GUIDELINES FOR THE CHOICE AND DEVELOPMENT OF AMAG MISSION PROJECTS 1.-Simple 2.-Community 10.-Church/ dialogue discernment Dialogue religions 3.-Poor 9.-vocations children and young 4.-international/ 8.-Brothers& Lay Incultuaration 5.-New creative ways of evangelizing through education 7.-FMS Identity chidrens rights 6.-sustainibility Introduction This paper is the result of the AMAG Council members seeking to produce a document that will facilitate a process of discernment about Mission projects. Together with the “True Discernment Document” they will, hopefully, become a helpful instrument in the process. The “True Discernment” paper focuses on the conditions and attitudes that will lead us in the path of discernment in tune with the hearts of Mary and St. Marcellin. The present paper is entitled, “Guidelines for the choice and development of Mission projects”. It seeks to offer some concrete points of reference to plan and develop AMAG projects in the spirit that should animate us and to do it in a communion of hearts. 1 This paper has gone through several stages to come up with the present contents and format. First, the members of the AMAG Council the more recent Circulars of Brother Sean and Brother Emili and Brother Emili’s letter to the AMAG Brothers and the one he wrote to the Provincials with a Section on the AMAG project. We also read carefully, once more, the Documents of the 21st General Chapter. Second, each one of the members of the Council wrote down and grouped by themes the thoughts that we found more relevant to our purpose. Third, we discuss the results our meeting of 16th May and we asked Juan to write a synthesis. Fourth, this synthesis was then re-written in a readable form as it appears in this present paper. It is now up to the AMAG Council to further refine it. The next step will be for the communities and individuals to further work through them in each one of the communities and then in the /Cluster retreats. With the proceedings from the meetings and the retreats, the AMAG Council will produce the final paper that will be submitted at the AMAG Assembly in July, 2013. Here are now the ten guidelines that, in our view, summarize the more recent intuitions and growing convictions of the Institute around the theme of mission projects. 1. The project should be simple and look simple The idea of simplicity is placed on the FMS presence in relation to the surrounding milieu. Our presence is expected to be of such nature that the poor around us might feel at home with us. The FMS project has to grow in dialogue with the poor around us and should not shock them. An implementation that develops slowly and through stages – always in dialogue with the people around us - seems to be the right approach for the FMS project development. It will be simple and look simple. 2. The visioning and implementation of the project should take place within an ongoing discerning community dialogue It will be chosen after a suitable process of Marist discernment It will have a Marian heart (for explanation, see above) Project Characteristics: Simple / low key / Marian / partnerships / Marist style. It appears as a strong dimension to be integrated in the dreaming and development of every AMAG Sector Project. There is a delicate stage in the development of a project at the level of the “dreaming”: the time when it is the dream of one of the individuals and not yet the dream of the 2 majority of the community. The Community Superior and the Sector Superior have an important role to play here: how to facilitate the community dialogue of the hearts that will allow the members of a community to discover that a particular idea comes not only from that person, but from the spirit. A similar process needs to be facilitated at the level of the whole Country: how to facilitate that the “dream” of a community becomes the dream of the majority of the FMS personnel in that Country? My experience is telling me that I have spent much time in facilitating this kind of dialogue (through my visits and Country meetings). People came to an open vote that supported the project. However, soon it became obvious that there was not an acceptance of the project from the hearts of the persons. “True” discernment becomes here essential for a communion of hearts around a particular project. If the community is the “starting and arrival point for Marist Youth Ministry” (ECir), then an AMAG project has to show clearly the presence and the commitment of the local Marist Community and refer people to the same community. It will have a vibrant Marist community at its heart, a community born of the XXI General Chapter calls. A new way of being Brothers 3. The project facilitates a significant presence among poor children and youth There seems to be a wide consensus, at all levels, that we are called to become a significant presence among the poor children and youth. It is not enough to work for the poor through different layers of administration. We are called to develop the heart of a poor person within ourselves and within our communities: looking into the reality of things and situations through the eyes of the poor children and youth. Working and being with the poor is a gift of God. One has to learn how to be present to and how to work with the poor. It will be “hands on” – ie. although there will possibly be an administrative dimension to the work, Marists will work directly and in the middle of poor children and young people. We will not be office bound. Our communities will also be located as close as possible to these same people 4. The project grows through an international and intercultural sharing and facilitates an international and intercultural presence An AMAG Project expresses how this internationality becomes a strategy for evangelization and refounding and is dreamt and developed through an international and intercultural dialogue. It facilitates and develops an international mind-set and allows for the witnessing of an international FMS community. It will possibly be in cooperation with other Administrative Units in the region. Need to collaborate with other AUs in the region (South Asia, East Asia, Sydney etc) It won’t tie future generations of local lay and brother Marists into sustaining OUR model of evangelisation (informed by our cultural backgrounds and previous experience). It is for them to inculturate the charism of Champagnat into their own cultures. We mentor and guide… 5. The project seeks to facilitate new creative ways of evangelizing through education It is an education project. 3 Respecting the reality of Asia and the dynamics of religious dialogue, the project has to answer in a concrete way the question of, “How do we, as a community, make Jesus known and loved there where we have been sent?” It will be a new response to local conditions, in keeping with the charism of Champagnat. It will not seek to replicate what is being done by others, although it may use those aspects which are in keeping with our charism. The model will vary, dependent on local conditions – in some country it might be focused around an institution (eg hostel, school); more often it might be smaller. No one model will fit all situations and contexts. Although it might learn from projects in other areas of the world, it will not seek to replicate those projects Our project will have an education focus (though not necessarily ‘school”and not necessarily ‘formal”). No 14 comes from a major push of the General Chapter and subsequent developments 6. The project will be relatively inexpensive, and sustainable in the medium term For an AMAG project to be sustainable it needs to: Be planned and developed through stages of different developments and experience. Local contribution in cash or kind should amount to a reasonable percentage (30%?) of the running costs over a well planned calendar. The Sector and the local community should develop the financial sourcing in such way that both the building costs and the running expenses can be met within a well studied plan and calendar. 7. The project seeks to offer a specific Marist way to mission in Asia having the cause of the Child Rights at heart It enhances a clear style of Marist presence: discreet, close to the people, simple, respectful of the context and offers the specific FMS identity way to Asia and makes a contribution to find the new creative ways to educate, evangelize, advocate with poor children and youth. The ministry will have a focus on child rights and particularly on the protection of children and young people in our care 8. The project is seen and implemented in a communion of hearts and presence of Marist Brothers and Lay Marists The animation community of an FMS project should be made of Brothers and Lay Marist as early as possible, have a formation program for Lay Marists from the beginning and seek sharing life and mission among them An AMAG project should count with Lay Marists Missionaries as from the planning stage so that the Lay Marist Vocation has its specific contribution to the vision and development of the project. 9. The project is planned and developed in a way that will facilitate attracting and ministering to potential and actual Marist vocations The work will have a component of vocation promotion and development of local lay Marist 10. The project and the way to go about it reveal the Marian face of the local church 4 The nature and style of the project help people identify in us the maternal face of the church. It will probably, but not necessarily, be in collaboration with the local Church1 and possibly in partnership with other organisations with similar values It will require of us to go where others cannot or will not go and stay until we are not longer needed. 1 There might be instances when, for political reasons, we distance ourselves to some degree from the official Church. It might even be thought necessary to model for the local Church a different way of evangelising 5
