8. Towards a more evangelical lifestyle

The community reports show that the Society values and wants to make more of the small gestures and services, the unpretentious care, that make up community life. Evidence comes from all over of progress in shared prayer, in communal apostolic discernment (NC 326, 3), in community recreation. Because of the demands of work, certain communities have to be content with very little by way of common activities, but one finds in the responses a desire to get beyond the mere minimum. In response to the call of the recent General Congregation, communities are open to the practice of hospitality (NC 327, 3) even where isolation or the arrangement of the house makes it troublesome.

Communities have also become more sensitive to solidarity with the poor. Jesuits express regret for not living at the level of the poor, and they often express a wish to live among the poor. Generally, variations in lifestyle rise from the demands of the mission (NC 321 and 327, 1). During the Provincial's visitation or our annual retreats, we should let ourselves be challenged about our lifestyle and even about the methods and tools we use in our apostolic work for those friends of the Lord who are the poor. They commonly know some things to teach us about our faith in the poor Lord whom we wish to witness to (NC 246, 1). In general, the personal life of Jesuits is simple and temperate. But we do not really share our material things. And both individuals and communities lack the will to give witness to evangelical poverty by a lean lifestyle with everything shared in common (NC 176, 2), and to shape a community of solidarity that gives brotherly service to everyone – men and women alike and especially the poor – for the sake of bringing all to Christ.

Reading through the letters that indicate real progress in the Society toward community life more in harmony with the Ignatian spirit, one grows aware that there is one thing we do not need to worry about: currently, we are in no danger of introducing monastic customs into our lives. The real risk along these lines is that those who are familiar with our communities cannot perceive in them the reason for our life in common: Christ and his Good News. The issue here is not just a kind of palpable evangelical compact among the community members. No, all of the arrangements in the house ought to point clearly to the reason for gathering a community in the Lord's name: the chapel (NC 227), the cloister (NC 327, 2), reminders of common prayer (NC 233, 234), signs of a life of evangelical poverty (NC 178, 179) – all of these also help identify a community gathered in the Lord's name.