The Western church sees religious
life numerically decreasing in Europe, but increasing in Asia. The reason could
be that in keeping with the Vatican II, there had been shift on the emphasis
from conformity to commitment which is at the basis of the post Vatican II
revision of religious rules. This is far challenging than the conformity, which
was the bedrock of the previous stage. Commitment demands a life journey that
carries one further in following Jesus. The identity of a religious institute,
the key issue is to discover to whom
the institute is sent because only from that do the what of identity and the how of
the mission flow. What appears to me rather interesting is that the question of
identity is the voice of the religious in Asia, which reflects the actual state
of affairs today, has not been heard adequately and incorporated into
principles of action. The voices that had an impact on the documents of the
Church relating to the religious, right from the Vatican II were from the West
or locals who had been trained in a “foreign” way of thinking.
Based
on the presuppositions on which Western society is organized, wide
consultation, democracy, local autonomy and similar values are incorporated in
the rules of the religious institutes even on our Indian soil. Eastern voices
always have been a call for caution as many of the recent documents prove it.
The revision was mainly as regards to the education and formation of the
religious at the initial stage, drawn broadly from the western culture with its
strong influence. With the revival of nationalism and indigenous values as
experienced today, we need to give thought to the future formation of the religious.
In the midst of the political struggle for the realization of Hindutva, it is
important, the spirit and mindset of the religious persons have to be changed
progressively. It is difficult to retain one’s identity while taking the best
from both worlds. It will run the risk of overshadowing the several cultural
elements in the religious training itself. We will run the risk of being called
traitors to our heritage.
In
our context, people generally expect protection and blessing from religion,
religious and rituals. People are happy that the religious duties are performed
on their behalf by religious persons (buying masses). It is therefore, the
“cassock” (the habit) that is respected more than the person and great respect
is shown to the one committed to religion.
The changing scenario of the
membership of religious institutes is to be taken into consideration. The
candidates are mostly from villages and generally are from second-rung
intellectual and economic status. Their early formative years are spent under a
rather autocratic regime of superiors. Thus, they learn from the very early to
“play the game”, to have double dealings in order to “be finally professed” or to
“get ordained”.
When the values currently dominant
in society have an influence on growing numbers of the candidates, we can ask
what happens to the religious institute’s identity. The question, then, to whom
religious are sent tends to be answered in practice. That is, they are sent to
those who more readily accept the religious as persons of some status and give
them a certain measure of respect and precedence. The religious, therefore, in
their habits, are the privileged ones at the bank transaction or at the medical
consultation table.
The general culture of a society
exerts a pressure on people to perceive the institute’s identity as normative,
how religious carry out their tasks tends to be defined by what ‘people’ like.
The crucial issue is whether people are to be built up into a community of
fellowship. The Church is the sign and instrument of intimate union with God
and the unity of the whole human race. The option of love (agape) as the basis
of a Church demands decision of going against the cultural norms (Lk 6:32-36).
Jesus obeyed even to the extent of undergoing death, but in that obedience he
gave a new direction to the obedience that was claimed in the current society.
To go by what the people like moves
in the directions of building up a clientele for oneself. The clients perhaps
know each other; they come for assistance, but they can hardly be called a
Church. The celebrations of the Eucharist in some religious communities are
clear proofs of this: view them in the light of aims and structure of the Mass
as envisaged in the revised Roman Missal to see how this dynamism functions.
There, one can, observe the “virtual conquest of space”.
The religious life numerically is
strong. In this transitional stage, with the sociological composition of
religious changing, there will be excesses and abuses. God’s action is taking
place when history recurs first as tragedy and then as farce. The freedom of
the religious of new generation consists in realizing that it is not reaction
to something but rather is a skill of discerning God’s plan in the signs of the
time and responding to it. The young generation are not comfortable with the
“cultural” presuppositions of their religious constitutions, practices and
behavioural norms derived from them, especially those of the Greco-Roman
heritage, wherein a community is formed, not of people connected by blood, but
through a sharing of commonalities. On the other hand, they find that their own
cultural world does not function well in their own society. Think of the
financial and social worlds of business which is a combination of both the
Greco-Roman heritage and local cultural norms. This is not sufficiently
addressed in religious life. Lack of commitment, continuing with a project only
as long as one’s emotions last, are some of the symptoms that exist in our
religious circle. We need to create a climate where the young religious could
discover and strongly affirm their own culture enlightened by the Gospels.
Our Eastern system allows, even
encourages the pleasures of sense to take their course until the individual has
a sense of ‘disgust’ and a realization of their inadequacy to satisfy one’s
longings. It is the path, the media that counts. The goal is already in the
path one follows. The time will come when the religious of this generation will
truthfully make present the cause of
Jesus in and through the traditions and cultures in which they have
lived and from which the previous generation was alienated. Emile Durkheim in
his work The Elementary Forms of
Religious Life, commented that the wise man is one who has a very clear
sense of what he must do, but who would usually be unable to translate it into
law. The younger generation of religious, growing up in their own culture may
do the right thing and then, perhaps later, others may give it a form. But the
question remains: does religious life as an institution challenge the culture
or does it simply and uncritically reflect the dominant culture?
No comments:
Post a Comment