic. It will be prophetic because it will have a plan which permits it to join a people, to put themselves in its service and in the service of a Church which is "a servant of the poor".
A Necessary Internationality
Internationality, as the Fr. General reminds us, is written in our Dehonian history and in its fundamental inspiration. It must therefore live. Nevertheless, if we speak of internationality it is because "nationalities", particularities and cultural differences do exist.
Even if we all find ourselves in Jesus Christ, we find ourselves there as Greeks or as Jews and we recognize each other mutually as brothers. It is as Greeks and Jews that we spread the Good News to the Greeks and to the Jews. Inculturation, inculturation of the Good News, does not mean making it aseptic, it is not denying the cultures which receive it nor is it presuming that we have the word which will be universally understood and received. Along with and starting from these differences and these particularities it is not that we must be uniform, but that we must be one. "God made man in his own image. Man and female he created them". Thus man and woman, if they become one, remain no less different: men and women! Therefore, in the Congregation it is a question of being together and of recognizing that we have the same thoughts, inspirations and feelings, through our different expressions, situations and cultures.
It is on this level that the question of the necessary internationalization of our Congregation is based. It would be easy, but an error, to believe that this function is fulfilled as soon as a Community is constituted with religious of different nationalities.
The international dimension is lived quite simply in daring to go to meet those who are outsiders to us; whether this is in the mission ad extra, or whether it be where we are in our own country, we must always be trying to build relationships of fraternity and absolute equality since we are all "brothers of every man, all brothers in Jesus Christ". And that places us in the problems of our society that concern immigration, people without papers, xenophobia, racism or the themes and the practices of the National Front...
Internationality is lived also in our structures and in our functioning as a Congregation by favoring international meetings and allocations on all levels as much as possible so that the eyes and the heart of all who live on our "planet-village" will remain open and so that we are able to accept each other in our differences.
It lives also because of the aging of a certain number of Provinces, especially in Europe. This is a fact. Again, it is necessary to live it with all the boldness and clairvoyance possible, knowing that there is no prophetism except in the acceptance of community missionary projects which allow us to get over our particularities and our egoism in face of the urgency of the mission, recognized as that thing which is most important and which is accepted as such by each individual and by the community.
Whatever may happen, disciples of Fr. Dehon, we are all called to go to and to live on the frontiers of humanity in order to be prophets of Love. We will be faithful to this call within the framework of a community missionary project, whether this is concretely with religious of different nationalities or not.