We Are Mission: Witnesses to Social Ministry Within the Comboni Family
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THE COMBONI FAMILY COMMISSION ON MINISTERIALITY WE ARE MISSION: WITNESSES TO SOCIAL MINISTRY WITHIN THE COMBONI FAMILY Edited by Fernando Zolli and Daniele Moschetti Cover and illustrations by UMBERTO GAMBA Since 1977, he has presented solo exhibitions in Italy and abroad. He collaborates with national and international Catholic and associationist publications; a painter by profession, he illustrated many books and publications. [email protected] www.umbertogamba.it 3 3 5 Why a second volume? Sister Luigina Coccia and Father Tesfaye Tadesse And their General Councils CMS - MCCJ «Now there are different gifts, but the same Spirit. There are different ministries, but the same Lord. And there are different activities, but the same God produces each gift in each person. A manifestation of the Spirit is given to each person for the common good. One and the same Spirit is active in all these, distributing to each person as he wills. For just as the body is one and has many parts, and all the parts of that body, though many, are one body so also is Christ.» 1 Corinthians 12 Dearest Brothers and Sisters, you will surely remember the first vol- ume Be the change you wish to see in the world; the ideas animating and guiding us were presented to you at that time, mainly as far as it concerns Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation. Those paths were in their turn possible thanks to the encounters between the World Social Forums (WSF) and the Forums organised by the Comboni Family con- comitantly with WSFs. Our commitment in the field of social ministeriality is huge in terms of space and time. We are heirs to a rich ministerial experience who was born and raised over these 150 years of History and Life due to many missionaries brothers and sisters’ dedication. They have interpreted the uniqueness of our Charism with apostolic enthusiasm and creativeness. Our wish is to share the broad range of the concrete ministerial expe- riences this second volume presents. First, to appreciate what we are already doing thanks to the gift of the Holy Spirit and also to our com- munal and individual answers. Secondly, to value the different works carried out by the Comboni missionaries which are complementary and mutually enriching by revealing us the fullness of the Charism with ever-increasing dynamism. We are convinced that sharing this plurality of experiences will work as charismatic attraction to young people attending our community, to- ward the option of an answer to God on their part as Comboni mission- ary brothers and sisters. 5 We welcome the gift of this second volume with renewed faith in the light of hope that enlivens us. Even if our Institutes and their Combo- ni Mission go far beyond this specific experiences, the encounter with them is important especially to younger generations’ formation jour- ney by taking care of their academic level. These experiences of missionary presence in the field of social pasto- ral care are varied as well as diverse with regard to the geographical context of action. Saint Daniel Comboni’s Charism pervades them, as they always are an answer by the Gospel to concrete situations of impoverishment and marginalisation. They further help us deepen the spirituality which sustains our social ministeriality. While leafing through the pages of this book, you will find a greatministerial variety. It is therefore noteworthy that many times a single project is fuelled by many particular services: this means to respond holistically/integrally to human beings’ complex reality and to the environment where they live. We invite and encourage you to wel- come the gift of the Holy Spirit who wants us in our turn to welcome the newness which is inherent into the folds of the social complexity, and then to open ourselves to the beauty of the upright life according to the teachings of the Gospel. We rejoice with the profound desire to transform reality which moti- vates the efforts of those who have experienced these paths firsthand. It is wonderful to understand that we are contributing significantly to making people the real protagonists of their own history. This is an ex- tremely important dimension, we might say constitutive, to the Plan for the Regeneration of Africa. This book helps us to evaluate how various ministries are having impact on the social transformation of reality, and how our ministerial presence is meeting an actual necessity given by the signs of the times where we live. The collaborative dimension of these experiences is a further element underlining the richness of this volume. Behind them, it is really im- portant to highlight the effort of a team operating at various levels of commitment and sharing gifts. As Comboni Family and inter-congrega- tional experience, we rejoice and validate such paths that bear witness to the importance and the emergency of being and living our mission in communion with each others. 6 7 Ministerial cooperation is the core foundation of the dream we were born from: ecclesial experience has to be built together, and we must be able to create alliances with other participants sharing our vision now more than ever. As General Directions of the SMC and the MCCJ and Central Committee of the CLM, we have received the proposal to set up the Comboni Family Commission to develop criteria and common guidelines on ministerial collaboration according to the Comboni Charism in order to help each other along this path. We are very grate- ful to the members of this commission for the work they carry on, and we sincerely wish them all the best. We are sure of their commitment - both as Comboni Family and individuals - in helping us giving life and supporting different ways of cooperating toward an aware social minis- teriality which should be focused on adequate growth - both human and spiritual - and on social transformation as a whole. The Synod for the Amazon, which has just ended in these days, has provided us with a document. Four kinds of conversions are required, and they are pastoral, cultural, ecological and synodal conversion; only in this way, a new world is possible. We surrender ourselves to the Holy Spirit’s living action while we are entrusting to Him the fruits of this great ecclesial event, and the journey this second volume has embarked on. Enjoy the reading and do not forget to spread the good news you will find in this book! 7 9 Presentation Members of the Social Ministry Commission: Father Daniele Mo- schetti, Sister Maria Teresa Ratti, Mister Marco Piccione, Sister Hélène Israël Soloumta Kamkol, Father Fernando Zolli Partners: Father Domenico Guarino, Father Joseph Mumbere Mu- sanga, Father Fernando González Galarza, Brother Alberto Parise, Father Arlindo Pinto Words and facts, ideas and actions are dynamics of a process that helps to grow, to face and to transform situations and contexts that challenge our everyday life. Thinking and acting are the two poles of human expe- rience that, by interconnecting, illuminate and complete each other, thus giving answers and starting solutions to the historical evolution of events and of life experience itself; this symbiosis also helps to seize opportuni- ties and to manage the critical aspects of each historical process. The Comboni charismatic experience was born and grew in this way; it started from the concrete experience and contact with the reality of Africa, followed the ancient path that others had walked before (Writ- ings n. 2746), took up the socio-cultural, religious, anthropological and environmental challenges, and proposed a new system, which found its completion and clarity in the Plan for the Regeneration of Africa with Africa itself. Comboni’s Plan, as we well know, was a gift of divine inspiration, but in the same way it was the result of meetings, debates, revisions; there was no lack of misunderstandings, criticism and positions that caused suf- fering, divisions, rejections and exclusions. From the first trip to Africa, undertaken by Comboni when he was only twenty-six years old (1857), as a member of the expedition organised by Don Mazza’s Institute, until the publication of the Plan (1864), seven years of research, discern- ment, revisions, prayers and inspirations passed, until it offered us an instrument that is still valid today in many of its features and which, along with the Postulatum pro Nigris, presented by Comboni to the Fa- thers of the First Vatican Council, constitute fundamental paradigms of reference for the evangelizing work of the Comboni Family in favour of 9 all the existential peripheries which, everywhere in the world, ask to be introduced to the beautiful cause of the values of the Kingdom. Theory and practice must proceed together and be articulated in the dynamics of daily life, as Benedict XVI reminds us: “Deeds without knowledge are blind and knowledge without love is sterile” (Caritas in Veritate, n. 30). A combination that is a guarantee of effectiveness for the proclamation of the Gospel in every part of the world and in every circumstance. Albert Einstein had had the same perception by start- ing from a different perspective: “Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind.” In this epochal change - an expression of Pope Francis - there is a need to understand how the Church and how the Gospel, which the Church bears witness to, can change reality, can have the capacity to influence the social, political, economic and cultural life of peoples and the eco- system of the territories. The Gospel as the living Word, not as a dead word. This is the great objective that the book is proposing: to present the orthopraxis of the social ministries of the Comboni Family, from Vatican Council II to the present day.