1. A human community is much more than its structures. It is also a high level interpersonal organism with goal-oriented drive. The substance of living community is an unknown spiritual reality of great potential value. We can exist without a good community, but we rarely flourish without one. Loving friendships, like marriages and families, need a social context in which to find and express their true meaning. To turn inward and attempt to live apart from others is an illusion which leads fairly quickly to deadly boredom, to neurotic outbreaks, or to active dislike.
2. A healthy community develops interior life, structures which go beyond individualism or a parasite attitude. It comes together to share faith, to reach out to others and to pray together. It achieves a corporate sense of self with an identity and purpose. It becomes an organism in which is greater than the sum of individual members. The development of a new way of life or renewal of life is a gift a release of energy from the Spirit of God within the community. This spirit helps us to live in the present and try to be, open to changes that lead us into the future.
DISCERNING A COMMUNAL DECISION
A communal decision will be discerned during the Fourth Week of the Spiritual Exercises. Much of the explanation given in the Second Week concerning Personal Life Decision apply at this time (see pages 161-165). When necessary additional explanation will be given as each Phase of the Communal Process is dealt with.
Phases in Making and Implementing a Communal Decision
Phase 1: Researching the topic and formulating an open question
Phase 2: Formulating the Possible Answers
Phase 3: Gathering the Data and Praying over Them
Phase 4: Making the Decision
Phase 5: Seeking Confirmation
Phase 6: Implementing the Decision
There are two aspects to this process. Private prayer (given in the Sixth Exercise) and community sharing described on pages 174, 178 and 180.
CHOICES FOR COMMUNION WITHIN AND BEYOND COMMUNITY
There can be two basic sets of decisions facing a group of people who come together to do communal discernment. The first involves their process and the way they wish to relate with each other. The second is concerned with the task or apostolic endeavour they wish to perform. To discover our basic issue and open question consider the following materials with regard to the groups interior life and apostolic activity.
A. With respect to our interior communal life.
1. Loving friendships cannot easily survive within a local faith-community whose institutions foster materialistic lifestyles,
manipulative pressures and coercion in the decision process. Whenever disciples of the Lord are graced to enter into their Christic selves and to commit their lives to the service of the reign of God on earth, the false structures in their own midst must be reformed. They have no alternative.
On the other hand, such reforms often tend to be cosmetic (superficial) as long as the Pascal Mystery has not yet been radicalized in most members.
2. What comes upon us with the gift of a new life in Christ risen is the prospect of a new kind of faith-community which strives both (a) to live realistically in the contemporary situation, and (b) to avoid the false institutions or processes of the world in which we live. It is essential for us to reflect, then, on the types of new community structuring which might make sense in today 's conditions.
We are compelled, then, to examine our own community structures. See how they love one another is the key to our witness. How do we make decisions together? How do we actually treat one another? What is our real attitude towards income, purchasing what we require, and using commodities?
3. Jesus' teaching on poverty is called spiritual freedom in the Two Standards. In our world of relatively high material resources, people are usually influenced by consumerist drives to acquire possessions of all sorts. At the same time, they often tend to act irresponsibly in their financial arrangements and to be unaccountable personally for what they do. How might we assist each other in our use of money? Jesus teaches us to relate to one another with acceptance, forgiveness and a deep respect for the mysterious worth of each person, especially the marginated members of society. How might we, incorporate those values in our community without competitive tensions and without scapegoating individuals?
4. Jesus' teaching on obedience to God is called discerning love in the Two Standards. Clearly, in his Gospel Jesus wants us to build communities in which leaders are truly the servants of the other members. How shall we do this today? How shall we design ongoing structures of decision-making, which rightly dispose of the social power in our community? Must we become polarized into opposed parties, or is it possible to do otherwise?
B. With respect to involvement beyond ourselves.
1. One set of decisions and actions will concern communal involvement in ministry in a parish.
2. A second set of decisions might refer to our activity of witnessing to our faith by encouraging the development of other faith communities.
3. Another set of decisions might consider ways to perform communal corporate acts of mercy.
4. A number of decisions might be made that involve the promotion of faith and justice. These could concern unjust structure in society or immediate activities with refugees and the homeless.
PROCEDURE WHEN SHARING PHASE I OF COMMUNAL DISCERNMENT
1. List Issues and Open Questions.
2. Listen to each other's reasons
3. After the discussion take one of the issues and use it to express and focus the group on one issue.
4. Write this issue in an Open Question that can be answered by many propositions.
5. Members of the group will take this issue and open question to their sixth prayer period and gather possibilities as directed in the Prayer Materials, page 107.
PROCEDURE WHEN SHARING PHASE 2 OF COMMUNAL DISCERNMENT
1. Each member shares their answers to the open question in their ordered list of priority.
2. The group then lists 3 or 4 answers.
3. After this it decides the order in which it will consider the answers.
4. Members of the group take the first of these answers to prayer and gather the data around it according to the 4 column method given in the sixth prayer period of Prayer Materials page 111.
PROCEDURE WHEN SHARING PHASE 3 OF COMMUNAL DISCERNMENT
1. Each member makes a 4 column composite of the reasons discovered by the whole group. This is done simply by going around the circle one reason at a time until all reasons have been stated. Complete column one then go to column 2, then 3, then 4.
2. Each member takes this composite home and prays to discover a Provisional Decision according to the sixth prayer period given in the Prayer Materials, page 114. This should be kept confidential so that true discernment in the group may take place.
DECIDING: Confirmation and Consensus
A significant experience, both at the time of decision and when seeking confirmation is Consensus. The following describes the consolation of consensus and a process for discovering consensus in a group.
Consensus:
Consensus in a group is a special form of confirmation. As a group moves to final decision it looks for full agreement or union, a sense of consensus. A group might say that a majority vote gives a consensus. This would mean that every member in the group is committed to the decision so reached by this majority vote. Such agreement may be enough for a united commitment to action. Others may say that only unanimity is the experience of consensus that expresses full agreement and union. I believe that consensus means more than either of these; only after a group dynamic in which everyone has fully participated can such agreement and union be termed consensus. While majority rule works in parliamentary procedure, discerning faith communities usually hope for unanimity in their decisions.
Description of the Consolation of Consensus:
Everyone in the group will be satisfied that they and the others have been listened to. Everyone will realize that the gifts of each member have been acknowledged. Everyone will be at rest with the outcome of the process. Everyone will sense that a free and effective process has been followed.
The group will know itself as beloved of God. It will recognize this love actually working in the group and be surprised. A sense of wonder will be experienced.
The group will have a sense of being energized and drawn into the future in spite of its limitations and past sufferings.
The consolation will be experienced as gift coming from beyond the group (the Holy Spirit).
Part of the experience of consensus will include the sense that carrying out a decision will be an expression of Finding God in all things in order to better love and serve God in all things.
When the group reflects on these experiences it may have an awareness of transcendence. It may sense that its unity is in the one of the godhead, that its sense of beautiful persons is in the beauty of God, its sense of rightness is in the truth that is God, its sense of goodness is in the goodness of God, and its knowledge of its human gifts are an extension of Jesus Christ.
The Fruits of Consensus:
The group is given the consolation of insight into its own experience of the paschal mystery and its own willingness to consider suffering with the body of Christ in the future.
The group has realized that the decision might well lead them into experiences of rejections similar to those found in their communal graced history. It has faced this in a mature way with equanimity and willingness to face such pain in the future for the sake of the body of Christ.
The group knows that suffering will be involved in the implementation. Yet the group is united and may even experience a special sense of its wholeness.
They realize that the experience of the consolation of consensus is more than sense of union in the group.
Everyone is committed to the decision and its implementation.
The group recognizes love working in the group and sees how this love frees everyone so that creative gifts get expressed; the creative action of the group as a whole takes place before its eyes.
The group enters the effort of implementing the decision with a realistic hope and a certain joy in the power of the risen Christ.
The group may experience a creativity it didn't know it had, hope in the face of obstacles, or a sense of universal compassion.
Process:
Consensus is always present in a group. The process over an issue is one of discovery. It is a method of finding the consensus in the group.
Unanimity:
When there is unanimity with a decision it is important to check if there is a true sense of consolation in the group. This is done when the group reflects on the process of decision-making with a sense of satisfaction and describes its sense of consolation with the decision reached. Even with unanimity it is important for the members of the group to share what reasons exercised them,i.e., what made them hesitation and what convinced them.
High degree of agreement:
When a high degree of agreement is reached, it is important to try and achieve full agreement so that all will commit themselves to implementation. This can be done by asking the minority to indicate their objections to the decision and discover what will satisfy them in implementing the decision. Even then it is important for all in the group to revisit the reasons against the decision and to face these in the implementation. After this it is important once more to describe the overall consolation with the decision reached.
Low degree of agreement:
When there is a low degree of agreement in the group it is wise to revisit the Issue and look for another proposal and go through another discernment process.
PROCEDURE WHEN SHARING PHASE 4 OF COMMUNAL DISCERNMENT
1. Going in a circular fashion each person indicate the provisional decision come to in prayer.
2. If there is unanimity. In a circular fashion each person now shares the main reason for the decision. After this another round of sharing the reasons that made each one hesitate. These latter are very important for the implementation of the decision in Phase 6.
3. If there is not unanimity but a high degree of agreement another procedure is followed with the hope that consensus may be discovered. This consists in surfacing the reasons for the minority vote. Then with a certain amount of give and take different aspects of the decision may be changed or assurances made that the concerns voiced will be dealt with in the implementation phase.
4. With a low degree of agreement follow the process mentioned above (page 177).
PROCEDURE WHEN SHARING PHASE 5 OF COMMUNAL DISCERNMENT
1. Going in a circular fashion each person indicates whether consolation was given and if so describes the consolation briefly.
2. If there is not unanimity the group will listen to the opposing reasons and decide if further changes are needed or suggestions for implementation to be added.
3. A continuation of #2 requires that after praying with the Implementation Phase each person will once again seek the consolation of confirmation.
PHASE 6: Implementation of the Decision
Many a well discerned decision has been lost in the implementation. This is usually the result of poor implementation procedures. Two initial concerns of implementation are communications and delegation. It is important that these be dealt with soon after the discerned decision has been made.
Again, it is helpful to consider the reasons against the decision found in the, second and third column of Phase 3.
As a group works through the various items of implementation it will become aware of the costs to the group. When the group faces these costs in union with Christ suffering and still wishes to implement the decision this is a further experience of the consolation of confirmation.
PROCEDURE WHEN SHARING PHASE 6 OF COMMUNAL DISCERNMENT
1. Share the results of prayer.
2. By means of interchange determine who will take responsibility for the various needs given in the prayer period on implementation (page 124).