Rethinking Religious Formation for the 21st Century Given by Sandra Schneiders, IHM

Religious Formation Conference the civil structure. Most Sisters, at that time, 5401 S Cornell Ave, Suite 304 INTRODUCTION Chicago, IL 60615773.675.8362 Thank you for the invitation to participate in this i.e., the fifties and early sixties, were sent into phone day of reflection on the immediate and longer- what we then called “the apostolate” in their range future of Religious Life and especially of early 20’s at the latest with little more than a [email protected] formation which is so crucial to that future. The high school diploma and perhaps some basic www.relforcon.org ministry entrusted to you in forming the people instruction, apprenticeship, or coaching from who will carry Religious Life into the future is the more experienced members of their own Managing Editor challenging to say the least, and I feel privileged Congregations. But these ministerial occupations Ryan J. Hoffmann to be invited to reflect with you about it during were beginning to be professionalized in a way this time we have together. that would have rendered Catholic institutions and the people who staffed them unable to When Mary [Johnson] and I first started talking compete, or perhaps even to function, in terms about this topic of formation in the current of the professional standards that would be cultural and ecclesial context in which U.S. mandatory in a very short time. In fact, we did Religious Life is unfolding today, we were both lose many of our institutions but our members struck by the fact that the changed situation of were able to move into other ministerial contexts formation in U.S. Religious Life today, in relation where they became, in many ways, the backbone to what it was in the immediate aftermath of of the U.S. Church’s outreach to its cultural Vatican II, that is, in the mid-sixties, presents an context in the very changed conditions of the interesting parallel or analogue to the situation post-Conciliar Church and world. We could have, faced by U.S. Religious Life in the 1950’s and early probably would have, been put out of business, 1960s in relation to what it had been in the early both institutionally and personally, despite our 1900’s. In the immediate aftermath of the Council, large numbers, boundless zeal, and even actual the mid-60’s, there were more women Religious effectiveness, by our lack of qualifications in the U.S. than at any time in our history: at the and credentials. What prevented that from highpoint in 1965 there were about 180,000; happening? today there are about 50,000, roughly a 72% numerical decline. However, except for a few very THE SISTER FORMATION MOVEMENT far-sighted people who saw the handwriting on Basically, a small group of very far-sighted the wall in the 1950s, most Congregations in that women Religious initiated, in the 1950’s, what era were not aware that Religious Life, despite its was eventually called “The Sister Formation numerical explosion, was actually poised to lose Movement” whose ultimate objective was to its overwhelming influence in the U.S. Catholic educate every Sister involved in active ministry Church. Why? Because virtually all Religious to at least the bachelor’s level of general at that point were ministering in large Catholic education before she began her full-time institutions owned and operated by their own apostolic involvement as a teacher, health care Congregations within the exclusive context of the or social service worker, or whatever she might Church, that is, only marginally and extrinsically be assigned to. And this facilitated a further related to their secular environs. It was the height goal of appropriate advanced preparation in her of the Catholic ghetto in the U.S. In the Catholic own professional field as that became possible ghetto, of which Religious institutions (including through summer graduate programs and even, Religious Congregations) were an integral part, in some cases, full-time university study, for Religious could function without the kinds which these newer Sisters were eligible because of education, certification, and credentialing of their undergraduate college degrees attained that would very soon become mandatory, not during initial formation rather than over 16 to 20 just in secular or public schools and hospitals years of piecemeal summer school courses This relforcon org but in all institutions that functioned within college level preparation of all new members F facebook.com/relforcon 2 Religious Formation Conference L twitter.com/relforcon˚ was not envisioned simply as a matter of certification but sixties and the dawning of post-modernity was still in the rather as a n integrated personal and professional formation future. But the founders of the Sister Formation Movement, of these young Sisters, that is, as the intellectual, spiritual, presciently aware that the “times, they were a-changing,” social, cultural, and professional maturation of the whole were dealing with the monumental task of changing the basic person. The result was that U.S. Women Religious became, notion and reality of formation for tens of thousands of young by the time Vatican II ended in the mid-1960’s, the best women Religious. qualified, best-prepared cohort of ministers in the American Church. Although they were not yet specialized in theology and philosophy, they were at least literate in these disciplines, ...although they could not have known it at that and because of their wider liberal arts preparation, t hey were time, in the mid-fifties and early sixties, these often better prepared than their ministerial peers, even in the clergy, to at least see the significance for their lives and pioneers of contemporary Religious Formation ministries of advances in the social and natural sciences. They were also preparing Sisters not just to teach and were, therefore, better prepared to participate in the initial nurse in their own institutions, nor even just for reception of the Council and to facilitate its reception among the Catholic population. It is not hard to imagine that, had it reception of the Council, but also for the socio- not been for women Religious, the Council might have been cultural-political revolution of the sixties, and the basically stillborn in the highly clerical and traditionalist U.S. emergence of post-modernity in the seventies Church of the 1950’s and 60’s. In a certain sense, the recent assault on U.S. Women Religious and their leadership by the and eighties. Vatican investigations was a back-handed recognition of the maturity – theological, spiritual, cultural, and ministerial – and therefore of the influence of women Religious in this country ANALOGY OF OUR CURRENT SITUATION on the American Church. This maturation would never have TO THAT WHICH GAVE RISE TO THE SISTER occurred unless those far-seeing leaders in the mid-1950’s had realized that unless women Religious were educated to FORMATION MOVEMENT Today, I would like to suggest, Religious Life and therefore the level of parity with their clerical and lay colleagues their formation for the life, is in a crisis situation analogous to that of sheer numbers (which no one could have foreseen would the late fifties and early sixties and calling for an analogously decline so precipitously within a decade or two) would not courageous and imaginative response. It is not the same be able to keep them in operation, much less influential. The situation. The challenges are not the same and the response power of women Religious in the immediate aftermath of the cannot be the same. Analogy is, by definition, a resemblance Council, which continues to this day, I think it is safe to say, in some particulars of things that are otherwise not alike. We derived directly from the visionary and courageous initiative are very aware of the critical respects in which our current of the architects of the Sister Formation Movement, operating existential situation as Religious is unlike that of Religious Life under the aegis of the Sister Formation Conference which in the mid-20th century. But I want to suggest that there are is now your own Religious Formation Conference, facing equally important and enlightening ways in which we are today challenges as daunting as those that confronted our facing the same kind and magnitude of challenges that the Congregations in the 1950s. Sister Formation initiative addressed and this might suggest We should add that, although they could not have known it that we can find solutions for our time and situation analogous at that time, in the mid-fifties and early sixties, these pioneers to those they found for theirs – and of which, in fact, many if of contemporary Religious Formation were also preparing not most of us are the products. We would not be here in this Sisters not just to teach and nurse in their own institutions, nor unheard of situation – a national convention – unless some even just for reception of the Council, but also for the socio- very radical developments had occurred between the days cultural-political revolution of the sixties, and the emergence of our cloistered formation and the post-modern condition in of post-modernity in the seventies and eighties. But what which we live today. the architects of the Sister Formation Movement did know The differences between the two situations, are evident. In was that they were preparing these young Sisters for the the 1950’s and early 60’s Religious Congregations had huge professionalization of ministry and that that professionalization numbers of members augmented yearly by the influx of would be short-circuited, merely secular competence, unless large numbers of recruits. Virtually all the new recruits were it included and integrated not simply academic education very young and part of the same historical generation and and professional training, but the theological and spiritual, sociological cohort. They came from intact Catholic families, personal and psychological, cultural and social, development with (usually) 12 years of total-immersion formation in the of these Sisters. The Sister Formation leaders envisioned a Catholic faith in Catholic grade and high school, and virtually new breed of Woman Religious. They intended to cultivate no real exposure to any alternatives to that all-Catholic view of fully developed adult persons of faith: spiritually, intellectually, reality. The young recruits were professionally uncommitted psychologically, socially, and culturally mature participants in with little idea what they would choose to do if they had been what would turn out to be the post-conciliar Church and the asked (which, of course, they seldom were). Had they not post-modern world. A full grasp of the newness of the cultural entered the convent they would probably be where there and religious situation that would emerge from the tumultuous their high school peers who did not enter continuedthe convent on next were: page mostly married housewives with growing families. These new But, and this is my second point, whatever the validity or Religious were slated to live and minister in the Congregation invalidity of our judgments about the health or viability of the they entered and its institutions for the whole of their lives. lifeform at this moment in time, it is what it is – and, if we are And no one, veterans or recruits, thought that there would be not to despair, we have to assume some measure of divine any real changes in the life or the Congregation’s ministries volition in this situation. I am not suggesting, as the reality (called “apostolates”) any time in the foreseeable future. deniers have suggested, that a huge pile of manure must mean that there is a pony somewhere in the neighborhood. The Today, as we are very aware, the situation is extremely present situation has major negative features and dynamics different from anything any of us could have imagined in the with which we are trying to cope. But, however we evaluate 1950’s. We have very few new members, none very young, it, this is what we have to work with. If we throw up our few coming from solidly, much less exclusively, Catholic hands, or throw in the towel, and resign ourselves to imminent backgrounds and usually with, at best, fragmented religious extinction – the infamous, “last one out turn off the lights” formations if any at all. But they are often professionally quite scenario, or what I and some others have called, the cultivation well formed, credentialed, and to some extent experienced. of a culture of diminishment – because we find ourselves in And the Congregation does not have placements for them a very different situation than the one that obtained often even if it did have the luxury of forming them according to its idealized scenario of the 1950’s , then the game is, indeed, requirements or desires. over. But if we decide to work with the situation in which we There are at least two important points to make about this find ourselves (which is, in fact, what we seem to be doing – as comparative situation if we are not to see it as a description of Mary has pointed out in regard to mergers, reorganizations, the beginning of the end of the lifeform we call Religious Life. internationalizations, and so on) we might discover that we First, there is nothing normative about the 1950s version of have more options, and more control over our fate, than we the life. In the history of the Church there have been periods have tended to think. And it is precisely some of those options in which large numbers of the faithful entered Religious Life that I want to discuss, particularly as they relate to formation. and other periods in which very few did. Different forms of the life have attracted large numbers at certain times and places THE NON-SUSTAINABILITY OF THE CURRENT as other forms have declined or waned or even disappeared, SITUATION: GOOD NEWS OR BAD NEWS, THAT only to experience, in some cases, a sociological re-emergence IS THE QUESTION at another time or in another place. And the numbers have One of the irrefutable conclusions that we have come to fluctuated greatly geographically, just as is the case today – whether we have realized explicitly and articulated it or when vocations are multiplying in some parts of the world not – over the past 30 years or so, is that the configuration even as they decline in others. The still widespread, even if of Religious Life in this country as it existed in pre-Conciliar, unarticulated, idea that Religious Life is healthy when it is modern times – especially in the first half of the 20th century – numerically huge, financially flush, institutionally established, is not sustainable today. We were organized, congregationally, and approved of by the powers that be, and unhealthy when as 400 plus virtual silos, each Congregational silo handling the numbers are smaller, resources are scarce, and approval every aspect of its own life – leadership, recruitment, is spotty may say more about the extent to which we have formation, ministry, continuing education of members, fund- internalized the might-makes-right, capitalistic, politically raising, finances, property ownership and management, health dominant value system of the first world than about the health care, retirement, end of life care, etc. – in virtual isolation from, of Religious Life in our context. Jesus’ movement, especially his if not in actual competition with, the other 399 silos. chosen itinerant band that made a life choice of total devotion to his project – that is, the biblical precursors of Religious Necessity in some cases and wisdom in others, has radically Life as I have suggested elsewhere – was hardly the most altered this picture, even if most of us have not attended sociologically successful operation in first century Palestine. to that fact explicitly. LCWR (the Leadership Conference Jesus’ band never seems to have exceeded, at most, a few of Women Religious), has brought together our highest dozen in his lifetime, and it does not seem to have greatly echelons of congregational leadership for mutual support, increased in the immediate aftermath of the Resurrection. corporate self-education, sharing of resources and best practices, collective action, and even – as we saw so recently

Religious Formation Conference We didn’t need each other, or at least we didn’t think we did, as long each Congregation had enough provisions in its separate silo. But now that, for all kinds of reasons, we don’t enjoy such self-sufficiency, we are finding out that common necessity can make at least as good neighbors as do fences.

– corporate self-defense in and outside the Church. Similarly, in suffering and crises, minister together, defend one another ATRI (the Association of Treasurers of Religious Institutes) in when anyone is under attack. Those of us who entered prior relationship to the financial aspects of our lives, the NRVC and to Vatican II, if we stop to think about it, can realize how new RFC in relation to vocational recruitment and discernment, this situation is. Who would think today that we entered and initial and ongoing formation, RCRI (the Resource Center our Congregation because it was evidently and unarguably for Religious Institutes) in relation to the financial and the superior to one across town? But how many of us didn’t, to legal aspects of our lives, both civil and canonical, NRRO (the some degree, believe at the time we entered that that was, National Religious Retirement Office) in regard to funding for indeed, the fact? While there are some formal, organizational the later stages of life, are all examples of organizing across mergers, especially in the so-called “cluster congregations, congregational lines, outside our silos, because we realize that is, groups with similar or identical foundational charisms, that we can do together what none of us can do very well the pattern seems to be primarily that of families in the same separately. At the next level down in institutional organization neighborhood or farms in the same countryside. Although it we see the same dynamics at work. There is considerable might not have happened if the material diminishments of the sharing of health care facilities and personnel, sharing of post-Conciliar period had not created such steep challenges ministries in spiritual life centers, peace and justice work, for us in so many areas, this development, in my view, is neither political activism; re-imagining ministry in existing schools a tragedy nor a counsel of despair. We didn’t need each other, and hospitals, and the founding of new, cross-congregational or at least we didn’t think we did, as long each Congregation types of such ministries. We have seen the emergence of had enough provisions in its separate silo. But now that, for all artistic collectives, interactive process facilitation, shared kinds of reasons, we don’t enjoy such self-sufficiency, we are cross cultural ministry at home and abroad, and on and on. finding out that common necessity can make at least as good In a sense, we have been creating, without perhaps averting neighbors as do fences. And we might even conclude that if to the fact, what people outside our life are increasingly and when the necessity no longer exists we will have learned seeing as a unified phenomenon in the Church: not so much a to prefer unity to individualism, sharing to owning, working collection of hermetically sealed organizations called Orders together to establishing ministerial fiefdoms. or Congregations, but American Women’s Religious Life, And this brings me back to where I started, namely, that we as the reality and strength of which rose to striking visibility American Women Religious, are facing a situation analogous during the Vatican investigations. During that traumatic to that which we faced in the mid-20th century when our experience there was no such thing, in our minds or in the “Mom and Pop store” approach to ministry, or at least our minds of our myriad supporters, as an isolated Religious “family farm” approach, suddenly faced the emergence in Order that could be picked off or brought to heel. Touching our fields of apostolate of large secular corporations and one of our Congregations was touching all of us. People, parishes, and even dioceses rose to the defense, not of the we realized that if we did not get our members educated, formed, credentialed, professionally up to speed in the rapidly “eastern province,” or the Mercies or the IHMs, but simply of collectivizing and professionalizing human services sector of “our Sisters” or even “the Sisters.” Like families in a healthy modern society which, for us, was our apostolic sphere, we but challenged neighborhood who get together across blood were going to find ourselves no longer major players in the lines to solve common problems with shared resources, areas such as health care, education, social facilitation and Religious are discovering what our secular counterparts have long known about us, that Sisters have more in common so on which were crucial to the health and well-being of the Catholic Church in this country. as Religious than they have separately as individual orders or congregations. Our distinctive charisms, like individual As I have already said, our situation today is not identical but personalities in a family, or distinct families in a neighborhood, analogous to that of the pre-Conciliar period. But it is in the are an enrichment in and through diversity, but not principles same area as that which gave rise to the Sister Formation of division or competition. What enhances one builds up all Movement, namely, how to deal with the people who have and what threatens one must be defended against by all. In recently joined us or are considering, or might consider, joining a way unprecedented before the 1960s we are at home on us? How do we get people who come to us, whether they each others’ property, seek solutions to shared problems are few or many, who are often considerably older than was together, share resources where we can, support each other previously the case, who arrive individually rather than in continued on next page large homogeneous groups, who are educated professionally do not control the number of vocations to Religious Life. but relatively unformed religiously, who are eclectically Our challenge is to figure out how to make the most of the experienced spiritually in the generalized but often rootless vocations God sends us. We don’t get to pick our historical spiritual questing of our time but unfocused denominationally location or its typical problems. But we cannot solve “small or traditionally, and so on, into a growth process that will numbers” problems with “big numbers” solutions, or vice result in their having and living a genuine, ecumenically and versa. inter-religiously open, but coherently Christian and explicitly Catholic spirituality that is theologically coherent, practicing, One problem of very small numbers is the problem of “cohort.” sharable among themselves and with others, mature and One or two people do not a cohort make. The term “cohort” responsible, and ministerially communicable? The answer, of is borrowed from the Roman military organization in the course, is formation – which is what you are all involved in up days of the Empire. The cohort was a battalion of a certain to your necks and which, I want to suggest, has to emerge size whose members lived and fought together, developing a from its current situation of constant, on the spot, re-invention shared vision and commitment to that vision, a camaraderie and do the analogous equivalent for our times of what the and loyalty and bondedness that enabled to fight as a unit Sister Formation Movement did in the mid-20th century. And more effectively than they could separately or even as I am trying to suggest that just as we have de-siloed so much part of a much larger unit. They were united by common of our life and ministry without diluting our charisms or losing military objectives and common designated leadership but our identities, we might be able to do something comparable also by interpersonal bonds of friendship and loyalty. They in regard to formation. were “comrades in arms” and not just partners in a venture. The term “cohort” has been borrowed by many fields, for Mary and I, and a number of people in this organization and example, by the medical profession to analyze factors in health in other meeting points of Religious concerned with our characteristic of specific populations and in economics for immediate future, as well as in conversations with a number of market analyses. It is used in education to help understand the Congregations and groups of Congregations in their various relationships between educational attainments by people who assemblies, have been talking for some time now about how share certain cohort characteristics. Often times the members it might be possible to reconceive, structurally and content- of these cohorts are not related personally to each other. It is wise, as well as operationally, the formation for Religious the analyst who sees something in common in the cohort’s Life and Ministry of the people who are entering Religious members. Congregations today or are thinking about doing so. I want to condense some of that reflection and discussion under two But for some sociological purposes, which is our interest headings, with the caveat that, if anything I am offering here here, a cohort is a group whose members share a significant is worth further discussion and reflection, the appropriate experience or collection of experiences, usually at a certain forum for those discussions is within Congregations and period of time or history, and have one or more similar among Congregations, perhaps through the mediation of characteristics precisely because of their common historical the Religious Formation Conference, the National Religious experience. A cohort is not the same as a generation although Vocation Conference, and LCWR. The two major headings, the terms are often, and causally, related. For example, people under which I want to make these suggestions are COHORT who were in college during the Vietnam War (and who are and PROGRAM, both of which have to do with the substance therefore mostly the same age) and who participated in the of the proposal. I will also mention some other topics which campus protests, draft-resistance, love-ins, and expressed might be offshoots or collateral advantages of a new vision of themselves in and were moved by the music and poetry of formation, such as visibility and economies of scale. that era, of the sixties, were a cohort the members of which, even today, have certain identifiable leanings, attitudes, fears, COHORT goals, and so on although the diversity of their later experience Let me recall what I said a few minutes ago, that, hard as it is makes them much more diverse than they were in the 1960’s. for us to realize, there is nothing normative about the size of A cohort tends to be, at least at its inception, a generational the Religious Life Movement in any historical period or locale. group, that is, people who are basically in the same age There have been periods, like the one we lived through just bracket, but cohort and generation are not necessarily prior to the Council or that of the first half of the 13th century synonymous. When we look at the Trump cohort they can look with the rise of the Mendicant Orders, when a huge proportion pretty generationally similar. But not so the Bernie Sanders of the Catholic population – for various religious, cultural, cohort which tends, in general, to be at least two generations economic and other reasons – felt called to Religious Life. The removed from Sanders himself and tends to include a fairly resulting surge in membership has, frequently if not usually, high number of people who, age wise, should be in the Trump led to periods of laxity and the necessity for reforms that camp. usually then cut the numbers back while raising the quality For our purposes, cohort refers to a sociological collectivity of the life. And there have been other times when Religious that is usually based in chronological or generational were few in numbers, but often effective out of all proportion location but that is primarily characterized by certain shared to their numbers because of their zeal and commitment due psychological/sociological features arising from a shared to their sense of urgency about the Gospel and the paucity cultural experience. It refers to an inbred “optique” or “take” on of resources to meet the need. But in any case, with the reality that is woven into the life experience of the members of best of intentions and the most strenuous of effotrts, we the cohort and is, generally speaking, only vicariously available

Religious Formation Conference to those who are not part of the cohort. Think of those who makes actual experience of their own cohort an existential grew up in the Depression and the indelible features of their necessity. That’s why so many of them seem incapable of experience, no matter how well off they might have become breathing if they are separated from their phone for more than in middle age, etched into their approach to money, saving, a minute and a half. spending and so on that is utterly foreign to their children who are denizens of a throw-away culture and its built-in obsolescence. For these children of a different cohort saving, delayed gratification, bargain hunting, or repairing broken The answer, of course, is formation – which is things instead of replacing them – in short, the economic what you are all involved in up to your necks proclivities of their parents’ cohort – appear to them to be and which, I want to suggest, has to emerge quaint tics of “old fogies”. Or think of the 1950’s Catholic ghetto cohort with its unconscious arrogance about having a lock from its current situation of constant, on the spot, on truth and virtue, to say nothing of salvation (from which, re-invention and do the analogous equivalent for of course, Protestants and Jews and pagans were excluded) our times of what the Sister Formation Movement and its often-mindless subservience to clerical authority, even in regions in which they, the parishioners, were clearly better did in the mid-20th century. educated and more experienced. Or think of the pre-Conciliar cohort in the ,Ch wurch who hether defenders of Council or throwbacks to Trent for whom the Council was a disaster, are something of a curiosity to 20-somethings today who cannot A major problem of the one or two person novitiate or initial remember a Mass in Latin, and think agonizing about an formation program, even when the older members of the unbaptized baby smacks of superstition at best. Congregation are the best people in the world and completely open to newer members and bending over backwards to Perhaps closer to home, for our purposes here, consider the point of psychological scoliosis to be non-judgmental, people who are “natives” to the electronic world, who welcoming, understanding, tolerant, encouraging and so were born after the invention of the computer and the on, is precisely that these newer members have entered establishment of the technological (as opposed to the a very different “world” or reality construction than the mechanical) world, who think and work and communicate one they come from and they have no cohort in which to and consume and relate and, in general, live in a different find themselves at home, take a breather from the rarified world, in many respects, from those of us who grew up in a atmosphere on planet “elderly”, feel their perceptions and pre-computer, non-electronic environment in which a landline questions and answers validated as real, coherent, and phone was the epitome of efficient communication. The very potentially understandable and answerable. When most of us meaning of “social” is irreducibly different for the cohort born were in formation, even though we rarely talked to each other into the electronic world from its meaning to those who are and when we did most important topics of conversation were transplants to the electronic continent from a planet long off limits, we knew, in our heart of hearts, that the novices go and far away which no longer exists. The possibility and knew what we knew, namely, that the formation personnel actuality of constant, immediate communication with and were all crazy. And that helped keep us sane until we blended virtual presence to anyone anywhere is not just a physical fact into the mainline of the community after developing new of contemporary social life; it is a life-shaping influence on definitions of “crazy” and “sane” and the ability to move the millennial generation that can neither be changed by (or between those two planets without getting the spiritual bends. probably fully understood by) people who do not belong to that cohort. Now, a weekend a couple times a year with other newer Religious is insufficient for developing a sense of cohort. It Participation in a cohort, the possibility and reality of sharing might give a sense of momentary relief from their sojourn on experience, insights, doubts, questions, etc. with companions another generational planet, but it might simply accentuate who instinctively resonate with one’s spontaneous “take” on just how estranging their basic, everyday experience is. lived reality is not just confirming or encouraging. It is not a Religious Life is composed of people who, over the course self-indulgent, immature desire for playmates. It is, to some of decades, have generated and live in a highly specialized extent, a necessity for people, especially young people who imaginative and behavioral world and even when they strive are testing their reality sense, the validity of their judgments, strenuously not to impose their worldview, values, attitudes, the normalcy of their reactions, the effectiveness of their etc. on the new member, her experience, if it includes choices and so on. They need the confirmation that they are virtually no sustained companionship with people of her own “not crazy”, that their questions are valid, that their concerns generation, is bound to be one of being an exotic species in an are broader than themselves, in short, they need the lived aquarium where, beautiful as they are, even the water and light experience that others, at least some others, live in the same are strange, to say nothing of the other fish. world that they do. They are not aliens in a strange land – which is what the relatively isolated experience of being in My point here is simple – although by no means easy or a Religious Congregation in which no one is less than 25 comfortable. Except perhaps for the enclosed monastery years older than oneself. If anything, the sheer breadth of which has somewhat different dynamics operative – newer vicarious experience which exposes the young person today Religious who are entering in ones or twos, often at very different ages, into ministerial Congregations, need, for normal to continuous up close contact with cultures all over the world, continued on next page development as Religious, a cohort environment. They need to programs in theology, or young adult religious programs be able to learn, grow, fail, succeed, experiment, question in an of one kind or another seeking, in some cases, a coherent environment in which their experience is common, shared, not approach to the religion they were born into, or, in other cases, in need of continual translation, at least by their peers. Very the justification of their latest experiment, or some alternative few Congregations are in a position to offer newer members to their birth-tradition that can make sense of their current this kind of cohort experience, just as few Congregations can experience. The people looking at Religious Life today are navigate the current economic or political or ministerial scene often not prepared, content-wise, to “give a reason for the faith in isolation. If there were nothing else to consider, I would that they profess” and of which they are proposing to live a suggest that the time has come to consider shared formation highly specialized version, namely, Religious Life. programs just as, in the late 1950’s and early 60’s, the Sister Formation Movement did, although what they needed to For example, we cannot expect mature sacramental practice combine, namely resources, was somewhat different from that is life and mission sustaining from people whose last what is most needed today, namely, shared socio-religious brush with sacramental theology was their preparation for cohort experience. First Communion. How can they be expected to take some kind of responsible position on homosexuality, same-sex PROGRAM: CONTENT AND STAFF marriage, transgenderism, divorce and remarriage, sex outside Now let me turn to the other, the second problem that of marriage, pre-nuptial cohabitation, celibacy, pacifism, just suggests to me that the time for shared formation programs war, the death penalty, contraception or any of dozens of other has arrived, namely, Program, including both staff and serious personal and social moral conundrums of our time if content. As we have already recognized, I hope, the religious/ they do not even know what conscience is – an annoying little spiritual background formation of most entrants to Religious voice inside spoiling most of their fun or just a figment of the Life today is not that of an intact Catholic family sending its childhood imagination like the bogey man – much less how children to the local parish school and reinforcing the stable conscience functions or should function in a mature believer. religious curriculum of the school with the orderly initiation How can they align their energies in relation to racism, sexism within the parish into the sacramental system, the mastery of a in society and especially in the Church, capital punishment, catechism of unquestioned and unquestionable doctrine, and war (just or unjust), human trafficking, and a multitude of the social reinforcement of continuous association with other other socio-political issues if they have had no exposure to children being raised the same way. We can certainly lament adult moral theology, personal or social? the uniformity, mechanistic approach, psychological pressure if not terror tactics associated with the rigid religious rules, A workshop here or there, a couple lectures by a visiting practices, and penalties of pre-conciliar Catholic education. theologian, exposure to a book on a subject which has not just But it is much easier, in the long run, to modify acquired two sides but multiple reasonably argued positions, is simply ideas and behaviors with more reasonable approaches than not sufficient to cause very much besides confusion. People to fill an intellectual and behavioral vacuum, or a confused who are going to accompany others in their moral lives have medley of beliefs, practices, and non-commitments or mental to be able to do much more than “just listen to people” and reservations with a positive and productive religious and “walk with them” while steering clear of intellectual content theological synthesis that can grow with the person as she or concrete choices. One does not “pick up” moral theology moves deeper into the Catholic Christian tradition within which and the ability to do complex, nuanced moral reasoning any her religious vocation is unfolding. Catholic Religious Life is, more than one picks up quantum physics or literary theory or after all, religious and Catholic – it is not a holding operation for aesthetics or psychology. whatever vague transcendental aspirations or commitments a What can we expect of a person who grew up in a family of person might harbor. multiple or no religious identity commitments, who has learned As many young adults who are serious about their own by osmosis or explicit teaching that one religion is as good as religious quest are finding out, they are ill-equipped, without another if the adherents of both are good people, and believes serious religious and theological education, to attempt to that she is a Catholic by accident of birth and a Christian by influence their world positively or even, themselves, to live in cultural habit but sees no real difference between Buddha and it coherently. These young people are increasingly showing up Jesus, no difference between revealed religion and a vague in theology departments, divinity schools, seminaries, masters ecological sensitivity to “nature” with a capital “N”?

Religious Formation Conference In other words, candidates for Religious Life today, if it is understood as something more than a social service organization, or volunteer corps or some sort of surrogate family, need to have a solid theological education which, given what is involved today, requires a minimum of three or four years of sustained, competent formation by people who do theology professionally.

How can a person whose historical knowledge of the Church volunteer corps or some sort of surrogate family, need to does not even include a realization of what happened at have a solid theological education which, given what is Vatican II, partly because she has no knowledge of what involved today, requires a minimum of three or four years of preceded the Council, situate herself in the ongoing struggles sustained, competent formation by people who do theology in the Church today, even struggles between bishops on professionally. Which is where the need comes in not only different sides of the same issue, to say nothing of pastors and for substantial content in the theological formation program lay people? How can she, actually, even decide what to read but for competent, full-time staff – trained theological or who to consult if she has not been exposed to what is “on professors – who are as well-equipped to educate these newer offer” in terms of contemporary types of theology, names of Religious theologically as others are to initiate them into the reputable authors, and other resources to which she can go as Congregations history and commitments. new issues arise for her in relation to her own spiritual life or the lives of the people to whom she ministers? Now, it is probably clear by now that I am mounting an argument for the establishment of a contemporary analogue In other words, a mature Religious needs a structured, to the Sister Formation colleges of pre-Vatican II vintage. No consistent, open-minded, in-depth acquaintance and community today is equipped to provide a graduate level knowledge of and about Catholic Christian theology if she is theological formation for newer members. And, I would argue, to be even basically equipped to live Catholic Religious Life in no one – short of miraculous intervention – is going to become the 21st century Church, much less to minister in the name of a full-fledged Religious without theological formation any that Church. She needs not a workshop, an occasional article more than they will become competent teachers or doctors or book, an isolated course here and there. She needs a full or social workers without graduate education in those fields. scale, basic, organized, se quential theological formation that We don’t have the personnel, the libraries and other research includes Scripture – both what it means to claim that a religion resources, but especially we cannot supply the quintessentially is biblically based and why Scripture is different from other necessary cohort of fellow students, the diversity of faculty, literary or religious classics, and knowledge of the content and the atmosphere of intellectual variety and growth needed of the Christian scriptures, both Hebrew Scriptures and New to bring candidates for Religious Life to the theological Testament. She needs a robust Christology including how maturity necessary for them to live the life themselves and Christian faith in the incarnation and the divinity of Jesus minister in the complex world and Church in which we live, in differs from the position of other religions on genuinely which they must function. admirable divine avatars or savior figures; Church history, including history of Religious Life, that can help her distinguish Before I make a concrete suggestion about how we might face between the substantive and the historically contingent; moral and meet this need for a theological, cohort-based formation theology, both general understanding of such categories program at reputable accredited theological faculties, I would as conscience, law, sin, virtue and moral reasoning and case mention just in passing a couple other benefits that such a studies of concrete moral dilemmas and how to work with the move might precipitate. For one thing, having such inter- people who face them; ecclesiology which will enable her to congregational scholasticates, or whatever we might call them, understand what it means to say that the Church is the Body in a couple or even several places in the United States might of Christ, how this comes to expression in Scripture and how help solve another problem we face in regard to vocations, it has been understood historically and is understood today, namely, the visibility of the life as a viable choice for younger and what that means for relationship with people who are people. Having some concentrations of people in formation not Christian or Christian in other denominations, and how at various locales throughout the country where someone one can think about issues such as ministry, the exercise of considering Religious Life could come, visit, talk to people their authority in the Church, responsible dissent, how to deal with own age, in their own cohort, about their experience of the life, conflicts within the Church, and so on. She needs a theology of even visit classes and spend community time with a variety Religious Life which is not a club or philanthropic organization of newer Religious would be both more realistic and probably or social phenomenon but a lifeform rooted in perpetual more motivating for someone in an initial stage of inquiry than profession and what the vows Religious make really mean, not taking part in some kind of “come and see” mini-program just in practice but biblically, historically, theologically. In other constructed for the prospective candidate. The inquirer could words, candidates for Religious Life today, if it is understood spend some time with a variety of younger people actively as something more than a social service organization, or involved in formation for the life. There is a difference between continued on next page reading a publicity brochure about a university, for example, part, and to function as a competent and responsible minister and making a visit to the campus where people are actually equipped to help people in many ways and to help people get living the life of the university and can “show you around” help beyond what the minister is prepared to offer when that in every sense of the word. Visibility is a serious problem for is indicated. In other words, the theological resources newer us today because we don’t have a variety of communities of Religious need are available. It is not necessary to re-invent the newer Religious to whom we can introduce an inquirer. Older wheel or create some exotic theological entity out of whole Religious can certainly answer questions, be hospitable, show cloth. Just as we send a prospective teacher or educational genuine interest in a visitor. But seeing what life as a Religious- administrator to get a masters or doctorate in education in-training looks and feels like is different. or a prospective financial officer to business school or into economics, we need, in my opinion, to provide all prospective And secondly, although it would take some ingenuity and ministers (and that is what all Religious in formation are) at creativity, as well as some allocation of financial resources least mid-level (that is, masters level) theological education to launch a program of theological formation for newer and formation while some might get doctoral level formation members at established theological centers, it might, in the if they are going to specialize in theological ministries. And I long run be a practical and economical move. Rather than would add, the fact that someone enters Religious Life with a having three or four part-time “formators” trying to juggle masters or doctorate in a secular discipline such as economics, their own full-time ministries with the attempt at constituting administration, history, chemistry, medicine or law or fine a “formation community” for the new members and somehow arts or psychology, does not mean that they are educated doing what is needed by the one or two people in formation, theologically or prepared for ministry, even for the exercise of the Congregation’s appointed formator would be overseeing their profession (psychology or law, for example) as ministry. the participation of the newer member or members in the All Religious need graduate level education in theology (which established theological formation program to which they is the “form” of all ministry) and in ministry (which is not just are sent and would be able, then, to orchestrate the other professional practice by baptized people). dimensions of formation, such as learning congregational history, getting to know the community itself, some Such a plan for the theological formation of new members at introduction to the Congregation’s ministries, cultural schools or faculties of theology would have to include plans immersion programs, etc. which might take place between for formative living (probably inter-congregationally which is semesters, in the summer, and so on. how Religious in the future will probably live at least some of their professed lives), spiritual direction, ministerial initiation, So, let me make a concrete proposal, not because it is the special instruction in Religious Life and practice in living the only one or the best one, but just as a conversation starter, an vows in relation to accountability, financial inter-dependence, incentive from which some creative planning might emerge. growth in the social dimensions of a celibate lifestyle, and One negative thing we can learn from the Sister Formation other elements of a formation program as well as good use Movement (and incidentally from the seminary pattern that of academic breaks for spending time at the motherhouse, has gone on for a couple centuries in the Church as the model in Congregational missions or other Congregational venues, for clerical formation) is that the kind of formative education participation in community events and so on. In other words, we are talking about cannot be effected today – if it ever younger Religious need to learn by practice how to live both could have – by building isolated or enclosed institutions like intensely identified with their own Congregation and inter- Sister Formation Colleges or seminaries, which cocoon the congregationally with other Religious, those of their own people in formation from the very world they are preparing cohort and older Religious – because this is probably how they to serve, foster a sense of “distance,” “exclusivity,” “privilege,” will be living and ministering throughout their mature careers and even “superiority” to the people to whom they will be as Religious. sent, and which themselves became architectural white elephants that created more problems than they solved. There Before you throw up your hands and say this is impossible, are, in this country, a number of geographically well-located inconceivable, too expensive, not viable, not necessary, institutions of higher theological education which could meet dangerous to our distinctive charisms, etc. I would make a plea quite adequately the academic needs of a theologically based that we at least think about it. The Sister Formation Movement formation program. They are located on both coasts and managed to educate a whole generation of thousands of in several places in the Midwest. Boston, Chicago, St. Louis, newer Religious, who were then ready when the time came for Berkeley come immediately to mind as centers which offer a the task of building Vatican II into our Congregations’ lives and variety of graduate level theological programs: research based ministries. These products of Sister Formation are the people predominantly academic degrees such as M.A.s and PhDs in leading our Congregations today. We have found ways to deal religious studies and/or theology; specifically “religious” or corporately, without losing our identities or going broke, with “ministerial” degree programs such as STMs and ThMs , MDivs our problems of aging and retirement, transforming huge and DMins; and ecclesiastical degrees like the STL, the ThD, physical plants into viable, flexible resources, sharing rather and the STD. The emphases in these various programs differ than duplicating health care facilities, learning to invest, recruit, as does the amount of time needed to complete them, but all finance, and fund-raise in cooperative ways. We work together of them have the advantage of being structured to “cover the in ministries – not only with lay people but among ourselves bases” of theological preparation – both preparation of the and between our Congregations. We have collaborated in student to live a theologically coherent personal spiritual life of learning new approaches to and methods of leadership, which lifelong theological development should be an integral opening new inter-congregational ministries, defending

Religious Formation Conference ourselves corporately against unjust attacks, making our life gether of these factors is that Religious Life for the foreseeable understandable to our lay friends and colleagues even to the future will be a much smaller phenomenon than it was when extent that they want, in increasing numbers, to join us as most of us entered. It is not that no one is entering Religious affiliates and associates and volunteers. Is it not time to face Life but we probably will never again see the life as anything this challenge of how to form a new generation of Religious, a other than a minority, specialized lifeform, which, perhaps, is new cohort of theologically sophisticated younger people who what it should be. will do Religious Life differently in the future because they will have been formed differently but who will be able to do for a new time what we continue to do for our time? We stand on the shoulders of risk-takers and The present situation is increasingly unworkable. As Einstein, builders. May we be worthy of our ancestors. that intellectual “saint” of our time is famously quoted as saying, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” But Einstein also said, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” I don’t So what is the analogy between the situation of impending think we are insane, but I do think we could be much more professional and ministerial irrelevance of Religious, due to imaginative – precisely in our approach to knowledge, and in lack of personal and professional formation, in the second half particular theological knowledge appropriated for spiritual of the 20th century that was averted by the Sister Formation development and ministry. If we are convinced that we are Movement and our current situation in which we are in danger not going to suddenly discover hordes of young people eager of losing our ministerial and spiritual leverage because of the to enter Religious Life, that for the foreseeable future we are decline in numbers and increase in age of our membership? going to be a relatively small band of people who must make And, more importantly, is there, and if so what might it be, that up by the quality of each individual member what we lack would be the analogous equivalent of the Sister Formation in quantity, then we need to find, to raise, to generate the Movement for our time. Can we imagine what, in our time, resources we need to prepare every single person who enters could perhaps avert, the withering away of the ministerial Religious Life to make a qualitatively superior contribution to influence of Religious due to the changing numerical and age Religious Life itself, to our Congregations, and to the People structure of our membership? I think there is, but I don’t think of God committed to us and our ministries. “Saint” Einstein we have a long time to get in motion and I do think we will had another important dictum: that no problem can be solved need at least as much vision, creativity, courage, and ability from within the consciousness that created it. A defeated to take risks, deal with set-backs, and work together as the or defeatist consciousness dominated by the specter of pioneers of the Sister Formation Movement needed. As they scarcity and diminishment, by a need to conserve resources started to find or build the colleges needed to educate Sisters, against the possibility of extinction, or even a fear of diversity, engage or produce the professors needed to teach the people questions, and experimentation, will not come up with in formation, develop a curriculum that would provide the solutions rooted in quality, abundance, confidence in the God integrated formation they knew was necessary, confront the who lets the rain and the sun fall copiously on all, and about Bishops and pastors who did not want “their” Sisters kept out whom we can never know enough much less too much. We of the classroom or the hospital long enough to be formed and stand on the shoulders of risk-takers and builders. May we be educated and did not want the resultant educated “uppity” worthy of our ancestors. nuns who knew as much as they did in their institutions, did not want to pay what an educated corps of professionals A major difference between the second half of the 20th century was worth and what their education cost. In other words, just and the first decades of the 21st is, of course, that the numbers as patchwork and stop-gap measures could not bring the of Sisters below retirement age is a fraction of what it was in frontier-formed Religious of the 19th and early 20th century the 1950s. Mary has just reviewed the statistics and some of the into the post-Conciliar Church and post-modern world of the reasons for the precipitous decline in the numbers of Religious late 20th and dawning 21st century, so the formation projects in the so-called first world. The take-away from these facts for that we have been experimenting with since our novitiates what I want to talk about is that the precipitous decline in num- went from 60 candidates to 1 or 2 and those 1 or 2 entered with bers of people entering Religious Life is not due to something high-level professional qualifications and little or no religious Religious have done wrong but to the ecclesiastical, cultural, or spiritual culture or formation cannot prepare this small and social features of our post-modern culture, including corps for the specialized role in Church and world that they the drastic decline in family size among Catholics, the vastly must play. My suggestion is that if Religious Life is to continue expanded life-expectancy and therefore delayed maturation of to make a qualitative contribution to the Church and world of first-world people and very increased life-expectancy of these our time, with far fewer personnel who will live longer, change people, the religious and denominational disaffiliation of a large ministries many times over that life-span, live more highly proportion of the first world population, including Catholics; the individualized professional, spiritual, and personal lives, they change in the age-structure of that population from concentra- must be formed in new ways that have to be imagined and tion below the age of 20 to concentration about the age of 60, created –sooner rather than later.  the expansion of educational and vocational opportunities for women, and such social factors such as feminism, post-mod- ernism, and the sexual revolution over which we, as Religious, have no control at all. I think the conclusion of the coming to-