Introduction to the present state of R.M.

There is the need to clarify our identity as Comboni Missionaries and how we work because we are undergoing a period of profound changes. There is a need to give “the reason for the hope” that we have”.
Mission is changing: The encyclical letter Redemptoris Missio made the whole Church aware that the horizons of the missionad Gentes are not restricted to geographical boundaries, to one people and a particular territory.

Vatican II, the new theology of religions, the document Dialogue and Proclamation and the more recent Missionary Encyclicals have emphasised the importance of dialogue, especially interreligious dialogue, in the mission ad gentes. The essential question is how to integrate this new perception into the proclamation of the uniqueness of Christ’s message of salvation.

Evangelii Nuntiandi highlights that true evangelisation involves primarily the task of evangelising the cultures which means, in the words of Paul VI, affecting “(…) criteria of judgment, determining values, points of interest, lines of thought, sources of inspiration and models of life (…)” of people. Inculturation becomes one of the ways to fulfil the missionary mandate.
Liberation and reconciliation are two dimensions which have increasingly been considered as inseparable from the proclamation of the Gospel. The different dimensions of the missio ad Gentes which I have highlighted pose a theological as much as a  methodological question: how are all these aspects to be integrated into the proclamation of Christ’s good news?

Africa is changing: the rise of the democratic movement, the increased importance of civil society, globalisation, socio-cultural change (urbanisation, the collapse of traditional society and values, the youth as the majority…)
The Comboni Missionaries are changing: interculturality, internationality as the dimension of an Institute which is becoming more and more international and intercultural, where we are called towards a ‘conviviality of differences’

The Ratio Missionis
The task to elaborate a Ratio Missionis was decided at the 2003 General Chapter. The process was intended to spearhead a personal and communitarian renewal in order to re-qualify our way to do mission

The first phase (from 2003 to 2006) was devoted to asking ourselves who we are, how we live and what we do (the phase of ‘seeing’). The second phase is dedicated the exercise of judging, to discerning. Discernment is a critical reflection leading to a decision; “discernment is to choose, take and leave” (Letter of the general Council ‘With Watchful Eyes”).
Criteria for this discernment are: the Word of God and of the Church; the Rule of Life; Comboni and our History and Tradition. But, I would add, the particular historical circumstances of the Country/place where the Comboni live and work become challenges for our discernment.

Discerning how to be Comboni Missionaries in Kenya Today

1. I am asking myself if the situation of Kenya is telling us something on how to be Comboni Missionaries in Kenya today.
2. We witness a Country deeply divided: poor/rich; undergoing socio-cultural transition; land issues and equal distribution of land. In this divided country there are three important issues here which are coming to the forefront: social justice, peace reconciliation, which are, incidentally, the issues for the next Synod for Africa. 
3. The Institute is asking us to take into account three areas of our being in our discernment process: spirituality; identity/charism; mission/evangelisation   I am trying to see how the situation in Kenya today - in a Country, as it were, deeply divided along ethnic, economical and social lines; in a situation calling for social justice, peace and reconciliation - is challenging us Comboni missionaries in Kenya today. How this situation is challenging our spirituality, identity and mission.
I know that the issues I am describing here would need deeper elaboration and insight.


4. Spirituality: According to the papers circulated to the confreres for the Ratio, the nucleus which gives orientation for our discernment is Jesus Christ the Good Shepherd, the centre of our life and mission and the community as a cenacle of Apostles

A call to avoid an intimist/disincarnated spirituality, especially these days when God and prayers seem escape routes to our problems. We are living in a Post-modern world (whatever the meaning we may attach to this term) There are, though,  some specific features of this period: last century ideologies and the “grand narratives” - as Lyotard names them i.e. those shared narratives which are socially cohesive - have collapsed; so individual and his needs and emotions at the centre of one’s interest (hence no lasting commitment but being led by the feeling of the moment), and truth depends on individual’s opinions and so reason has an utilitarian aim; culture and cultural identity are a characteristic of this time: it is a world fragmented, discontinued, disrupted; fear is the emotion towards a world judged as hostile; the mechanism of defence is splitting: some negative or controversial aspects of the world are denied and only those we regard as positive are accepted.
Here there is the risk of a disincarnated and intimist Spirituality which translates into practical options: the centre is the small group, emotionally charged, a group where the important is being at ease with each other; attention to nice liturgies and the exterior aspects of prayer. A spirituality which does not change our attitudes and does not give the courage to dare, to go out and build the Kingdom of God a spirituality which does not help us build a society of justice and reconciliation is contrary to a Christian spirituality as pointed out in the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church no. 545: “This spirituality (of the lay faithful) precludes both an intimist spiritualism and a social activism, expressing itself instead in a life giving synthesis that bestows unity, meaning and hope, on an existence that for so many different reasons is contradictory and fragmented”. The outcome of a disincarnated spirituality might be seen in the way in which “Religious institutions compromised from their identity as issuers of virtue to be supporters of parties and persons…If these organisations - points out an article on The Nation newspaper - intend to play a believable role in reconstruction of our society, they will not redeem themselves by a mere reorganisation. It will take a courageous conversion”: (The Nation 10/2/2008)

A reconciled community: it implies a conviviality of differences, which means welcoming our differences: learn to live not only as an international community but as an intercultural community where cultural differences are not a threat but to our stability but lived as a gift.

5. Identity/Charism: its fundamental aspects are: Mission, Comboni, and the Heart of Jesus; and we are missionary religious ad gentes, ad extra, ad vitam ad pauperes
   • These words I wrote to the West Pokot communities in December 2007 after my visitation: “Nowadays young people will not accept to be in a mission where heavy structures are to be administered and run. Availability for any kind of job is not an option. Usually, young people prefer other type of missions, structurally simpler. On the other hand, the time spent in a particular mission or even area will be limited. Today’s trend in a globalised world and the young people’s mentality make us conclude that missionary service spent in a particular mission or mission area will be limited to few years. The time when missionaries were spending years and years in a given mission area is definitely coming to an end. Confronted with these possible developments we might have different reactions: we might blame formation, the lack of missionary spirit in the younger generation or something else - and let events run as they use to. Or, conversely, we might make sensible decisions to prepare the future and, eventually, to prepare our people for that future”.
   • Faced with these difficulties and the blurring of boundaries of such terms as gentes, poor, extra… I do not think we can we can reach a consensus in the Congregation: see in Kenya, for instance, the differences among our confreres working in urban and those in rural ministry. These differences are not based on theological motivations but on practical ones (i.e. “there are too many missionaries in cities; better invest in rural areas”); or, another nuance of the ad extra and gentes concepts, the call to missionaries to re-evangelise Europe. We will not have a formula helping us fix our charism and, hence, our fields of work. An authoritative act which decides our fields of work might be called forth.
   • The Charism has to be interpreted according to the signs of the time. Comboni and the Heart of Jesus bring about two dimensions of our charism which are important in today’s multi-centred and multicultural world and Kenya’s ethnic divisions: the inclusiveness of Comboni’s dream (all the forces of the Church involved in evangelisation of Africa – Comboni’s call for a ‘catholic’ Institute - the Africans drawn in for their own evangelisation and promotion) and the all-embracing love which makes of the people of Africa join and be part of the Church - as the Heart of Jesus’ spirituality underlines.
   • In 2000 The Theological Commission of the Union of the Superiors General in Rome issued a study on globalisation “Inside Globalisation: a Multi-Centred and Intercultural Communion”: it elaborates a spirituality of the Covenant calling the religious Institutes to be servants of the Covenant. There are two dimensions in this spirituality: a) God draws near to us allowing our brokenness to come to the forefront, to be seen b) to see the broken world with the vision of God. (Noah: after the experience of the loss of their familiar world, God re-creates a new world where there is a new relationship) These two dimensions and the spirituality of the Covenant call forth three important expressions:
     
   1. The capacity to affirm differences without compromising unity which expresses itself in commitment to life: in a globalised world when the life of the poor is reduced to the capacity of work and produce; when human dignity is diminished (refugees); there is an “eclipse of the value of life” as John Paul II said in the encyclical Evangelium Vitae. Again, the Pope: “It is also a question (…) of the "moral conscience" of society: in a way it too is responsible, not only because it tolerates or fosters behaviour contrary to life, but also because it encourages the "culture of death", creating and consolidating actual "structures of sin" which go against life”. A commitment to life is a commitment which does not disappear because of difficulties or opposition. It is a commitment grounded on God’s commitment to his promises (“I am who I am”). Commitment to life is commitment to God’s justice and peace.
   2. Connection which is about relationships, about belonging against exclusion (in today’s Kenya where the ethnic group defines your being), but courage to identify our difficulties, naming them, relationships, for instance, which are self-destructive; it calls for a commitment to reconciliation.
   3. Communion: in which differences are experienced as a gift. John Paul II said in his Apostolic Letter Novo Millennio Ineunte: “Consequently, the new century will have to see us more than ever intent on valuing and developing the forums and structures which, in accordance with the Second Vatican Council's major directives, serve to ensure and safeguard communion”. A spirituality of the Covenant means to give hope to people in the Spirit of the Beatitudes. I believe that we have to re-discover these dimensions of our Charisms vis-à-vis the challenges of the world and of Kenya in particular.
6. Mission/Evangelisation: we proclaim and witness Jesus Christ and his mission; we work so as people are the protagonist of their own destiny and development (“Save Africa through Africa”).
   1. We have to re-discover our being missionaries by giving a time-frame to our presence in a given parish or area. This, again I wrote to the confreres of West Pokot: “Let me add a personal consideration which might not be palatable for many. We have to think that our time in West Pokot is not for ever - but this we have known it since the beginning of our mission here. The new element is that we have to give a time-limit for our presence here after more than 30 years. We certainly must be proud for what we have done and achieved. I really have a great admiration for our confreres who have worked in West Pokot… But my conclusion is that we cannot do much more than what we have already done. As things are now, I doubt about great breakthroughs in the evangelisation of the Pokot people. There may be the need of a totally different approach which, I suspect, cannot come from us, Comboni Missionaries. The people expect us a type of presence we have built over the years which is difficult to change in people’s mind.  Fr. P. Manna, the P.I.M.E. Superior General, wrote almost 100 years ago, that missionaries should be given a time-limit for their presence in a given area. The time frame makes missionary work different: one of the outcomes is that we would work to make people more responsible for the running of their life and mission. “30-40 or 50 years of work in a specific territory – writes Fr. Manna - could be assigned to these missionaries… then, with the aim well understood, the plan of our work would be different”
   2. The ministry of reconciliation A theologian and a missionary, Robert Schreiter, summing up the aims of the missionary work in the 19th and 20th century,  points out that missionary work during the time of colonialism focused on civilisation, health and education; during the post colonial period, on dialogue, liberation and inculturation. Now, he underlines, in a situation marred by violence, hatred, division and war, a situation where traditional values have dissolved and selfish and immediate gains are sought - at times identified with individuals of dubious repute – the missionary work has to be geared towards reconciliation. This, I am sure, has to be the priority of our pastoral work. A work, I would add, we cannot carry out on our own but together with other pastoral agents, churches and people of good will.

By Fr. Mariano Tibaldo, mccj, Provincial Superior