SYNODALITY, PARTICIPATION, COMMUNION

Sister Mary Francis Fletcher

For several years we have all been reading about, and some have been engaged in, the Church’s synodal process, established by Pope Francis in preparation for the Synod on Synodality. As I have pondered all that Pope Francis is trying to do for the Church, I have felt that his call to enter fully into the synodal journey is also key to our future. In his talks and writings, Pope Francis calls us to pastoral conversion, which lives out the model of Church as the “People of God.” It flows from Vatican II, from Lumen Gentium, which, since then, has been the major focus of many other Church documents and teachings.

Reading the descriptions of “pastoral conversion,” I believe it is exactly what we also have been seeking and working toward within our community.  The 2007 conference of CELAM, the Latin American Bishops Conference, described “pastoral conversion” as “an attitude of openness, dialogue and availability to promote co-responsibility and effective participation...”  Pastoral conversion calls all believers to participate collaboratively in discernment, planning, decision-making and implementation, united as one in serving the Mission of Jesus.

What could greater synodality, pastoral conversion, mean for us now?  Are we called to the same co-responsibility, to openness and dialogue, to involvement in discernment and decision-making, within the community and in our ministries among God’s people?  What have we already done?  What is God asking today?  How does synodality, full participation in offering our gifts and insights, lead us to communion, to be the presence of Jesus, for our world today?

Looking back, I could see the ways we lived synodality within our community, especially at times of rapid change, at times which required everyone’s participation in seeing the need and determining the future.  I don’t want to stop with that though.  I want to call us now to a new level of engagement, deeper synodality, stronger co-responsibility, for our future and for the Mission of Jesus?

Before Vatican II, our governance structures were organized in such a way that the community’s leaders, at each level, were primarily responsible for the discernment, direction and decision-making in the congregation.  This former style of governance freed the Sisters for service of others through the ministries to which each one was assigned, freed each one to witness God’s care through her relationships and service, in community and in ministry.  This way of structuring ourselves was the norm for the first 120 years or so of our congregation’s life as women of Providence.  It was appropriate for those times.  And as with the Church, by the 1960’s new ways of living and serving were required because the world for decades had been learning, developing and evolving while little change had taken place within the Church or in religious communities.  The signs of the times called for “aggiornamento,” to allow the winds of the Spirit to blow through and bring us into a new era.

Following the Second Vatican Council and its new interpretations, in 1968, our leaders held an extraordinary Chapter to begin to explore and address the Council’s call to us and to all religious communities.  In 1970 an ordinary Chapter followed in which the Sisters sought to reorient our congregation’s life and structures, to begin experimentation and study, all based on those new understandings.  In these two “change” Chapters, the delegates took to heart the new theology and ecclesiology, the new teachings and challenges which came from Vatican II.  In the more than fifty years which have followed, we have deepened spiritually, grown intellectually, matured psychologically and been strengthened in many other ways.  Our spirit, charism and mission remained the same as it had been in the beginning, though our expression of these evolved with each new era.  Over these years, we have grown tremendously in recognizing our baptismal call, our equality as disciples of Christ, and our appreciation for the spiritual gifts of grace given to each of us.  More conscious of our personal and communal charisms, we have offered ourselves within and beyond our community for the emerging needs of our times, our cultures and our universe.

During these years, we imagined more horizontal and circular types of leadership.  We broadened the ways each member could be engaged in dialogue, discernment and decision-making.  Through opportunities for education, ongoing spiritual growth, greater sharing of information and increased participation in meetings and conversations, we have been able to participate in processes of setting our congregation’s direction and co-creating our world anew. 

During the 1970’s, from the study of our history and charism, from returning to original sources of our founding and a greater knowledge of our founders, we worked collaboratively to write new Constitutions and a General Directory.  In the years which followed, participation by more delegates and strong Chapter commitments emerging from prayer and reflection, listening and sharing, focused us ever-forward.  Our Chapter statements were on justice, internationality, the signs of the times, ministry to the poor, leadership, charism and our spirituality of Providence.  In 1990 we heard a call for “a total and radical refounding” through adapting “the expression of our charism and mission to the circumstances of contemporary society.”  That Chapter direction called us to “change, risk-taking, radical personal and communal conversion, a renewed vision that shapes a future of hope … based on the gospel and tradition given to us by Bishop Ketteler and Mother Marie.” It also included a commitment to a “participatory style of governance… built on the shared responsibility of all members.”  Every new statement and Chapter mandate flowed from stronger desires and deeper calls to grow spiritually, to develop and strengthen our communal living and our witness of Providence, to respond to the needs of others in Mission.

Our 2022 Chapter Statement, emphasizes many of the same values and goals.  It’s like a spiral.  We have worked at these ideals over and over; we have made many efforts to grow, learn, deepen, to be the women God calls us to be, personally and communally.  Yet there is always more to be done:  to try again, to listen more contemplatively, to speak more honestly, to act more courageously, to be more fully involved, for the sake of our lived witness of Jesus’ Mission.  And the world in which we live, as it changes, calls us to new perspectives, to tap new resources, to see new ways to offer our gifts to meet the ever-emerging needs.

Our awareness has shifted now, so that it is not internationality that needs to grow, but interculturality.  We want to do more to appreciate and value the cultures, histories, life experiences, and particular ways of each Sister and each country from which she comes.  We want to know one another more fully, to understand each other through the holistic lens of culture, as well as through our generational and individual diversity.  The Chapter Mandate of 2022 calls us to this commitment; true unity and communion requires us to go beyond ourselves toward others.  As we begin to make new opportunities available for learning and sharing together, it is very important for each Sister to accept these invitations.  Shared efforts can enrich all of us in greater communion with one another.  We hope to become more open to others and better prepared to offer ourselves and our service of unmet needs.  Our efforts will only be as successful as the openness and willingness of each one of us, to take part, to engage in the available opportunities, to show up, and to give time and effort to the deeper conversations. 

In 1985, we recognized our participation as “co-creators with our God, by showing the face of Providence to our world and by building a future based on Christian hope.”  We heard the challenge from Mother Marie and our first Sisters “to confront creatively the problems and issues of our times.”  We acknowledged our desire for every member to see herself as “integral” to community governance and, in the Chapters which followed, many times, delegates emphasized the need for new models of governance, for new structures which would allow greater shared responsibility based on the principles of subsidiarity, accountability, consensus and collegial decision-making.  Now we have a 2022 decision to “recommend potential governance structures to fit the congregation’s present needs and future reality.” 

We cannot fulfill our chapter goals and decisions without strong synodality, without the presence and participation of each Sister to the level of her capability, without the engagement of every one of us.  Genuine encounters with each other enrich us as we listen and learn, as we discern the movement of God’s Spirit among us, and as we reach decisions which require us to be mutually accountable to and for one another.  Listening intently, sharing fully, and entrusting each other with our insights, brings us into deeper understandings of one another and helps us to experience God’s desires for our shared future.  These experiences give us the courage to take risks together, to do something new, to allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit, and they draw us as one into deep communion, united in Christ, for the sake of Mission

Synodality has been part of our growth and development, our desire and effort for many decades.  We know our world is evolving ever faster.  It’s often hard to keep up, to understand what is happening and the why of it.  Participation with one another helps us to see that while much has changed, we are grounded in the truth that our God of Providence loves us, that the Spirit of God guides us, and that we are called to “live as Jesus did, always striving to do God’s will.”  These ways of assuming responsibility together, for our future, bring us to true communion, as one in the community of Divine Providence, as one in the Body of Christ.  Join us in this journey of synodality, participation and communion!

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