WAYS OF REFOUNDING THE CHARISM

BY PROMOTING VOCATIONS

As witness I will tell of two experiences. One took place in my own religious Province, in Paraguay. (I am German by birth, but before coming to Rome I worked for 18 years in Paraguay.) The second experience is from Spain.

"Refounding"! The word reminds me that we used this expression about ten years ago when we were trying to find a new formula in the promotion of vocations. We had been ten years without any novices. During that period our policy for formation was: to prepare our young people for a "real" community life, that is, as they would experience it on entering the ministry. To tell the truth, the communities in the Province did not have much life in community; community meetings and prayer in common were not very frequent. It was taken for granted that each one would, of his own accord, do something to nourish his piety, facing at the same time a difficult missionary work. Another reality which should be mentioned: the lifestyle in a Province whose members were 90% foreigners, could not be qualified as simple. In formation our stated aim was to prepare our young people for this reality. We considered that it would be most logical to have the lifestyle in our prenovitiate and scholasticate correspond to the lifestyle in the mission communities. Our young people, however, found this formula less attractive and practically all of them left us. However, there was a strong desire among the few young Oblates in the Province to overcome the vocations crisis. We were looking for new ways and we spoke of "refoundation".

The leader in this field was a young Paraguayan Oblate named Father Marcos. He and I were given the task of promoting vocations in the Province. Our request was accepted to have this as a full-time occupation. The basic change which we planned to introduce was simply to be inspired by our Founder, Saint Eugene de Mazenod, instead of modeling ourselves on the missionaries of the present time. What would Saint Eugene have done in the Paraguay of today? This was our starting point. The concrete expression of this idea was a little house which the Provincial gave us permission to acquire and which we baptized Vocations House of St Joseph the Worker.

In his youth ministry, Father Marcos had come to know a number of young people who wanted to test and see if they had a vocation but who were not prepared to enter a seminary structure. Therefore we suggested to them that they live in community for one year. The lifestyle would be that of our Founder. Some of them accepted. Characteristic of our lifestyle was that it was incorporated in a typical barrio of the capital city. The eight young people and the two Oblates slept in two rooms and took care of all the chores in the house, being available to receive at almost any hour the young people of the barrio. There was no formal study but we had our own program of biblical, doctrinal and human formation. An intense life of prayer and frequentation of the Sacraments was an important element in our experience. I shall mention one point in particular: every week we had a silent Wednesday. The only visits allowed on that day were by those who accepted to participate in the silence. There was fasting until supper time. The most important apostolic activity of the vocations house were the so-called youth missions. At different times of the year, all of us together with other young helpers, went to places which were pastorally abandoned, just as our Founder had done in promoting parish missions. We spent some days or even a couple of weeks with the people, visiting their homes, organizing meetings for the young people and for adults, giving talks and preaching.

The vocations house continued in this form for five years. It was discontinued for a number of reasons. Missions to young people are still carried on today on an annual basis. The most recent, in January of this year, involved one hundred missionaries, including about ten Sisters, religious and priests. As regards vocations, the fruit of our "refoundation" experience has come with the years. Since 1986, our Province, which has about 40 Oblates, has had one or two novices each year. Even a womens’ branch of our Congregation has taken root: some girls who had taken part in our missions have asked to live the Oblate charism. There is also a group of lay people who wish to share the charism of Saint Eugene with us.

The second experience which I wish to present took place in the First World. It happened in Spain. If, in Paraguay, the initial motivation came from the lack of vocations and from there we moved into youth ministry, in Spain the starting point was the pastoral ministry among young people in itself. In working with young people it was customary also to speak of the charism of the Congregation. Father Alfredo, the man who initiated the movement, however, says that he was always very discreet in suggesting to the young people the possibility of a vocation to consecrated life. The vocations did come, just the same, and they were to some extent the fruit of pastoral ministry among young people which was centered on Christ. This happened in a Province which had not had a priestly ordination or a perpetual oblation for twenty years.

I shall quote from a report by Father Fernando, the present coordinator of youth ministry and whose vocation is the result of the Oblate refoundation in Spain: "What we offer to young people is the faith which is intended to fill a void which society cannot satisfy: a response to the dissatisfaction and the emptiness which they feel. We do so by offering them what we experience in our own lives: JESUS CHRIST. It is in Him that we understand the real destiny of Man and of the Church. The general aim of our program is : "To evangelize the young people of today, by leading them to a personal encounter with Christ, a community living of faith, in keeping with the Oblate spirit." What is suggested to the young people is the following: To come together in Christian life groups, or to follow on, in communities of Christian life. It is an effort to initiate the young people to community life as expressed in Acts 2, 42-47. In their weekly meetings the young people share their lives around the Eucharist, prayer, the Gospel, frequentation of the Sacraments and commitment to evangelization. They also take part in the activities of the parish or community where they live. (NB. In one of these parishes in Madrid it is quite common to have 80 young people at weekday Mass).

Personally, I am convinced that two-thirds of the perseverance of young people is due to accompaniment. In their relationship with the priest, this accompaniment is realized in the Sacrament of reconciliation and in spiritual direction. It is necessary, however, to "lose" (or gain) a lot of time with young people. Another important element is the fact of their coming together.

This method is at present being used in six Oblate parishes in Spain with a total of seven hundred young people. Among them there are life groups and some who live in community. All youth ministry implies vocations ministry: groups in which the young people can discern their own vocation: lay, priestly or religious life." The results of this activity in a Viceprovince which has 50 members: 7 Oblate priests, 1 diocesan priest, 8 scholastics and 3 women religious. All of this began twenty years ago in a Madrid suburb, in the parish of Aluche.

These examples will be sufficient. Others could be mentioned, experiences in France, Italy, Senegal etc. Refoundation experiences would be needed in other areas of the Congregation, including countries in Africa and Asia where there are many young people in formation but where a fresh missionary impulse is needed. The most important element in what we call refoundation is not so much the explicit insistence on the Founder and on the charism of the Congregation. In those places where there has been success the main reason was the promotion of the values which animated the Founder and which are a part of our charism. Christ himself is the center of those values.