Animating the Comboni community

PRESENTATION

Dear Confreres,
Provincial and Delegation Superiors
OGF Coordinators
Superiors of Communities,

We are pleased to present to you this book of “tools” to animate our communities, which has been prepared by the Central Commission for Ongoing Formation, in collaboration with the Provincial Coordinators in charge of this sector (2011).

The Chapter has given ample emphasis to the role of ongoing formation, convinced that this is “a determining factor not only for our life and apostolic efficacy but also for the future of the Institute” (CA ’09, 137), and reiterating what the Rule of Life (100.2) states, that is, that the local community is indeed the “favourable environment” to practice it.

Without minimizing the personal responsibility of everyone, it seems that a turning point for the desired renewal of our Institute lies precisely in the revitalization of the local community. A community life of “quality”, which proposes to live – in the logic of the “highest common denominator” – the values of the Rule of Life, is the humus or environmental factor that can nourish our personal commitment and encourage us in times of weakness and fatigue.

This does nothing but confirm the importance of your role as “animators of the community”. The Rule of Life says about the “superior’s ministry”: “The superior animates the community and the individual members in the search for the will of God, in the realization of their missionary consecration and the growth of charity” (RV 107). A very heavy task, indeed. But the Lord who has entrusted us with this ministry will not leave us alone but give us his spirit of charity and service, discernment and fortitude, humility and patience. Let us put our trust in him!

This booklet, presented to all, is specifically designed for you, as a supporting instrument in your effort to programme and animate community life. It offers you seven tools:

- 2 of community planning, as a help in programming the Community Project and the Pastoral Plan.

- 2 of ordinary animation of the community, with proposals for the planning of the Weekly Community Day and Community Council.

- 2 of fraternal promotion to offer special initiatives, such as Life Sharing and the Meeting for Brotherly Help.

- And finally a proposal for the development of the Life Personal Project, mentioned in the Chapter (CA ’09, 30.1), which is certainly basic to the commitment and vitality of the community.

These proposals will have to be adapted to your concrete situation and will certainly be further enriched by your particular experience. True fidelity requires greater creativity. So from this joint effort in diversity something new may come to further improve these tools.

Dear superiors, we place this book into your hands, with the confidence that you will give to it the same importance that the General Council has given to it, so that it may be a useful and valuable tool of reference for years to come for our communities, and especially for you. We are sure that it will be a valuable contribution to “build enthusiastic communities able to promote the integral growth of their members and be an authentic witness of evangelization”, as the Chapter desires (CA ’09, 33).

We entrust this initiative and the effort you will make to put it into practice and to make it fruitful to the intercession of Comboni and our predecessors.

Fraternally Yours,
Fr. Enrique Sánchez González
Superior General
Rome, February 2012
140^th  anniversary of Comboni Institute Rules (1872)