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1. First Section - Our missionary life PDF Print E-mail
Written by Consolata.org   
Tuesday, 07 February 2006
“The form you should take in the Society is that which Our Lord inspired and continues to inspire in me....The Spirit gives form and life to the individual Societies, as well as to the individual members. Every Society has its own spirit, from which and for which it lives. Individuals are living members of the Society to which they belong insofar as they have the right spirit” (SL 64, 66).

ABBREVIATIONS

AEFJN = Africa/Europe Faith and Justice Network
AMV = Mission Animation and Vocation Promotion
BU 101, 25 = Official Bulletin, n. 101. pg. 25
Consulta 32 = Consulta 2002, pg. 32, (BU 100)
Const = Constitution and General Directory IMC
EN = Evangelii Nuntiandi
GSM = General Secretariat for Mission
ID = Interreligious Dialogue
IXGC 47 = Acts of the 9th General Chapter, pg, 47.
JPIC = Justice and Peace and Integrity of Creation
LMC = Consolata Lay Missionaries
NA = Nostra Aetate
NMI = Novo Millenio Ineunte
PCL = Plan of Communal Living
PEM = Letter Povertà Economia e Missione
PPL = Personal Project of Life
RM = Redemptoris Missio
SL 14 = Spiritual Life, pg. 14,
XGC 47 = Acts of the 10th General Chapter, pg. 47


First Section – Our missionary life

Chapter 1 – AS DISCIPLES OF CHRIST

1. To follow Jesus for us means to participate in his mission, making “ourselves totally available to God, to the Church and to the brothers and sisters in order to preach the Gospel throughout the world and to witness with our life to the infinite power of the Spirit (Const 20). We follow him by living our baptism and our religious consecration “which, in a special way, enables us to share in the mystery of the death and resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ... imitating the life he chose for himself and his disciples, that of obedience, chastity and poverty.” (ib.).

In a life of intense spirituality and prayer

2. Only a deep engagement in a life of holiness makes one an authentic missionary (cf. RM 90). Striving for sanctity, indicated to us by Blessed Joseph Allamano, remains a real obligation, which passes through the experience of God, the centrality of Christ in his proclamation of God’s kingdom and in his paschal mystery, leading to a mission lived in the spirit of contemplation incarnated in today’s life (cf. IXGC 49)

We realize this commitment:
2.1 Through a spiritual journey and personal prayer, which become the soul of our living together and of our exercising mission with particular attention to the poor.
2.2 In a humble and deep listening to God through his Word, which we commit ourselves to meditate individually and as communities, deepening and witnessing it in the daily events of our life.
2.3 In the knowledge of one’s own personal reality. Accepting one’s own strengths and weaknesses, and integrating them into the constant changes of our life. This is certainly one of the secrets and one of the major strengths of a serene process towards personal, communitarian and apostolic maturity.
2.4 By giving space and valuing the times of the spirit, the rhythm of prayer and of personal reflection, the community exercises of prayer (daily, monthly day of recollection, annual spiritual exercises), the expressions of popular piety and of inculturated spirituality.
2.5 In celebrating faithfully the daily Mass, the liturgy of the hours as an action of thanksgiving and intercession for all, and the sacrament of reconciliation.
2.6 In making efforts to pray and celebrate with the faithful of the communities entrusted to us, thus uniting prayer and work following the example of St. Paul (cf. Rm 12, 1-2).
2.7 In an attitude of ongoing conversion. Each missionary is invited to prepare his Personal Project of Life, in order to harmonize better and better all the dimensions of his life (human, intellectual, spiritual, communitarian, and his interpersonal relationships and ongoing formation (cf. XGC, 39).
2.8 In receiving spiritual direction, an extremely valuable instrument of growth, according to the concrete possibilities available. (cf. Const 68).

In a consecrated life

3. We, priests and brothers, are consecrated for mission. Religious life, as an evangelical alternative to the dominant culture, according to Allamano’s teachings, is a prophetic font and strength of mission, from which, in turn, it is enriched (cf. IXGC 53),

We live our consecration:

3.1 Led by the Spirit of God, having God as our only absolute, following the values of the kingdom manifested in the person of Jesus as the supreme norm of our being and our actions.
3.2 Living out our religious vows which make our apostolic life fruitful: Through obedience we search together for and live according to God’s will. With poverty we follow Christ in full communion among ourselves, and in solidarity with the poor. In chastity God’s universal love is incarnated in us.

In the witness of our life and of martyrdom

4. “Witnessing to the style of life of Jesus, which He proposed to his disciples, even without an explicit announcment of the Gospel, is evangelization” (XGC 42). Our institute has known and still knows situations of missionaries who are threatened, kidnapped, wounded and even killed for the sake of the Gospel. Many of our confreres live without much security and in real danger. The true measure of discipleship is faithfulness until death (SL 352-357).

To achieve this:

4.1 We are called to offer our witness during all our life. For this reason we appreciate and highly value in our communities the “presence of elderly confreres, for their invaluable experience, information, advice, and the witness of their fidelity to our vocation” (Const 24.2).

4.2 We accept sacrifice as an integral part of our life and our commitment of evangelization. Missionaries suffering from illness, offer their suffering. Their contribution also helps them to be true disciples of Christ on the way of the cross (cf, IMC, Consecration and Mission, 1995, p.616).

4.3 The ideal choice of a missionary “whenever surrounded by armed conflicts, is to remain with his people and share the danger and the lack of security. In such context, though, all efforts should be made not to put in real danger, and without serious reasons, the life of the missionary (Consulta, 49), and of the local people”.

For the service of mission in the Church

5. Love for the Church pushes us to feel united to the local churches and to the people whom we serve. The dialogue with them and a keen attention to their needs and demands, guide us in discernment about our commitment, and helps us to assume important and prophetic attitudes.

Our activities become part of the pastoral work done in communion and formulated in the diocesan pastoral plans.

Our commitments in the local churches should be clearly spelled out in agreements with the Bishops. They should be periodically revised.




CHAPTER 2 – HOW WE LIVE OUR IDENTIFICATION WITH THE INSTITUTE

6. Drawn by the charism of the Institute, we become members of the IMC family and we assume its peculiar characteristics:

6.1 “The ‘distinctive mark of a true missionary’ is an ardent desire to make the Lord known” (Const 18).

6.2 “We feel we share in Mary’s motherly mission to take to the world Christ our savior.... together with Mary we announce God’s glory to all peoples” (Const 11).

6.3 We are “to be Eucharistic missionaries” (Const 12).

6.4 We are to distinguish ourselves by our “love, fidelity and loyalty to the Pope and the Bishops, and by faithfully following the directives of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples” (Const 13).

6.5 “Love for the Sacred Liturgy .… a heritage left to us by our Founder” (Const. 14).

6.6 “All the members are as brothers and accept each other as such ...united in mind and heart” (cf. Const 15).

6.7 We should value and love work, even manual work: this is a tradition in our Congregation, which “contributes to human development and to evangelization, and to the smooth running of the community” (cf. Const 16).

We recognize a father founder

7. The Consolata missionaries recognize that God has bestowed upon Blessed Allamano the charism of the foundation of the Institute for the good of the Church and of humanity. After a little over one hundred years since its foundation, it is still indispensable that we have a dynamic fidelity to that charism in order to continue our appropriate response to the challenges of our time (cf. XGC 23).

7.1 The General Government, with the cooperation of the Office for Postulation, should continue to promote the study, the deepening, the knowledge and devotion to the Founder in the various countries where we are present and work.

7.2 Each missionary, in his personal choices of life and activities, ought to compare himself with the living and perennial Founder.

We recognize Consolata as our mother

8. Consolation, which we learn from Mary “our model and guide, our inspiration and mother” (XGC 25) and our Foundress, inspires in a significant way the daily living out of our ad gentes missionary charism.
The maternal style of Our Lady Consolata pervades and shapes our way of living and exercising mission. “The Consolata is for us more than a simple devotion, or a title. She inspires our way of concretizing our charism. In the tradition stemming from the Founder, to bring the joyful announcement of the Gospel is to work for the welfare and the happiness of people, it is to free them from all sorts of sadness and suffering, from fear and oppression” (XGC 25).

We recognize the Institute as our family

9. Even though the Institute has gone through many and profound geographical, cultural and international changes, nevertheless it has never ceased to remain a “family”, and to recognize as part of its identity that “spirit of family”, so often and strongly proposed by Blessed Allamano as one of its characteristics. This spirit allows us to feel like brothers who are interested in each other, who live mission in unity of mind and heart and who share the joys, sufferings and hopes (cf. Const 15), as well as their own goods.


CHAPTER 3 – HOW WE LIVE IN COMMUNION

10. “The value of community life is of primary importance to us” (Const 22) and the “characteristic bonds of communion are the sharing in the one bread and the one cup, the maternal presence of Our Lady of Consolation, the same vocation, and our Founder, the spiritual father of us all, because we are his children, we are all brothers”(Const 21).

Communion of intent and of life

11. The purpose of our living in community is the mission. To promote it we work in communion, “as one family in which all members welcome one another,” “with one and the same purpose in mind,” and with “esprit de corps” (cf. XGC 24).

11.1 The family spirit is lived through co-responsibility, communication, dialogue and fraternal love. It is expressed also in celebrating together with love the family feasts and anniversaries.

11.2 Important means for living together and in harmony are: prayer life, friendship, sincerity, mutual understanding and esteem, hospitality and good manners (cf. Const 31), fraternal help and correction, forgiveness and reconciliation.

11.3 The local superior is the head of the community, and has the duty to animate the confreres and to promote an environment of mutual trust and communitarian discernment (cf. Cost 27). He should take to heart and promote the Plan of Communal Living, as well as ways of behaving in the community which are in keeping with our religious consecration and our style of life.

The Plan of Communal Living

12. The Plan of Communal Living is a means which helps us highlight who we are. It should include objectives of work, means for its realization, and the roles and tasks of each member. It should be considered not only as a program of activities, but, above all, as an instrument of renewal and growth in all the dimensions of our life.

12.1 This plan is formulated by all the members of the community, at the beginning of a pastoral or academic year, and, possibly, with the participation of the Regional Superior or a member of his Council.

12.2 It should be periodically reviewed and updated.

12.3 It is of great importance to discover the relationship between the Personal Project of Life and the Plan of Communal Living, and also to correlate our community and personal project with other pastoral plans of the local communities. The charism unifies and promotes the personal experience and the community life.

Participation in the life of the Institute

13. Participation in the projects of the region, the continent and the Institute opens the missionary to the work in communion.

13.1 The missionary who actively participates in all the projects is able to overcome individualism, lack of confidence and withdrawal from community.

13.2 He also considers the local, regional and continental meetings as special means to enrich his ongoing formation, to prepare programs of work that are more inculturated and effective, and to feel more intimately linked with the rest of the confreres in the continent.

Communion and collaboration with the Consolata Missionary Sisters

14. A special bond unites us with the Consolata Missionary Sisters, “because of our common origin and vocation, and in accordance with the wish of our Founder”(Const 9). Communion with them is part of our own identity (cf. XGC 26).

An active and respectful collaboration among our two Institutes:

14.1 favors a better mutual knowledge;

14.2 leads to a common reflection on the charism and aspects of mission, the consecrated life and ongoing formation;

14.3 has its natural outcome in joint mission openings and the common participation in programs and activities in the field of AMV, JPIC and pastoral life.

Communion and collaboration with the Consolata Lay Missionaries

15. In its history, our Institute has benefited from a precious collaboration of the laity who normally were engaged in professional works. In the last several years, while this worthwhile and useful collaboration in specific professional services to the mission has continued, a new trend of missionary involvement has emerged of lay people who wish to respond to the call of Christ making of “mission a real choice of life” (XGC 67). They are the Consolata Lay Missionaries. As lay missionaries they wish to participate in more direct way in the charism and spirituality of the Consolata Missionaries, with some sort of involvement at home or abroad in AMV, or in other activities of our mission ad gentes (cf. XGC 67).

15. 1 All the missionaries should undergo “ a change of mentality in order to understand and appreciate their role, learn how to dialogue, accept to work with them and respect their specific contribution (XGC 68).

Communion with all peoples

16. Our missionary community is fond of humanity and pays keen attention to the events of history. For this reason it is called to:

16.1 read history as the “theological” manifestation of God in the lives of peoples;

16.2 witness to the evangelical alternative to the culture of power and of possessions;

16.3 give voice to those who are voiceless;

16.4 share with the poor.

Internationality and interculturality

17. “ Our Congregation is international and it includes members from different countries. A missionary must learn to live and work with confreres from different cultures (Const 23).

The makeup of our communities is more and more international and multicultural, with members different in “age, origin, background and preparation” (Const 24). All together we form an icon of God’s kingdom where persons of each race, tongue, people and nationality are gathered together in unity.

This requires that we search together for the criteria which allow us to live in an atmosphere of interculturality in our apostolic as well as our formative communities. In today’s global society, often torn apart by divisions, sectarianisms and fundamentalism, these communities are a witness to the possibility of living a communion of life which harmonizes diversities and appreciates different cultural elements, thus offering a true missionary witness.
17.1 For a more mature community life and a more effective apostolate, the study of the language of the place where the missionary works ought to be integrated with the study of the culture in order that the missionary might capture the uniqueness that characterizes each culture (cf. IXGC 46). “Internationality requires mature personalities that know how to go over their own culture while they identify themselves with it, and the culture of others, in order to create communities which make the Gospel credible” (XGC 38).

17.2 Each missionary is called to live and to witness a communion which values diversity, with an attitude of kenosis of himself in order to allow room for the other, so that dialogue becomes his fundamental attitude, and respect for persons and cultures becomes his operative horizon.

17.3 In the multicultural encounter, there emerges a new missionary, faithful to his origins, and at the same time open to sharing his values and to accepting those of the others.

The inculturation of the charism

18. Inculturation, which consists in the intimate transformation of authentic cultural values through their integration in Christianity, and the insertion of Christianity in the various cultures, concerns each continent and touches all aspects of the life of the Church (Cf. RM 52). The original intuition of the Founder, which constitutes the foundational nucleus of his charism, develops with the expansion of the Institute, and is lived through the process of inculturation in dynamic and critical confrontation with the different cultures.

18.1 The original inspiration of Allamano is certainly reviewed and interpreted in the new socio-cultural contexts and in those of the churches where we are present.

18.2 The process of inculturation of the charism requires the following: understanding and appropriation, becoming part of life, reformulation through the oral and symbolic language, witnessing. It takes place under the guidance of the Spirit, and it requires long times for its fulfilment.

18.3 Inculturation cannot be done only by specialists, but it is the task of all, and it is the fruit of the work of the entire community of the Institute in its cultural diversity.

18.4 Even though the charism is expressed in varied ways, nevertheless it remains unique and this uniqueness should be understood in terms of unity of its essential elements, which allows the identification with our religious family, and, at the same time, the pluriformity of the cultures. (XGC 76).

18.5 Indispensable reference points for the inculturation of the charism are: a profound knowledge of the spirit of the Founder and of our history and tradition and an accurate study of the cultures and attentive analysis of the signs of the time in the Church and society.


Avvicendamento and availability to the mission ad extra

19.The purpose of avvicendamento is to allow for a good functioning of the entire Consolata
Family. The opening of new communities, the necessity to offer to all the confreres a missionary work, especially outside their own country, the reduction and illnesses of the personnel, the ever growing need for specialization, and the opportunity of making some changes in specialized sectors, justify this avvicendamento within the Institute. This requires availability in each missionary. Obviously a certain stability of personnel should be maintained, in order to lessen possible inconveniences in the communities which we serve, and to avoid difficulties to the missionaries due to transfers to new places. To leave behind well known and loved realities can create suffering and anxiety, but it also can become a source of renewal. This avvicendamento should be lived with great confidence in the future.

19.1 After nine years of service in a Region, each missionary makes his availability for avvicendamento known to the superiors (cf. XGC 33).

19.2 The availability ad extra is a fundamental element of our vocation, and all the missionaries are encouraged to live it outside their cultural and ecclesial environments.