#565

Joe Arimpoor, Delegate of Hyderabad, India, has this to say:
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I was rather apprehensive at the beginning as the Chapter was proceeding. 

I expected the retreat held before the Chapter began, to be, not only a time for reflection and prayer, but also an eye-opener on the topic itself - something like what a ‘keynote address’ does to an assembly that gathers to deliberate its future-plans. For me it was a disappointment. 

Secondly, the thrust towards numerical consistency of the SDB community seems to be too exclusive and inward looking. It does not seem to take into account the real contexts of the situation in which our communities work. Speaking from the Asian context, I feel there is a deep urgency to enter fully into the evangelization that many church documents challenge us to  ‘Ecclesia in Asia’, ‘Christ for Asia and Asia for Christ in the Third millennium’. For this we require a great multiplication of labourers in the vineyard. Our preoccupation should not be ‘what is the number of the ideal Salesian community’ but how many more people can we collaborate with and how best can this be done. So I envisage, not just full-time vowed members as part of our communities, but also extended communities of part-timers, non-vowed members working and living in a community. There is also the possibility of those who work together but may not live together  fired by the same goal and enthusiasm, using the same spirit and style of Don Bosco… 

Thirdly, I find the ‘Justice issue’ clearly missing in our discussions at the chapter. The synod ‘Justice in the World’ in 1971 was a clarion call to all religious congregations within the church and many different congregations responded. Somehow our discussion on the ‘evangelical witness’ of our communities has ignored the issue altogether. We are more comfortable with the charity and welfare approach. Even our interpretation of the preventive system seems too narrow. We are forgetting that working for justice is itself a work to prevent the damages that cause emargination and abuse of children and youth in our world today? Why are we Salesians still silent on this issue with no official document out yet?

Fourthly, we are asked to review the working of the structures of the Centre and suggest more effective ways. It is taken for granted that we know how these structures of the Centre function. However, going by our constitutions and regulations, many of us still do not know what are the ‘technical offices’ and the 'consultant boards’ set up according to Reg. Art 107 and how they function. We are not even aware of any secretariat working according to Reg. Art 108. 

There is, however, a value that I cherish at the Chapter  the process itself. Listening to different views and experiences and insights one gets enriched and gets a global view of the congregation  and its unity in diversity is made visible.  

Joe Arimpoor
Delegate for Hyderabad, India
joearimpoor@yahoo.com

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Thinking aloud is a private initiative that seeks to share impressions among English-speaking participants at a time when the Chapter is at its peak. 
It is a response to a query from confreres back in the provinces: 'Can't our delegates tell us what they think ?' 
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