To Any Regions Whatsoever

… we have judged that it is of the greatest profit to us to … [vow that]wherever [the Pope] may be pleased to send us to any regions whatsoever, we will obey at once, without subterfuge or excuse, as far as in us lies.(1540 Formula of the Institute of the Society of Jesus, 3)

As common works of the Jesuit Conference of South Asia (JCSA), De Nobili College (DNC), Jnana-Deepa Vidyapeeth (JDV) and the Papal Seminary come under the direct authority of the President of the JCSA aka the Provincial of South Asia (POSA – we Jesuits have a knack for coining words and abbreviations) - currently Fr. Edward S. Mudavassery SJ (of the Hazaribagh Province). Every year, therefore, the POSA makes a visitation of these three institutions and, as part of his visit, takes the opportunity to talk to scholastics about the Conference-level view of the Society (a Conference is a group of Provinces that are closely linked, by geography and culture, and collaborate extensively). This year's visitation started earlier this week and just concluded yesterday. On Thursday night, the philosophers had the opportunity for a tête-a-tête with the POSA.

One of the key points the POSA took pains to emphasise was the universal nature of the Society's Mission. In his words, “One joins the Society and is missioned to a Province, not the other way around.” Jesuit Provinces are not conceptually autonomous entities, even if they are so administratively. This universality is, for me, exemplified by the Irish Province, whose official title is “The Jesuits in Ireland” rather than “The Jesuits of Ireland”. Right from the foundation of the Society, we were and are a body called to transcend racial, ethnic and cultural differences to form one, unified, world-wide missionary society at the service of Christ and His Church under the direction of the Pope. In doing this we are not, however, called to be mass-produced automatons; we are expected to lose nothing of the richness and giftedness that the same racial, ethnic and cultural differences bring.

The universal mission of the Society is driven by our vow of obedience which, in our case, carries the specific sense of mobility and availability for mission (as expressed in the quote from our Formula above). I like to say that, while Benedictines take a vow of stability, Jesuits take a vow of instability. This availability (disponibilité as Gabriel Marcel would put it) calls for a comparatively long formation process, which I'll be describing in a subsequent post.

Back to the POSA's chat: the talk was certainly effective in raising awareness of the role played by the JCSA in the Society today (nearly one in four Jesuits worldwide comes from South Asia – the vast majority from India) and in the future (over one in three for Jesuits in formation). Combined with the rapidly growing provinces of Africa and South-east Asia, this means that the Society of Jesus (like the Church) is moving “southward” (see Catholic-journalism stalwart John Allen's penetrating analysis of “mega-trends” in the Church). Thus, the POSA exhorted us scholastics to maintain such a universal perspective and yet be rooted in our Indian culture so as to present a distinctive giftedness to the Society, the Church and the world. We must take responsibility for our own formation and always look to develop skills that are useful at Province, Conference and worldwide levels.