INTRODUCTION

"Congregavit nos in unum Christi amor"

1. The love of Christ has gathered a great number of disciples to become one, so that, like him and thanks to him, in the Spirit, they might, throughout the centuries, be able to respond to the love of the Father, loving him "with all their hearts, with all their soul, with all their might" (cf. Deut. 6:5) and loving their neighbours "as themselves" (cf. Mt. 22:39).

Among these disciples, those gathered together in religious communities, women and men "from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and tongues" (Rev. 7:9), have been and still are a particularly eloquent expression of this sublime and boundless love.

Born not "of the will of the flesh", nor from personal attraction, nor from human motives, but "from God" (Jn. 1:13), from a divine vocation and a divine attraction, religious communities are a living sign of the primacy of the love of God who works wonders, and of the love for God and for one's brothers and sisters as manifested and practised by Jesus Christ.

In view of the relevance of religious communities for the life and holiness of the Church, it is important to examine the lived experience of today's religious communities, whether monastic and contemplative or dedicated to apostolic activity, each according to its own specific character. All that is said here about religious communities applies also to communities in societies of apostolic life, bearing in mind their specific character and proper legislation.

a) The subject of this document is considered in light of this fact: the character which "fraternal life in common" manifests in numerous countries reveals many transformations of what was lived in the past. These transformations, as well as the hopes and disappointments which have accompanied them, and continue to do so, require reflection in light of the Second Vatican Council. The transformations have led to positive results, but also to results which are questionable. They have put into a clearer light not a few Gospel values, thus giving new vitality to religious community, but they have also given rise to questions by obscuring some elements characteristic of this same fraternal life lived in community. In some places, it seems that religious community has lost its relevance in the eyes of women and men religious and is, perhaps, no longer an ideal to be pursued.

With the serenity and urgency characteristic of those who seek the Lord, many communities have sought to evaluate this transformation, so that they might better fulfil their proper vocation in the midst of the People of God.

b) There are many factors which have determined the changes of which we are witnesses:

- "Constant return to the sources of the whole of the Christian life and to the primitive inspiration of the institutes".(¹) This deeper and fuller encounter with the Gospel and with the first breakthrough of the foundational charism, has been a vigorous impulse towards acquiring the true spirit which animates fraternity, and towards the structures and usages which must express it adequately. Where the encounter with these sources and with the originating inspiration has been partial or weak, fraternal life has run risks and suffered a certain loss of tone. - But this process has occurred within the context of other more general developments which are, as it were, its existential framework, and religious life cannot exempt itself from their repercussions.(²)

Religious life is a vital part of the Church and lives in the world. The values and counter-values which ferment within an epoch or a cultural setting, and the social structures which manifest them, impinge on everyone, including the Church and its religious communities. Religious communities either constitute an evangelical leaven within society, announce the Good News in the midst of the world, the here and now proclamation of the heavenly Jerusalem, or else they succumb by decline quickly or slowly, simply because they have conformed to the world. For this reason, a reflection and new proposals on "fraternal life in common" must take this existential framework into account.

-- Developments within the Church have also marked religious communities deeply. The Second Vatican Council, as an event of grace and the greatest expression of the Church's pastoral guidance in this century, has had a decisive influence on religious life; not only by virtue of the Decree Perfectae Caritatis, which is dedicated to it, but also by virtue of the Council's ecclesiology, and each of its documents.

For all these reasons, this document, before addressing its topic directly, begins with an overview of the changes encountered in the settings which have more immediately affected the quality of fraternal life and its ways of being lived in the various religious communities.