cloister_paschal

by Regina Siegfried ASC

(Reprinted with permission from the May-June, 2002, issue of Review For Religious)

What motivates a congregation to use different terminology to describe its charism; what prompts that same community to find another word to say its name both to itself and to other people? The Adorers of the Blood of Christ have recently experienced these two developments. For a community of women religious whose charism is rooted in a central mystery of our redemption, the answers to those questions flow from a developing appreciation of the richness of our charism.

Charism

Some excellent recent studies of religious life and charism form background reading for this article. Rather than focusing on the nuances and distinctions of charisms, this article concentrates on the growth of one congregation's understanding its charism and maintains that "history changed the expression of our charism," as Joe Nassal, CPPS remarks in his article "Reclaiming Our Name." While nineteenth-century terminology often sounds like language from another era to twenty-first-century ears, the heart of the founding charism expressed in language from another age and culture still resonates for our congregation today. In a letter to Biagio Valentini, CPPS, dated June 28, 1841 Maria de Mattias, founder of the Congregation, wrote: "The spirit of this holy work. . .is all charity. . .charity toward God and the dear neighbor." The Preface to the 1857 Constitution phrases the understanding of the charism in these words:

Now this our lowly Congregation that lives and labors under the glorious title of the most precious Blood of Jesus Christ must be patterned and shaped into a living image of that divine charity with which this divine blood was shed and of which it was and is sign, expression, measure, and pledge.

Maria de Mattias focused her understanding of our sharing in the Redemption in terms of our practice of "charity toward God and the dear neighbor." With her history rooted in violent nineteenth-century Italy where political and social strife were the reality of life, Maria de Mattias knew that the "divine charity with which this divine blood was shed" spoke to the hearts of her "dear neighbors," especially the women and children who needed education and longed to hear a word of peace.

Recent Developments in the Founding Charism

After Vatican II, the congregation, now world-wide, missionary, and ministering in truly needy places, rephrased its understanding of the founding charism in its 1968 "Life Charter" which was retained for the 1992 revision of the Constitution:

Our charism as Adorers of the Blood of Christ is deeply rooted in the death-resurrection mystery of Jesus. Ours is a paschal identity, signed in the blood of the Lamb. As a congregation we are to bear witness in hope and joy to the living presence in our world today of Christ's adoring, redeeming love, which gives meaning to human suffering and can render it powerfully liberating and life-giving. (#22 "Paschal Mystery in Our Charism")

Although the title of the congregation has changed slightly over the course of our history, Adorers has always been a decisive part. The original document written in Maria's own hand has Adorers of the Divine Blood. A later shift was to Adorers of the Blood of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. In 1968, the title of the congregation was changed from Sisters Adorers of the Most Precious Blood to Adorers of the Blood of Christ to reflect a more contemporary and holistic understanding of the theology of the Blood of Christ. The United States expression of the charism moved from devotionalism to a concentration on the Paschal Mystery. We began to be aware of the cycles of life-death-Resurrection in the life of Jesus, the life of the Church, and in the lives of the congregation and its individual members. Immersed in this mystery of our redemption through community education and personal prayer, we began to focus on growing to be "more credible witness[es] of God's tender love of which the blood of Jesus is vibrant sign and unending covenant pledge" (Life Charter, # 2).

Becoming credible witnesses meant (and still means) living lives of simplicity, involvement in social justice issues, solidarity with the poor, and growth in community living through workshops in communication, conflict resolution, and prayer. Reflecting on the intensely apostolic dimension of the charism helped us to understand that ministry flows from prayer and prayer floods ministry, much as the classic "Gift of the Nile" provided thriving stands of wheat. The Adorers of our title is contemplative; the Blood of Christ keeps us mindful of the work of redemption. The one title symbolizes the unity of contemplation and mission. Along with other communities, we researched our roots, wrote histories, and reclaimed a charism that had been in us from the beginning. We were proud to be Adorers of the Blood of Christ, confident that our Paschal Mystery charism continued to be a fiery and energizing spirit for the Church and us.

From Paschal Mystery to Reconciliation

In "Reclaiming Our Name," Joe Nassal, CPPS writes: "The charism does not change. . . What changes is our response that is shaped by the currents of history" (p. 842). This is precisely what happened to the Adorers of the Blood of Christ and to other Precious Blood congregations in the early 1990s. After two decades of highlighting the Paschal Mystery facet of the charism, historical events drew our attention, prayer, and reflection to another face of our theologically complex charism.

Our international congregation has a province in Bosnia and had United States missionaries in Liberia, West Africa. In the early 1990s war raged in both places. While we dreaded that Sisters in Bosnia might be killed, it was the five United States Adorers shot in Liberia, West Africa in October 1992 that gave the Croatian Sisters who ministered in Bosnia the courage to stay with the people, to witness to peace, and to attempt to bring reconciliation there. Matija Pavic, one of the Croatian Adorers who experienced the war and destruction of that country wrote:

Since their martyrdom I can say we feel greater closeness among us, at the level of the province and of the congregation as well. . . . We experienced the truth of the Word that we are called to witness Christ even to shedding of our own blood. We were Overwhelmed by feelings of worry, compassion, and Prayer; it was as if their suffering spilled over into us.

Reconciliation is possible only when we have embraced the Paschal Mystery.

The world-wide violent shedding of blood in our life time-South Africa, Central and South America, Croatia, Bosnia, Rwanda, Indonesia, in the crime and violence in our own streets, Afghanistan, and in recent terrorist attacks - cries for reconciliation rather than revenge. As Adorers, we understand the seemingly impossible hope that the shedding of the Blood of Christ gives to Christianity. Christ's death was not the end, but the beginning of salvation and reconciliation. So, too, the bloodshed and suffering of our world today need not be the end but the beginning of a new, albeit painful, reconciliation for this world of ours today. While South Africa and Central America horrified us with their violence and blood poured out, they were far away from our rather insulated lives, or so it seemed. Liberia and Bosnia, similarly far away were made personal, close-up, and full of grief for us Adorers because of the presence, suffering, and deaths of our sisters in those countries. We became the sufferers with raw and public sorrow. We also knew that our Sisters gave their lives in the service of the Liberian people and that the Croatian Sisters willingly suffered along with their people.

Robert Schreider, CPPS writes:

Repentance can originate from the side of those who have perpetrated violence, but reconciliation and forgiveness must come from the side of those who have suffered violence.

Revenge is anger with an ugly face and wielding weapons. The retaliator is reduced to the level of the perpetrator; revenge continues the cycle of violence, spinning it out of control into more madness. Reconciliation is love tempered by suffering, immersing the wounded in the depths of the Paschal Mystery of our redemption. Reconcilers seek to restore wholeness, not cause more fragmentation and division.

Reconciliation and revenge are not mutually exclusive dichotomies; rather they are participants in a conversation that needs more discussion to reach deeper understanding. For either partner to demonize the other vitiates the process. In a homily during a prayer service for peace shortly after Sept. 11, 2001 Joan Range, ASC reflected that "we must reflect on the cost of bring peace through reconciliation." She prayed that Jesus will "heal our wounds and give us your Spirit so that we can be ambassadors of your reconciling presence in the world." Peace and peacemaking on many levels become the work of those who reconcile.

Robert Schreiter describes three characteristics of the spirituality of reconciliation: an attitude of listening and waiting, attention and compassion, and a post-exilic stance. As we tell our own stories of the violence done to us, we learn to listen to other sufferers, to wait with them as the pain becomes transformative. Reconciliation keeps us conscious of the suffering of others; we become compassionate in ways we never dreamed possible. We learn to live in a new place, beyond the circumstances that have exiled us from our former existence. Schreiter writes:

For those who are reconciled, reconciliation becomes a calling. They move to a wholly new place, from which they call oppressors to repentance and serve in a prophetic way for the whole of society.

From ASCs to Adorers

Why, in the last year or two, has the United States province of the Adorers of the Blood of Christ, begun to refer to ourselves as Adorers instead of the formerly common ASCs? (Our website is now even http://adorers.org)! Is it merely for more name recognition and an attempt to avoid insider Catholic, religious life, language? While Adorers might be easier to understand, indeed even have better name recognition, I think there's more to the new use than an effort to enhance our public image.

The shift from ASCs to Adorers highlights the contemplative dimension of the charism and provides for the balance of prayer in the midst of activity. Helen Lindsey, ASC believes that "Adorer is a statement of who we are; adoration is what establishes the uniqueness of our charism." We have become comfortable with Adorers because we have contemplated the Paschal Mystery, are in the process of realizing and internalizing the depths of reconciliation and wonder where next the vitality of the charism will lead us as our history unfolds.

Perhaps Maria De Mattias sensed the link between adoration and reconciliation when she wrote to Bishop Annovazzi on November 13, 1838 that our work is to "establish that beautiful order of things which the great Son of God came to establish in his blood." Contemplation and adoration urges us to reconciliation and restoration of right relationships.

Therese Wetta, ASC succinctly summarizes the unfolding of the charism when she says:

Reconciliation as a current expression of our Charism was prompted, I believe, by the work the CPPS men were doing on spirituality coupled with the increasing need for reconciliation in our more violent and disturbed world. Love and unity have always been expressions of our charism. Now we see love and unity achieved through efforts at reconciliation-the same deep union that Jesus achieved for/with us through the shedding of his blood.

While this article concentrates on one small community, I think it has implications beyond the Adorers of the Blood of Christ. If we believe that our charisms are vibrant, flaming gifts and graces given to the founders and living in us today, they do indeed grow, transform, and breathe in us today for our world. Communities can trace the expansion and maturing of the foundational charism to discover how that gift is still relevant, appropriate, and significant in contemporary society.

US Mission Center, 4233 Sulphur Avenue, St. Louis, MO 63109, 877-272-1870
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(Copyright 2005 Adorers of the Blood of Christ)