ratio misionis south africa

RATIO MISSIONIS
Continental synthesis for English speaking Africa
Pretoria – RSA – July 2008

SPIRITUALITY a)

Core: The spirituality of the Comboni Missionary is centred in Jesus the Good Shepherd as source of his life and mission.
SEEING: In the first stage we saw that our spirituality lacks clarity and is poor. This means that our life and our mission do not rely enough on Jesus Christ.

PROPOSALS
What do you suggest for the Institute?

At Personal Level

To enhance our Spirituality at the personal level we are asked to:

Organise our spiritual life in accordance to the Rule of Life with proper time for prayer, spiritual reading, Lectio Divina, days of recollection, annual retreat, moments of prayer and of relax etc..
Take advantage of regular spiritual direction and, in case of need, of counselling.
Find a proper balance and unity between prayer and action.
Pay more attention to personal and communitarian spiritual growth.
Take and keep the resolution to read the whole Rule of Life at least once a year.
Centre our life and mission on Christ the Good Shepherd and responsibly carry out our pastoral activities.
Recover our spirituality and the sense of our Comboni life through Comboni’s Writings and the history of our Institute and missionary experiences.
Be attuned to the Local Church and parishes in which we live and work.
Prepare the Yearly Personal Life Project since witness of life appeals to people more than the reasons of our activities.
Read the signs of the times in a positive way.
Develop a listening attitude towards the confreres and the people.
Each confrere should seek a deeper relation with the Pierced Heart of Christ and a proper knowledge of Comboni.
Each Confrere should have a serious personal spiritual journey through spiritual direction, sacramental reconciliation and self supervision and evaluation.
Each Confrere, in his work, is called to a constant conversion of heart.

At Community Level

We should make better use of the space in the community for sharing our personal journey with the confreres, in order to improve communication among us.
We should always be ready to offer and receive counselling and brotherly correction.
Our spirituality must always be founded on the Word of God and be missionary oriented.
We should foster our knowledge and appreciation of each other and of the situation in which we work.
In our community great attention must be given to personal and communitarian growth, promoting and favouring On Going Formation initiatives.
Fidelity to community activities such as Days of recollection, Community Council, etc…
Superiors of the communities are to be the true animators of spiritual life of the community.
Our communities should be Christ centred (cenacle of apostles).
Revitalise our Prayers in community, by reviving our traditional forms proper to the Institute: Adoration, Devotion to the Sacred Heart, and Patron Saints of the Institute, Stations of the Cross, Rosary etc.
The Community must have time for planning and evaluation of the work in an atmosphere of prayer and meditation.
Each community must elaborate its Community charter.
Each community should create a healthy and communitarian environment for all the members who should feel welcome and appreciated.
The community must pay proper attention to young confreres who are to be introduced to the place and the missionary work.
Each community must programme its celebrations of reconciliation
Community members are to be aware of working for the Lord and not for themselves.

At Provincial/Delegation Level

The P/D Superior should emphasise the need of a deeper silence and personal prayer in each community.
All the members of the P/D should make use of the provincial retreats and other initiatives, to deepen their understanding of Comboni Spirituality, charism …

At Continental Level

There is a widespread need of a continental OGF plan.
Inter provincial encounters for different age groups should be organised.

At Institute Level

The Institute should train confreres specialized in spiritual direction, retreats, counselling, in view of fostering a Comboni spirituality.
The Institute should select formators among well identified confreres, who are known for their deep spirituality and identification and missionary experience.
The Institute should encourage the on going formation team to offer courses on Comboni Spirituality to the provinces.
Spirituality of the brothers to be appreciated, promoted and valued.
The richness and values of community life should be acknowledged and made use of at the level of Institute.
The Institute should address seriously the tensions caused by elements of inculturation, internationality and globalisation brought into it by the contemporary society.
The Institute should favour and make use of the publication of written material on spirituality on Comboni and elaborate booklets with Comboni prayer.
The Institute is to pay adequate attention to newly professed and ordained as well as to those newly assigned to a different country.
Humility in the service of authority is the golden rule in all levels of the Institute.

SPIRITUALITY b)

Core: “Cenacle of apostles”: to evangelise as community
SEEING: We experience a weak type of community live, we are not very sensitive towards our brothers and live a competitive/individualistic style of life

PROPOSALS
What do you suggest for the Institute?

At Personal level

General Principles
1. To assume the spirit of the community as “Cenacle of Apostles”, we Comboni Missionaries commit ourselves to a process of personal conversion by returning to the sources of our spirituality, namely the Word of God, the Rule of Life, the Writings of St. Daniel Comboni and life witness of the Comboni missionaries.
Concrete means
2. To prepare a personal spiritual project of life comprising of spiritual direction, active sacramental life, spiritual readings...) for a consistent journey of on-going formation involving serious regular exercises of discernment, reflection and self-evaluation.
3. To make use of approved psychological tools for human growth, such as the Enneagramme, Myers-Briggs and others means which will enable us to deepen our self-knowledge as well as to be more in touch with our inner life and motivations. In this way each confrere will be well equipped to give a fruitful contribution to the life of the community.
4. To improve the quality of our presence and active participation in the life, prayer and activities of the community.
5. To be aware of the international character of our Comboni community and therefore give due respect and attention to our cultural differences.

At Community Level

Elements of Fraternal Life in the Community
1. To value the community as a privileged place for personal and spiritual growth.
2. To commit ourselves to cultivate the virtues of openness, humility, love and unconditional acceptance of the other as a gift, so as to be able to tackle all issues relevant to the individuals and community.
3. To make use of the Community Councils or other appropriate moments to create a space when confreres can express.
4. To ensure that in the spirit of the “Cenacle of Apostles” our communities are welcoming especially to the local pastoral agents, seminarians and our candidates in basic formation.
5. To welcome confreres with special needs and in particular situations and help them to re- integrate in the community.
6. To responsibly commit ourselves to the community more as builders and not just as consumers.
7. To consider the Community Charter as an essential instrument to help us to be faithful to the community and to our personal project of life.
8. To foster fraternal correction and mutual personal accountability in our communities.

Community and On-going Formation
8. To establish a habit of regular sharing on the Word of God as well as initiatives for sharing our life, faith and ministry.
9. To organize on-going formation workshops on interpersonal communication and conflict management skills at community, zonal and provincial levels.
10. To dedicate sufficient time for community encounters (prayer, common planning, evaluation,
discernment and recreation).
11. To plan moments for in-depth study and reflection on the history of the Comboni Institute and Mission so as to enhance our sense of belonging together.

At Provincial/Delegation Level

1. To ensure that Local Superiors are sufficiently prepared for the service of authority and animation of their respective communities.
2. That the Provincial/Delegation Superior, during his visits, spends more quality time with the confreres and helps them so that in the communities there is a positive atmosphere of sharing and understanding.

At Continental Level
Accept inter-culturality and inculturation as basic factors in our missionary life and service in Africa in order to have a harmonious community life and ministry.
To identify confreres who can create continental reflection groups on Comboni spirituality. These confreres will then be charged, among other things, with the task of studying and clarifying the tension between our being religious and our being missionaries; as well as that between community life and apostolate.
Create appropriate structures for spiritual renewal and psychological healing for confreres who may be in need. Pay due attention to confreres stressed by life situations.

At Institute Level

That the General Council prepare a Rotation and Personnel Assignment Policy that ensures quality, stability and continuity in each Province for a decent community life.
That the Institute implement the age-old principle of reducing our commitments and re-assessing our priorities so that we can indeed have a more balanced life-style with quality time for both ministry and community life.
That theaptitudes for community life beconsidered in Basic Formation as part of the essential criteria of vocational discernment.
That the service of authority be carried out in the spirit of listening, dialogue and fraternal promotion and affirmation.
That confreres in the service of authority (leadership) should have the attitudes of the Good Shepherd and be good animators of their respective communities avoiding the “I-know-for-you” attitude.
That the Superiors, at all levels, avoid favouritism/double standards among confreres so as to promote fraternal relationships while taking care with due confidentiality of confreres with special needs.
That the Ratio Fundamentalis Studiorum be updated clarifying the type of missionaries we need for the mission of today.
That there should be a summary of the Ratio Fundamentalis Studiorium on Bible, spirituality and Mission to be used for on-going formation for all confreres.
That the General Administration fosters specializations only at the service of the mission and community life.
That the Institute undertake serious on-going formation programmes to foster deep spirituality and a sense of belonging to the Institute.

IDENTITY a)

Core: Mission, Comboni, the Heart of Jesus are elements of the charism that cannot be given up by MCCJ .
SEEING: In the first stage we saw that the assimilation of the elements of our charism is not very deep. The interpretation of the charism is more an individual business than a communitarian one.

PROPOSALS
How do we live and propose day by day these elements of our combonian identity?

At Personal Level

The sources of our Comboni Identity are:
1. Word of God (love of God) in our daily encounter with Christ, the “First Missionary” and “The Good Shepherd” through personal contemplation and communitarian prayers.
2. Comboni (his writings, his person, what has been written about him). The more we know Comboni the more we feel at ease with ourselves, because he is the mediator and source of our personal and communitarian identity.
It is the charism of Comboni that leads me to look at the realities in the light of faith, to offer my life in complete obedience to the Father, serving Him in my brothers and sisters “for whom Christ died”, to walk and work with them in respect, understanding and love.
3. Rule of Life assumed and accepted as a sure guide in my discipleship of Christ in the Comboni way.
4. Witness of the exemplary confreres who left a marked sign of their missionary life.
5. Passion for evangelization and passion for the people source of energy for total commitment to the mission.
We are asked to be “person-oriented”, more than “task oriented” missionaries, finding our joy in the fact that the people are helped and nourished.

Local/ Community Level

1. The Comboni Community has to make common cause with the people: by defending their rights and being their “voices”, by paying attention to situation of injustices suffered by the people, remaining with them, without any calculation of dangers and hardship.
2. The witness of community life is an excellent method of evangelization, especially in situations where explicit proclamation is not possible.
3. The community is to seriously undertake initiatives of on going formation that help the members to know more about our identity, personality and charism (meetings, seminars, retreats, publications, etc).
4. As Comboni Missionaries we need to be identified with the Local Church, while retaining our charism.
5. We propose the figure of St. Daniel Comboni as a model of faith and commitment to mission and to the people we work with.
We need to strive for the right balance between efficiency and compassion, accountability and fraternal understanding.
6. The service of authority should see to it that the communities put into practice the Rule of Life, Provincial Director and Community Charter.
7. We encourage to cultivate the true spirit of the Vatican Council II as in Nostra Aetate regarding the followers of other world religions.

At Delegation/Province Level

As Comboni Missionaries:
1. We should speed up the process of revising and amending our Provincial Directory by involving all the confreres.
2. We should insist on the implementation and evaluation of the Six-Year Provincial Plan.
3. We are to mediate God’s presence in our Christian communities by being present, especially in times of crisis, by listening, giving hope and courage, and by accompanying them to respond rather than react to the situation.
4. The Comboni Community should work on reconciliation, touching reality and embracing diversity.
5. Our Christian communities are to be truly catholic, universal, where bishops and priests, religious and lay people are welcomed, regardless of their ethnic origin.
6. Our Comboni Communities should be more involved in the formation of political leaders, of priests/ministers, and in advancing the growth of the political awareness among the people.

At Continental Level

1. We propose a better coordination and mutual information among the Provinces/Delegations in the sub-region, in order to forge a common vision of mission, and present our specific Comboni identity.

At Institute Level

1. We propose to work for the renewal of the Ratio Studiorum.
2. We recommend to animate and carry out the on-going process of the Ratio Missionis up to the desired end.
3. We propose the full implementation and follow up of the decisions of the General Chapters and other initiatives of the General Council.
4. We propose to re-express our charism and identity in an update language and in conformity with our cultural context, language and symbolism.

IDENTITY b)

Core: We are religious missionaries ad gentes, ad extra ad pauperes and ad vitam.
SEEING: In the stage of “Seeing” we have also assessed the decrease of vocations and, in some, of the sense of belonging.

PROPOSALS
How do you expect these three elements to be lived in our Institute?

At Personal Level

1. The Comboni Missionary in Africa feels identified with these four dimensions of the Comboni charism: ad gentes, ad extra, ad pauperes and ad vitam. In order to live out our concrete identity we are called:
a) to nourish it by returning to the sources of our spirituality;
b) to work according to the plan of the Local Church;
c) to generously dedicate all our energies for missionary service;
d) to go out of our geographical and psychological boundaries to announce the Good News respecting the values of the receiving culture.
e) to live our identity in the diversity of our ministries;
f) to live in an attitude of total, generous and enthusiastic self-giving in order to be a dynamic presence in the animation of the local Church;
g) to improve our fraternity and ministerial service, open to new forms of missionary presence.
2. The present global society poses some challenges that invite the Comboni missionary to renew his sense of missionary consecration.

At Community Level

1. Community life should be characterized by prayer, sharing and consistency with our R.L.
2. The Comboni community is called to ever improve its dedication, making common cause and living a simple life style close to the people.

At Province/Delegation Level

1. In the field of social justice:

Take a clear stand against ethnic discrimination and violence, expressing concern to the Bishops, the politicians and public opinion when problems related to violation of human rights are detected, educating to Christian solidarity that goes beyond ethnic and religious grounds.
The identity of the Comboni Missionaries should lead us:

1) to pay attention to the youth, developing strong movements, to counterbalance even the lure of the militias and of political motivated association contrary to the values of the Gospel;
2) to speak out, bringing the Social Doctrine of the Church to the fore in our homilies and catechesis, taking a stand on the side of the poor.
2. In the field of identity and balance of personnel:
a) To review our commitments, community by community so that the choice of our fields of work is made in accordance with the above fundamental elements of our identity (ad gentes, ad extra, ad pauperes and ad vitam). Therefore, we need to arrive at specific mission fields which are a fruit of common discernment and action.
b) A lack of a common project in the community, in the work and in the province poses a difficulty to live with serenity the Comboni missionary consecration. The challenge is to reduce the many tasks and elaborate a common project of mission in which all may take part.
c) To balance what needs to be done with our real capacity and talents, the Provincial Superior and his council are called to make some hard choices in such a way that they are accepted as common priorities by all.
d) To be radical in our availability to the province so that we can establish priorities and make decisions as a province.
3. To use our magazines to a greater extent for mission promotion, vocation promotion and justice and peace.
4. Our programs of on-going formation should take into account the deepening of our identity.
5. To avoid the lack unity/continuity between the plans of the province and of the Institute, it is important to have the older members of the Province share their experiences.

At Continental Level

1. The charismatic historical preferential option for Africa is still valid and should be actualized even today: Islam, Justice and Peace, Pastoralists, migrants and refugees, urban ministries...
2. Intercontinentality is an important element of our missionary identity, therefore it should be kept at the level of basic formation and in the provinces.
3. The fundamental dimensions of our identity should be stressed more during basic formation.
4. There are situations ‘ad gentes’ everywhere. Yet, leaving one’s own country remains an essential element of our missionary service.

At the Institute’s level

1. To actualize the charism the group proposes:
a) Going back to the ‘primigenia inspiratio’ of Comboni. We need to go back to our origin and make serious discernment on our choices at Institute level. It is important to making memory of our history in order to acquire a better sense of belonging.
b) To redefine the fields of evangelization through an honest and serious historical assessment and evaluation being aware of our limits: we are becoming always fewer, advancing in age with more limited economic resources...
2. The work of the Comboni Missionaries in Africa has bore great fruits, nevertheless we are called to evaluate and address the failures of our methods of evangelization.
3. In order to assume early our basic identity, the first assignment of a confrere should be a ‘missionary assignment ad extra and ad gentes’.
4. We are ‘a never settled people’, always in search or on the move, even within the same mission set up, we should counterbalance it by an inner settled spiritual and psychological maturity.

MISSION/EVANGELISATION a)

Core: We witness and proclaim Jesus Christ and his mission by being missionaries with generosity and courage.
SEEING: In general, according to what we have seen in the first stage, we live a mission based on doing projects that need a lot of money and personnel in order to carry on.

PROPOSALS
Which could it be the “plan of regeneration” of our Institute
in order to regain in our concrete life the vision that Jesus and Comboni had?

Personal Level

Each confrere should understand that our mission is centred in Christ and the charism of Comboni. "There is no Christian mission apart from Christ, personally encountered, of whom the missionary gives constant witness" (Redemptoris Mission, 4-11)
Each confrere needs to live more and more in close contact with the people – making common cause with them. This will enable us to go to the roots of their real needs.
Each confrere is called to work in team with his community and the pastoral agents: planning, and evaluating together.
Relate to people in a brotherly and friendly way, to walk with them, learning from our pastoral agents and collaborators, aware that working under pressure and strain might push the missionary to the limits and to be rude.
The missionary should seek the quality and intensity of his commitment to the mission in terms of zeal, total dedication, faithfulness and seriousness.

At Community Level

The community has to work in team in order to respond to its mission purpose. It must devise means of constantly evaluating and clarifying its missionary service, in order to have an effective presence that answers to real needs in the mission and defining our priorities, aware that we cannot do everything.
We need to be inserted in the Local Church – learning to journey and grow together, to dialogue and collaborate with all agents of mission.
We need to value and ensure stability and continuity in carrying out our missionary work.
We must make an effort to prudently mediate the encounter of the values of the local culture with those of the global culture in the light of the Gospel values.
We should integrate the quality of our presence as witness that gives attention to the person, with whom we work, involving them in the decision making process, thus avoiding individualism and or protagonism.
Our being with the people must be more important than means and money, listening to them, analyising their social political situation, and paying attention to the various groups such as farmers, teachers, clercks etc.

Province/Delegation Level

Provinces and delegations should have a clear six-year-plan, in accordance to the General Chapter resolutions and directives, to answer the real needs of the missions and the missionary needs of the Local Church. This plan is to be regularly evaluated in its implementation.
The Provinces/Delegations should care about qualifying personnel and taking up commitments, in order to ensure the basic conditions of community life, stability, and the training of confreres in language and culture.
Delegations and provinces should continue the implementation of the Total Common Fund (TCF), as the preferred system to acquire, administer and share the common goods.
The methodology of the Ratio Missionis for the community discernment, should be adopted at community and provincial levels.
Given the challenges of modern world, and the increasing difficulties in the missions, the Provinces and Delegations should ensure the fostering of an optimistic attitude that comes from the power of the Gospel, thus the missionaries become a sign of hope.
At the level of Mission Animation, we should be a stimulus for the Local Church by getting involved in the Diocesan offices: especially the Mission Office, Justice and Peace, Inter-religious Dialogue/Ecumenism.
Provinces should identify confreres who show certain human qualities and dedication for specific roles to be trained for a more qualified service to the local church.
We should continue our reflections about the vocation crisis to religious and missionary life. Missionary vocations arise from a local church that is mission oriented. Therefore the Provinces should double their efforts in the mission animation of the local Church.

Continental Level

The Provinces/Delegations should organize meetings of confreres at continental level to forge a common methodology of evangelization, specifically for certain areas such as mission among the pastoralists/nomads; refugees and migrants….urban and peri-urban apostolate.
The Provinces/Delegations should cooperate in preparing confreres who have aptitude and attitudes to serve in challenging missionary commitments, which are considered a priority at continental level.
The Provinces/Delegations are committed to New People Media Centre (NPMC) in the spirit of service to the English speaking Christians of Africa, producing formative and informative material and training people in the use of the media.

Institute Level

Since we are born and called for the mission, we are to remain faithful to first evangelization. Our priorities should be well defined after a serious discernment to ensure that our service is meaningful to the local Church and to ourselves.
The Institute should animate the Provinces/Delegations so that the Total Common Fund (TCF) becomes a shared value at the service of the evangelisation.
Our Institute always has valued works of charity and development as expression of its missionary activity. Today there is more need to reflect on how to maintain this link of evangelisation and human promotion in a changing society which tends to marginalise the activities of the church, reducing her to a mere NGO.
Conflicts resolution, inter religious dialogue, ecumenism, healing and reconciliation, should be part of our work of evangelisation as a pastoral priority.
The Institute should make the Social Teaching of the Church part and parcel of the evangelising mission of the Church, promoting professional ethics among the Christians.
The Institute remains committed to work with the MEDIA promoting a message of peace and unity against the general wave of violence and of discriminating ethnic loyalty.
The Institute should reorganise the circumscription/provinces /delegations to make them more functional and capable of dealing with the challenges of the modern world.
The lay people have proved themselves handsomely in doing a good job in evangelisation. We need to trust and empower them, delegating responsibilities, leadership and management.
The Institute should be more concerned about studying the rapid social changes which leave the people and ourselves confused and disoriented, and have confreres prepared in sociological studies able to help in facilitating the transition so that people may maintain their values, while adapting to the new incoming culture.
The Institute should mantain the values of internationality and implement it where it is not sufficiently present, including the Curia..
We need to work out a clear policy for rotation and uphold the value of internationality which is an essential characteristic of our Institute right from its inception.
The Institute needs to focus on quality of community life, to strengthen communities and to make use of available means to make them places of healing, human growth, real cenacles of apostles as envisaged by St. Daniel Comboni. The General Administration, in dialogue with the Provincial Delegation Superiors should implement the orientation regarding the numerically consistent communities.

MISSION/EVANGELISATION b)

Core: The mission that characterises us is that of favouring the protagonism of people in the various fields (“Save África by means of África”), as expression of their being image and likeness of God.
SEEING: We found out that our style of doing mission looks more for personal protagonism than for involving the people and we distance ourselves from the rythm of people. By doing this, our charism is emptied.

PROPOSALS
According to you, what has to be done so that all missionary activities may favour the protagonism of people and lead them to self-reliance?

At Personal Level

Personal attitudes:

The missionary needs to make an on-going effort to study the language and the culture of the people in order to value them and put into practice a method which may respect their contribution, according to their possibilities: to pass from the attitude of being the providers of all solutions to the conviction that solutions are found within the people; being aware that the Kingdom of God is already present among the people and experiencing this reality with a sense of awe and respect; to be humble enough to learn from the local people.
To live close to the people and in solidarity with them, having a real love for them.
To grow in patience knowing that we are all liable to make mistakes; learn from each other in order to discern and seek together the will of God.
Cultivate an attitude of self-criticism to foster reconciliation within the community. An attitude which may be a real witness for all.

Methodological approach:

To promote appropriate projects of self-reliance and forms of human development (fair trade).
To change to a more simple and less economically dependant life-style.
To involve people in the decision process, making them feel responsible, industrious and cooperative.

At Local Community Level

1. Comboni Community:

The Comboni community must exercise its leadership in a spirit of communitarian discernment and team work.
The projects of development should be discerned, presented and promoted by the whole community.
The community is to find in the Total Common Fund (TCF) a means of sharing and responsibly contributing to the needs of the community and of the mission.
The community should consider the evaluation of its activities and attitudes as an important means of growth.
To respect each other’s cultural identity, rediscover plurality within our communities as a powerful witness to the outside world.

2. Towards a self-reliant, self-ministering and self-propagating local church:
a) The Comboni community should respect and participate in the programs, activities and structures of the local Church and collaborate with the local clergy.
b) The Comboni community is called to animate the local church to be aware and live fully her mission dimension.
c) In order to promote the principle of subsidiary by sharing responsibilities with the local agents, the Comboni community must strive to accept people as they are and seek ways of mutual understanding aiming at empowering people on church activities.

3. Christian leadership at all levels:
a) The Comboni community is called to foster a sense of responsibility of the laity and to invest in the preparation of the local leaders through an integral (human and spiritual) formation.
b) The Lay people (also lay volunteers and LCM) have proved themselves handsomely in doing a good job in evangelisation. We need to trust and empower them on management.

At Delegation/Province Level

Justice and Peace: in the context of the Second African Synod and the priorities of the AMECEA the missionary work has to be geared towards reconciliation, especially in situations of violence, hatred, division and war. The Provinces should take seriously the new challenges of evangelisation and prepare confreres on fields such as Islam, Youth, urban ministry…

As much as possible, produce and distribute literature on Justice and Peace to help people understand and foster reconciliation.

The provinces should make a serious discernment and solve the imbalance between commitments and personnel. Concrete criteria for discernment are: self-supporting structures, enough local leaders and sufficient local clergy.

To promote collaboration and networking/lobbying with other organization.

To embark on a particular service, the provincial councils must discern together with the local Church the real needs in order to give a pertinent response with adequately prepared personnel and that the local church can have the time to digest and assume the project. The G.C. is also asked to collaborate with the discernment.

At Continental Level

1. That the Continental structures (annual assembly of provincials/delegates, evangelization, reflection groups) continue be developed so as to share more responsibly respecting the principle of subsidiarity and move towards some form of decentralisation.

2. Our missionary animation must be presented in positive terms to promote solidarity being respectful of the dignity of the African peoples.

3. Assumption of interprovincial/continental projects should be done after dialogue among the local church, the provincial councils and the GC.

At Institute Level

1. That the Institute develops at the various levels proper and common methods of studying common issues, their assimilation, implementation, and the follow-up of the decisions taken.