INTRODUCTION TO WORKBOOK III

Now that we have seen what a commitment to Justice and Peace means in the daily life of an individual brother, sister and community (Workbook #1), and the foundations required for this type of work (Workbook #2), we are ready to take the next step. We will look at the practical ways of doing things and implementing a project, be it as an individual or as a community. This Workbook will not be presenting you with a protocol or a list of administrative procedures to follow. What it will do, is present the methodological guidelines to be used, those that are most effective in the fight against poverty, injustice, war, violence and exclusion.

It is important to remember that this work cannot be reduced to the mere realization of a series of specific projects carried out by people whom we consider to be specialists in the area of Justice and Peace (or by eccentric individuals somewhat marginalized within the Order). Justice and Peace is one of the fundamental characteristics of our membership in the Dominican family, a specific trait that impacts all of our ministries and activities when we take into account the poor, the voiceless, the victims.

"All of our apostolic activities must be carried out with the specific intention of bringing truth and mercy. They must bring freedom by making known the requirements of justice and peace. By so doing we avoid the dissociation of the work of evangelization from that of humanization, no matter how humble the task may be."

(Roman Congregation of St. Dominic)

1. Justice and Peace: A Component of Every Dominican Vocation

Preaching is our specific vocation, it is the exercise of words and deeds destined to open the men and women of our time to the understanding of the Word of God, so that they can make themselves available to this ever-present God (contemplata aliis tradere). This preaching is a work of mercy, a gift, in order to bring salvation, healing and life in abundance.

Dominican preaching is " verbo et exemplo": meaning that our words and our actions (individually or communally), must witness to the content of our discourse. One component without the other disqualifies the bearer.

Dominican preaching is what brings us together as a unique spiritual family, distinguishing us from other religious families, where the apostolate is the determining factor. Although preaching is the foundation of our identity it can take on many different forms. Preaching from the pulpit is one way; but there is preaching through art (Fra Angelico...), through manual labor, education, nursing, youth ministry, ministry to women, etc. The history of our Order shows that this diversity has always been of utmost importance. Our concern for the very poor and for those who are victims of injustice and violence must always be an integral part of all our multi-varied forms of preaching.

Preaching treats the other as a partner in the process. We "preach" to someone because their salvation, their happiness (in the fullest sense of the word, material and spiritual), is important to us. This "other" we refer to is not an "empty vase" that we must fill with "the good word"; this person is a partner, an agent... To truly preach to another person we must first establish a bond of friendship and sympathy with him/her and desire their salvation. We need to have made an effort to know the person, to understand the questions, the anguish, the problems and the hopes that inhabit his/her being.

The Constitutions of the brothers insist on this point in LCO 99, "...it is not sufficient to be attentive to the situations and aspirations of those to whom we address ourselves, it is necessary that we establish a living bond with them..."

This need to know the other could even go as far as having certain members of the family ask to live with those to whom we are sent to bring the Good News, particularly if they are poor or victims of violence and/or injustice. Some of our members have gone to live in the slums, in the suburbs with the working class, in deprived neighborhoods where they share the difficult living conditions of inadequate housing, lack of hygienic services, promiscuity ... so they can live in true proximity with the voiceless in our society, with the excluded.

In 1977, the sisters of Samaj Seva Niketan in Bombay ( Dominicans of the Rosary ) went to live in Ghatkopar, a slum area that was poisoned by adulterated alcohol. The sisters live with the people and undertake various types of social work that change according to the needs. They intervene at the educational level by teaching kindergarten and giving classes to the adults in the evenings, they do medical work by taking care of the sick and teaching preventive medicine, they organize leisure activities with sports competitions for the women and picnics... To help out financially, they set up an "employment agency" and managed to secure loans from the banks... They have become politically involved, by working with public authorities to obtain better living conditions for the people. The sisters have linked their apostolic life and their actions to the fate of the slum inhabitants.

The Dominican brothers and sisters living in Haiti have been combining their apostolic activities with development work for many years. They have recently "abandoned" everything they were doing because they wanted to live more radically with the "grassroots", with peasants in a small village on the coast. They live in a convent that consists of five "cayes-pays" (huts) in the middle of a banana plantation, where they have no electricity (although there are a few solar panels). Each one has but a small one room hut with an earth floor and a tin roof. They made the very clear choice to live with these people so they could better discover with and among them their hopes and their needs. Though they are "living with" they are in no rush to begin a specific ministry; their goal is simply to listen to what the people have to say.

The desire to know means that we make a sincere effort to respect the realities and the mysteries of the life of the people with whom we are living each day. Some of the brothers and sisters are more academic or scientific in their approach; their contribution also adds to the work of preaching.

The Bartolomeo de Las Casas Center in Cuzco, is one of the centers belonging to the Order where the objective is to come to a better knowledge of the lived reality of the poor in the Andine region.

The BCC was founded in Cuzco, Peru, in 1974, by Dominican brothers and sisters to help those who wanted to better understand the reality of the Region and participate in its development. The BCC is composed of four complementary entities. The first of these is the "Colegio Andino", where the focus is on studies and teachings directly related to the problems of the history and culture of the Andine people, as well as on the socio-political and economic development of Peru and the Andine region as a whole. The College publishes a scientific journal on Andine culture.

The "Las Casas Center" itself uses a very effective multi-disciplinary approach to study the mechanisms that contribute to the poverty, environmental degradation and cultural alienation of the peasants and urban inhabitants of the Region. The staff is made up of specialists in economics, sociology and agriculture, who often serve as consultants to those doing social development projects. The Center also has a small annex for the growing of medicinal plants and basic health care.

The third entity is the "Casa Campesina", a drop-in center for the indigenous people living in the high regions of the mountains when they come to Cuzco. The Center not only provides them with a place to stay at a reasonable rate but also provides them with access to legal counsel and opportunities for training. The fourth entity is the Documentation Center, with a publishing house attached to it. The purpose of this Center is to preserve and make the history and culture of the Region accessible to the ordinary people. The Center is open to the public and houses a photo library depicting life in Cuzco at the turn of the century. Through its work, the BCC is not only helping others come to a better understanding of the region and the protection of the culture of the Andean peasants, it is also contributing to history-in-the-making. The goal is to take culture as a starting point to propose strategies for appropriate development.

Dove 2We find similar centers as the one in Coban (Guatemala), as Economie et Humanisme (France), as Espaces (Belgium)... In all of these Centers the primary goal is to better understand the reality being lived by men and women of the area, and to use this information so as to propose actions that are respectful of the cultures and values all while helping to improve the living conditions of the people.

For more than ten years the General Chapters of the brothers have been saying that Justice and Peace is a constitutive element of our preaching and even determines its credibility. Many other Dominican congregations have also emphasized that the preaching of the sisters must pass through acts of solidarity and the promotion of causes touching the lives of those most in need.

"The Chapter reaffirms that the effort we make to help build a more just and loving world is one of the essential aspects of our Dominican life... it is not a case of quantity or of specific actions... but rather the spirit with which all of these things are done, the spirit that brings the gospel to all that we do ...

In this effort of mind and heart may the Word of God, studied and celebrated, always serve as our first point of reference, so that we are able to "see the poor as the image of God revealing itself to us" (Mexico 1992), and that we may draw from this source the strength and energy that is required to make the commitment to stand with them so that 'a new world built on justice can come about.' "

Acts of the General Chapter of the Dominican Sisters of Monteils, 1995.

Although all of the texts of the Order insist on the Justice and Peace dimension of our preaching (cf. Workbook #1), we will take as example of this the letter written by BR. Damien Byrne in 1989, on the topic of preaching .

"Our preaching will not be complete unless it relates the Gospel to people's lives. As Jesus made his message relevant to the lives of the people in his day, we must make his message relevant to the people of ours. Faithful to the Gospel, our preaching must also address the questions they ask. This imposes upon us the obligation of listening and to be alert to the movements which are taking place in our rapidly changing societies. How can we speak to people's needs unless in some measure we share their sorrows and joys ? In Gaudium et Spes (1) we are reminded that "...the joys and hopes, the pain and anguish of the people of this age, especially those who are poor or in any way afflicted, these too are the joys and hopes, the griefs and anxieties of the followers of Christ. Indeed, nothing genuinely human fails to raise an echo in their hearts." Before we speak we must listen not only to peoples' voices but to eyes and hearts. Then our spoken word each day from the altar, the classroom, in the hospital ward, in the parlor will be a word of hope."

In the Ratio Studiorum Generalis of the brothers we read;

"From the start of formation, particular attention shall be given to social questions and economics to enable the brothers to understand the conditions of life of the men and women to whom they will have to announce the Word of God, and among whom they will promote justice and peace. The aim of our preaching being the conversion of men and women who will work together to transform the unjust structures of our society, the brothers must be sufficiently aware of the causes of injustice to identify them and fight them." (14,4)

And in the recent text of the Chapter of Caleruega (1995):

"In imitation of Jesus himself, and of Dominic who renounced the fruitless opulence of the Cistercians in Provence, we are invited to take steps in order to realize our option for the poor by sharing their life. As an Order, we are asked to make a serious effort in terms of standards and life-styles, reflected in the neighborhoods in which we dwell and the people with whom we live. Experiences today among the marginalized, immigrants, and lower income groups energize our preaching ministry. We learn to speak their language and to recognize God's presence and action in their daily lives. We learn what it means to be deprived of those goods which correspond to human dignity. And so we are empowered to proclaim the word of compassion, announcing the presence of Jesus Christ crucified and risen among his people, proclaiming their dignity and worth as temples of the Spirit, and articulating their basic human rights.

This is the word that has the power to change hearts; to open people to one another in dialogue and to the living God who longs to converse with us in prayer; to create the disposition for a manifold of healing; to put into motion the mysterious dynamism of mutual forgiveness; finally, to set the foundation for genuine community, where the Eucharist is celebrated as the dangerous memorial of him who gave himself away only to receive as his own heritage the first fruits of the Reign of God, life in abundance. In this process Dominican life in community is itself challenged and enhanced, and Dominicans themselves are given the impetus to move on to new frontiers.

At the frontier of the marginalized, evangelical poverty is experienced as a voluntary choosing of simplicity of life, whereby we acquire a new vision of social reality and the Reign of God, seeing them through the eyes of the poor. This provides us with content for our preaching on the issues of Justice and Peace. Among the poor we proclaim Jesus, inviting people to live his life, and to practice the sort of dialogue which promotes ever new understanding and realization of the Reign of God.

The following are some questions to help us ensure that our preaching (through the various forms it may take) is truly rooted in Justice and Peace.

 

It is simply not enough to speak out against those things we feel are not right. We have to be able to suggest alternatives and become part of the solution. It is so much easier (with an ensuing loss of credibility) to only criticize and analyze situations. One of the characteristics of Dominican preaching is its orientation to hope. Our words must follow the path from denunciation to constructive proclamation, from protest to witness.

The brothers at their chapter in Oakland (1989) wrote: "There is no valid reason for us to intervene through the spoken word if what we say does not bring people to a greater sense of hope and renewed enthusiasm. All of our preaching, where the core message is one of justice and peace, must be in accordance with the gospel imperative of not passing judgment on others and focus on the fact that whenever we work for the coming of justice, no matter how modest it may seem, it is already Beatitude." (ordination no. 43)

How can we bring hope to the poor and to those who are victims if we truly want to respect their suffering without proposing "consolation after death" as the only viable answer? This is the question we must reflect on when doing our theological and pastoral reflection, so as to discover what meaningful actions we need to undertake. Are we ourselves men and women of hope, are we convinced that there are ways out of the crisis, out of this dark night?

"Our preaching is without the shadow of a doubt a most audacious undertaking, exposed to all kinds of risks, fragile as are all human creations, in search of partners, inviting, hoping, vulnerable to distractions, sometimes like "a voice crying in the wilderness." However, it is indispensable that we continue to preach despite all of the above, because of the grace given to preach, because the desire to preach was bestowed upon us gratuitously and it is only when it is shared that this grace becomes gift.

As women preachers we must seek out other women, all of humanity, to help them overcome the temptation of giving up for reasons of fatigue and the enormity of the task. "My soul failed at his flight" says the Beloved in the Song of Songs (5:6) and this must be the attitude of itinerant Dominicans.

Our preaching should make our hope believable and awaken all hope that slumbers which reverberates in a thousand protests. "I have taken off my tunic, am I to put it on again? I have washed my feet, am I to dirty them again? (Song of Songs 5, 3-4)." From the address given by S. A. Marabotto, to the International Assembly of Dominican Sisters, May, 1995.

PalmAnother characteristic of Dominican preaching related to hope is love for creation, for the world. Life is fundamentally beautiful and is worth living... But such a statement can be very painful for a person who is suffering because he/she has fallen victim to another person, to the system, to violence. How do we convey to them the joy of being alive? How can we help these men and women discover that we all have the capacity to forge new paths?

Our love for creation invites us to take the environmental crisis seriously and to be attentive to the discussions taking place on the future of the planet. Concern for the environment should nurture our reflection on justice and peace. In the appendices, you will find material to help you begin this reflection process.

 

| Back | Index | Next |