Sunday, 23 February 2020 the Provincial team of Pachmarhi Sisters Annies, Navya, Rohini and Shobha shared about the Extended Council 2020 – Rome, with the sisters of Bhopal region at Marian hall, Bhopal. The day began with a meaningful prayer service conducted by the team. The prayer was based on the theme of extended council, “Incarnating Love with Joy”. It was heart touching as the sisters went around embracing each other and sharing the experience of love with one another.
S. Annies the Provincial gave a brief introduction about the Extended council. Sr. Shobha began the sharing on the topic “Global Religious Life” as given by S. Patricia Murray IBVM at the Extended Council. In her sharing she stressed Incarnating Love with Joy is an invitation to enlarge the place of our tent, stretch our tent curtain wide, do not hold back and lengthen our cords, strengthen our stakes and how we are challenged to reach out globally to people of other faiths women and men of goodwill.
Sr. Rohini continued sharing on the topic Interculturality as given by Fr. Tim Norton SVD. Gathering on the topic Culture, Multi-culture, Cross culture and Inter culture she explained that when people of different cultures make a faith-based choice to live together and learn from one another with a willingness to change because of this experience.
"As religious are called to lead like Jesus”
Same topic was carried forward by Sr. Navya and further she explained how Jesus himself made an intercultural journey during his life. The early church community was transformed gradually, moving from an exclusively Jewish group to a group that fully embraced Gentiles and people of all cultures. She also spoke to the gathering on “Leaders as Leaven”. This leadership program emphasizes on self-awareness and self-transformation, enabling one to lead from within. She also made a clear difference between management and leadership and stressed the fact that everyone is a leader whether in leadership roles or not. We are always influencing others all the time by the way we are. We are leaders all the time, 24X7. We as religious are called to lead like Jesus following the servant leadership model.
In the afternoon session an activity was conducted for the participants based on the four inter cultural conflict styles: discussion, engagement, accommodation and dynamic style to know which style each one functioned. Last sharing was done by Sr. Annies in which she shared the information about the missionary presence in France, covenant with China and about the Sisters of St. Joseph of Pinerolo. The day was concluded with the Italian blessing song, “Ubi caritas” every sister was invited to make movements of blessing with their hands as a symbol of blessing the whole universe.
S. Victoria Irudaya Raj
