Report day 5

FIC Leadership Workshop, 7 October 2019

Anton Karyadi FIC

At 7:30 A.M. on Monday, 7th of October, in Maastricht, the sun is yet to reveal itself. It’s still cold, about 12 degrees Celsius, but the participants of the FIC Leadership Workshop are ready for prayers in the prayer room. The prayers were led by Br. Diego Izquierdo. The Chilean delegation led the participants in a deep reflection on Godliness, a theme from the Rules of Conduct for Superiors by Brother Bernardus. Godliness is virtue that is needed in carrying out our mission as brothers. A Superior must, after the examples of the Savior, be a fire, one that gives both light and warmth. It is to God that he must go and ask what he should teach others; and to find nourishment for himself as well as for his brothers. If the superior is devoted to prayer, spiritual exercises, and godly “negotiations”, his brothers will also; at least for them it will be a strong stimulus.

During the first session of this morning, we continued to deepen on The Service of Authority and Obedience, Part two, titled Authority and Obedience in Community Life. The Provincial groups gave reports on questions that they discussed during the last session. The questions bordered on themes like  "concrete ways of ensuring the well-being of community; Conflicts faced in the exercise of authority; How to avoid conflicts; the practice of love of God and neighbor; Concrete ways to improve fraternal life in the community; and finally, new insights gained during the leadership encounter."

After the coffee break, Br. Theodorus introduced the third part of the document Service of Authority and Obedience, on Mission. He invited participants to reflect on Jesus as our mission. The word of God and the other spiritual exercises which keep us focused on the daily invitation of God are very important elements. God speaks to us through our daily experience of Him. Consecrated life responds fully to the call of Jesus in love. Jesus is the center of our whole lives. Our call is to serve and not to be served. We are men of mission. Our mission and obedience cannot be separated. Authority is recognized as an important task in carrying out our mission. Br. Theo stressed that we are to animate and to coordinate the various competences in relation to our mission. Our life is entirely a search for God and a continual learning to listen to the voice of God and do His will.

After Br. Theo ended the presentation, participants were invited to do a personal reflection on some questions, and this took us to lunch time.  From 3.00 PM to 4:00 PM, participants went into provincial groups. They shared their experiences on how to live out our authority and mission using the reflection questions that were provided. Afterwards, they came together to share the results in plenary. The questions include the following themes:

How we try to make Christ present in our lives and to create possibilities for others to meet Him, as individuals and as a team of Provincial Council; how we handle the problem of “difficult obedience” of our members and how we dialogue with them; what spiritual exercises we do every day to make ourselves more aware of the will of God; how to make ourselves happy when we do our tasks as leaders; the most challenging tasks as person in authority in the present time; how we try to be better men of mission especially in our leadership function. The sharing revealed many kinds of interesting experiences. Unfortunately the time for this session was not enough for all to share. We went for supper at 17:30, and agreed that the sharing would continue the next day.

After supper, we had our daily Eucharistic celebration, after which participants were free except for the Ghana provincial delegation who had a meeting with the General Council. We gave thanks to God that we had a fruitful day though the weather was cloudy and cold.