WHAT KIND OF VOCATIONS FOR A RENEWED CONSECRATED LIFE?
WHAT KIND OF CONSECRATED LIFE FOR "NEW" VOCATIONS?

The double question in the title of this paper is certainly worthy of two separate lectures. However, the natural coincidence of the two questions justifies an attempt to put my thoughts together in a single treatment of the matter. One question cannot be answered without referring to the other, whilst together the two answers might lay the first stone in the process of refounding the consecrated life (vc) which, as last November’s Assembly showed, cannot be delayed. It was against this background that the careful choice of papers for this Assembly was made.

I propose to begin with the second question. Vocations and the vc - if this does not sound too irreverent - have the same relationship as the chicken and the egg: which came first? It seems to me, at least from a logical standpoint, that it would be appropriate to start with an analysis of the vc at this present moment in history, i.e. from the point of view of its various innovations, rather than analyzing the vocational qualities and innovations. The latter should flow easily from the former, whilst at the same time being one of its pre-requisites, a condition not to be ignored: if renewal is taking place within the vc, everyone who today embraces and wants to live it must adapt to these innovations. Indeed, we can say that the vc will never be renewed if vocations are not made "new" by the innovations we are now trying to express and illustrate. On the other hand, these innovations are not simply a sociological fact, but a requirement of this transition period, of these times of exodus. Might it not be that the whole Church is opening up to the new evangelization? Does Vita Consacrata not continually repeat that we must "look to the future" to be "renewed by Christ on a daily basis"? Again on the subject of vocations, the concluding document of the European Congress on Vocations to the Priesthood and to the Consecrated Life bears the significant title, New Vocations for a New Europe.

Whatever we choose to call this renewal process ("refoundation" or the active force of a "creative fidelity"), one thing is certain - we can delay it no longer.