Preface
“Yearning for a new way will not produce it. Only ending the old way can do that. You cannot hold onto the old, all the while declaring that you want something new. The old will defy the new; the old will deny the new; the old will decry the new. There is only one way to bring in the new. You must make room for it.” NealeWalsch
We cannot travel to the future without honoring our past, our ancestors and traditions, but these cannot lead us there. We need to include and transcend the past, loosen our grip on time-honored traditions and make room for the new. What leads us into the future is our courage, creativity, and tenacity to give life to our deepest longings called forth by the lure and love of God. Honoring the past cannot mean living in the past. And honoring our ancestors cannot mean living as they lived. If we truly honor those who have brought us to today, we must do for the next generation what our ancestors did for us: We must make room for the new. “For our lives to be meaningful,” said Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “they must succeed in continuing the creative work of evolution.”
Intentions Of This Book
This book will address four centralquestions:
- What are the graced crossroads religious communities are now facing and the deeper invitations calling them to the inner work of transformation?
- What are the challenges and opportunities in our world and within Religious Life that have brought communities to these graced crossroads?
- How might communities assess their capacity to engage in communal transformation, what will it ask of them, and what can they expect to come from it?
- What does a Journey of Transformation truly involve and how can communities proactively engage in this Divine Mystery?
Our entire globe is going through a Great Turning, a massive transition which we, as a species, are partially responsible for creating. The fate of the planet, humanity, and the 20 million other species that inhabit our common home are all tied together. We are at a tipping point at which we will either evolve into a new way of being or devolve toward a sixth great extinction in the 4-billion-year history of our planet.
Religious Life, as well, is going through a seismic transition due to both external global changes and internal changes taking place within the Church and Religious Life. The demographic changes alone are demanding enormous change. Beneath these surface changes, though, communities are facing any number of crises related to survival, identity, integrity and relevancy. These crises, in turn, are challenging the very soul of communities at the crossroads.
Religious communities are at a graced crossroads facing existential decisions that will determine their fate. Beyond the obvious need for organizational change, many communities are discovering adeeper invitation as they discern God’s call to new life. They are searching for ways to navigate this transition. Many hope to bring forth a new spirit as they work toward completion. Others hope to bring forth not only a new spirit but new life by transforming their own lives and creating new pathways to the future.
It seems everyone is talking about “transformation,” not just the Catholic religious communities, but civic communities, other mainline reli
