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LCWR Assembly Explores the Call to Foster Communion in a Fractured World

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LCWR Assembly Explores the Call to Foster Communion in a Fractured World LCWR Update — October 2018 — page 1 October 2018 LCWR Assembly Explores the Call to Foster Communion in a Fractured World t LCWR’s 2018 assembly, held in St. Louis, August 7-10, nearly 800 participants explored the assembly theme of “Being the Presence of ALove: The Power of Communion.” The assembly focused on the urgent need to foster communion and connection in a world plagued by polarization, division, and fractures of communion. Speakers explored insights from new understandings of Trinitarian theology and how those insights might help in the creation of new and more effective ways of strengthening and supporting the global community. In her presidential address, Teresa Maya, CCVI spoke Keynoters Simón Pedro Arnold, OSB; Heidi Russell; Gloria of the need to be prepared for this unique time in Schaab, SSJ; and facilitator Cathy Bertrand, SSND religious life and what may be the new call to Catholic leadership will not be complete until we have called all sisters. “Our new apostolic call is centered on meaning. of our sisters to share the ‘why’ of their extraordinary We need to tell our story, the deep meaning of our lives.” lives, that allowed us to do everything we have done,” she said. “Our story needs to be shared with a world She continued, “We will become lighter and itinerant, desperate for meaning and purpose. Sisters, our time in we will be fewer. However, we will be enough; we will be what God needs today. We will bring with us our call to community and our stubborn conviction that Christ suffering in God’s people requires our response.” The first keynoter, Gloria Schaab, SSJ, proposed that “living in Trinitarian relation in our world calls us to foster nonhierarchical relationships of inclusivity; transform social, ethical, and political systems; and imitate divine solidarity with human suffering.” To the extent that we do this, she noted, is “the radical power of communion and love in the image of Trinity dynamic, emergent, and effective in the church and in our world.” The second keynoter, Heidi Russell, spoke of the Fox News interviews LCWR president Teresa Maya, CCVI interconnectedness of all of life, reminding participants, prior to the start of the assembly in its St. Louis studio (continued on page 3) LCWR Update — October 2018 — page 2 From the LCWR Presidency Facing Our Histories of Racism by Sharlet Wagner, CSC — LCWR President y first international trip as a me with a smile, and said a few words to newly-elected leadership team the sister next to me. She translated, “He Mmember was a visit to our sisters told me, ‘She is a guest in our country. We in Bangladesh. The trip was a profound must be nice to her.’” experience of disorientation and displace- ment for me. Bangladesh, a country that I remembered this experience during the is 90% Muslim, has a culture that is rich LCWR national assembly in St. Louis as I in sounds, scents, colors, and dress that listened to keynote speaker Heidi Russell were entirely foreign to my experience. I challenge us to examine our own racism. had lived and traveled internationally but I had been shockingly quick to see this had never felt quite so alien nor quite so Bengali Muslim man as a threat. I, who helpless as I did in Bangladesh. believe wholeheartedly that we are all sisters and brothers, equally created in the Two of our sisters and I were traveling image of Christ, had seen only the strange from one village to another by train in the stranger sitting across from me, and one morning, and as we stood on the had failed to see the Christ. platform, a crowd of men formed a We are called to circle around us, several people deep, We rightly cry out for justice in society all staring at me. I knew rationally that explore how our biases and decry the evils committed through they meant no harm. I looked very intolerance, through fear of the “other,” foreign and they were simply curious. and prejudices con- through all of the “isms” that pollute our Nevertheless, I felt my anxiety rising as tinue to limit both our world. It is good that we do this. At the the minutes passed and the crowd grew. same time, as leaders in our religious Thankfully, the train soon arrived and congregations and our congregations, we must each examine our we boarded and found seats facing an sisters and brothers. own “isms,” and help our members do the older man and two children, a boy and same. This means facing histories of rac- a girl. ism in our communities. At the same time, it is critical that we not naively assume The man’s appearance fit the Western that congregational racism belongs only stereotype of a fundamentalist Muslim. He wore a full- to our past. We are called to explore how our biases and length white robe and white prayer cap and had a long prejudices continue to limit both our congregations and grey beard and bushy grey eyebrows beneath which his our sisters and brothers. When we help ourselves and eyes glared out at me in a menacing way. I was already our members to become more finely attuned to our un- in a state of heightened anxiety due to my experience conscious intolerances and assumptions of superiority, on the train platform, and this did nothing to calm we can become fuller participants in God’s mission. me. As we waited for the train to move, I feverishly thought, “He hates me! He knows I’m a Christian, and The Muslim man on a crowded train was a profound an American, and he hates me!” I only hoped he would experience of God’s presence for me. His act of reach- not act on his obvious animosity toward me. ing out toward me shattered my stereotypes and called forth a desire to reach back. I had some Oreo cookies At that moment a vendor walked by and I asked the in my bag, and I asked the man’s permission to share Sister next to me what he was selling. She told me it them with him and his two grandchildren. The Good was chanachur, a local spicy snack food. When the ven- News was profoundly present among us as they ate dor passed the other way, the menacing man opposite Oreos and I ate chanachur and the train moved through me stopped him, bought some chanachur, handed it to the Bangladesh countryside. LCWR Update — October 2018 — page 3 LCWR Assembly Explores Communion (continued from page 1) “At our core we are interconnected to one another and to God, and yet somehow we find ourselves limited in our relationality, finite in our capacity to connect to one another.” Sharing insights into racism that she has gleaned from her experience after adopting two children who are black, she challenged participants to continuously ask themselves: “Whose voices do we not hear? What connections have we turned off? Who are Responders Charmaine Krohe, SSND; Cecilia Magladry, CSJ; those at the margins of our communities?” Sangeeta Ayithamattam, SCN; and Barbara Dreher, CSJ Simón Pedro Arnold, OSB spoke of the freedom that religious life, and the world we serve? Throughout the arises when one accepts one’s own vulnerability assembly participants were also invited to commit to and need for mutual dependence. Communion, he spending time each day in personal and communal believes, is “not the end of rifts and divisions among contemplation that placed them in deeper communion us,” and it comes from “the choice to share with one with the world, especially the places of great suffering another our vulnerabilities, fragilities, and wounds.” and pain. “For those in the ministry of leadership in religious life, the increasing fragility of institutions, persons, Being in Communion: Standing Against Racism and communities is almost always seen as a dying…. Would this be a gospel attitude?” he asked. “The The assembly unanimously recommitted to its 2016 ministry of leadership is to believe, trust, and permit assembly resolution which states: the providential and surprising fruitfulness of fragility, not to resist it.” In the presence of constant and painful reminders of the deep roots of racism in our country, we Participants practiced contemplative dialogue in the Leadership Conference of Women Religious small groups twice during the assembly, asking the reaffirm the 2016 assembly resolution and pledge questions: What ignites a spark in you about the power to go deeper into the critical work of creating of communion as it relates to your life and ministry? communion, examining the root causes of injustice What matters most for the future of our communities, and our own complicity, and purging ourselves, our communities, and our country of the sin of racism and its destructive effects. (continued on page 4) Deepening group listeners Barbara Flores, SCN; Virginia Herbers, ASCJ; and Susan Francois, CSJP; and contempla- Responders Jane Herb, IHM; Veronique Wiedower, CSC; Pat tive guide Liz Sweeney, SSJ Siemen, OP; and Maria Hughes, ASC LCWR Update — October 2018 — page 4 LCWR Assembly Explores Communion thanked Mary Pellegrino, CSJ as she concluded her service as past president. (continued from page 3) Following the passage of the resolution, the participants demonstrated their commitment by leaving the meeting area and walking outside to the steps St. Louis’ Old Courthouse where Dred Scott sued for his freedom in 1846. There, the nearly 800 members stood in silent prayer to remember victims of racism and to pray for the systemic elimination of racism throughout the country and the world. Outstanding Leadership Award 2018-19 LCWR presidency: Jayne Helmlinger, CSJ; During the assembly, LCWR bestowed the 2018 Sharlet Wagner, CSC; and Teresa Maya, CCVI Outstanding Leadership Award on Anita Baird, a member of the Daughters of the Heart of Mary.
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