A COMMITMENT TO NEIGHBOURHOOD

Base Ecclesial Communities in Global Perspective.

Gerald Proctor

A thesis submitted for the degree of

Master of Philosophy

At Liverpool Hope University, UK

September 2012
 DEDICATION

This thesis is dedicated to

Fr José Marins

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The Most Rev Patrick Kelly, Archbishop of Liverpool, without whose

permission and support this thesis would not have been possible. I record

my gratitude to Fr José Marins (Brazil), Sr Socorro Martinez (Mexico), Fr

Joe Healey (Kenya), Bob Moriarty (USA), Estela Padilla (Philippines), Fr

Amado Picardal (Philippines), Cora Mateo (Taiwan), Cathy Whewell

(Australia) and Mathew Fox (England) who read the drafts of my thesis and

made invaluable comments and corrections, and Abi Williams (Liverpool)

whose help with layout was invaluable. Finally I wish to thank both my

supervisors for their unfailing encouragement and inspiration throughout –

Dr Peter McGrail and Dr Janet Speake.

2
 ABSTRACT

The thesis challenges a perceived disconnect between the faith community of Roman

Catholics in the UK and the places and streets where they live. It argues that the

neighbourhood should be the locus both for mission and community. It has a particular

passion for the recent occurrence of city centre apartment living. The thesis firstly examines

the global phenomenon of Base Ecclesial Communities in the Catholic tradition from the

South. Starting in Latin America and exploring their unique contribution, it then reviews the

experiences of Africa and Asia, before drawing conclusions from the different contexts. The

thesis is motivated and inspired by the commitment and insights of the faith communities of

the South and finds enthusiastic dialogue partners in the West, not from religious but from

secular sources. Together they interrogate the Church at home about the opportunity

presented by the world of atomised and anonymous urban residents, to model for them an

alternative reality of a humanised city built around a communitarian vision.

3
 CONTENTS

Chapter 1:- Introduction 7

1.1 Personal Context 10

1.2 Methodological Context 15

1.3 Structure of the Thesis 24

Chapter 2:- Latin America: otra iglesia es posible 26

2.1 CEBs Tracing the Roots 29

2.2 Marins’ Pathway to CEBs 33

2.3 Medellin the Kairos Moment 37

2.4 Significant Projects and People 40

2.5 CEBs Embodiment of the Second Vatican Council 42

2.6 CEBs Redefining Ecclesial Consciousness 47

2.7 History Moves On 50

2.8 Freirean Pedagogy 53

2.9 Cardijn Methodology 57

2.10 Conflict and the CEBs 61

Chapter 3:- Africa: different context important lessons 70

3.1 Discovering Another Tradition 72

3.2 The Exercise of African Initiative 74

3.3 An Ancient African Value 78

3.4 The Imploding Parish 80

3.5 Africanisation by Becoming Local 83

3.6 SCCs a Priority Beyond Africa 87

4
 3.7 An Emerging Theology of Local 90

3.8 Same Church - Different Ecclesiology 96

3.9 Lessons and Insights 104

Chapter 4:- Asia: different context wider horizons 109

4.1 A Seed is Sown in the Philippines 111

4.2 Signs of a New Dawn in India 119

4.3 The Emergence of AsIPA at the Continental Level 123

4.4 Uniquely Asian Basic Human Communities 128

4.5 Gospel-Culture Encounter: Asian Insights 133

4.6 BECs Renewal from the Periphery 140

4.7 Neighbourhood – Common Ground for Civil Society 143

4.8 Challenging the Structures 144

4.9 Are the BECs a Local Church? 148

Chapter 5:- Exploring Neighbourhood 156

5.1 Adelaide: Australian Exceptionalism 157

5.2 Neighbourhood as Part of the Creation 168

5.3 The City as Place of Diversity 170

5.4 From Inhospitable Spaces to Hospitable Places 173

5.5 Cities in Decline 177

5.6 Is Community Possible given Urban Diversity? 183

5.7 Engaging with the City and its People 186

5.8 Attempts at Defining Community 190

5.9 Locality is not Everything 193

5
Chapter 6:- Conclusion 200

6.1 The Neighbour is Common to us all 201

6.2 Motivating the Faithful 204

6.3 Motivating the Parish- St Margaret Marys 205

6.4 Learning from the Global South 209

6.5 Vision of Communitarian Mission 211

6.6 Deep Roots in the Tradition 212

6.7 Reform from the Centre and Renewal from the Edge 215

Bibliography 218

6
 CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

The first recorded question asked of Jesus in the gospel of St John was the simple ‘Where

do you live?’ to which it is said he replied ‘Come and see’ (Jn.1:38-39).1 And the two

disciples who asked the question went with him to a particular dwelling in a particular

place somewhere in the neighbourhood of the River Jordan where they spent the rest of

that day together it being about 4pm in the afternoon. We can assume that he was staying

either in temporary accommodation hastily put up by the many pilgrims to the site or was

lodging in someone else’s habitation for the duration of his stay in the area. It’s quite

possible that the two disciples were offered hospitality for the night.2 The question of

where someone lives points to deeper issues of belonging and identity, it also speaks of

the desire to locate someone, to have a place where an encounter can occur, where guests

can be invited and welcomed, a space where conversation can be pursued over time,

where the business of human relationships can be explored and the meaning of life can be

investigated. One of those two disciples of John the Baptist that asked that question was

Andrew3 and the next day he brought his brother Peter to meet Jesus presumably to the

same place. Simple beginnings gave rise to important consequences in the lives of those

first disciples; and equally it might seem to some that focusing on the places where people

live is a little simple and inconsequential. However my thesis will make the case for both

1
Carson D. A. (1991) The Gospel according to John Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press; Brodie T. L. (1993)
The Gospel according to John Oxford: University Press. ‘This may be read simply as an inquiry about
Jesus’ location … it may also be seen as reflecting a quest for God’ 160; Brown R. (1966) The Gospel
according to John Vol 1 London: Geoffrey Chapman. ‘On the level of normal conversation menein can
mean ‘to lodge’ … but here the term also has theological overtones’ 75; Bultmann R. (1971) The Gospel of
John A Commentary Oxford: Basil Blackwell, translates the Greek menein as ‘stay at an inn’ as in other NT
usages, ‘And it is essential to know where Jesus lives for in the place where Jesus is at home the disciple
will also receive his dwelling (14:2)’ 100; Haenchen E. (1984) John 1 A Commentary on the Gospel of
John ch1-6 Philadelphia: Fortress Press, discusses question of hotels and accommodation 158-159.
2
The New Jerome Biblical Commentary (1989) London: Geoffrey Chapman.
3
Jn 1:40-42

7
Church and society to place much greater significance on the local communities that

people inhabit because there will be consequences if we don’t.

Concretely in my case during the years of writing this thesis I have been living in the

largest apartment complex within Liverpool’s city centre, comprising 420 apartments

distributed across 13 separate blocks. Along with other residents I had been involved in

the organisation of a Residents Association in an attempt to bring improvements to the

management of the estate. As a result of this work I was elected General Secretary of the

Federation of Liverpool Waterfront Residents Associations and this role eventually led to

the formation of Engage Liverpool which speaks on behalf of all leaseholders and

residents in leasehold property across the city centre and waterfront and of which I am

currently chair. It is estimated that about 32,000 people live in apartments in what is

called the city centre, an area that stretches from the city centre to include waterfront

apartments at the former Herculaneum Dock in the south to Waterloo Dock in the north.4

It is the reflection upon this work over the past decade and my previous experience with

the involvement of the Catholic Church at neighbourhood level in the developing world

through Base Ecclesial Communities (BECs) which will bring together two strands of my

life, the ecclesial aspect of BECs with the secular aspect of city living. My thesis will

contribute to the debate about the kind of ecclesiology being promoted in the Church,

about the importance and nature of community both as a normative experience for

everyone within the Church and as the accepted objective of the mission and identity of

4
Figure taken from Liverpool Residential Update, Quarter 2, 2012 by City Residential, Liverpool.
http://www.cityresidential.co.uk/images/cms_uploads/editor//Liverpool%20Resi%20Update%20Q2%20201
2.pdf Accessed 10.09.2012.

8
the Church. It will speak to those who are making decisions about our cities and to our

Churches who appear to lack a vision for the contribution Christians can make to the

growth and indeed the humanisation of city centre living. This thesis argues that

Christians have an understanding about neighbour and place that could easily become a

motivating factor in the energising of individual believers and entire communities seeing

the place that they inhabit becoming the locus where they live out the commitments of

their discipleship.

The thesis will explore the importance of place as a crucial location where the encounter

between gospel and lived realities can take place. More specifically I will focus on the

neighbourhood as a smaller unit within either the rural or urban environment where

people have set up homes and from where they live out their lives as peoples of faith.

This is the context in which faith is lived and expressed for many people and it is the main

location where they relate their faith to the reality of human existence. The direction

travelled by this thesis follows the trajectory of my own life which has given form to the

ideas that I shall be addressing. Without having spent time in Latin America I would not

have been exposed to the phenomenon of BECs which ecclesial phenomenon will form

the greater part of my research. Although the approach taken here flows from my own

experience, the thesis is not an exercise in autobiography neither a research of self but it

will be necessary in order to understand the approach I am taking to engage albeit briefly

with a number of key influences that feed into this thesis. It also needs to be stated at the

outset that I am an outsider especially when commenting upon base communities in other

continents. My insights and understandings are therefore limited and conditional. I

would not be capable of discerning the deeper cultural nuances and perspectives that only

those from within a culture are truly able to appreciate. So I acknowledge in advance that

9
there will inevitably be misunderstandings and misinterpretations and therefore the

research will to some extent be incomplete and inadequate.

1.1 PERSONAL CONTEXT

The methodological process followed by this thesis requires appropriate self-disclosure.

Browning 5 has stated that the writer should begin by articulating the background,

experiences and questions that have given shape to their concerns and presuppositions.

Walkerdine comments that ‘If we adopt research techniques which place our own

subjectivities more centre-stage in the research process perhaps far more may be gained

than it is feared will be lost.’6 One of the most powerful memories I have from my youth

is walking through the streets of the Catholic neighbourhoods of Liverpool during the

celebrations for the opening of the Metropolitan Cathedral in 1967 and being absolutely

overwhelmed by the sense of community and identity that was on display during those

days. I remember particularly the area known as the Bull Ring (St Andrew’s Gardens) in

the shadow of the cathedral where the few Protestant families in the tenements had

decorated their flats with orange bunting to complement the explosion of the papal

colours, yellow and white. It was the moment when I first made the connection between

the Church to which I belonged and its potential impact upon an actual neighbourhood in

the city. Meanwhile as I grew up a vocation also grew to ministerial priesthood in the

Roman Catholic tradition that even though I sensed deeply a missionary dimension within

that call I also knew that I didn’t want to stray too far from the Pier Head and the River

Mersey. I knew that the very geography of the city was part and parcel of whom I already

5
Browning D. S. (1991) A Fundamental Practical Theology: Descriptive and Strategic Proposals
Minneapolis: Fortress
6
Walkerdine V. (1997) Daddy’s Girl: Young Girls and Popular Culture. London: Macmillan Press Ltd
75.

10
was and who I would become. Diocesan priesthood as distinct from religious life is

indeed a commitment to place and I expected to live out my life within a fairly restricted

geographical boundary.

My research question arose in part because I have witnessed in my lifetime gradual

erosion within the city itself of the significance of place and neighbourhood. This

followed the wholesale demolition and destruction in the 1950s and 1960s by city

planners of entire neighbourhoods, with their communities being uprooted, divided and

moved to various out-of-town destinations. 7 Recently there has been a phenomenal

explosion of apartment blocks across the waterfront and city centre during the past 20

years with little thought given to the question of community or neighbourhood.8 The

research question was also influenced in part by seeing a re-organisation of the parishes of

the Archdiocese of Liverpool which has left many neighbourhoods without an ecclesial

presence as parishes merge and some are suppressed, leaving presbyteries empty and

churches being closed or demolished with apparently little debate or discussion, that I am

aware of, about the importance of the streets and neighbourhoods left behind. This has

raised significant questions for me about the locus of mission for local as well as national

Roman Catholic leadership and its commitment both to place and to community.

The thesis will very much follow the lines and involvements of my own life and the

different insights that have come to me as a direct result of having had the various and

7
Murden J. (2006) In: Belchem J. (ed) Liverpool 800 Liverpool: Liverpool University Press 395-399. In
1954 Liverpool’s Medical Officer of Health declared that 88,000 dwellings were unfit for human habitation.
In the end 78,000 were demolished, 36% of the total housing stock and 70% of all the dwellings in the
inner-city. ‘Dispersal was undeniably traumatic, as long-standing, tightly knit communities were broken
up…’ 416.
8
32,000 people are said to reside in Liverpool’s waterfront and city centre apartments. See previous
footnote no.4.

11
varied experiences that have come my way. None of this would have been possible

without the six years I spent as a LAMP (Liverpool Archdiocesan Missionary Project)

missionary priest on loan to the Society of St James serving in Ecuador and Bolivia from

1985-1991.9 This brought me into contact with an outstanding ecclesial encounter that

was to mark me for the rest of my life. I personally had the good fortune to meet some of

the most influential people of the Latin American Church during a critical period in its

recent history. I took part in the Theology Summer Schools organised by Gustavo

Guttierez 10 in Lima, Peru, recognised as the father of Liberation Theology; I knew

personally Mgr Leonidas Proano, 11 Bishop of Riobamba, Ecuador and known as the

‘Prophet of the People’. I attended workshops on Communidades Ecclesiales de Base

(CEBs/BECs) run by the Marins Team (Fr. Jose Marins, Sr. Teolide Trevisan and others)

in Bolivia. I spent time in Chile during the military coup of General Pinochet and

witnessed the suffering of the people in the Santiago suburbs; I was in San Salvador and

the University of Central America just a few weeks after the massacre of the six Jesuits

and their housekeeper and her daughter. 12 During those missionary years I was

thoroughly immersed in the life of a vibrant and courageous local Church and of course I

was exposed not only to ecclesial currents in Latin America but also to the social and

political movements that characterised life in the late 1980s; these where formative years

for me and their influence will be clearly seen in both the content and direction of the

thesis.

9
Archbishop Derek Worlock started the Liverpool Archdiocesan Missionary Project whose aim was to
maintain 6 priests in Latin America, through the auspices of the Missionary Society of St James the Apostle
based in Boston USA (http://www.socstjames.com) and working in the Andean countries of Ecuador, Peru
and Bolivia.
10
Guttierez G. (1971) Teologia de la Liberacion, Perspectivas Lima, Peru: CEP.
11
A collection of Bishop Proano’s writings was published entitled El Profeta Del Pueblo (1990) Ecuador:
Fundacion Pueblo Indio del Ecuador.
12
Carranza S. (1990) Martires de la UCA 16 de Noviembre 1989 San Salvador: UCA Editores

12
I then returned to the Archdiocese upon completion of my missionary commitment and

went to the Liverpool parish of St Margaret Mary which had in 1991 the largest Catholic

population of any parish run by the diocesan clergy in the Archdiocese of Liverpool. It

was seen by many as a big challenge, however, my immediate private and personal

realisation was that in Liverpool I had responsibility for 6,500 Catholics and we were then

three resident priests but I had left behind in Ecuador a parish of 65,000 Catholics with

myself the only resident priest. I was to remain there as Parish Priest for 12 years during

which time I attempted to re-structure the parish into smaller units or communities. This

proved to be an extraordinarily challenging option and it wasn’t until I went to work for

four months with Archbishop Len Faulkner of Adelaide, South Australia, as a member of

his Basic Ecclesial Communities Office 13 in September 1999 that I was able to

significantly improve my pastoral organisation and planning which was something I had

first been exposed to in South America. 14 This period in Australia will merit further

exploration later in the thesis due to the major impact it had on my thinking and praxis.

The thesis will also make reference to the work of trying to establish BECs in the

Liverpool parish and the lessons that were learnt in the process.

I left the parish in May 2003 and Fr. Marins invited me to join his team as their first

English member and I spent 2004 delivering workshops and seminars on BECs in many

Latin American countries and also to Hispanic communities throughout the United States

of America. Marins had already worked in Adelaide, South Australia and had visited

Liverpool on three separate occasions to deliver training and workshops to the Catholic

community in the parish. This generous invitation gave me unparalleled and unique
13
Cathy Whewell and Fr Bob Wilkinson were my hosts and colleagues during the visit and exhibited
profound enthusiasm for BEC work which radically impacted on my own understanding of Church.
14
Cabello M. (1987) Espinoza E, Gomez J, Manual de Planificacion Pastoral – una experiencia
latinoamericano. Caracas: Ediciones Paulinas.

13
access to the world’s leading expert on BECs and the various communications we have

subsequently shared over the years continued to assist in my development and

understanding as I became a member of Marins’ mailing list which consists of an invited

group of theologians and BEC practitioners who share unpublished material, reflections

and comment among the group for peer evaluation. It was during the year working with

Marins that he suggested to me that I should consider becoming acquainted with the BEC

experience in other continents so as to have a much broader experience of the

phenomenon within the Catholic Church. Being fluent in English and Spanish as well as

being a European who had lived intimately the Latin American reality proved to be a real

advantage in my visits to Africa and Asia.

This was to take me on my first journey to Africa which followed advice I had received

from the Executive Secretary of the AsIPA Desk (Asian Integral Pastoral Approach) 15 at

the Federation of Asian Bishops Conferences (FABC) Office of Laity and Family who

had said that in order to understand the BECs of Asia I would have to go to Lumko 16 in

South Africa to complete their training programme as that was the foundation and model

used for the spread of BECs throughout much of Asia. And so in 2005 I enrolled on the

four-week International Pastoral Ministry Course held in Germiston, Johannesburg. It

was there that I became familiar with the BEC experience particularly in South Africa but

also through conversations and research with BECs/SCCs in East Africa.

15
Ms Cora Mateo. AsIPA is the Asian Integral Pastoral Approach and is the body charged by the Asian
Catholic bishops with assisting the development of BECs throughout the region.
16
Lumko is the Pastoral Institute of the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference.
http://www.sacbc.org.za/about-us/associate-bodies/lumko-institute/ Accessed 04.09.2012.

14
That ensured that I was ready and prepared to attend the AsIPA 4th General Assembly in

the Maria Rani Centre, Trivandrum, India from November 8th - 15th 2006. I spent a

further month travelling the length and breadth of India visiting BEC practitioners and

their communities, something I was able to do on a further three occasions in the

following three years. During 2008 I had arranged for the Marins Team to re-visit Asia,

this time with myself as a member, and we delivered training and workshops in India, Sri

Lanka, Singapore and South Korea. I then attended the 5th General Assembly of AsIPA

which was held in the Philippines, at the Regional Major Seminary, Davao from October

20th - 28th 2009. These AsIPA gatherings brought together Catholic BEC practitioners

from across Asia, where they evaluated progress, celebrated achievements and made plans

for the future.

1.2 METHODOLOGICAL CONTEXT

The methodology that I have already started using in this Introduction is following the

principles of Practical Theology17 which is based on the interplay between experience,

reflection and action. Schleiermacher 18 considered to be one of the founders of the

discipline in the 18th century when he published his work Brief Outline of the Study of

Theology,19 divided theology into three fields: philosophical, historical and practical; the

latter addressing the practice of church leadership. So for almost two hundred years in

Europe the field of practical theology was limited to the work and spiritual leadership of

ministers in the Church. Under the influence of social studies in recent decades practical

17
Browning D. S. (1991) A Fundamental Practical Theology: Descriptive and Strategic Proposals.
Minneapolis: Fortress; Ballard and Pritchard (1996) Practical Theology in Action: Christian Thinking in the
Service of Church and Society. London: SPCK; Woodward and Pattison (2000) The Blackwell Reader in
Pastoral and Practical Theology. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
18
Dingemans G. (1996) ‘Practical Theology in the Academy’ The Journal of Religion 76:1 82.
19
Schleiermacher F. (1811) Kurze Darstellung des Theologischen Studiums. Berlin.

15
theologians worldwide have agreed on starting their investigations in practice itself;

making therefore the self-understanding of a particular religious tradition the centre of

any reflection undertaken by the theologians. This approach moves, therefore, from

practice to theory and then back to practice.20 Browning asserts that practical theology

should begin with an articulation of the experiences, situations and questions that shape

the concerns and presuppositions of the writer because that is what they will bring with

them to the discipline of theological reflection. This is precisely the method that I am

following. Since practical theology has been accepted as an academic discipline that

studies the practice of a religious tradition, the debate has focused on four principle

issues: a) establishing with precision the field of this discipline; b) its academic status; c)

the methodology of the discipline; d) its normative background.21

Initially the field of practical theology was limited to the clerical leadership of the Church,

but by the second half of the 20th century the emphasis had shifted to the functions of the

Church as a whole. For many practical theologians, ecclesiology and church development

have become the foundational sub-disciplines of practical theology.22 Both ecclesiology

and church development feature largely in the research that this thesis covers. Dingemans

states that at the present time the majority of academic practical theologians seem to

consider ‘the functioning of the Church in the perspective of the coming Kingdom of God

in the world’ as the actual field of practical theology. 23 This perspective governs the

research I have undertaken. I will be examining an aspect of ecclesial life that is indeed a

20
Browning (1991) 5-6.
21
Dingemans (1996) 83.
22
Proponents of this approach are: Haendler O. (1957) Grundriβ der Praktischen Theologie; Arnold F. X.
(1964) Handbuch der Pastoraltheologie. Freiburg, Basel and Vienna: Herder; Muller A. D. (1950)
Grundriβ der Praktischen Theologie; Josuttis M. (1980) Praxis des Evangeliums zwischen Politik und
Religion. Munich: Kaiser; Bohren R. (1971) Predigtlehre Munich: Kaiser; Hopewell J. (1987)
Congregation, Stories and Structure. Philadelphia: Fortress; Dingemans (1996) 84.
23
Dingemans (1996) 85.

16
fairly recent phenomenon (BECs) as it impacts upon the world of today and understand it

very much as a sign of the in-breaking of the Kingdom of God inaugurated by Jesus.

Another understanding of the reach of Practical Theology is given by Pattison and

Woodward who describe it as ‘A place where religious belief, tradition and practice meets

contemporary experiences, questions and actions and conducts a dialogue that is mutually

enriching, intellectually critical and practically transforming.’24 We shall be looking at

BECs as an example of Church organisation and practice and we shall be investigating in

detail the contemporary experience of BECs across much of the developing world and the

questions they raise and allow this phenomenon to dialogue with the reality of religious

belief, tradition and practice in the developed western world. Given that practical

theology is understood as a science of action25 and something that is transformational, this

fits in well with my approach to this recent occurrence in the Catholic Church. One of the

foremost protagonists of Practical Theology in the UK, Stephen Pattison wrote:

I have never ceased to think of myself as a practical theologian – a critical inhabitant

of an action-guiding worldview (Christianity) who attempts to correlate and bring into

dialogue aspects of the Christian tradition with contemporary experience and

understandings of humanity that emanate from other disciplines for the purpose of

change and transformation.26

24
Woodward and Pattison (2000) 7.
25
This shift has been influenced mainly by some American theologians: Boisen A. T. (1946) Problems in
Religion and Life: A Manual for Pastors. New York: Harper and Row; Hiltner S. (1947) Religion and
Health. New York: Harper and Row; Clinebell Jr H. (1966) Basic Types of Pastoral Counseling.
Nashville: Abingdon; Dingemans (1996) 87.
26
Pattison S. (2007) 20.

17
While this research will listen to voices from other disciplines it will also listen to voices

from other cultures and backgrounds in the receiving Churches of the southern

hemisphere in the hope that what will result will be change and transformation from

within the sending Church of the northern hemisphere. This missionary-inspired

language understands that I was originally sent from one place and people while being

received by another place(s) and people(s) and this event is not without its consequences

and repercussions for all parties involved.

Moving on to the second issue about Practical Theology’s academic status, Dingemans

understands there to be three different approaches to the discipline which in today’s

environment are increasingly being combined. They are firstly the empirical-analytical;

secondly the hermeneutical; and thirdly the critical-political. Some practical theological

scholars27 prefer the first model as it is highly influenced by the practice and methodology

of the social sciences. J. A. Van der Ven calls this ‘empirical theology’ 28 in which

practical theology gathers facts and knowledge that others can check and verify about

religious practices. However there are others29 who prefer the second model and I find

myself among them. These theologians feel that not only religious reality, but reality as

such, can be opened up in a more appropriate way within the framework of language.

27
In Germany: Bastian H. D. (1969) Theologie der Frage. Munich: Kaiser; Schröer H. (1964) ‘Theologia
Applicata’ Pastoraltheologie 53 389-407; Daiber K. F. (1977) Grundriβ der Praktischen Theologie als
Handlungswissenschaft. Munich: Kaiser. In the Netherlands: Nijmegen research group of Van der Ven J.
A. and Heitink G. (1993) Praktische Theologie: Geschiedenis, theorie, handelingsvelden. Kampen: Kok.
28
Van der Ven J. A. (1993) Practical Theology: An Empirical Approach. Kampen: Kok Pharos translated
by Schultz B. from the original Entwurf einer Empirischen Theologie (1990).
29
In the USA: Scheiter R. (1985) Constructing Local Theologies. New York: Orbis; Gerkin C. (1984) The
Living Human Document: Re-visioning Pastoral Counseling in a Hermeneutical Mode. Nashville:
Abingdon; Gerkin C. (1986) Widening the Horizons: Pastoral Responses to a Fragmented Society.
Philadelphia: Westminster; Poling J. and Miller D. (1985) Foundations for a Practical Theology of
Ministry. Nashville: Abingdon; Browning D. S. (1991). In the UK: Pattison S. (2007) The Challenge of
Practical Theology. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers; Sweeney J, Symonds G, Lonsdale D. (2010)
Keeping Faith in Practice: Aspects of Catholic Pastoral Theology. London: SCM Press.

18
They cite a number of influences on their work30 and describe their analysis of reality

differently from and in contrast with the analysis emerging from the descriptions of

empirical research.31 This hermeneutical approach is widely followed and though it might

not provide as clear and detailed a picture as the empirical method it nonetheless draws

upon the history and background of the Churches and also gives an insight into the values

and norms of the different ecclesial communities. I have followed this approach in

exploring the origins of BECs in three quite different geographical locations, namely

Latin America, Africa and Asia. I discounted using the third model as although I will be

looking extensively at the Latin American reality I will not be focusing on Liberation

Theology as such, which is the core of the critical-political approach to practical theology.

This will be mainly because it has been extensively and exhaustively studied elsewhere.

Any serious research into Liberation Theology at the continental and global level would

inevitably divert attention away from the ‘local’ issues of place and neighbourhood that

will be the focus of this study. Liberation Theology is profoundly polemical as far as the

magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church is concerned, with their historic allegations of

Marxist influence32 upon and corruption of theology and praxis.

The third issue of the methodology of the discipline is addressed by Dingemans when he

suggests that, ‘the most important debate in practical theology in recent years has been on

methodology and the most important word was interdisciplinarity.’ 33 Van der Ven

30
Literature: Ferdinand de Saussure, Roman Jakobson, Umberto Eco. Philosophy: Hans-Georg Gadamer,
Paul Ricoeur. Cultural anthropology: Clifford Geertz, Victor Turner. Dingemans (1996) 89.
31
Dingemans (1996) 89.
32
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19840806_theolo
gy-liberation_en.html Instruction on Certain Aspects of the ‘Theology of Liberation’ (1984). Accessed
06.09.2012. Also the response:
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19860322_freedom
-liberation_en.html Instruction on Christian Freedom and Liberation (1986) Accessed 06.09.2012.
33
Dingemans (1996) 91.

19
describes the following changes that have come about within practical theology in recent

decades: monodisciplinarity where ecclesial dogmas, doctrines and documents provided

the prescriptions for the practice of religious action; multidisciplinarity where social

scientists began to make contributions but theologians still felt bound to reserve to

themselves the last word; interdisciplinarity where room is created for a real discussion

between theology and social sciences. Going further than Dingemans, Van der Ven

proposes another term intradisciplinarity where theologians become proficient themselves

in the social sciences so as to raise theological issues within the terms familiar to social

scientists. In my final chapter I will be drawing upon the work of a number of

professionals within the social sciences to take further my thesis in an interdisciplinary

way.

It is important to answer the question what is the particular methodology employed by

practical theologians? There are four stages in the methodology agreed upon by most

practical theologians: 34 (i) research begins with an interdisciplinary description of the

practice or analysis. Methods may vary in the research but my approach will be to follow

a hermeneutical, historical and linguistic approach issuing in the type of description as

described by Browning;35 (ii) the next step is to seek an explanation of the situation by

drafting a hypothesis that can be verified (or falsified) and as my approach will be the

hermeneutical model I will do this through a broad narrative description that covers

reality at large; (iii) the third stage or normative phase, will be to examine the praxis itself

to find if there is any normative background within the tradition or anything normative

within the ideas of the believing people. Through a revision of church documents and the

34
Dingemans (1996) 92.
35
Dingemans (1996) 89.

20
reflections of people on the ground an interpretation will be attempted that achieves an

understanding of the vision, meanings and values that lie behind the actions of the

Church. Practical theologians are warned to have a critical awareness of their own

theological and social preferences and other interests that might be involved;36 (iv) finally

all practical theological work aims toward making suggestions and recommendations in

order to improve and transform existing practice.

The methodological process outlined here has been followed closely throughout the

gestation of the thesis and will be evident in the structure of the thesis as a whole. I

decided to place the thesis into a geographical context that creates dialogue partners of the

two-thirds world and the one-third world, in other words, a conversation will ensue

between the southern hemisphere where faith and Church is flourishing and the northern

hemisphere where faith and church attendance is declining. More precisely in chapters 2-

4 which examine the BEC phenomenon on three continents of the south I shall be using

stages (i) and (ii) of the methodology that will both describe and analyse the practice of

BECs as well as seeking an explanation for this ecclesial reality widely experienced

throughout Latin America, Africa and Asia. In chapter 5 I will present research material

and reflections on neighbourhood from the western experience of Europe and North

America, while concluding the BEC analysis with a visit to Adelaide, South Australia.

The conclusion to the thesis will unite stages (iii) and (iv) in presenting what I consider to

be the normative elements from the research as well as offering ideas and suggestions that

might shed light upon present praxis and encourage change for the future.

36
Poling J. and Miller D. (1985) Foundations for a Practical Theology of Ministry. Nashville: Abingdon.

21
The final issue debated by practical theology is the question of normativity. In this

narrative vision of the Church that I will be developing I shall be drawing upon the idea of

memory37 or the internal history of the Church in which the narratives of the past (that are

called ‘tradition’) and the experiences of the people and their Church community today

(tradition working itself out in the present) are brought together and examined. In this

thesis the ecclesial reader especially will be confronted by their past (both recent and

distant) with the hope of finding new ways of interpreting the past and opening up the

future. Gerkin speaks of ‘widening the horizons’38 of persons and communities in order

to bring them face to face with the normative ground of their foundational stories in a new

process of interpretation. It is certainly my aim to expand the horizons of my fellow co-

religionists with this thesis and to contribute to a debate about the nature of Church and

the future of mission in England and Wales today.

Of course it really could be quite arrogant of me to aim to expand the horizons of anyone

if it wasn’t for the fact that my own limited ways of seeing and understanding have been

challenged especially through my cross-cultural experiences but also through the research

process of these latter years. Before concluding this Introduction I want to comment on

the work of Martyn Percy whose ideas I have found to be particularly helpful. He reflects

upon the kind of research that I am involved in and states:

This encounter-based approach is far riskier, since it virtually anticipates change on

the side of the inquirer. To truly listen will mean being open to the possibility of

37
The concept of ‘memory’ is found in the writing of Browning, see footnote 5, and also of Hough Jr J. and
Cobb Jr J. (1985) Christian Identity and Theological Education California: Scholars Press 50.
38
Quoted in Dingemans (1996) 96.

22
 change… Moreover, I hold that it is precisely this kind of challenge that should, and

could, help shape the discipline and practice of ecclesiology.39

His approach to practical theology firmly situates it as a listening and reflective discipline

that means that it is rooted in a determined form of research that often begins by learning

to listen deeply and well. He says that research in religion is often about re-searching,

about looking at things again, from a different angle, with a new light, going over old

ground perhaps but with fresh enthusiasm and renewed vision. ‘Re-searching, retelling

and reconstructing are critical, related yet distinct stages within the overall penumbra of

research.’40 This is further enhanced by the work of Poling and Miller:

Practical theology is a critical and constructive reflection within a living community

about human experience and interaction, involving a correlation of the Christian story

and other perspectives, leading to an interpretation of meaning and value, and

resulting in everyday guidelines and skills for the formation of persons and

communities.41

Percy clearly encapsulates what I seek to achieve by my research; he states that research

is ultimately a review, a re-consideration and a return – perhaps leading to a revolution.

He argues that the key to successful research lies in establishing that the knowledge we

have is inadequate and insufficient, despite appearances to the contrary. Therefore, the

39
Percy M. (2005) Engaging with Contemporary Culture: Christianity, Theology and the Concrete
Church. Aldershot: Ashgate 7.
40
Percy (2005) 9.
41
Poling J. and Miller D. (1985) 62.

23
research must help to identify new knowledge or at least reinterpret that knowledge so

that the way we look at some specific topic might be challenged and changed. ‘Finally,’

he argues, ‘it leads us into a situation where we can begin to say something entirely new

about the apparently familiar.’42 The research will challenge the perceptions of people in

the Church about BECs being a phenomenon that we in the West can treat as irrelevant to

our ecclesial journey. The thesis will demonstrate that the apparently familiar concepts of

neighbour and neighbourhood are in need of a radical overhaul. Inspiration will come

from the BEC voices of the southern hemisphere and some secular voices of the northern

hemisphere.

1.3 STRUCTURE OF THE THESIS

Following the Introduction which has situated this research in the context of Practical

Theology and examined the methodology that will be employed, using personal

experience and history to delineate the lines of research, there will be three chapters

focusing on three continents which are delivering BECs.43 Each chapter will commence

with an exploration of the history of BECs in the area and will attempt to deliver a

definitive history, challenging some of the incomplete ideas circulating about origins and

influences within the wider BEC and research communities. Chapter 2 commences the

journey in Latin America, and takes a unique approach to BECs there by using as a

dialogue partner Fr José Marins who is widely acknowledged to be the world’s leading

authority on BECs. Mine will not be an uncritical assessment of the contribution BECs

42
Poling and Miller (1985) 10.
43
A BEC is basically a small gathering of Catholics who meet regularly in their homes, bringing their faith
and their lives together by reflecting upon life and the needs of their neighbours in the light of the gospel
and acting together to transform that reality with the values of the kingdom of God. They model an
experience of community for those around them and maintain bonds of communion with the wider Church.
They choose one or more from their number to facilitate the meetings and they discern together how to
develop ministries that will enable them to be of service to the neighbourhood.

24
have made to the Church; but it will attempt to lay out some of the insights that I argue

have a wider significance than presently acknowledged. Chapter 3 will deal with BECs in

Africa. I have amassed a body of literature that is unrivalled in the United Kingdom in

bringing together for the first time much of the written literature about BECs in East

Africa. The chapter will critique the experience that will both celebrate the African BECs

achievements and learn from their perceived shortcomings. Chapter 4 will move on to

Asia where the influences of both Africa and Latin America can be traced today.

However it has a context unlike any of the previous locations and therefore has developed

significant insights unique to its pluralistic religious identity. These will be added to the

reflections from Africa and Latin America in order to enter into dialogue with aspects of

the reality of the United Kingdom in particular and Europe and North America in general.

What will be explored in chapter 5 with the assistance of a number of secular authors will

be the context common to all three continents, the location for our base communities

namely the neighbourhood; as well as the desire to live community in that urban context.

Chapter 5 will also present research findings about BECs in South Australia that will raise

questions about their ability to flourish in a post-industrial and post-modern westernised

urban context. The Conclusion of the final chapter will bring everything together and in

conformity with the principles of the methodology being followed will examine present

practice with a view to making suggestions for renewal and reform.

25
 CHAPTER TWO

LATIN AMERICA: OTRA IGLESIA ES POSIBLE44

It is widely recognised that the countries of South and Central America as well as Mexico

and the Caribbean were the location for the emergence of Comunidades Eclesiales de

Base (CEBs)45 or Base Ecclesial Communities (BECs) in English. They gave rise to an

unprecedented ecclesial moment with far reaching consequences for the local

practitioners as well as for Catholic people living in other parts of the developing world.

This chapter will reflect on the origins, history and development of the CEBs through the

prism of one of their greatest exponents, Fr José Marins, a Brazilian Catholic priest of the

Archdiocese of Botucatu, Sao Paulo. Despite being recognised by practitioners of CEBs

in every continent as the world’s leading expert his contribution has been commented

upon, but not subjected to detailed analysis until now. Access to material which

circulates privately amongst a small group of mostly Latin American theologians has

enabled this study to develop accurate insights into and a deeper understanding of the

process and thinking which has accompanied CEB development for over 50 years. It is

indeed an original contribution to knowledge of this important development in the

Catholic Church.

44
‘Otro mundo es posible’ is the theme of the highly successful World Social Forum which started in Porto
Alegre, Brazil in 2001 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Social_Forum Accessed 25.09.2012 and which I
attended in 2005, so I have used the same idea for this chapter heading which means ‘Another Church is
Possible’ or as it is also sometimes translated in English ‘A Different Church is Possible’. See also an
article by Richard P. (2007) ‘Será Posible Ahora Construir un Nuevo Modelo de Iglesia’ Aparecida:
Renacer de una Esperanza, Fundacion Amerindia, digital book, 93-98.
http://www.hechoreligioso.net/Proyectos/VCELAM/docuVCELAM/206_AmerindiaAparecidaLibroVirtual.
pdf Accessed 20.06.2012.
45
Out of respect for the peoples of Latin America I will use the acronym CEB throughout this chapter.

26
This chapter will also examine the new theological and ecclesiological emphases that

arose from the base communities. It will not, however, focus on the many ecclesio-

political questions and issues arising from Liberation Theology even though in many

respects they developed alongside each other. The intention, rather, is to present that

which is unique to CEBs in their Latin American incarnation, which will involve looking

at the theology that surrounded and grew out of the communities while not becoming a

hostage to fortune with the much wider and exhaustively debated Liberation Theology.

We shall explore the theological method favoured in the CEBs and look at other

influences that played a significant part in the theological and methodological processes.

The chapter will then look at the serious question of ecclesial conflict through an analysis

of the recent CELAM V General Assembly in Aparecida, Brazil and finally will attempt

to comment on where the CEBs in Latin America are today as well as reflect on their

contribution to the wider world.

It is appropriate to seek to understand the historic evolution of CEBs through the lens of

Fr José Marins as they both have their beginnings on Brazilian soil. When trying to

identify and speak about the various aspects of CEBs commentators often make reference

to Marins as in this case: ‘It is a Brazilian priest, José Marins, who has most clearly

articulated these, and who is the leading authority in Latin America on the CEBs.’ 46

Within Protestant circles Marins’ role is acknowledged as the leader of CEBs on the

continent: ‘…Fr José Marins, Latin American coordinator of the movement …’47 In this

wide-ranging article Cook attaches an extensive bibliography for the time, which contains

no less than 11 references to books and articles written by Marins and his team, way
46
Kirby P. (1979) ‘Basic Ecclesial Communities’ Doctrine and Life 29:9 586.
47
Cook W. (1980) ‘Base Ecclesial Communities: A Study of Re-evangelisation and Growth in the
Brazilian Catholic Church’ Occasional Bulletin of Missionary Research 4:3 114. Though I consider it is
inappropriate to refer to CEBs as a ‘movement’.

27
beyond the output of any other author. In an article in 1980 we find: ‘José Marins, a

specialist on BCCs in Latin America …’48 He is of course recognised as an authority on

base communities within Brazil: ‘José Marins, a colleague of the Boffs, has summarised

what the CEBs mean to the Brazilian theologians …’49 Whatever the context Marins is

recognised by all authors as the person with most experience and who has contributed

most to the development and understanding of CEBs.

Marins was born in Prata de Botucatu (now called Pratania) on Wednesday 25th May in

1932 to Joaquin Marins Peixoto and Isabel Ferrari Marins, his father’s family tracing their

ancestry back at least five generations within the Säo Paulo region, while his mother’s

family were immigrants from the Veneto region of Italy. In September 1952 he was sent

to Rome for theological studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University and on 25th

February 1956 was ordained priest at the Basilica of St Paul outside the Walls. During his

years studying theology he also managed to find time to enrol at the recently founded

International University for Social Studies Pro-Deo 50 where he did a two year course

specialising in the Methodology of Public Opinion. Shortly after completing studies in

Rome he went to Belgium for a brief internship51 before returning to Rome for a further

five months, which he spent at the International Centre of the Movement for a Better

World (MBW) at their Roca di Papa headquarters, where he met the founder, mystic and

prophet of renewal Fr Ricardo Lombardi SJ. During this time Marins was encountering

ideas and people that were to have a transforming effect on his young life. He returned to

48
Deelen G. (1980) ‘The Church on its way to the people: BCCs in Brazil’ Pro Mundi Vita Bulletin 81 3.
49
Blowers L. (1989) ‘Ecclesiogenesis: Birth of the Church or Birth of Utopia?’ Missiology 17:4 410.
50
The Istituto di Studi Superiori Pro Deo, was founded by Fr Félix Andrew Morlion and Monseñor Antonio
de Angelis in 1946 and in 1948 it became the Università Internazionale degli Studi Sociali "Pro Deo".
51
This was with the Young Christian Workers, where Marins spent time with Joseph Cardijn (before he
became Cardinal) and was exposed to the Cardijn methodology of see/judge/act.

28
Brazil in 1957 where in the March he was sent to the parish of Ourinhos, Säo Paulo where

he was to remain until November 1959.

2.1 CEBs TRACING THE ROOTS

Meanwhile powerful developments were taking place within Brazil itself, especially in

the rural areas and within the Church. It seems that at the level of the Church an

important moment was the 1st General Assembly of CELAM52 held in 1955 in Rio de

Janeiro where the bishops from across Latin America came together and reflected upon

the impact Protestant groups were having upon the Catholic faithful. Present as an

advisor was Fr Agnelo Rossi,53 who by the following year was made Bishop of Barra do

Pirai. The story has often been repeated about the old woman who spoke to Rossi during

a pastoral visitation at Christmas. She told him about her distress at finding that the three

Protestant churches were ‘lit up and crowded’ while the Catholic chapel ‘is closed and in

darkness’ because no priest was able to be present.54 This provoked a response from the

bishop and by the end of 1957 the diocese had 372 people’s catechists who had been

formed and trained as community leaders. Their task was to gather together their local

Catholic community, with the approval and in the name of the bishop, for the purposes of

enabling the faithful to pray and read the bible together. This was an attempt at keeping

alive their sense of ecclesial consciousness and helping to develop an identity as a

community of Catholic people. This missionary movement, as it has been called, situates

52
CELAM: Conferencia Episcopal Latinamericano or the Episcopal Conference of Latin America.
53
He moved from Barra do Pirai to become Cardinal Archbishop of Sao Paulo 1964-1970 before moving to
Rome as President of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of the Peoples (Propaganda Fide) 1970-1984.
He died 21.05 1995.
54
Marins J. (1979) ‘Basic Ecclesial Communities in Latin America’ International Review of Mission 271
237. Libanio J. B (1980) ‘Experiences with the Base Ecclesial Communities in Brazil’ Missiology 8:3 321.
Deelen G. (1980) 4. Dias Z. (1984) ‘Resistance and Submission – The Kingdom of the Powerless’
International Review of Mission 292 409. Padilla R. (1987) ‘A New Ecclesiology in Latin America’
International Bulletin of Missionary Research 11:4 156.

29
very firmly the emerging CEBs within an ecclesial context of an evangelisation without

sufficient priests, of an attempt to animate the Catholic faith in the face of an avalanche of

Protestant missionaries who were having remarkable success amongst the poorly educated

and frequently un-evangelised Catholic community. It was also a lay-led liturgical

movement in that the people were learning to celebrate their faith even in the absence of

the priest.

This experience, though a rough model nonetheless provided a beginning from which

CEBs would emerge, more refined and honed but with some of the original spirit still

intact. Especially that of the people growing from being objects of the efforts of others to

evangelise and instruct them, to becoming subjects in their own right as they took on

responsibility for the tasks of catechising, liturgical leadership, and community

organising, leading to their gradual transformation as they began forming small

communities of faith. Though its beginnings were in a movement that was struggling to

make up for the absence of an ordained priesthood it was still the germ of an experience

where the Church had begun to trust the laity to perform some pastoral, catechetical and

liturgical tasks on behalf of their community, albeit in a controlled and limited way.

That was one ingredient in the process of forming CEBs but it was happening alongside

another remarkable social initiative of education for the masses through the medium of

radio schools, begun in Natal, Rio Grande do Norte, around 1959 under the inspiration of

Bishop Eugenio de Araujo Sales.55 This was indeed an extraordinary development which

began as a response to the immense social and economic problems encountered by the

55
He ended up being Cardinal Archbishop of Rio de Janeiro 1968-2001 and died 09.07.2012.

30
majority poor population of that part of Brazil. They suffered from all the consequences

of extreme poverty – malnutrition, endemic illness, illiteracy, exploitation and injustice of

all kinds. The Church had, in an attempt to respond to this demanding situation, started

some years earlier by opening welfare centres and schools. However as a result of that

initiative and the reflection and analysis it provoked it became clear that more was needed

and so the Movimiento de Educación de Base 56 was formed. Properly translated into

English this should read the ‘Movement for the Education of those at the Base’ (MEB)

not the oft-translated Movement for Basic Education.

The MEB took the form of radio schools, which were vehicles for an education for

change programme. Small groups or communities were formed around the radio

reflecting upon their reality as they participated in an education programme that attempted

to reach out to the poor masses. The movement quickly spread from Natal to the whole of

the North East and further afield. Similar initiatives were taking place in other parts of

Latin America too; indeed this one was inspired by Radio Sutatenza of Columbia. The

radio schools of Natal lasted for over 20 years and significantly influenced the formation

of the CEBs because they brought into the equation one of the most significant thinkers of

the 20th century, Brazilian educationalist and influential theorist of critical pedagogy

Paulo Freire. At the time Freire was working and living in Recife, the capital of

Pernambuco state in the North East of Brazil, where he was Director of Education and

Culture. We will return later in the chapter to reflect upon his contribution to the

development of CEBs.

56
Officially set up in 1961 by Presidential Decree from an agreement between the National Conference of
Bishops (CNBB) and the Brazilian Ministry of Education and Culture, Libanio J. B. (1980) 322.

31
The term ‘Comunidades Eclesiales de Base’ had yet to be invented, but the expression ‘de

Base’ was already in use in 1959 associated with the radio schools and here it means

clearly those at the base of society, the ones at the bottom, the majority grouping in

society and always characterised by their poverty, social exclusion and oppression. The

English term ‘basic’ does no justice to the origins of the Spanish word, and unfortunately

though the English word ‘base’ has a similar sense it confusingly also has other meanings

too. However when the time came to name the ecclesial phenomenon of small

communities it was logical to use a term already in use which perfectly described the

nature of those groups as being from and at the base, the grass-roots of society.57

These two strands emerging in Brazil a few years apart were to heavily influence one

another in the next decade and provide a very fruitful exchange of practice and

methodology; the more intra-ecclesial concept from Barra do Pirai bringing the

evangelical experience of pastoral, catechetical and liturgical communities while the more

outward-looking and educative experience from Natal bringing with it a liberating

pedagogy and a consciousness-raising methodology. In many places it was the people

who had gathered around their radios for the literacy programmes that became the ones

who later formed their groups into CEBs. A unique contribution given by the Latin

Americans to our understanding of CEBs is their use of Freirean methodology. This

aspect is little recognised or appreciated and seldom replicated by practitioners of the

various incarnations of CEBs in Africa and Asia. When travelling with the Marins Team

in India for example it was clear that the methodology they used there for the formation of

57
‘…they were given their name comunidades eclesiales de base because they are communities primarily
composed of lower-class, grassroots people, the base of society’ Boff L. (1990) Church: Charism and
Power. New York: Crossroad 125. ‘The spirit of our church community has expanded into a vast
flowering of Christian communities, base communities, from the base of society and from the base of the
Church…’ Casaldaliga P. and Vigil J. M. (1994) The Spirituality of Liberation. Kent, UK: Burns & Oates
Ltd 187.

32
base communities was the old colonial education process referred to by Freire as the

‘Banking system’ which he had so devastatingly critiqued. Indeed it had been an

immense gift to the peoples of Latin America that many of the poorest have had the

opportunity through the CEBs to participate in a process that was both liberating and

transforming. They have learnt how to reflect and analyse, and also to base their actions

upon a sound grasp of reality. This is not true everywhere.

2.2 MARINS’ PATHWAY TO CEBs

During this time Fr Marins was working in his parish where he had an experience that

influenced him for the mission he was to be given later. He had already taken part in one

of the international training workshops of the MBW with Fr Ricardo Lombardi and was

aware of the importance of renewing the Church by a conversion of consciences,

relationships and structures. Using these ideas Marins was able to critique the way the

Church was traditionally run and organised and he realised that a new approach was

necessary. He was one of two priests in the parish of Ourinhos and despite immense

pastoral efforts it was clear to him that they couldn’t reach even 20% of their 50,000

parishioners. This reality is replicated across not only Latin America but also in many

countries throughout the world; there are very few baptised Catholics that manage to

develop a relationship with their parishes in any regular and active way. That means that

they are unlikely ever to experience the most basic aspect of the faith namely the chance

to live their discipleship in a communitarian and missionary context. The parish was in

need of a structural reappraisal that would make it possible to deliver what in effect is the

right of every baptised person - to experience and live their Catholic faith.

33
From 1960 Marins became full-time coordinator of the MBW national team which was

functioning as a service of the National Conference of Bishops.58 MBW placed a great

emphasis upon the need for effective pastoral planning following serious and

comprehensive dialogue with all parties concerned. It was this work across the whole

country that led in 1962 to the Emergency Plan of the National Bishops Conference

(CNBB) which included as its main points renewal of the clergy and of Catholic schools,

and the transformation of the parish into co-ordinated small communities of faith, worship

and love. The fruits of this action plan were harvested in 1965 by the First National

General Pastoral Plan which was to be in force for 5 years. The Plan proposed as the first

goal of action ‘to get the parishes to create and build up basic communities, ensuring their

coordination.’59 The Bishops also promulgated ideas that had come fresh from the first

document of the Second Vatican Council in 1963, The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy

(Sacrosanctum Concilium), when they recommended in their Plan that the base

communities should become liturgical assemblies ‘with the active participation of all their

members according to their functions…’60 But remarkably the Plan had a new vision for

the parish that it described thus:

Our present parishes are or should be composed of various local or base communities,

because of their extension, density of population and percentage of baptised who by

rights belong to them. It will therefore be of great importance to undertake parochial

58
The national team had 15 members (priests, religious and laity) who travelled the country for 5 years
delivering 1,800 courses as part of a general pastoral renewal campaign. This approach using MBW
methodology and ideas was responsible for the emergence of an atmosphere of inquiry, communal reform,
and pastoral planning. The unity of the church was stressed throughout; Marins J. (1979) 239.
59
Marins (1979) 239.
60
Ibid.

34
 renewal, by creating or promoting these base communities. They should be

developed in the parishes as far as possible…61

The Brazilian Bishops had in 1962 identified that some of the problems facing the Church

could be resolved by making sure the clergy received better theological training and

pastoral formation and so Marins was appointed also to address this by being given

responsibility for all the clergy of Brazil, a post he held for 7 years. During this time it

became clear to many that a better approach would be to begin at the base, to start from

the bottom and work upwards; completely reversing the logical approach of the hierarchy

which is usually top-down. This meant that any programme should take its starting point

from the people, from those who form the majority in any parish, the laity. This reversal

coincided with one of the main themes emerging from the work of the Second Vatican

Council,62 that of the People of God.63 It is a sign of the increasing importance of Marins

to the Bishops and also a measure of the confidence that they had in him that he was

named their peritos to the Council and accompanied them to three of the sessions. 64

Noteworthy here is the farsighted attitude of the Brazilian hierarchy who, in their

documentary orientation, made it clear that each should be thinking already about how

they would respond to the Council once its business was concluded in Rome. Throughout

the Council Marins was also working in the Secretariat of the Brazilian Bishops

Conference from 1961-1967.

61
Ibid.
62
‘Documents do not change structures. Fr José Comblin many times warned us that the Second Vatican
Council had profoundly changed our theological vision of the Church, but had not changed its structures.’
Richard (2007) 95. Translations from Spanish sources are unless otherwise stated my own.
http://www.hechoreligioso.net/Proyectos/VCELAM/docuVCELAM/206_AmerindiaAparecidaLibroVirtual.
pdf Accessed 20.06.2012.
63
Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (Lumen Gentium) 1964 chapter 2 In: Flannery A. (ed) (1992)
Vatican Council II The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents. New York: Costello Publishing and
Eerdmans Publishing 359.
64
II Session: 29 September – 4 December 1963. III Session: 14 September – 21 November 1964. IV
Session: 14 September – 8 December 1965.

35
We have commented upon two major influences on the development of CEBs in Brazil –

the pastoral evangelical dimension from Barra do Pirai and the educational methodology

from Natal. Libanio makes an important and significant point when he states that ‘All of

this would probably have produced only a more modern Church, as has happened in other

parts of the world. However, the addition of a political ingredient produced the CEBs

phenomenon.’65 From the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s Brazil witnessed a growth

of popular movements and social forces encompassing voices from the middle and upper

classes as well as those at the base calling for a change in society. Auspiciously there

came together within the Catholic Church two significant factors: on the one hand a group

of progressive bishops led by Dom Helder Camara and on the other a growing mass of

faithful in various social apostolates increasingly critical of a Church allied with the

dominant classes. Libanio called this ‘the beginning of the realignment’ of those who still

identified with the dominant conservative forces of the ruling hegemony and those who

identified with the cause of the majority urban and rural poor. Put simply the Church

began to turn towards the poor and the popular classes became significant for the Church.

The more official repression restricted both peasants and trade unionists, the more the

Church cemented its alliance with the poor. Following the bloodless ousting of President

Goulart in a military coup in 1964 the Church became during the dark years of repression

virtually the only safe space in which anyone could meet and discuss the concerns that

were surfacing from within the poor sectors of society. ‘Without the vigour of the

popular classes, without this new openness to the poor on the part of certain segments of

the episcopacy, and without the vitality of some of the middle class laity … the explosion

of the CEBs would be difficult to imagine or explain.’66

65
Libanio (1980) 324.
66
Ibid.

36
2.3 MEDELLIN THE KAIROS MOMENT

A moment of extraordinary genius and profound institutional inspiration took place in

Medellin in 1968. It was the II General Assembly of CELAM and the result of a process

of reflection begun during the sessions of the Second Vatican Council and now bearing

fruit in the official response of the entire Latin American Episcopacy in a programme of

action that was to bring the insights and experiences of the Council to bear on the reality

of Latin America. Marins was present throughout and therefore saw first-hand how the

enthusiasm and spirit of the Council became the driving force of an entire Church for an

entire generation. It was unique and as Comblin commented recently, ‘Latin America had

Medellin, but in Europe, Asia or Africa there were no gatherings with an impact similar to

Medellin, and hence the utopias, hopes, aspirations and even the decisions of Vatican II

could easily be dismantled.’67 This meeting was in effect a legitimate and authoritative

teaching moment for the bishops of the Church, yet it came under sustained attack from

forces within the Curia in Rome and from a minority within the Latin American Church.

But Medellin remains forever as an impressive attempt on the part of a significant sector

of the universal Catholic Church to take seriously the insights and decisions of Vatican II

and faithfully to turn them into reality.

By 1968 there was enough experience already within the Church for the bishops to make

some very significant statements about the emerging experience of CEBs. These are

worth looking at as they set the tone and direction for CEBs and gave them full Episcopal

approval almost from the outset. What is quite remarkable is the arrangement that is

given to chapter 15 of the final document on the renewal of pastoral structures. They

started their assessment of ecclesial structures from the base upwards. The first level to
67
Comblin J. (2004) People of God. New York: Orbis Books 181.

37
be considered was the Comunidad Ecclesial de Base, followed by the Parish, the Diocese,

the Bishops Conference and the Continental structure of CELAM. In other words they

had already seen and acknowledged that: ‘The Base Christian Community is therefore the

first and fundamental ecclesial unit… It is, then, the initial cell of ecclesial structure…’68

The Latin Americans were amongst those who began to understand that neither the parish

nor the clergy as long-standing ecclesial structures in the Catholic Church had been

capable of delivering the kind of setting in which people could be evangelised and live out

their Catholic faith in communities geared towards mission. And so they set about a

restructuring of the Church placing the emphasis firmly at the base rather than at the apex.

Other Churches in the developing world made similar reflections in the following decades

however the Episcopates of the Churches of the developed world in Europe and North

America have never, to my knowledge, decided that the Church needs restructuring in this

way.

Another element at Medellin that was to prove crucial and distinctive for CEBs was the

acknowledgment that the Church primarily exists in and for the world and was not a

group turned inwards towards the intra-ecclesial: ‘The CEBs, open to the world and

inserted within it, have to be the fruit of evangelisation, and in this way also the sign that

confirms with deeds the message of salvation.’69 The bishops were in no doubt about

what they wanted to see as a major pastoral option emerging from the Conference and it

was: ‘That they should secure the formation of the greatest number of ecclesial

communities in the parishes…’ 70 They were making a choice for the future of their

Church and they were prepared to back up that choice with personnel who would be
68
CELAM (1968) Medellin: II Conferencia General del Episcopado Latinoamericano. Mexico: Ediciones
Dabar paragraph 15:10 177.
69
CELAM (1968) paragraph 8:10 108.
70
CELAM (1968) paragraph 6:13 94.

38
available to travel to each country and community to facilitate the growth of the CEBs.

Marins had become the assistant secretary to Bishop Eduardo Pironio, 71 the Secretary

General of CELAM. He suggested that Marins should embrace a new ministry, which

continues to this day, by responding to the many requests that CELAM was receiving for

help and support after Medellin and Marins decided that the best approach would be an

itinerant team. Suggestions for participants were made by the Directors of CELAM’s

Pastoral Institute in Quito, Ecuador, where Marins was also a professor. This work with

the full support of the bishops started out with no budget and was told to rely totally on

the generosity of the dioceses requesting their help. Marins had $80 with which to

commence his project. He was joined by Sr Teolide Maria Trevisan (Brazil) of the

Congregation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Fr Juan Carlos Iguartua (Venezuela)

missionary of the Padres de Burgos, Fr Joaquin Martinez Corcoles (Spanish) IEME,72 and

Fr Carlos Samaniego (Ecuador) Vincentian. A consequence of having an itinerant team

has meant an option for the spirituality of mission; no home or base to operate from, no

office or secretarial support or centre from which to offer courses, no place for study or

writing except airport departure lounges and arrival halls, no salary and no power over

your own life; everything depends daily on the choices and possibilities of the host.

Living out of a suitcase for over 40 years is testimony enough to the profound

commitment and spirituality not only of Marins but of Sr Teolide Trevisan who has been

his constant companion. Despite all of this Marins remains the most prolific writer about

CEBs in the world and his authority finds inspiration not in theory but in praxis, the lived

experience of CEBs in every country and continent. He was also a member for 11 years

of the CELAM Theological Commission.

71
Went to Rome and became a Cardinal in 1976 and Prefect of the Congregation for Religious 1976-1998
and later President of the Pontifical Council for the Laity 1984-1996. Died 05.02.1998.
72
IEME: Instituto Espanol de Misiones Extranjeras – the missionary endeavour of the Spanish diocesan
clergy.

39
2.4 SIGNIFICANT PROJECTS AND PEOPLE

Across Latin America a number of expressions of ecclesial life had been taking place

during this time along the lines of liturgical and catechetical experiments as well as base

communities, ecclesial or otherwise. It is worth noting some of the more significant

outside Brazil: los Presidentes del Asamblea (Dominican Republic) with Bishop Roque

Adames in Santiago de Caballeros; los Delegados de la Palabra (Honduras) with Bishop

Marcelo Gerin in Choluteca; CEBs in San Miguelito (Panama) with the missionaries from

Chicago; in Riobamba (Ecuador) with Bishop Leonidas Proano;73 also in Chile and Peru;

in Guatemala with the Maryknoll Missionaries; and with the reflection groups in

Montevideo (Uruguay). Marins was to visit all of these places and more with his team

over the next decades offering them support and encouragement in their calling to be

Church at the smallest level in the barrios and favelas of the cities as well as in the rural

areas in the remotest parts of the continent.

Before we commence a reflection upon the ecclesiology and theology of the CEBs it is

useful to take a synoptic overview of those persons who were essential to the

communities. These small communities of the poor became the dynamo for a flourishing

of theological, biblical, spiritual, historical and sociological reflection across the continent

and indeed for the large number of martyrs74 from within the CEBs. Some of those who

developed a theology in tandem with the CEBs were José Comblin (Brazil), Gustavo

Gutierrez (Peru), Leonardo Boff (Brazil), Juan Luis Segundo (Uruguay), Juan Bautista

Libanio (Brazil), Lucio Gera (Argentina), Luis de Valle (Mexico), Carlos Bravo

(Colombia), Jesus Andres Vela (Columbia) and Boaventura Kloppemburg (Brazil).

73
I knew Bishop Proano and spent time with him at Santa Cruz, Riobamba, during my time as a missionary
with the St James Society in Ecuador from 1985-1991.
74
One estimate suggests that there were 850. Fox M. (2011) The Pope’s War, New York: Sterling Ethos 42.

40
Amongst the great biblicists were Carlos Mesters (Brazil) and Pablo Richard (Chile/Costa

Rica) and Javier Saravia SJ (Mexico). Segundo Galilea (Chile), Bishop Pedro

Casaldaliga (Brazil), José Maria Vigil (Nicaragua) and Ronaldo Munoz (Chile) wrote

about spirituality and inspired a generation in their struggle for justice and contemplation.

Enrique Dussel (Argentina/Mexico) critically developed historical insights that assisted

the communities to place themselves in a greater context. Bishop Leonidas Proano

(Ecuador) and Bishop Samuel Ruiz (Mexico) were instrumental in giving voice to the

indigenous peoples of the continent. There were many bishops who showed determined

leadership and great valour in their defence of the poor and their communities of faith in

the face of powerful political and military opposition: Carlos Partelli (Uruguay); Enrique

Angeleli, Jaime de Nevarez and Vicente Zaspe (Argentina); Anibal Maricevich and

Ramon Bogarin (Paraguay); Valencia Cano and Raul Zambrano Camarer (Colombia);

Helder Camara, Luis Fernandes, Luis Colussi and Fernando Gomes (Brazil); Sergio

Mendes Arceo, José Llaguno, Bartolome Carrasco and Arturo Lana (Mexico); Silva

Enriques and Enrique Alvear (Chile); François Gayot (Haiti); Jorge Manriquez Hurtado

(Bolivia); Marcos McGrath (Panama); Juan Gerardi and Gerardo Flores (Guatemala);

Oscar Romero and Arturo Rivera y Damas (El Salvador). Marins knew personally all of

these people and worked with them over many years.75 They were a generation of pastors

who showed exceptional courage and leadership in difficult times. Their names are

revered across the continent.

There were many significant priests and women religious and laity who over decades and

often at great risk to their lives worked with the CEBs and with Marins as the CEBs grew

75
A full list of inspirational Latin American bishops can be found at Marins J. (2002) Lo que Nuestros
Antepasados Nos han Enseñado Guadalajara, Mexico: Enrique de Ossó 444-666.

41
and developed. Among them were: Fr Expedito Medeiros and Mr Fernando Altemeyer

(Brazil); Sr Carolee Chanona (Belize) Fr Rafael Palácio (El Salvador); Fr Edwin

Baltodano (Costa Rica); Fr Joaquin Martinez Córcoles (Dominican Republic); Fr Ivan

Marin (Columbia); Fr Anibal Coerezza (Argentina). There were countless women

religious throughout the continent whose unsung role was vital for the success of the

CEBs. They were inserted into the poorest communities, living and working alongside

the people, participating in the life of the CEBs and accompanying them with leadership

training and formation programmes. Without their contribution it is certain that the

priests and theologians alone could never have enabled such a flourishing of CEBs to take

place.

2.5 CEBs EMBODIMENT OF THE SECOND VATICAN COUNCIL

From the beginning Marins has accompanied not only the praxis of the CEBs but also the

theological reflection surrounding them. Starting with the Second Vatican Council and

continuing through Medellin what is revealed by that reflective process in the emerging

understanding of CEBs is the most thorough reception of the basic principle from Vatican

II, namely the idea of the People of God.76 Latin America is probably the first continent

to grasp the significance of this ecclesial understanding and to relate it to the everyday

way the Church was being organised and understood throughout the many countries in

South and Central America. As we have already seen in the Medellin document the CEBs

are understood to be equal in content and nature to the community of the parish and

diocese. As an expression of the base they are therefore the most reduced and smallest

number of participants as well as in geographical extension but they are not reduced in

76
Tamayo-Acosta J. J. (1989) Para Comprender La Teologia de la Liberacion Estella, Spain: Editorial
Verbo Divino ‘…the fact of Vatican II having so favoured the idea of People of God made possible the birth
and development of CEBs in Latin America’ 47.

42
ecclesial intensity or density. CEBs localise the great ecclesial community in every

human space where they exist and appear.

Many authors, such as Juan José Tamayo-Acosta have noted,

… the creative fidelity with which the Latin American Church has received the

legacy of the Council… together with the communitarian perspective sanctioned at

the Council, the new ecclesial paradigm becomes concentrated in Latin America

around the comunidades eclesiales de base.77

He goes on to state that the CEBs are no more than a way of understanding and living the

mystery of the Church, they constitute in a sense ‘the privileged channel for the conciliar

ecclesiology of communion.’ 78 Tamayo-Acosta in 1989 is noting publicly that the

European Episcopal Conferences are in many cases actively opposing the phenomenon of

CEBs and putting innumerable obstacles in their way.79 This will be returned to at a later

stage in the chapter when we look at the conflict aroused by this new way of being

Church. Despite this early resistance within Europe to the experience of CEBs in Latin

America it seems to me that what the bishops of the New World did was very much

inspired by the same Spirit of God who had indeed also been inspirationally present at the

Council. This research has shown that the phenomenon of CEBs was understood as a

reception of the Council. The spirit and teachings of the Council were now being given

flesh and put into practice in a concrete form by the poor majority of the believing

77
Tamayo-Acosta (1989) 44.
78
Tamayo-Acosta (1989) 45.
79
Ibid.

43
Catholic faithful. ‘This way of acting by the Latin American bishops, first in Medellin

and 11 years later in Puebla, was nothing improvised or random, but had its basis in the

ecclesiology of Vatican II.’80

A major understanding from an early stage about CEBs sprung from the Vatican

Council’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (Lumen Gentium); especially paragraph

26 from which it is worth quoting extensively:

This Church of Christ is really present in all legitimately organised local groups of the

faithful, which in so far as they are united to their pastors, are quite appropriately

called Churches in the New Testament. For these are in fact, in their own localities,

the new people called by God, in the power of the Holy Spirit…. In these

communities, though they may often be small and poor, or existing in the diaspora,

Christ is present through whose power and influence the One, Holy, Catholic and

Apostolic Church is constituted.81

Two ideas flow immediately from Lumen Gentium 26; one is the theology of the local

Church82 and the other is the Church as the Sacrament of the presence of Christ. Both of

these theological ideas are found throughout the writings of not only Latin American

theologians and bishops but also those in Africa and Asia too when referring to CEBs.

80
Tamayo-Acosta (1989) 48. ‘The CEBs are the cells of this new ecclesiology, oriented towards the
kingdom of God’ Codina V. (2007) ‘Eclesiologia de Aparecida’ Aparecida: Renacer de una Esperanza,
Fundacion Amerindia, digital book, 107.
http://www.hechoreligioso.net/Proyectos/VCELAM/docuVCELAM/206_AmerindiaAparecidaLibroVirtual.
pdf Accessed 20.06.2012.
81
Flannery (1992) paragraph 26 381.
82
‘The ecclesology of the local Church has been absent in the Church during all the 2 nd Millennium.’
Codina (2007) 105

44
Constantly authors are making the point that so much of what emerges in Latin America

in the years following the Council is the fruit and direct result of that same Council.

Casaldaliga says: ‘The new idea of the Church that is part of our Latin America

spirituality is deeply marked by the new view of the Church that emerged from Vatican

II.’83 And he also quotes some words of Karl Rahner about the same paragraph who said

that section 26 was probably: ‘the greatest innovation in Conciliar ecclesiology and a

really promising approach for the Church of the future.’ 84 When the bishops met at

Medellin they were consciously attempting to live out the Council in the context of their

countries and perhaps in some ways to take forward the insights of the Council and insert

them into the cultures and spiritualities of the peoples of the continent.

In the opening paragraph of Lumen Gentium the Council Fathers had approved these

words: ‘Since the Church, in Christ, is in the nature of sacrament – a sign and

instrument…’ 85 it became normative for theologians to refer to the Church as the

Sacrament of Christ, as Casaldaliga put it, ‘the flesh of Jesus in every time and place, the

visible, incarnate and inculturated sign of the presence of Jesus…’86 Marins was one of

the first theologians to speak of the CEBs in terms of them being situated at the level of

sacrament and not at the level of charism. In other words it is in the nature of the CEBs to

be part of that tradition of the Church which understands itself as being in full communion

and conformity with the sacramental nature of Church as sign of the presence of Jesus,

but at the lowest strata in society and with the smallest numbers in the Church,

experienced at the place where ordinary people live out their lives, in the neighbourhood.

83
Casaldaliga P. and Vigil J. M. (1994) The Spirituality of Liberation. Kent, UK: Burns & Oates Ltd 186.
84
Ibid.
85
Flannery (1992) paragraph 1 350
86
Casaldaliga and Vigil (1994) 183.

45
It is a crucial and significant development because many have not understood CEBs in

this way and see them as a movement within the Church, a kind of apostolic group, a

society that one can choose to belong to or not. From their earliest days in Latin America

CEBs were understood as belonging to the very nature of the Church, as sharing in the

sacramentality of the whole Church, as permanent sign and presence of the Catholic

Church in its smallest manifestation, at the lowest level of the parish and society. In a

sense this is what the parish has always been, the setting down of a Christian mission in

the midst of the world and as close as possible to the people it will serve. But with

parishes becoming so large and the clergy so few it was part of the genius of the Latin

Americans to come up with the challenge of taking Church to another level, a lower,

smaller level, closer again to the people and more clearly a part of their neighbourhood

lives without any dilution of the experience or presence of being Church. This is a

belonging by virtue of baptism; one is a member of the Church through baptism and

equally a member of the local CEB through baptism. It is seen and understood simply as

the way a person truly belongs to the community of the Church, within a grouping small

and intimate enough for the baptised to be known personally and to participate fully in the

mission and communion of the Church. The CEB enables the baptised to live out in their

life the vocation of being a believer committed to the Reign of God and the

transformation of the world. Gutierrez says ‘These communities are cut down to human

size’87 and in them people gather, meet and find identity as persons, and in this way the

CEBs promote personalisation and are schools of growth and development for the

participating members.

87
Gutierrez G. (1980) ‘The Irruption of the Poor in Latin America and the Christian Communities of the
Common People’ In Torres S. and Eagleson J. (eds) The Challenge of Basic Christian Communities. New
York:Orbis 116.

46
2.6 CEBs REDEFINING ECCLESIAL CONSCIOUSNESS

These reflections make clear what many have realised, that ‘The basic ecclesial

community is a redefinition of ecclesial consciousness.’ 88 For some, that ecclesial

consciousness is the legitimate living out of the new understandings of Christian life

flowing from the Second Vatican Council. Others clearly felt as time went on that this

was an incorrect interpretation of the Council and they attempted to oppose both the

CEBs and the theology that accompanied them. Although working in a hidden and

secretive manner, whoever these people were, there began a persecution and violent

attack upon those who were active in the CEBs, creating an extraordinary number of

martyrs and victims of civil and ecclesial repression.89 The ecclesial consciousness of the

CEBs revolved around the foundational conviction that these base communities are

genuine experiences of Christian communities that are fully in communion with their

pastors at parish and diocesan levels. The people knew that they were members of the

Church just as much as the clergy and religious were and shared with them an equal

dignity and responsibility.

Latin Americans have a very strong sense of their identity as a ‘people’, that is that they

exist as part of a wider social or civil collective. This sense of being greater than the

individual adds to their consciousness that in belonging to the CEBs they are part of a

reality that is born of the people and is not just a structure that is imposed upon the people

from without. Libanio expresses it in this way: ‘The heart of this new ecclesiology

88
Libanio J. B. (1979) ‘A Community with a New Image’ International Review of Mission 68:271 257.
89
The presence of a ‘hidden, disrespectful and arbitrary hand’ is noted by Oliveros R. (2007) ‘Iglesia
Particular, Parroquia y CEBs’ Aparecida: Renacer de una Esperanza, Fundacion Amerindia, digital book,
http://www.hechoreligioso.net/Proyectos/VCELAM/docuVCELAM/206_AmerindiaAparecidaLibroVirtual.
pdf 211 Accessed 20.06.2012. Also .Lernoux P. (1989) People of God: The Struggle for World
Catholicism New York: Viking, documents extensively aspects of the persecution.

47
appears to be the community as it is born of the people and to which the people want to

belong, as a continuation of the historical commitment in the region.’90

In order to grasp more fully what we mean by being ‘born of the people’ we need to

realise that this phrase has very specific connotations in terms of referring specifically to

the sense of the people as the poor, oppressed, believing majority, the ones at the ‘base’,

the marginalised races, the exploited classes and despised cultures. It is from these that

the CEBs are arising; from these poor, oppressed sectors a Church is emerging rooted in

the milieu of exploitation and the struggle for liberation. This new ecclesial phenomenon

is making the Church present amongst these poor and marginalised people in a way that

previously it never was present. It is almost a different kind of Church or at least

presence of Church. These Christian communities are not some parallel organisation

operating alongside those of the people’s movement. They are rather communities and a

Church made up of persons involved in that movement who seek to live their faith and

celebrate it together in such communities. In other words the Church is emerging from

within a social reality of poverty and oppression and as such is being born of the people,

is growing from within their reality and is totally identified with the people and their

struggle in a way that it never was before when the Church was seen as being a clerical

hierarchy who in fact appeared to be more identified with the establishment and the ruling

civic authorities than with the poorest at the base of society.

90
Libanio (1979) 259.

48
Gutierrez understands very well the implications of this way of thinking about the

Church, often referred to in Latin America as an ‘ecclesiogenesis’ or re-birthing of the

Church.91 He states:

A debate on ecclesiology has even been opened up by efforts to show that to be born

of the people is the vocation of the whole Church, not some parasitic or fruitless

alternative to it. Such efforts could not help but provoke questions, fears, false

interpretations and even hostility.92

From the perspective of Latin American practitioners and theologians this is not a debate

about what the Church ought to be, but of what the Church is now, concretely. Once

again we are not dealing with theory but with practice, an attempt to describe in an

authentic manner the reality that is being lived and felt within the CEBs all over the

continent. Those outside and dealing merely with the theory or theology arising from the

CEBs have been quick to accuse the CEBs of being a parallel Church. 93 The real

antagonism here is not between institution and community but between a Christendom

system and a people’s Church, or a Church of the poor. The former is characterised by a

Church that is tied to those with power and prestige and the latter is formed by those at

the base and those who choose to live in solidarity with them making their cause their

own.

91
Boff L. (1986) Ecclesiogenesis: The Base Communities Reinvent the Church. New York: Orbis.
92
Guttierez G. (1980) ‘The Irruption of the Poor in Latin America and the Christian Communities of the
Common People’ In: Torres S. and Eagleson J. (eds) The Challenge of Basic Christian Communities –
Papers from the International Ecumenical Congress of Theology, February 20th-March 2nd 1980, Sao
Paulo, Brazil. New York: Orbis Books 119.
93
The Nicaraguan bishops accused the BECs there of being a parallel Church, see Vandenakker J. P. (1994)
Small Christian Communities and the Parish. Kansas City: Sheed and Ward 102. Also Gallo, J. (1989)
BECs: A New Form of Christian Organisational Response to the World Today. Boston University: Doctoral
Dissertation 440.

49
There are mutual benefits to both of these groups and in reality within Latin America

these different trends within the Church have been converging for decades, the two are

geared toward each other, they are not two Churches, they are one and the same Church

made concrete at different levels of society. However the tension between these two

ecclesiologies continues throughout this period and right up to today. Latin America

proved to be perhaps the main battle ground and people paid for being on the wrong side

in this debate sometimes with their lives and often with their careers; and the perceived

‘wrong side’ was always the side that didn’t have power, either civil or ecclesial.

2.7 HISTORY MOVES ON

By 1979 and the III General Assembly of CELAM held in Puebla, sufficient time had

elapsed for the final document produced by the Assembly to reflect the many tensions this

level of ecclesial life was causing within the Church hierarchy. One of the first comments

in the final document (paragraph 96) noted that ‘The CEBs that in 1968 were just an

emerging experience, have matured and multiplied in a number of countries, in such a

way that that they are now a source of joy and hope for the Church…’94 I have noticed

that there are 15 paragraphs that reference the CEBs doctrinally in a positive light while

there are a further 7 that reflect upon their problems.95 The insights and declarations of

Medellin are referenced throughout and applauded as is the admonition of paragraph 58 of

Evangelii Nuntiandi in 1975. 96 However by the time of the IV General Assembly of

CELAM in Santo Domingo in 1992 the forces of opposition have gained sufficient

94
CELAM (1979) Puebla: III Conferencia General del Episcopado Latinoamericano. Mexico: Ediciones
Dabar 78 (my translation)
95
CELAM (1979) positive: paragraphs 96, 173, 239, 261, 273, 618, 629, 640-643, 648, 650, 653, 1147;
problems: paragraphs 98, 111, 262, 462, 627, 628, 630.
96
.http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/paul_vi/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_p-
vi_exh_19751208_evangelii-nuntiandi_en.html Apostolic Exhortation of Pope Paul VI. Accessed
28.08.2012.

50
strength to undermine one of the fundamental aspects of the nature of CEBs by putting

onto the same level CEBs and movements in the Church. In paragraph 58 ‘The Parish,

community of communities and movements…’ and in paragraph 259 ‘… small

communities, groups and ecclesial movements and Base Ecclesial Communities.’97 This

theological confusion is an attempt to challenge the basis that CEBs are a level of Church,

part of the sacramentality of the whole Church, while ecclesial movements and

organisations are in fact part of the charisms that the Church enjoys for her mission.

There is a conscious and deliberate downgrading of CEBs in the official documentation -

even though it appears to be slight it is in fact highly significant and represents the

growing influence of the Roman and curial position. Oliveros has been particularly clear

about this moment:

This affirmation of Santo Domingo could lead to the error of considering that the

Church is community and also is movements. Another thing would be to clarify what

is ecclesiologically correct: that the Church IS community and within her she HAS

movements.98

José Comblin reflecting upon IV CELAM General Assembly in Santo Domingo (1992)

and also on the Synod of the Americas (1997) traces an opposition to the very notion of a

Church of the poor, which was given impetus and form by the CEBs. The analysis he

makes in his seminal work People of God shows that the concept of the people of God

cannot be separated from the notion of the people being the poor majority with their

97
CELAM (1992) Santo Domingo: IV Conferencia General del Episcopado Latinoamericano. Mexico:
Ediciones Dabar 75 and 259 (my translation)
98
Oliveros (2007) 206.

51
causes and concerns. The emergence of the CEBs was in effect the emergence and

recognition of this Church of the poor as an identifiable and conscious gathering and

organising of the great mass of poor people. It was an irruption of the poor in history.

‘History has shown that the Church cannot be people of God unless it is Church of the

poor. The two go together (as shown by their suppression at Santo Domingo and at the

Synod of the Americas).’ 99 In a remarkable sentence in the final document from the

Synod Pope John Paul II attempts to redress the balance that he sees has been disturbed

by the CEBs with their stress on the Church of the poor by identifying the elite members

of society as a neglected and disaffected ecclesial grouping. 100 Comblin analyses the

present reality of the CEBs:

Base communities reached their highpoint in Brazil between 1975 and 1985. At that

point they levelled off and they have been on the defensive since then… For a time it

was hoped that the CEBs would provide a model for the future Church. Some diocese

were reorganised based on CEBs, giving the impression that the whole Church would

be a constellation of CEBs. As could have been expected, the times were not yet

ripe… The CEBs were shown to be what they actually were: a popular minority

facing a Church predominantly tied to the middle classes, though it kept talking about

the preferential option for the poor for some time. Even the term had disappeared by

the time of the Synod of the Americas (1997). The poor went back to where they had

99
Comblin (2004) 141.
100
‘As I have already noted, love for the poor must be preferential, but not exclusive. The Synod Fathers
observed that it was in part because of an approach to the pastoral care of the poor marked by a certain
exclusiveness that the pastoral care for the leading sectors of society has been neglected and many people
have thus been estranged from the Church.’ Paragraph 67:251 76. Downloaded from the Catholic
Document Archive http://www.catholic-pages.com/documents/ Accessed 13.02.2012.

52
 been for so many centuries, the object of charity of a Church united around its

bourgeois base.101

2.8 FREIREAN PEDAGOGY

It is important to look briefly at one of the greatest legacies of the CEBs on the continent

and that is the pedagogy of educational theorist Paulo Freire and the methodology of the

hermeneutic circle developed by Juan Luis Segundo.102 Freire was an educator and he
103
created a new educational method for stimulating consciousness-raising which

significantly influenced the development of CEBs in Latin America and is noticeably

absent in their emergence in other parts of the world. ‘An important role in the

development of the CEBs came from the liberating pedagogy of Paulo Freire’ states

Libanio.104 Freire remains to this day one of the most challenging interlocutors in the

CEB process because he injected into the project the idea of awareness-raising and this

was something those with power and their allies were never happy to witness; because, as

the thesis has shown, we are talking about the awareness or consciousness of the poor

who are the majority. This carried with it serious consequences. A key insight from

Freire and one that again differentiated these CEBs from their BEC cousins in Africa and

Asia was the primacy of praxis. He made the point that no amount of lessons, sermons,

lectures or courses would change consciousness but only the action of human beings on

the world. There was a naivety that imagined that words and thought had the power to

transform and Freire insisted that only action, engagement with reality, was truly

transformative.

101
Comblin (2004) 140-141.
102
Segundo J. L. (1976) The Liberation of Theology. New York: Orbis Books.
103
Comblin (2004) 129
104
Libanio J. B. (1980) ‘Experiences with the Base Ecclesial Communities in Brazil’ Missiology 8:3 325.

53
 …one cannot change consciousness outside of praxis. But it must be emphasised that

the praxis by which consciousness is changed is not only action but action and

reflection. Thus there is a unity between praxis and theory in which both are

constructed, shaped and reshaped in constant movement from practice to theory, then

back to a new practice.105

And so in the dialectic between reflection and action a new moment was born that of

‘theoretic praxis’ as Freire called it, when the people stood back from their action to

reflect upon that action in order to return to the action in a new way and achieve

understanding or a raised level of consciousness which was of course a critical attempt to

reveal reality and in the process transform it by the liberative action of the people. ‘There

is no conscientisation if the result is not the conscious action of the oppressed as an

exploited social class, struggling for liberation.’106 CEBs, through the methodology that

was followed in their meetings, were locked into the reflection-action process by the

hermeneutic circle. Freire is perfectly aware that ‘a growing number of Christians in

Latin America are discovering these things’ 107 through the CEB process which was

rapidly spreading across the continent. As mentioned already this often produced a crisis

in both the people and their political and religious leaders. This was occurring at a time

when there were very few governments with democratic credentials on the continent and

when some ecclesiastical leaders were afraid of the changes being wrought by the Second

Vatican Council. The result was widespread persecution of the leaders of CEBs from

within and without the Church. The heroic witness to the liberating transformation of

many local and national situations through the concerted action of the participants of the

105
Freire P. (1973) ‘Education, Liberation and the Church’ Study Encounter SE/38 9 (1) 3.
106
Freire (1973) 4.
107
Ibid

54
CEBs was matched by the increasing dismantling of the prophetic dimension of the

Church, ‘whose witness became one of fear - fear of change, fear that an unjust world will

be radically transformed, fear of getting lost in an uncertain future.’108

We cannot understand the role and importance of Freire in the basic communities if we

cannot grasp the importance of history to the Latin American culture and people. He

insisted that the Church lost its way when it became anxious to avoid the risk of a future

that must always be constructed and not just received. There was a clear grasp of the

theological principle that Jesus came to inaugurate a kingdom that radically altered reality

and challenged the creation of a new historic moment that tipped the balance in favour of

a particular way of being human and being together in society. The Church is the

sacrament of Jesus and the CEBs as part of that sacramental line and tradition are called

to be faithful to the mission entrusted to all the disciples to transform the world into the

kind of place where all could flourish and the values of the kingdom were lived and

experienced by everyone. Freire, Segundo, Marins and others contributed massively to

the formation of a methodology and praxis that delivered a conscientised people who saw

themselves as immersed in history transforming it by their simple actions and gestures.

This was often what inspired so many to give their lives in the simple yet courageous act

of being a member of their base community.

And indeed Freire himself was part of that inspiration, for example in this passage where

he spoke to the problems faced by those who had become afraid of the violence levelled

108
Freire (1973) 5.

55
against them and were tempted to withdraw or retreat from their commitment to the cause

of the people’s liberation:

A basic difference between those who leave and those who stay is that the latter

accept, as an integral part of existence, the dramatic tension between past and future,

death and life, staying and going, creating and not creating, between saying the word

and mutilating silence, between hope and despair, being and non-being… It is only in

so far as I accept to the full my responsibility within the play of this dramatic tension

that I make myself a conscious presence in the world. I cannot permit myself to be a

mere spectator. On the contrary, I must demand my place in the process of change…

History is becoming; it is a human event. But rather than feeling disappointed and

frightened by critical discovery of the tension in which my humanity places me, I

discover in that tension the joy of being.109

In 1973 Freire wrote something prophetic given the trajectory of Santo Domingo and

Aparecida: ‘… we should not be surprised if one day CELAM is severely restricted by the

power elite, through the anti-prophetic Church of which we spoke.’110

I suggested earlier that Freire’s work fed into the development of what is referred to as the

hermeneutic circle and basically constituted the methodology that the CEBs used to

organise their gatherings and to create coherence between Church and gospel, and faith

and life. Cadorette makes a significant point when he states that: ‘An important

109
Freire (1973) 7.
110
Freire (1973) 8.

56
characteristic of basic Christian communities, particularly in Latin American countries, is

a concern with injustice and the evangelical demand for the believing community to

confront it in a socially efficacious way.’111 CEBs in this continental incarnation have a

distinctive ethos and culture; their service of the world is achieved by confronting the

injustices suffered by the poor majority, with the gospel demand for a liberation from all

that is not of God and God’s kingdom. The methodology that the overwhelming majority

of CEB groups used was that of the See/Judge/Act method, developed in Europe initially,

where it was known as the Cardijn method after the structure established by Cardinal

Joseph Cardijn in Belgium when he started the Young Christian Worker movement.

2.9 CARDIJN METHODOLOGY112

In Segundo’s theology there was a coming together of sociological analysis with

liberative theological praxis; in this method critical information and experience served as

an indispensable catalyst that enabled the Christian community to engage with the reality

of tackling injustice where it affected the lives of people in the neighbourhood.

Knowledge awakens us to what is, but also and perhaps more significantly, to what might

be. In other words the facts that are evidenced in the analysis at the stage of seeing the

reality and gaining as much knowledge as possible of the present situation, then enabled

participants to transcend the oppression of the present moment by imagining, through the

next phase of judging that reality in the light of the gospel and therefore being enabled to

re-imagine themselves in a new moment, while making a commitment to acting together

111
Cadorette C. (1987) ‘Basic Christian Communities: Their Social Role and Missiological Promise’
Missiology: An International Review 15:2 18.
112
See an article by Marins J. (2007) ‘El Ir y Venire del Método: Ver-Juzgar-Actuar’ Aparecida: Renacer
de una Esperanza, Fundacion Amerindia, digital book, 53-58.
http://www.hechoreligioso.net/Proyectos/VCELAM/docuVCELAM/206_AmerindiaAparecidaLibroVirtual.
pdf Accessed 20.06.2012.

57
in the social sphere for a different future. This process led many of the CEB practitioners

to a state of heightened consciousness or raised awareness and along with that the

attendant ideological suspicion that became part of many of the CEBs. Slowly but

imperceptibly the poor and marginalised began to see through what they saw as the false

logic of the dominant sector’s values and language as they grew in critical self-awareness.

Marins believed that the CEBs in Latin America refined and improved upon the

methodology that they took from the Catholic Action groups with the addition to the usual

process of see/judge/act of a subsequent reflection/action process or evaluation, which is

exactly what Freire described as ‘theoretic praxis’, and finally celebration or the moment

when the faith community recognised that which had been achieved was part of the

Christ-inspired mission that the people had received historically from the gospel.

Segundo in his book The Liberation of Theology described the four steps of the

hermeneutic circle and it can be seen how they corresponded to the methodology used by

the CEBs in their meetings. He insisted that to begin moving through the hermeneutic

circle there must first exist an ‘ideological suspicion’, an uneasiness about received ideas

and the way they can be interpreted; this has been shown to have come about through the

‘see’ phase of the process. What was most controversial about this process was that it

could not be contained simply within the social or political sphere but would also cross

over into the ecclesial sphere and included analysis of the role and impact of the

institutional Church. For example many had discovered through their meetings that

despite its rhetoric the Church had sometimes failed to offer true community or a

prophetic critique of oppression, and therefore that the institutional Church had been a

religious legitimator of the status quo.

58
The second step in the hermeneutic circle followed from this realisation and was referred

to as reformulation. After following the constant process of looking at reality in the light

of the gospel, the ‘judge’ phase, the people had not only redefined their understanding of

society and their place within it but had also re-imagined Church and their role within it

and a new prophetic definition of Church had been born which was far richer and

efficacious than that which preceded it. It was really valuable to notice how ecclesiology

was springing from the human experience of people committed to a liberative praxis

rather than simply from the mind of the teaching authority of the Church. The third phase

of the circle entails implementation and clearly was analogous to the ‘act’ stage of

methodology used in the CEBs. What had taken place over a period of time within the

CEBs had been a re-doing of Church as the community moved from theory to practice.

A reimagining of Christian life had caused the CEBs to create more dynamic ecclesial

structures. I have witnessed this personally on many occasions throughout Latin

America. There the usual and expected structure for the running of Church meetings had

been totally reversed, while the bishops had to sit and listen from within the large national

and international gatherings, while the poor and marginalised groups (indigenous, youth

and women) were given pride of place to share their experiences and insights with the

assembly. The atmosphere was egalitarian, respectful and semi-democratic with ecclesial

leadership forced almost to assume a position of listening service. Of course some

ecclesiastics were extremely comfortable with this while others were clearly ill-at-ease.

Now to the final and fourth stage of the hermeneutic circle which ensured that the forward

momentum of the Christian community was kept in motion by a critical reflection process

59
or evaluation which examined and refined the new ideas and structures that were

emerging from the other phases of the process. ‘Thus we arrive once again at the

beginning of the circle never quite content with what we have achieved nor satisfied with

any given definition of the Christian community.’113 This process ensured no doubt that

the CEBs contributed to the credibility of the Church and gospel in the contemporary

world. It also needs to be said that when compared with the way CEBs have developed in

Africa and parts of Asia there was a far greater stress in Latin America upon action as a

constitutive element of the CEB process and therefore there were far fewer groups that

had remained at the level of bible-study groups or prayer groups or groups that simply

assisted the parish priest in helping him to administer the parish.

Those who had little or no experience of the Latin American CEBs often accused them of

being ‘political’ (simply because they engaged in the liberative praxis of challenging the

daily injustices they encountered in the neighbourhoods where the CEBs were based) and

therefore in their estimation they had become lost to the Church and were unworthy of

being called ecclesial groupings. However those who had personal experience of the

working of the CEBs knew very well that the mission of the CEBs was the same as that of

the whole Church namely the transformation of society (the irruption of the kingdom)

through the preferential ecclesial option for the poor, their cause and concerns. Now of

course not everyone agreed that this was indeed an orthodox ecclesial position and so the

very ethos and ideology of the CEBs throughout the continent was called into question

and conflict ensued.

113
Cadorette (1987) 27.

60
2.10 CONFLICT AND THE CEBs

The theme of conflict and the CEBs had been constant throughout the development of the

communities in Latin America and the Caribbean. This chapter will now analyse the V

General Assembly of CELAM held in Aparecida, Brazil, from 13-31 May 2007 as a place

where that conflict again came starkly into focus through the altering of the final text of

the assembly by Vatican officials in the name of Pope Benedict XV. This final section of

the chapter draws upon the observations of Marins and Comblin who were participants in

the Assembly. Despite the clear problems that the participants experienced both at the

Conference and afterwards in receiving the approved final document from Rome, there

were many who have tried to discover or recover, from within the documents and the

experience of the Conference, sufficient content to be able to motivate those who look to

church documents for their orientation and inspiration.

The preparations for Aparecida from within Brasil are illustrative of the issues that later

came to light. Brazil is the country that has the largest Episcopal Conference in the

continent as well as the country with the largest number of Catholics and yet their

supportive submission about CEBs to the body responsible for the preparatory document

was ignored and a number of their points failed to find their way into the text. Instead of

their clear positive comments for example there appeared various doubts, questions and a

definite refusal to commit to either promoting CEBs or developing them. The same thing

was to be repeated with the submission from CELAM itself about CEBs. And it seemed

to get no better when the General Assembly actually met in Aparecida. As Marins

reported: ‘In the lived experience and in the debates of Aparecida the theme of CEBs has

61
been conflictive…’ 114 He notices three main currents that were present at the

Conference; one that wanted to ensure continuity with and relevance to the pastoral

options from Medellin and Puebla (the option for the poor, for justice and for the CEBs);

another more attuned to the concerns of the Vatican authorities, insisting in making sure

that the interests, focuses and themes coming from Rome should predominate (the truths

of faith, teachings of the Popes, the battle against moral relativism, bioethics etc); and a

third less numerous but more ‘spiritualising’ trend that tried to disconnect the experience

of faith from social and political issues.115

The first and second redactions of the Conference text showed significant improvements

on the initial pre-Conference documentation but by the third redaction the power of those

who opposed CEBs became obvious. CEBs were removed from their context and now

were placed alongside the family, the movements, seminaries and Catholic teaching in

general. This was a ‘purified’ version of the text and taken together was not at all

enthusiastic about CEBs; everything positive said about them in the second redaction had

mysteriously disappeared. For the fourth redaction it took the intervention of ten of the

Bishops’ Conferences during the final plenary session and a series of tense votes for the

text that had been approved in the second draft to be reintroduced. 70 bishops voted in

favour while 57 voted against, therefore it didn’t achieve the two-thirds majority required.

However without further problems or interventions it appeared in the final document

where it was approved by all the bishops with 2 votes against and 1 abstention.116

114
Marins unpublished manuscript used with permission. 3-part document 2007 Part 2 CEBs La 5a
Asamblea, Aparecida, Brazil; 3:2 El Contexto de la Asamblea.
115
Marins unpublished manuscript used with permission. 3-part document 2007 Part 2 CEBs La 5a
Asamblea, Aparecida, Brazil; 3:2 El Contexto de la Asamblea.
116
Marins unpublished manuscript used with permission. 3-part document 2007 Part 2 CEBs La 5a
Asamblea, Aparecida, Brazil; 3:3 La Crisis de los Textos.

62
The previous General Assembly in Santo Domingo (1992) had not been a high-point in

the development of the understanding of the CEBs. It did not go any further than

Medellin (1968), neither did it repeat or even deepen in any way that which had been said

about CEBs in Puebla (1979) where they had been clearly seen to be part of the ecclesial

structure and were understood to be an integral level of ecclesiality, namely that fullness

of Church at the base or smallest and most local level alongside the parish and diocese.

The same could be seen in the methodology used by the bishops of see/judge/act where

CEBs found a place at each stage or moment in the process. However in Aparecida the

document was ambiguous about CEBs, there being no continuity about how they were

understood or expressed in the life and mission of the Church. They were placed in the

same unsatisfactory situation as in Santo Domingo, namely as just another expression of

small communities, movements and new ecclesial groups. There was no clear definition

about their identity or the place of each of those in the ecclesial structure. And yet they

had also reinstated in its entirety chapter 7 of the second redaction where CEBs were

situated alongside the parish, diocese and Episcopal conference as part of the structure of

Church. Nonetheless the final document that received almost unanimous approbation

from the Bishops was welcomed by all the CEB practitioners, given the level of

controversy engendered in the debates.

The process that was followed by all meetings of bishops’ conferences around the world

was that the document agreed by them now had to go to Rome for final approval by the

Holy Father. When this approved document returned to Latin America and was read by

the bishops and participants it became clear that in some sections there had been serious

changes made to the text approved by the bishops. The section which had suffered the

greatest censure was CEBs. Whole phrases and sentences were deleted, new ideas and

63
phrases inserted and in places entire paragraphs had been restructured. Some important

elements had been kept117 but they had been weakened and undermined by an obsessive

insistence on the CEBs being integrated fully into the parish and in complete fidelity to

‘the inestimable treasure of the Tradition and Magisterium of the Church’. Indeed the

Roman document renewed the accusation, which had appeared in the Puebla document in

an entirely different historical context, about secularization and an ‘ideological

radicalisation’ of ‘members of the communities and entire communities’. All of which

was used to justify the removal of a ‘unequivocal reaffirmation’ and a ‘new impulse’

which the V General Assembly wished to give to the CEBs in this new context in Latin

America and the Caribbean.118

The real shock here was not that the section on CEBs had been radically altered but that

the text that the bishops had voted in General Assembly had been so seriously changed. It

was the rejection of the significance and competence of the ecclesial authority

representing a whole continent and it seemed to negate the teachings of the Second

Vatican Council about collegiality. A letter was sent to all the bishops who had been at

Aparecida by the continental leaders of the CEBs in which they said:

We want to express our profound anxiety and distress, at discovering that the final

document from Aparecida, approved unanimously, has been modified in a way that

not only makes changes to the document but actually changes the document. This

117
‘… it is important to note that the clear affirmation in the Aparecida Document of the parish as
community of communities, overcomes the theological and pastoral confusion introduced in the Santo
Domingo Document.’ Oliveros (2007) 206.
118
For a full account of the texts before and after corrections see Muñoz R. (2007) ‘Los Cambios al
Documento de Aparecida’ Aparecida: Renacer de una Esperanza, Fundacion Amerindia, digital book,
http://www.hechoreligioso.net/Proyectos/VCELAM/docuVCELAM/206_AmerindiaAparecidaLibroVirtual.
pdf 297-308. Accessed 20.06.2012.

64
 seems to us that it calls into question the magisterial authority of the Bishops of Latin

America and the Caribbean. It disturbs us that the teachings of the Second Vatican

Council that we welcome as the word of the Magisterium for the Universal Church

appear to have been seriously damaged in a way that affects the meaning of

subsidiarity for the Local Churches. This attack on the work you have done at

Aparecida saddens us.119

The response from the bishops was disappointing; though individuals made their

frustrations known privately, collectively they said nothing, preferring to show their

obedience to and maintain their communion with the Holy Father. But what is clear is

that as a result of what happened many rejected the document that came from Rome and

took instead the final document approved unanimously by the Bishops. It is also clear

that CEBs remain an important topic for Rome and that they continue to make an impact

not only on the social scene but also within ecclesial circles too. If this wasn’t the case

why would so much effort be put into changing the text agreed by the bishops; surely it

would have made more sense just to let it all pass without the need to add and insert new

phrases, getting rid of words, substituting others and transforming the pastoral style into a

far more moralising and disciplinary style?

Many questions remained unanswered; why had they removed expressions of support and

confidence and expressions of a willingness to accompany the CEBs substituting instead

generalisations of one-sided isolated events and failings that left open the possibility of

119
CEB theologians, practitioners and facilitators letter to Aparecida bishops of 28.07.2007 from Santo
Domingo and signed by Fr Jose Marins, Sr Teolide Trevisan and 19 others. Marins unpublished manuscript
used with permission.

65
new responses including perhaps that of Episcopal rejection? Why had the positive

approach of the Assembly been changed into one from the Vatican of suspicions,

allegations and antipathy? Why was there such an insistence on demoralising the CEBs;

on a best-case scenario by reducing them to the level of a movement or a short-term

pastoral programme and on a worst-case scenario by leaving the clear impression that the

CEBs no longer had a trusted place within the Church? It was deeply significant that the

same attitude wasn’t exhibited against the new ecclesial movements many of which

showed well-documented fundamentalist tendencies and there were even cases within the

charismatic movement of break-away churches and in parishes of disconnected pastoral

and liturgical structures. Why had Rome found it necessary to add suspicions and

allegations in relation to CEB fidelity to Church teachings and authority when nothing of

this sort appeared in a single text voted on by the Bishops during the Assembly?

The perspective of José Comblin is noteworthy. He wrote a response to the V General

Assembly which was written for the Chilean Catholic movement Somos Iglesia and

published by Fundacion Amerindia. 120 The final document from Aparecida addresses

CEBs in paragraphs 176-179. Comblin comments:

This is the part of the document that suffered most corrections in Rome, the Bishop’s

document being much more insightful. Even so the text mentions all the positive

fruits of the CEBs, recognising that they were the sign of the option for the poor. The

Bishops had written: ‘we want to vigorously reaffirm and to give a new impulse to the

120
Comblin J. (2007) ‘El Proyecto Aparecida’ Aparecida: Renacer de una Esperanza, Fundacion
Amerindia, digital book, 171-186.
http://www.hechoreligioso.net/Proyectos/VCELAM/docuVCELAM/206_AmerindiaAparecidaLibroVirtual.
pdf Accessed 20.06.2012.

66
 life and mission of the CEBs in their missionary following of Jesus. They were one

of the great manifestations of the Spirit in the Latin American and Caribbean Church

after the Second Vatican Council.’ (194) These phrases were censured and removed

and the text became much weaker as a result. Other corrections followed a similar

line. But the Bishop’s text remains and can be consulted; and for the Latin American

consciousness that text is more significant than the censured text.121

Comblin draws our attention to one of the most challenging aspects of the entire

Aparecida Conference: its focus on mission. This was an attempt to inject a relatively

new dimension for the Church to consider and in so doing challenged the future and the

structure of the ecclesial community in Latin America. Of course for almost 50 years the

CEBs had self-defined as ‘a missionary community with a communitarian mission’ and so

were well placed to develop some missionary principles from their long experience of

being an out-going and outward-looking Church focusing on transformative change in the

social and ecclesial spheres. This mission-centred change which the Bishops were calling

for ought to affect all the institutions of the Church if it was going to be effective. The

Bishops stated in the final document that it should start with the reform of the parish (372)

which must be subdivided into smaller communities where there were closer and better

relationships. The Bishops went on to say that care must be taken that these groupings

don’t reproduce the structure and the activity of the parish. And yet it was extremely

helpful and indeed brave that the Bishops should hint that it was a badly-functioning,

inadequate institution for these times of growing urbanisation and increasing

secularisation.

121
Comblin (2007) 175

67
This mission-centred project of Aparecida was so radical that doubts arose as to who was

going to put this programme into practice. Comblin pointed out that history showed that

the most profound changes in the Church came from new people forming new groups and

creating a new life-style, always starting from a life-option of poverty. It was never the

established leadership or the traditional structures that empowered change as these were

shown to be incapable of taking the necessary risks; and it was this understanding that

enabled the realisation that the clergy were not in any condition to apply this programme.

Generally it was the laity and only occasionally bishops and priests who somehow

managed to undergo a conversion usually by escaping from the system in which they had

been rooted. ‘Personally, I believe that the future missionaries capable of changing the

face of the Church will be the laity, lay missionaries’. 122 As Comblin explored the

practical outcomes of the Aparecida Conference with regard to mission it became clear

that he was describing what the CEBs had been doing for decades and would continue to

do in the future despite there being those in Rome and some Bishops on the continent who

wouldn’t agree. This transformation of the Church would not be realised in a top-down

way, nor would it begin with a theoretical plan, but simply with people who were willing

to start an adventure, hopefully with the support of the hierarchy. There could not be

some preordained programme to follow because the Holy Spirit must be leading the way.

If the missionary action doesn’t come organically from the actual people engaged in this

activity it will have no effect because it won’t be a living human witness, which is in fact

the only thing that can touch the hearts of those to whom the mission is addressed.

This chapter has spent some considerable time exploring the origins and theology of the

CEBs specifically analysing them through the lens of Fr José Marins. We looked at the

122
Comblin (2007) 178.

68
inspirational CELAM meeting at Medellin and the consequent meetings terminating with

an extensive comment on the controversial and conflictive Aparecida meeting. We saw

how CEBs were celebrated as an embodiment of Vatican II and how they have lead over

the years to a rich and developing new ecclesial consciousness, likewise controversial,

which has given rise to a sense of a Church of the Poor or Church from the Poor. This

research has also focused on the distinctive pedagogy of the CEBs and the methodology

that emerged across the continent, noting the considerable contribution of Paulo Freire. In

the next two chapters we shall explore the impact and contribution of the BECs of Africa

and Asia to the world-wide phenomenon of this grass-roots ecclesial development.

69
 CHAPTER THREE

AFRICA: DIFFERENT CONTEXT IMPORTANT LESSONS

This chapter having left behind the experience and spread of BECs in Latin America will

now focus on their growth and development throughout the continent of Africa, where

they prefer to call them Small Christian Communities (SCCs).123 This research has not

uncovered any direct causal effect in their spread and growth; different circumstances and

diverse influences have nonetheless produced a result similar in many ways to the

experience of Latin America, without the added problem of ecclesial and societal conflict.

The chapter will explore the history of SCC development, the underlying theology that

accompanied it and the lessons learnt in the process, focusing particularly on Eastern

Africa.124 This region has probably seen the greatest development in SCCs in Africa and

from within the considerable literature brief comments and evaluations of other African

regions are also made.

The chapter will look closely at the context in which SCCs became the preferred pastoral

option of the Catholic bishops and this will involve a brief examination of the perceived

inadequacy of the colonially inherited model of Church and parish and also an

understanding of the contribution of the African independence movements as well as the

growth of African Independent Churches. It will ask what if any, are the ways in which

this different context led to the development of a different version of SCCs? What impact
123
Out of respect for the peoples of Africa the acronym SCCs will most usually be used.
124
The de facto historian of this period is Fr Joseph G. Healey MM who started work in the Nairobi offices
of AMECEA in 1968 as the first Social Communications Secretary. His latest book is the most
authoritative version of the historical process of SCCs in the region. Healey J. (2012) Building the Church
as Family of God: Evaluation of Small Christian Communities in Eastern Africa. AMECEA Gaba
Publications – CUEA Press; Double Spearhead Nos 199-200.

70
has this had on their success or otherwise? One of the significant aspects of SCC

development in Africa is the critique that emerges from within the SCC process. It raises

questions about the relationship between establishing a pastoral priority and fully

understanding the implications and limitations of current ecclesiologies. In recent years

Africa has been instrumental in the spread of SCCs to Asia through the AsIPA

programme and in the next chapter we will look at whether any of the African lessons and

evaluations accompanied the process.

Research for this chapter began with a familiarisation visit to South Africa at the end of

2005 where I participated in the International Pastoral Ministry Course at the Lumko

Institute in Johannesburg.125 Here I gained first-hand knowledge of SCCs from within the

organisation that has developed the training and facilitation of leaders throughout the

whole of Southern and Eastern Africa. Being exposed to the methodology and materials

of Lumko proved to be vital in my research programme, enabling me to compare not only

the way SCCs are organised in Africa but also the ethos and methodology used in their

replication. This was important because if SCCs are genuinely an experience of Church

then it is crucial to also sense the spirit that permeates them and animates the process of

formation. I also set aside time to study some of the literature on the subject at the mayor

seminary in Pretoria before returning to the UK where I soon discovered that I would

have to travel to either London or Edinburgh if I was to access the same journals at

home.126 Much of my information came from the African Ecclesial Review (AFER) and

125
http://www.sacbc.org.za/about-us/associate-bodies/lumko-institute/ Accessed 11.09.2012.
126
During the period of this research there have been over 80 different articles published in East African
journals on the subject of SCCs between 1973 and 2006. The greatest period of reflective output was
during the 1980’s when 39 articles were published, 20 in the1970’s and 25 in the 1990’s.

71
the AMECEA Spearhead journal,127 this is a large body of material all of which I have

accessed but a smaller body of work produced in Kenya called the AMECEA

Documentation Service (ADS) was more difficult to track down, however many of their

authors have also published in other journals and are cited in the bibliography.128

3.1 DISCOVERING ANOTHER TRADITION

Parallel to the changes taking place within the universal Catholic Church during the

1960’s as a result of the Second Vatican Council, changes were occurring in Africa that

left an indelible mark upon the thinking and attitudes of many Church personnel. The

African world-view had not disappeared with the advent of a western-style Christianity

but emerged again in the post-colonial period. Changes taking place right across the

continent included the dramatic impact on the established mainstream churches of the

growth of African Independent Churches and from the late 1940s onwards the spread of

anti-colonial African independence movements. These had an enormous effect upon the

way Africans saw themselves and understood their relationships with their history and

their choices for the future. At the same time and connected in some way was the

growing realisation that the structure of Church life was inadequate to meet the needs of

these newly independent Africans.

127
Both journals are produced by Gaba Publications, Kenya for the AMECEA (Association of Member
Episcopal Conferences in Eastern Africa) bishops. AMECEA is a service organization for the National
Episcopal Conferences of the nine English-speaking countries of Eastern Africa - Eritrea (1993), Ethiopia
(1979), Kenya (1961), Malawi (1961), South Sudan (2011), Sudan (1973), Tanzania (1961), Uganda (1961)
and Zambia (1961). The Republic of South Sudan became independent on 9 July, 2011, but the two Sudans
remain part of one Episcopal Conference. Somalia (1995) and Djibouti (2002) are Affiliate Members.
128
Edele (1979) 135; Healey (1978) 136, (1979) 175, (1984) 284, (1996) 453; Sirikwa (1979) 168; Buys
(1979) 171; Healey (1979) 183, (1984) 284; Shorter (1985) 299; Walliggo (1994) 429; Ishengoma (1996)
453.

72
R Hunt Davis129 listed three divergent interpretations of the colonial period which he drew

out from a number of academic papers on African history. They were all concerned with

examining which had the most impact on shaping independent Africa - the pre-colonial or

the colonial period. The first and earliest group of writers argued that the colonial period

created a decisive break with the African past. Other historians responded by arguing that

the colonial period must be set within the perspective of African history as a whole and

stressed that continuity with the past was as important as the changes brought about by the

colonisers. The third position is that of the ‘radical pessimists’ who though agreeing with

the first school that the colonial period was the most important in African history and

constituted a significant rupture with the previous era nonetheless argued that the colonial

powers had left the continent in such a state of dependence that only a world-wide

economic revolution would bring about the radical change necessary to truly liberate

Africa.130

Africans such as the novelist Chinua Achebe and the political scientist Abiola Irele 131

argued that colonialism affected African society and culture to its core. This in turn had

led Africans in a search for new values that had produced popular movements like

religious independency and negritude.132 African leaders like Leopold Sedar Senghor and

Julius Nyerere have then argued that the process of nation-building necessitated

recapturing the memory of the past from which the colonial period had separated

Africans. It was not enough to be going forward but in both national as well as ecclesial

129
Hunt Davis R. ‘Interpreting the Colonial Period in African History’ African Affairs: Journal of the
Royal African Society (1973) 72 (289) 383-400 www.jstor.org/stable/721149 Accessed 02.02.2010
130
Hunt Davis (1973) 387.
131
Hunt Davis (1973) 389.
132
Abiola Irele ‘Negritude or Black Cultural Nationalism’ Journal of Modern African Studies (1965) 3 (3)
cited by Hunt Davis (1973) 389.

73
life there developed a sense that in order to move to the next stage of post-colonial

African development there would be a need to recapture and reconnect with the past, with

a different way of doing things; in other words exploring another tradition, another way of

being African.

This seeking out of another or older tradition for inspiration was happening for some

African leaders on two levels; firstly society was attempting to reconnect with a pre-

colonial past in order to make sense of the challenges of the present, and secondly for

Catholics the Second Vatican Council was doing a similar thing, when it encouraged a

return to the roots of scripture and tradition as an inspiration for renewal. There were a

number of Church leaders who sensing the signs of the times produced insights that were

to have an enormous impact on the ecclesial scene just as political leaders were having on

the national scene. Their contribution will be explored later.

3.2 THE EXERCISE OF AFRICAN INITIATIVE

It was becoming apparent to many that though the Catholic Church was seeing a

significant increase in the consecration of African bishops during this period ‘…

paradoxically at the same time the Catholic Church could be called the least African of

all, because it was so thoroughly controlled from abroad.’133 This was most obvious in the

naming of bishops according to a list and agenda drawn up in the Vatican but it was also

very apparent in its missionary involvement. Gifford noted in passing the influence of the

Catholic Church on the socio-political field, its prestige and formidable presence across

133
Gifford P. ‘Some Recent Developments in African Christianity’ African Affairs: Journal of the Royal
African Society (1994) 93 (373) 522.

74
the continent.134 Yet despite this level of interaction with African societies it should still

be noted that the Church continued to be understood and interpreted within the foreign

and colonial period of African history.

Historians of the transition from traditional to contemporary Africa have noted the

significance of the concept of African initiative, demonstrated particularly in the

Independent and Separatist churches movement but by no means confined to them.

Richard Gray commented in a paper delivered in 1977:

We begin to see African Christian initiative not merely in the propagation, expansion

and explanation of an alien religion in black Africa but also in the context of a global

transformation of a purely western, parochial understanding of Christianity itself.135

The impact here was not only that Africans were taking the initiative in organising their

own versions of the Christian faith which were drawing thousands away from the

European-based colonial Churches but that their very existence was having an influence

on mainstream churches. The Church universal is challenged by her encounter with

Africa and the consequent insights and experiences which will impact upon the self-

understanding of the churches in the West.136 This process is identified by Healey as

being underway within the Catholic Church possibly as early as 1961 in former Zaire137

134
Ibid.
135
Gray R. (1978) ‘Christianity and Religious Change in Africa’ African Affairs: Journal of the Royal
African Society 77 (306) 90.
136
Ibid.
137
‘At its 6th Plenary Assembly from 20 November to 2 December, 1961 the Zaire Episcopal Conference
(now the Democratic Republic of the Congo or DRC that is a neighbour to Eastern Africa) approved a
pastoral plan to promote "Living Ecclesial Communities” (also called "Living Christian Communities”).

75
(now called the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), a neighbour to AMECEA and

a Francophone country). However he does acknowledge that SCCs were not officially

launched until 1971-72 during a period of crisis within the country.138 Another significant

date is 1969 in Tanzania when Fr Daniel Zwack called for a study to be made of the

reasons why large numbers of Catholics were leaving their Church and joining the

Independent Churches. He raised some very important questions in his Position Paper for

the Tanzanian Seminar Study Year in which he had drawn attention to the success of a

three-year project of creating small communities among the Luo in North Mara,

Tanzania.139 As a result Dr Perrin-Jassy, a cultural anthropologist, was requested by the

Maryknoll Fathers to investigate three problems that were affecting the mission of the

Church amongst the Luo140 in Tanzania including: the impact of the growing number of

African Independent Churches (some of which involved breakaway former Catholics), to

explain why they had such a strong following among the people in North Mara and

propose practical conclusions on a pastoral plane. Perrin-Jassy published her ground-

breaking study in French in 1970 (which was later translated into English in 1973) in

Communautés Ecclésiales Vivantes de Base (CEVB) is the full French term for SCCs. The bishops opted
for these communities to be more important than the well-known mission structures (church buildings,
schools, hospitals). These Living Ecclesial Communities were said to be the only way to make the Church
more "African" and close to the people.’ Healey (2012) 11-12.
138
‘The actual launching of SCCs in DRC goes back to the period 1971-1972 when there was a
confrontation between President Mobutu Sese Seko and the Catholic Church. Mobutu’s “authenticity”
campaign suppressed the missionary institutes and associations. To meet the crisis the Church established
the priority of the creation and organization of SCCs. The pioneering and visionary Cardinal Joseph Malula
of Kinshasa Archdiocese, DRC stated: “The Living Ecclesial Communities are slowly becoming the
ordinary place of Christian life, with the parish as the communion of the Living Ecclesial Communities.”
This included emphasizing lay ministries and implementing Vatican II’s theology of laity…’ Healey (2012)
12.
139
Healey specifically identifies the area as the Luo-speaking Deanery (especially Nyarombo, Ingri and
Masonga Parishes) in North Mara in Musoma Diocese in northwestern Tanzania. Healey (2012) 13.
140
(i) Meaning and importance of the dissident movement called Legio Maria (ii) Why the Luo were
leaving the Church to join African movements (iii) What are the religious needs of the Luo? Kelly J. (1991)
‘The Evolution of Small Christian Communities’ AFER 33 (3) 110-111.

76
which she highlighted many points that proved to be significant for the developing self-

understanding of the Catholic hierarchy.141

(i) For people to feel they ‘belong’ to a group they have to take an active role in that

group. (ii) Experience has shown that one can attain recognition more easily in a

small group than in a large one. (iii) Members become ‘totally involved’ in the

group’s activities and planning when it is small.142

What emerged were an awareness of and a focusing on questions of participation,

belonging, involvement and size. These were the building blocks of community and they

contributed significantly to the growth of the African Independent Churches. The study

was massively influential and went on to highlight the importance and stress placed upon

the experience of community among the members of their congregations.143 What was

missing in the Catholic Church for most Africans was precisely an experience of

community. This basic anthropological need of Africans emerged into view once the

clerical culture reacted to the disappearing crowds of baptised Catholics by asking the

question what the religious needs of the Luo were and whether the Catholic Church was

meeting them? This focus on the African and their experience of Christianity opened the

Church to an implicit critique of the culture and choices of the colonial Church. The

exercise of African initiative and basic elements of anthropology became recognised as

141
Perrin Jassy M-F. (1970) La Communaute de Base dans les Eglises Africaines Series I Vol IV Ceeba
Publications Bandundu: Zaire. English edition Basic Community in the African Churches (1973) New
York: Orbis
142
Kelly J. (1991) ‘The evolution of SCCs’ AFER. 33 (3) 111.
143
Gray (1986) 51. Kelly (1991) 110-112. Bishop Holmes-Siedle remarked ‘…she published the results of
her Tanzanian research which influenced so profoundly our way of conceiving our apostolate in Africa.’
Holmes-Siedle J. MAfr ‘Overview of Small Christian Communities in East Africa’ AFER (1979) 21 (5)
275.

77
essential ingredients in the re-thinking of Catholic pastoral priorities that emerged from a

deeper encounter with culture and tradition. The Catholic experience of SCCs was an

African response to an African problem, it was not the copying from another continent of

a model of Church that might or might not prove pastorally useful here.

3.3 AN ANCIENT AFRICAN VALUE

I found in Latin America that the concept of ‘reality’ was crucial in beginning to

understand how the Latin American thought and reacted to the whole of life. It was

second nature – an understanding that what was, the way things in fact exist, the actual

experience of life, underpinned everything in their cultural responses to events and

experiences. Reality was encountered in a profound analysis of an event that involved

many elements including the socio-political, socio-economic and the theological-cultural.

In Africa the concept was nuanced differently. Reality was found in the handing on of

information from one generation to the next, not simply within the content but in the

process of transmission itself. The ability to become a full person was wrapped up in the

process of receiving that ‘power to be’ by the younger generation from their elders.144

This made the relationship between one generation and the next not simply chronological

but also ontological. It showed the vital importance of relationships and the unique

weight placed on this element by African cultures. To hand on tradition was at the same

time to be involved in community, ‘tradition and community are two sides of the same

reality.’145

144
Booth Jr N. S. ‘Tradition and Community in African Religion’ Journal of Religion in Africa (1978) 9
89.
145
Ibid.

78
African religion is communal in two senses. First, the beliefs and practices are those of a

particular community and so in a sense it could be said that there are as many African

religions as there are identifiable communities. But secondly, African religion is

communal in the sense that the community is itself the ‘ultimate concern,’ that for which

a person would sacrifice everything, even life itself. Newell S. Booth Jr states that this

appears to be characteristic of religion all over sub-Saharan Africa. 146 We cannot

understand African religion or culture without a realisation of this communal concern. It

is expressed very succinctly by Mbiti in this way: ‘I am because we are and since we are,

therefore, I am.’ 147 Community along with tradition has ontological significance; it is

sacred. A person has their being only as a participant in the on-going community.

The community dimension is central to our understanding of the contribution Africa has

made to the Catholic Church and it goes a long way to understanding why and how the

concept of Small Christian Communities gradually took on such importance right across

the continent. But another crucial element in the process that made SCCs seem like such

a good idea to the bishops was the fact that African religion is at its core ‘humanistic’

because its primary focus is on human values.148 This humanism is communal, rather than

individualistic; the individual is significant in so far as they participate in the community.

SCCs were a way in which these critical elements of African anthropology could be

assimilated into the pastoral practice of the Catholic Church. It is not as if these elements

were ‘foreign’ simply that they had been disregarded in favour of other cultural and

religious priorities of the West

146
Booth (1978) 90.
147
Quoted by Booth (1978) 90 and taken from Mbiti J, African Religions and Philosophy, Heinemann,
London, (1969) 108.
148
Booth (1978) 91.

79
3.4 THE IMPLODING PARISH

Given the considerations we have briefly noted about the impact of a thorough

reconsideration of all things colonial it is not surprising that in the ecclesiastical area a

major focus was a revision of the parish, in response to the question as to whether it was

meeting the needs of the Church in a post-colonial independent era. In one of the first

articles to appear in the literature MacInnes raised a vital question about the African

parish: ‘fundamentally it is a Western European parish system transplanted on African

soil… can it continue to convince people in a new situation and a new society:

Independent Uganda, 1969?’149 Clearly linking the critiquing of the parish system with

the newly emerging moment in African history the conclusion was dawning that the

inherited colonial model of Church was no longer adequate for these new times as people

began to analyse the nature and working of a system that had been imposed on them by

European and North American missionaries. His article also identified something that

could no longer be ignored even though it was a direct result of the prevailing system –

namely, the passivity of the laity. He wrote ‘…many of our people long ago opted out of

an active role in this church, in this system. It had little to offer them.’150 There was

something about the way Catholic life was structured that seemed to create this reality and

the ensuing problems and difficulties. Less than a decade later Crowley reports, ‘It is

painfully obvious that many of the structures related to the community and to ministry are

now totally inadequate to meet the demands and thinking of the African Church.’151 He

specifically named the parish as being at the root of the problem. He was not alone in

making this connection, Gray agreed with his analysis, ‘One of the dominant facts of

149
MacInnes G. (1969) ‘An African Parish – Is there an alternative?’ AFER 11 (3) 225.
150
MacInnes (1969) 231. “Still today it has little to offer the great mass of Christians living at any distance
from Parish centres, small hope of personal growth or spiritual progress, little enough in the way of
community life or an authentic African celebration of times and events.”
151
Crowley P. (1977) ‘Christian Community and Ministry’ AFER 19 (4) 201.

80
church history in Africa is that the parish… has so seldom provided the structure of the

local Christian communities.’152

An avalanche of commentators weighed in with their analysis - Hetsen stated that there

were ‘…those who feel the need for a complete ‘overhaul’ of the traditional parish

system. This ‘overhaul’ should enable the parish to move slowly into a new reality: that

is to move away from a sacramental service station and to develop into a communion of

communities.’153 Moschetti wrote ‘… the parish in its present form requires renewal as it

no longer meets people’s needs.’154 Kalilombe added ‘Our parishes are often too big, and

at best they are useful administrative units.’ 155 Ndingi also noted that ‘…in 1973 we

began to realise that the structure we had in the church would not be sufficient for the

1980’s. It was good for administration, but did not go down deeply enough.’ 156 This was

a conversation little heard in Latin America or indeed in Asia and yet in Africa it was

deafening. African commentators were noting that the parish as an administrative unit

had indeed some benefits, but that they needed it to deliver far more. I take Ndingi’s ‘did

not go down deeply enough’ to mean the parish wasn’t taking root in genuine African

culture and traditions. SCCs would be an attempt to do just that.

The parish was in desperate need of revision, because the colonial system more interested

in administration and the faithful reporting back to Rome of precise numbers of baptisms,

communicants, marriages etc, had created a passive, dependent and infantile Church

152
Gray R. (1986) ‘Popular Theologies in Africa: A report on a workshop on Small Christian Communities
in Southern Africa’ African Affairs: Journal of the Royal African Society 85 50.
153
Hetsen J. ‘Aspects of Christian Community Building in Africa’ AMECEA Spearhead (1983) 75 19.
154
Moschetti D. ‘Small Christian Communities – A Fitting Ecclesiology for the Cities’ AMECEA
Spearhead (1997) 145-147 69.
155
Kalilombe P. (1974) ‘Biblical background to the AMECEA theme – position paper’ AFER. 16 (1) 60.
156
Ndingi R. A New Missionary Era (1982) 99.

81
which contrasted with the growing awareness and experience of collective participation in

the emancipation and liberation of many African peoples. Interestingly in Africa though

the parish was a territorial concept of rural origin and had serious limitations when

applied to the urban milieu 157 nonetheless it was out in vast areas of the African

countryside that its inherent deficiencies were exposed; the parish was never a sufficient

level of structure even for the missionaries who sub-divided the system into out-stations

where the priests could attempt to gather and organise at least some of the faithful.

It was within this context of a profound questioning of the parish model that the bishops

of East Africa became open to reviewing the perceived wisdom that the basic structure of

the Church as practiced in Western Europe was the only way that Catholic life could

flourish. They were clearly aware that even though numbers were still increasing almost

exponentially, their Catholic communities were not truly flourishing but were in crisis.

Kalilombe readily acknowledged to the bishops of AMECEA, in a position paper for the

1976 Plenary Assembly, that unless there was a whole-scale revision of pastoral practice

then disaster was staring them in the face:

In these circumstances of Eastern Africa, what we call missions or parishes cannot be

taken as the basic units of the local Church. If we do the Church is doomed to failure.

We need to adopt a new system whereby the basic units of the Church are those

smaller communities where the ordinary life of the people takes place.158

157
Moschetti (1997) 69
158
Kalilombe P. (1976) ‘An overall view on building Christian communities – position paper’ AFER. 18
(5) 267.

82
This was the beginning of a creative moment for the Catholic Church which was being

challenged on many fronts to respond to the new realities of both secular and ecclesial

life. The bishops were aware that their Church was heavily dependent, firstly upon a

small minority of the baptised, the clergy and religious, leaving the majority laity passive

and uninvolved, and secondly upon help from abroad in the form of missionaries and

financial and material support. They knew that this state of affairs maintained a Church

in a state of infantile dependence, incapable of standing on its own feet, ‘missionary’ and

not truly local and therefore to a degree ‘foreign’ because it was not yet rooted in African

cultures and traditions. There was a real need for the Catholic Church to become a mature

and truly local Church, which would only happen when the organisation of Church life

would depend on the majority of the local people themselves taking full responsibility for

the development and growth of their ecclesial reality.

3.5 AFRICANISATION BY BECOMING LOCAL

This thrust or drive to become a ‘local’ Church was one of the factors that made the

experience of Africa quite different from that of Latin America. The post-colonial

context was forcing the bishops to find a way of organising ecclesial life in such a way

that they could really engage with all of their people and not just the clerical elite.

Similarly, as at the national political level Africans were taking responsibility for the

direction that their countries were moving in, so at all ecclesial levels there was a growing

need to allow the Catholic people to start taking responsibility for the future direction of

their Church and its mission. Of course this was already happening all around them in the

spectacular growth of the African Independent Churches.

83
Perrin-Jassy’s report became a very important piece of evidence as the AMECEA bishops

prepared for their decisive IV Plenary Assembly in Nairobi, Kenya. This proved to be a

critical step in clarifying the need to re-structure Church, away from the traditional model

of parish and outstation with its juridical and bureaucratic ethos, and towards smaller

groups of the faithful that would be marked out by inter-personal relationships, active

involvement and communal responsibility. In August of 1972 Patrick Kalilombe had

become bishop of Lilongwe, Malawi. His input and impact in those early days proved to

be foundational for the AMECEA bishops. Gray attested that ‘Kalilombe…had been one

of the principal architects of the concept of Small Christian Communities among Roman

Catholics in Africa.’159 They held their IV AMECEA Plenary in December 1973 which

was entitled: ‘Planning for the Church in Eastern Africa in the 1980’s’. Of the 26 position

papers drawn up by the bishops, the question of SCCs was not among them. The bishops

did not even include SCCs in the resolutions of the Study Conference. However SCCs

made their first appearance in an official AMECEA document when they were mentioned

in the preamble to the guidelines issued at the close of the IV Assembly and Kalilombe

was responsible for that input.

Kalilombe had presented one of the Position Papers requested by the bishops: ‘The

biblical background to the AMECEA theme’ within which he situated their debate in the

context of biblical scholarship on the New Testament experience of Church. He outlined

for the bishops that the early Church understood itself to be the Church of Christ

subsisting in a communion of local Churches. Each local community was of a size that

made possible genuine personal relationships where people were known by name and

experienced a high degree of communal bonding in living, worship and witness. The

159
Gray (1986) 49.

84
Pauline Churches of Antioch, Ephesus, Philippi, Corinth and Thessalonica made

strenuous efforts to support one another and share resources and maintain the bond of

unity amongst them all. And yet the basis of their Christian life was the local community

of the faithful to which they belonged. In taking the bishops back to a place before the

parish system came into being he freed them from the historical and cultural limitations of

the present reality and allowed them to get in touch with the source and origin of the

Church. It was here that they sensed the vitality and dynamism of those early Christians

that contrasted so forcefully with the paralysed state of their own African congregations.

His reflection asked the bishops to examine if their inherited complex colonial system

‘has not led to a gradual loss of the importance put on the basic Christian community?’160

In the African context community was a cultural priority as we have seen and the

European missionaries had not given sufficient weight to the deeply held conviction that

life only had meaning within a context of profound personal relationships, not only with

the living but also with the ancestors. This uniquely African world-view was not the

experience of the foreign clergy coming as they did from societies heavily influenced by a

very different world-view. Kalilombe was able to show that the desire to restructure

Church life was actually a returning to a more scriptural ecclesial reality and therefore not

a new idea at all, but a going back to the roots, something indeed that the Second Vatican

Council had asked of the entire Church. Pastoral planning had been done for too long at

the diocesan and parish level, one removed from where people actually lived and

interacted. The thrust of his appeal was clear ‘that it is really at this grass-root level that

160
Kalilombe (1974) 60.

85
the Church can hope to be part and parcel of everyday life.’ 161 And this was to be

reflected in the preamble to the guidelines issued at the end of the Plenary Assembly.

Unlike other parts of the world the decision to promote SCCs in Africa was based on a

sense of needing to own the Church, to make it ‘indigenous’ or ‘local’, so that there was

no longer a gap between the faith people professed and the lives they lived. What was

stark in Africa was the foreign face of the Church; it was felt to be European and not

African, something that the consecration of black bishops had not really challenged. The

AMECEA bishops grasped the urgent necessity of looking for a different model or a new

way of doing Church that would deliver the vision they had sensed in the New Testament

and that chimed so closely with their own sense of African identity.

While the Church of Christ is universal, it is a communion of small local Christian

Churches, communities of Christians rooted in their own society…so that with time

they become firmly rooted in the life and culture of the people… incarnated in the life

of the people. She is led by local people, meets and answers the local needs and

problems, and finds within herself the resources needed for her life and mission. We

are convinced that in these countries of Eastern Africa it is time to become really

‘local’, that is: self-ministering, self-propagating and self-supporting.162

This was the moment when the young Churches of Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda

and Zambia decided it was time to grow up, to stand on their own two feet, to become a

161
Ibid.
162
AMECEA (1973) ‘For the Catholic Church in Eastern Africa in the 1980’s’ AFER. 16 (1) 9-10.

86
mature Church, independent of the European missionaries. Of course it was no surprise

that this came about in the decade following the bloody struggle for independence of

many African nations. Society was definitely setting the agenda and showing the way.

The realisation that the present parish system was unsustainable underpinned the drive for

renewal. This again is something unique to Africa as they feel their way towards a

different expression of Church in communities at the base of society and Church.

We believe that in order to achieve this we have to insist on building Church life and

work on basic Christian communities, in both rural and urban areas. Church life must

be based on the communities in which everyday life and work takes place: those basic

and manageable social groupings whose members can experience real inter-personal

relationships and feel a sense of communal belonging, both in living and working.163

3.6 SCCs A PRIORITY BEYOND AFRICA

While this research looked in detail at the leadership given by the collective voice of the

East African bishops through their AMECEA gatherings it was also important to make the

point that there were already a few people at the grass-root level who were ahead of the

game. There was not a great deal of evidence to say exactly how many missionaries or

native clergy had adopted the form of base communities before the bishops began to

formulate their pastoral choice. One of them however was Fr Edele, MAfr who started

163
AMECEA (1973) 10.

87
preparing for SCCs in his parish in Lusaka, Zambia from 1968 and finally launched them

in 1971 two years before the bishops gathered.164

The bishops gained a significant boost to their confidence and their project when in 1974,

the year following their first official foray into the idea of SCCs, there took place in Rome

the Synod on Evangelisation and the presence of episcopates from all over the world had

a dramatic effect on those from Eastern Africa. There was a mutual exploration of this

new phenomenon of base communities as Bishop Ndingi from Nakuru, Kenya comments:

Our bishops also became interested when they realised that similar developments

were taking place in the Church in other parts of the world. Small communities

became so much a part of the Synod that Pope Paul VI devoted an entire section to

them in Evangelii Nuntiandi.165

Kalilombe agreed: ‘The AMECEA delegates …had the chance to realise that all over the

Church there is much talk about Basic Christian Communities,’166 reinforcing for them

the importance of the theme. The bishops were aware that although a similar process was

underway across the developing world nonetheless each was growing independently of

164
Edele A. MAfr reports starting BCCs in his parish in Lusaka, Zambia in 1971 but having prepared for
them by a 3-yr visitation of parishioners since 1968. “We got valuable hints on how to form BCCs from
Europe and South America” but he was keen to improve on what he had heard by including “…every
Catholic family… not just a small percentage of the Catholic population” ‘Establishing Basic Christian
Communities in Lusaka, Zambia’ Pro Mundi Vita Bulletin (1980) 81 22.
165
Ndingi (1982) ‘Basic Communities: The African Experience’ In: Padraig Flanagan SPS (ed) A New
Missionary Era. New York: Orbis 101. Also Ndingi (1979) ‘Implementing AMECEA’s pastoral priority’
AFER. 21 (5) 287.
166
Kalilombe (1976) 262.

88
the other. This fact was attested to by a number of writers167 who made the point that

Africa was not attempting to copy what was going on elsewhere in Latin America and

Asia but was coming to similar conclusions for quite different and independent reasons,

as Ndingi explains, ‘we had had very little communication with those places.’ 168 What

was fascinating about the African practitioners of SCCs was that they felt the need both to

express their independence of the growth of BECs in South America for example but at

the same time to constantly evaluate what they were doing against the experiences of the

Latin Americans. This evaluation was well documented in a series of articles published

for about a decade from 1984.169 They attest to many and significant differences between

the development of BECs in Latin America and SCCs in East Africa (not least of which

was the connected question of differing terminology)170 but it was clear to me that despite

those differences the basic concept is virtually identical. They both understand the

BEC/SCC to be a level of church, something that will be explored in greater detail.

The determination of the African bishops to continue along the pastoral path they had

chosen is further underlined by their decision to make SCCs their study theme for the next

two Plenary Assemblies of AMECEA. Building Small Christian Communities in Eastern

Africa was their chosen theme at the V Plenary in 1976 in Nairobi, Kenya and again in

1979 in Zomba, Malawi at the VI Plenary Assembly. This was an extraordinary

commitment and reveals the vital importance the bishops attached to renewing the Church

in Africa. We were not dealing here with people paying lip service to a concept that had

been agreed at some academic or bureaucratic level but this showed a remarkable

167
Ndingi (1982) 100; Healey (1986) 17; Pro Mundi Vita (1977) 22.
168
Ndingi (1982) 100.
169
Kritzinger (1989); Healey (1984, 1986); Lobinger (1987, 1995); Kwame Kumi. (1995); Guiney J(1988).
170
Lorscheider A. (1977); Ndingi (1982); Healey (1983, 1984, 1986, 1987, 1993); Hetsen (1984); Collins
R. (1988); Kritzinger (1989); Kakuba-Kapia (1991); Wuestenberg (1995).

89
understanding of the need to fully explore both the theological and practical requirements

of their ground-breaking option. Kalilombe found their 1973 pastoral priority decision

‘remarkable’ when reporting back to the bishops in a Position Paper for the 1976 Plenary

Assembly.171 He traces how many of them have followed up their decision with local

synods, pastoral study or planning meetings across East Africa. So much so that when the

AMECEA Documentation Service circulated a questionnaire in 1975 to ascertain how the

dioceses ranked their priorities they were pleased to find that the highest priority in

AMECEA was ‘building Christian communities’. Not surprisingly then the Executive

Committee chose this as their theme for the V Plenary Assembly.172

3.7 AN EMERGING THEOLOGY OF LOCAL

Having issued guidelines in 1973 the bishops felt the need now to offer a deeper and more

argued theology for their pastoral priority. As with their Latin America counterparts they

understood SCCs to be the basic element of being Church, the smallest expression of the

fullness of being Catholic.

The Christian Communities we are trying to build are simply the most local

incarnations of the one, holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church …The task of building

Christian Communities is more of creating and developing awareness of what our

renewed vision of the Church means in practical terms and relationships, than one of

building structures.173

171
Kalilombe (1976) 261.
172
AMECEA Documentation Service 19th November 1975 No 11/75/1 contains the results of the enquiry
and the subsequent decision to choose the topic for the 1976 Plenary Assembly.
173
AMECEA bishops plenary statement in AFER (1976) 18 (5) 250.

90
They did not imagine that they were starting a new group or sodality, nor was it a project

to implement a new ecclesial movement with headquarters in Rome, it was quite simply a

renewed vision of the nature of belonging to the Catholic Church that without a sense of

participating at the most local neighbourhood level there was something essential missing

from one’s Christian discipleship. By 1979 they were clarifying exactly what these SCCs

were not:

The Small Christian Communities should not be understood as a fringe group, nor a

group for a few elite people, nor a group formed for a particular purpose, such as a

prayer group, a sodality, a Catholic Action group, a development group, a study

group, though these are legitimate and valuable: it is precisely the means by which the

one Church is present in each locality, touching the whole life of its members.174

That local level was the place where people shared life together, lived alongside one

another in the same network of streets, experienced meaningful personal relationships and

supported each other through similar needs, problems and anxieties. Ndingi stated that

‘Whatever structures a community assumes, they should reflect the Church as an

institution of brotherhood, of communication and of dialogue.’175 The renewed vision of

Church that the AMECEA bishops shared was one where relationships had a priority and

the search for communion and communication among individual Christians was a living

out of the gospel challenge to love one another. It was also a way of fleshing out the

Vatican II designation of Church as People of God which was freeing up many from

174
AMECEA (1979) 267.
175
Ndingi (1979) 290.

91
understanding Church as a merely hierarchical institution and giving due recognition to

the dignity of all the baptised and their role too as a People structured ministerially.

The decision to establish SCCs across this region of Africa responded to a new ecclesial

moment fed both by a reflection on the failures and inadequacies of the colonial system

and by the theological renewal inspired by the Second Vatican Council as well as by a

growing awareness of the surfacing of a deeper African identity, an Africanisation of the

Church. Many writers noted that what was fundamentally happening with the emergence

of SCCs was a re-understanding of the Church, a re-working of foundational structures

and a re-engaging with the concepts of relationship and communion. In other words there

was a new ecclesiology being forged, which required a new attitude and mentality on the

part of leaders and people formed in the previous way of Church self-understanding. The

new style of leadership required by this pastoral decision necessitated a different set of

skills if there was ever to be a fostering of the gifts and charisms of the Spirit from within

the whole People of God, giving rise to the flourishing of new ministries and services.

This was a challenge that some writers would say has not been met.

Ndingi was not alone in highlighting perhaps one of the most crucial elements of the SCC

phenomenon when he drew attention in his Position Paper for the 1979 Plenary Assembly

to the continued emphasis on the local church meant that they were precisely talking

about ‘part of the Church’s structure.’ 176 The place that had done most work on this

difficult area is Latin America and unfortunately this thesis will not be able to explore this

176
Ndingi (1979) 294. He also uses this expression in another article: ‘the Small Christian Communities are
meant to be the groundwork of Church structure and are therefore the basic cell for all the Christians in the
neighbourhood’ Ndingi (1982)103.

92
concept as fully as it deserves, suffice to notice here that the same intuition was being

registered in faraway Africa as early as 1979. The point Ndingi was making was that just

as the parish is the local embodiment of the diocese and the diocese of the universal

Church so ‘the SCC is an attempt to get down to an even more local level than the parish’

and was therefore an embodiment of the Church in its smallest unit. There was a truly

African sense that unless the Church can get into the very place where life was lived, felt,

experienced, suffered and struggled with there could be no engagement with the very

mystery and nature of the God who was manifested as incarnate in the neighbourhoods of

Bethlehem, Nazareth and Jerusalem. ‘That is the place where God is most truly for them,

the God who is ‘Emmanuel’, God-with-us; there is the place where the Church, as the

Body of Christ, must be effectively present to them.’177

Kalilombe in his Position Paper, An Overall View on Building Christian Communities,

for the 1976 AMECEA Plenary Assembly had made it very clear to the assembled

hierarchy that the whole question of ‘local’ was rich and profound in its meaning. ‘If we

are justified in concluding that the aim of the AMECEA bishops in their efforts at

planning for the Church in the years to come was to “localise the Church” it is because

this “localisation” is a pregnant notion.’178

Kalilombe spent quite some time with the bishops in defining exactly what he meant by

this term. He rejected the simple idea of ‘adaptation’ where the Church merely replaced

the foreign-born missionaries with indigenous personnel, in favour of a more thorough-

going notion of ‘incarnation’, where the Church was literally born of the people, took

177
Ndingi (1979) 294.
178
Kalilombe (1976) 262.

93
flesh, substance, from the very lives of the African people. He then used language which

was very powerful and perhaps provocative for some declaring that he ‘mean(s) a Church

which, in the area where it exists, becomes the “Sacrament” or effective sign of men’s

reconciliation or reunion with God and with one another.’179 This bringing the concept of

sacrament right down to an area, a specific geographical place, the locale where African

laity are striving to make Christ present ‘for the people in that area,’180 profoundly altered

the clerical balance of power, which had traditionally understood itself as the custodian of

the sacramental system. This became abundantly clear when he stated categorically that

‘the real point at stake is whether or not it is on the local people and local conditions that

the running of the Church really depends’ and went on further to explain that it was in fact

a question of power by stating that ‘the Church will not be localised until these (laity) are

in a position to determine the shape of the Church in that place.’181 Such powerful and

profound imagery made clear the challenges that lay ahead.

In Africa the Church was trying to insist on the need to engage at the most local level if

there was to be not only any meaning to the concept of belonging but also if there was to

be any meaning to the concept of being Catholic. In the closing statement of their 1979

Plenary Study Conference in Zomba, Malawi, the bishops drew inspiration from the

words of Pope John Paul II in his first encyclical letter, Redemptor Hominis, where he

stated that the Church was ‘a community that, even from a human point of view, should

become more aware of itself, of its own life and activity,’182 to understand that the project

they were engaged upon was precisely a process of growing self-awareness. They were

exercised by their determination to see that ‘this universal Church must be really present
179
Kalilombe (1976) 263.
180
Ibid.
181
Ibid.
182
Donders J. (ed) (1996) John Paul II The Encyclicals in Everyday Language New York: Orbis 18.

94
to Christians in their own locality; it must be truly local as well as universal.’ 183 The

bishops were convinced that their Church which was spread all over the world and had a

very defined international not to say global presence should also be capable of operating

at the smallest and remotest level of the planet.

Small Christian Communities are means by which the Church is brought down to the

daily life and concerns of people where they actually live. In them, the Church takes

on flesh and blood in the life situations of people… In them, they can truly experience

the Church as a new way of being together.184

The bishops’ document stated that ‘Structurally, the Small Christian Community is the

most local unit of the Church.’185 In making SCCs a part of the ecclesial structure the

bishops here were going beyond that which had been accepted by the Second Vatican

Council where there was not any reference to Church that was not either the church

universal or the local church meaning the diocese. This designation of the SCC as Church

had its roots in New Testament, especially Pauline ecclesiology. The bishops felt that

they could go beyond the Council in their theology, perhaps because the very existence of

this way of being Church had already moved them beyond that which was envisioned at

the time of the Council. The bishop’s statement went on to say that the family was the

‘domestic Church’, without challenging that assertion; though in fact, in the documents of

the Council where this phrase was introduced, it was always prefixed by the Latin word

‘velut’ which means ‘as if/like’. In other words its use was metaphorical rather than

183
AMECEA (1979) 266.
184
Ibid.
185
AMECEA (1979) 268

95
descriptive. But in order to make clear that any theology which attempted to say that the

family and not the SCC was actually the basic unit of the Church the bishops corrected

that notion by stating ‘…but of its very nature it (the family) has to reach out to other

families, and the Small Christian Community is made up of several family groups.’186

3.8 SAME CHURCH - DIFFERENT ECCLESIOLOGY

Commenting as early as 1979 at the Irish Missionary Congress, Ndingi stated that ‘In East

Africa a new approach to ecclesiology is evolving.’187 He was aware that the AMECEA

decision to base the life of the Church in the region on SCCs had meant a rupture with the

past, a change from the way things were done previously. Only six years earlier the

bishops had realised that the structure they were operating from would not be adequate for

the 1980s. They reconfigured the structural failure of the inherited system as he went on

to explain: ‘Instead of starting the groundwork with the parish, as we did formerly, we

start it with the small communities.’188 The inadequacy of the existing pastoral models has

been well attested to already and Lwaminda notes that it was this critical awareness that

motivated the bishops in their pastoral choices, in other words it was an ecclesiological

reason that lay behind the pastoral priority.

The Bishops were searching for ways and means of making the Church local so that it

could play an effective role in the development of the young nations of the region as

186
Ibid.
187
Ndingi (1982) 101.
188
Ibid.

96
 their salt, leaven and light. But, this would only be possible if and when it is present

in living local communities and is in constant dialogue with the society.189

These men realised that they needed to be part of the emerging independent Africa or they

and their flocks would be left behind on the shore as the tide ebbed away from their still

too European-styled Church. This emerging ecclesiology however was grafted onto an

understanding of Church that was anything but renewed and engaged. No doubt amongst

the bishops who voted in favour of SCCs were a number who went home and did very

little about the implementation of their proposals, not because they were not men of

goodwill, but simply because they had a concept of Church that precluded this idea of

dialogue with the world as a necessary part of the Church’s mission and raison d’etre.

The pre-Vatican II view that the Church was a divinely instituted hierarchical

organisation whose main purpose was to dispense the sacraments as essential means of

salvation held sway amongst a great many of the Church’s clerical personnel. This was

the model that they were trained in and have operated from for decades; that the role of

the Church was in the spiritual and religious sphere and not directly in the social,

economic and political areas of human life. Their central concerns were therefore intra-

Church activities like teaching religious doctrine, dispensing the sacraments, spiritual

sanctification, internal order and discipline, personal and sexual morality.

Kalilombe was one of East Africa’s most significant SCC commentators. Speaking of his

own reality in the diocese of Lilongwe, Malawi, he stated that if SCCs were to succeed in

189
Lwaminda P. (1996) ‘A theological analysis of the AMECEA documents on the local Church with
special emphasis on the pastoral option for SCCs’ AMECEA Spearhead. 140-141 89.

97
the diocese then one supposed that ‘…the clergy must be quite conscious of the change in

the conception of the Church’s role in society implied in the new system, and accept it as

the basis of Church life and activity. It is tempting to assume that such an understanding

has taken place.’190

This assumption was made because it was the clergy who were in touch with recent

developments in Church teaching and would have benefited from in-service training on

the documents of Vatican II. However, the bishop challenged that assumption saying that

many priests active in the diocese after 1975 (the year the diocesan synod made SCCs the

pastoral priority) were accustomed to thinking about and organising Church according to

the former distinction between the ecclesiastical and secular spheres. Change would not

come easily to them. He went on to make an absolutely crucial point often overlooked

when implementing new pastoral strategies that the main problem was not necessarily one

of theory but more probably one of change of attitudes, mentality, reflexes and practical

skills. Even when people were capable of intellectually grasping new ideas it could take

time and effort before that translated into actual changes in everyday attitudes and

activities. He took his point a stage further when he noted that the potential problem with

the clergy was that they would try to implement the new system with the attitudes, values

and habits more appropriate to the former system.

This insight is profound and critical, as Mejia states, ‘The first criterion to be taken into

consideration before establishing pastoral priorities is the model of Church we have in

190
Kalilombe P. (1984) ‘From outstations to SCCs’ AMECEA Spearhead 82-83 20.

98
mind, either consciously or unconsciously.’191 There has not been sufficient reflection

dedicated to understanding that our way of approaching any pastoral challenge will

depend to a great extent on the way we conceive of and understand the nature of Church

and its mission in the world today. Long before a new pastoral initiative is launched

significant amounts of time need to be spent preparing the ground by analysing the

preconceived ideas and presuppositions of those who will be required to implement the

new strategy. On the whole this has not been the pastoral practice. Kalilombe admitted

that when the bishops decided to adopt the new system of small communities not enough

study had been made of the differences between this new method and the old one of

outstations it was replacing. The ecclesiologies implied in the two methods had not been

sufficiently analyzed and contrasted. Consequently, at several points in the

implementation, the typical conceptual ideology, practical objectives, tools, methods, and

attitudes undergirding the outstation system were still being used in pursuing the

objectives of the quite different projects of Christian Communities. Hence the

problems.192

About the same time Hetsen was reaching an identical conclusion: ‘The first requirement

for the establishment of SCCs seems a very fundamental one: namely, the need of a

change of attitude or mentality’193 by everyone involved in the project. Hetsen called it

looking at the Church in a different light. This new light meant for him becoming aware

that the Church meant first of all the people, the faithful, and not just the clergy who are

less than 1% of the Church. He went on to quote Bishop Zoa of Cameroon intuitively

feeling that SCCs in West Africa would imply a strong ‘declericalisation’. It was

191
Mejia R. (1992) ‘The pastoral priorities of the local Church in Eastern Africa’ AFER. 34 (6) 329.
192
Kalilombe (1984) 71-74. Also Kalilombe (1976) 269-272.
193
Hetsen (1983) 20.

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becoming clear that the ecclesiology one brings to any project must be recognised,

acknowledged and worked on if any pastoral project was to succeed.

The Tanzanian writer Magesa, who was grappling with the fact that many people, laity

and clergy alike, treat SCCs with suspicion, introduced another interesting angle on the

debate. He noted that present ecclesiologies stood in the way of people recognising SCCs

as both helpful and orthodox, despite the bishops being the ones who were promoting

them! And the reason was:

Many pastoral agents in the region are doubtful about them, and see them as

challenges to the present parish structure. In most minds, the parish remains the

primary structure and expression of the Church; the parish priest the primary (in some

cases the only) minister.194

This attitude was understandable given the dominant presence of the parish in the mind-

set and experience of the Catholic population. But as Magesa went on to explain this

parish-centred ecclesiology was by no means the only ecclesiology available, there was

also a different and earlier ecclesiological perspective that traced its origin right back to

the New Testament. The early churches provided us with a rich source of experience that

enabled us to better appreciate the new moment we were facing and understand the new

challenges that SCCs were designed to meet. There are important consequences to be

considered in saying that SCCs were the most local realization of the Catholic Church.

From the scriptural accounts of the early church communities we could see that they

194
Magesa L. (1984) ‘BCCs and the apostolic succession of the Church’ AFER. 26 (6) 348.

100
followed no blue-print or model left behind by Jesus and that whatever ministries came to

flourish in the different urban fellowships, they tended to emerge from each community

as a response to their local needs, under the watchful gaze of their founding apostle.

While Magesa was delighted to exclaim that SCCs were probably one of the best things to

have happened since the close of the first century, he also cautioned with this insightful

analysis:

The concrete, realistic and independent choice in faith must be made to let SCCs

express their ‘being churches’ with structures and ministries evolving at least partially

from within themselves. But if our ecclesiology continues to insist that SCCs remain

parish-centred in structure and priest-centred in ministry, while at the same time we

say they are ‘churches’, we can only wonder if we are not wasting our time in our

efforts at renewing the Church through the building of Small Christian

Communities.195

Reflecting the tension between the two main ecclesiological perspectives he drew our

attention to the vital importance of ensuring that the framework or methodology we

operate out of was appropriate to the content we were trying to share. Perhaps more

gently the Jesuit Guiney wrote ‘It can be safely said that church leaders who have not

grasped Vatican II ecclesiology do find it difficult to understand how SCCs can be

accepted as a new way of being church.’196 Yet it was precisely this that made the SCC

experience so exciting for the whole Church today, it was a new conception of Church, an

195
Magesa (1984) 352.
196
Guiney J. (1988) ‘Comparing BCCs in South America and Africa’ AFER. 30 (3) 177.

101
ecclesiogenesis as the Latin Americans refer to it,197 and the new could only be given birth

to by those who to some extent were dissatisfied with the past and were awaiting or

actively encouraging the new present. Concluding his important article Magesa stated

that ‘the success of SCCs in Eastern Africa will depend a great deal on our

ecclesiology.’198

The decisive factor in the success or not of SCCs lay with the clerical elite and their

willingness to relinquish power. Church leaders whose formation took place prior to the

Vatican Council were operating in a feudalistic institution very much concerned with

power and it is this inherited image of the Church that is the greatest threat to the progress

of the Church in Africa and beyond. When Healey made the first evaluation of the

AMECEA process in 1986,199 10 years after the bishops officially made it their pastoral

priority, he noted that there were some achievements but sounded a note of warning that

the project was not attaining its overall purpose. Many diocese were not even making a

start with SCCs while in those that had made efforts the ‘major problems’ were linked to

clerical resistance and control:

Some diocese had done little to encourage SCCs in practical terms… SCCs are

clerical-centred with little and at times no initiative at all from the laity… Some

priests fear that if such communities are not properly managed other sects may spring

up. There has been over-supervision of the SCCs due to fears of the danger of the

emergence of ‘splinter groups’ and ‘schisms’… Thus SCC leaders are not allowed to

197
Boff L. (1986) Ecclesiogenesis: The Base Communities Reinvent the Church. New York: Orbis.
198
Magesa (1984) 356.
199
Healey J. (1987) ‘Four Africans Evaluate SCCs in East Africa’ AFER 29 (5) 266-277.

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 take full responsibility… Other people do not like changes. They want to continue

things as they always did… When the laity is responsible the clergy tend to be very

strict. Good recommendations from the Christian communities are not welcome.200

Some report the worldwide emergence of SCCs as an inspiration of the Holy Spirit 201 but

nonetheless its implementation rests in the hands of those who have authority in the

Church. It can be seen from the many commentaries and evaluations of the process that

this new style of being Church threatens the command structure and reveals that many of

those in power are not ready for change. Uzukwu traces the problems of SCCs in Eastern

Africa back to the ‘burden of European Christianity which the African clergy appears

unwilling to cast off.’ 202 This far-reaching analysis recognises that the hierarchical and

authoritarian structure of the colonial Church is now the very impediment to the African

Church’s effort of renewal. In other words indigenous clergy have internalised and

accepted that model of Church, which they have also stated is no longer adequate to meet

the needs of Africans today. Uzukwu takes his comments a step further and ponders how

this state of affairs has come about? He takes issue with the training programme in the

seminaries and religious houses that maintains the ideology of authority by shielding the

students from the real concerns of life in Africa. They may be in Africa, he says, but they

do not live in Africa.

200
Healey (1987) 266-277, quoted in Uzukwu E. (1992) ‘The Birth and Development of a Local Church:
Difficulties and Signs of Hope’ Concilium 1992/1 18.
201
O’Halloran J. (1996) Small Christian Communities – A Pastoral Companion New York: Orbis 23-27.
202
Uzukwu (1992) 18.

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3.9 LESSONS AND INSIGHTS

The experience of developing SCCs in Africa has taught us some very important lessons.

Though the reasons for their growth are very different from and later than Latin America

nonetheless their basic shape is similar.203 One significant difference however lies with

the motivation of the people who gather together at the neighbourhood level, as Hetsen

observes: ‘in Africa, the reason for starting an SCC usually is a deepening of the faith.’204

Of course what we mean by that phrase differs according to our faith understanding and to

some extent also our cultures. Latin Americans as we have seen form BECs as a faith

response to the gospel invitation to inaugurate the kingdom on earth, which means for

them to transform the world with kingdom values. In Africa people join an SCC to get

closer to God, to deepen their piety, to be more spiritually aware and to experience the

love and closeness of family relationships and so what they do with the SCC turns out to

be quite different in the sense that they are content with the element of prayer and bible

reflection and less comfortable with the next stage of going out and changing the

neighbourhood.205

A key lesson from Africa is the distinction between establishing a pastoral priority and

examining and understanding a person’s underlying ecclesiology. It has been a great help

to learn from local evaluations of the process to date that many of the failures are due to

an ignorance of the importance and significance of the ecclesiology, or church-

203
Kwame Kumi (1995) ‘Despite the significant differences in their origins, the Latin America and East
Africa BECs have a lot of things in common and they both constitute a new way of building the Church at
the grassroots.’ 165.
204
Hetsen (1983) 27.
205
Healey J. (1997) ‘Our Five Year Journey of SCCs: The Evolving Sociology and Ecclesiology of Church
as Family in East Africa’ AFER 39 (5-6). ‘In spite of the present dose of piety and spiritual devotion among
many African Christians, moving to SCCs with a real spirit of inculturation, service and transformation of
society is still very difficult’ 292. He also gives a good description of a typical SCC meeting in Nakuru
Town, Kenya where there is a strong emphasis on piety and devotions: 288.

104
understanding, that pastoral workers bring to the task of forming small communities.

Africa more than anywhere else it seems has revealed that the two ecclesiologies 206

leading up to and present in the documents of the Second Vatican Council actually

present us with certain difficulties and obstacles in the successful completion of the

collegial decision of the AMECEA bishops to make SCCs their preferred pastoral

priority. Basically those whose understanding of the Church and her mission follows a

more pre-Vatican II approach find SCCs almost unnecessary as for them the sacraments

are key and they take place in the parish church, these are often members of the hierarchy

both bishops and clergy.207 While those whose formation has placed a high priority on the

vocation of all the baptised as People of God, collegiality, and the building of the

kingdom find SCCs an invaluable tool for the mission and self-expression of the Church.

In Africa SCCs have offered the Catholic Church perhaps the only way in which given its

structure and history it can at last offer to local people a truly African sense of belonging

to a community and therefore of beginning to become an indigenous church or at least an

inculturated church. In this regard it also offers to the universal Church an essential

element of its own identity that of giving people (not only the faithful through experience

but also those non-members through example) a genuine experience of community, of

showing in concrete how love of neighbour can become a reality in even the smallest and

remotest place.

206
Kalilombe (1984) 25-27; 73-74. Also Kalilombe (1976) 269-272.
207
Ugeux (1995) ‘Yet in spite of all the enthusiastic official declarations from Rome and the different
Episcopal Conferences, local Church leaders have rarely given priority to this policy’ 135.

105
The willingness of theologians and practitioners to talk and write about the failures and

limitations of the SCC pastoral priority was a real strength. Healey was identifying a

number of elements contributing to their lack of success. He first lays some blame at the

feet of the bishops of AMECEA: ‘Various African theologians have stated that when the

bishops in Eastern Africa launched the SCCs in 1973, 1976 and 1979 they underestimated

the importance of a guiding theology for the experiment.’208 We have commented on this

problem in our discussion of ecclesiologies. However Healey goes further with his

analysis. He argues that despite the years of SCC growth and development ‘SCCs are

taken as simply an addition to the old way of being Church. The institutional model of

Church under hierarchical, clerical and often paternalistic control is still the most

dominant.’209 He says that the problem goes back to the very beginning of the initiative

and the failure to place it fully under the people at the grassroots. I wonder whether the

bishops really thought that the people at parish level would be capable of delivering this

new ecclesial vision. He also identifies a failure to clearly and powerfully articulate the

aims of SCCs from the beginning, perhaps for reasons of fear or prudence, but the impact

of that had repercussions on the very shape of the evolving SCCs. Healey is distressed to

note that they have remained disconnected from much of Africa’s reality.210

But there is much to celebrate in the African experience of SCCs. Healey, in his latest

book evaluating SCCs states that there are 120,000 Small Christian Communities

throughout the nine countries of the AMECEA region. 211 This is an extraordinary

achievement and is indeed a sign of vitality and growth since they were first instigated

208
Healey (1997) 296.
209
Healey (1997) 297.
210
‘However given Africa’s most oppressive problems of poverty, corruption, disease, suppression of
human rights, wars and conflicts, dictatorships and exploitation, it is shocking to find that the SCCs do not
take these issues as fundamental in their vision and activities.’ Ibid.
211
Healey (2012) 8.

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over 50 years ago. I would like to draw attention to a further aspect of the success story

of SCCs in Africa that should both serve as an example of excellent practice but also as an

indictment of the state of the Church in the so-called cradle of democracy in the western

world. Because Africa generally (and in this case Tanzania particularly) has been

engaged in a grass-roots project of building up the Church from the bottom, from its base,

over time it has become possible to re-structure their model of Church in an organic way

that invites admiration from those who haven’t even given a thought to this level of

ecclesial maturity and awareness.

The implementation of the new Constitution of the National Lay Council in 1998

required that the election of lay leaders in parishes throughout Tanzania start at the

level of SCCs and move upwards. This insured that the parish council leaders would

be chosen from those who were already leaders in their SCCs – thus true

representation from below. Such decisions gave full confidence to the faithful and

opened new possibilities for the laity in the local church.212

This example feels light years away from the suspicion of democracy and the fear of

genuine lay empowerment that seems to pervade attempts at renewal in many of the

countries of Europe. Democratic elections within every parish starting at the lowest level

ensures that those who are leading their Church community in the neighbourhood are

valued and empowered as they are also called upon to represent their communities at

higher levels of the parish and diocese. Decision-making that is seriously influenced by a

212
Cieslikiewicz C. (2005) ‘Pastoral Involvement of Parish-based SCCs in Dar es Salaam’ In Healey J.
and Hinton J. (eds) Small Christian Communities Today: Capturing the New Moment. Maryknoll, New
York: Orbis Books 99, also quoted in Healey (2012) 23.

107
strong lay voice is truly inspirational and it must be noted is structural. SCCs are bringing

about a change at a quite fundamental level by organically permitting new stages of

growth and development to take place simply because the place where effort at renewal

has been made was at the very bottom, at the smallest level of Church existence – a small

group-gathering in the neighbourhood.

Given my limited and brief personal experience of SCCs in Asia, it will be interesting to

see what of the successes and critiques that have been readily acknowledged in Africa,

found their way in the process of sharing SCCs with bishops throughout Asia, as they

were being introduced to the Lumko model with Lumko practitioners. It would seem to

me that there was so much useful reflection coming out of Africa about SCCs that one

would hope to find these insights freely shared and similar mistakes not being replicated

across another continent.

108
 CHAPTER FOUR

ASIA: DIFFERENT CONTEXT WIDER HORIZONS

Asia is most definitely not Africa or Latin America, and the cultural, religious and social

contexts are significantly divergent from the other continents. In this chapter we shall

explore the history and origins of BECs in two countries of Asia. The first place to

introduce the new ideas was the Philippines and that though there was some influence

from the experiences in Latin America, BEC growth and development in the islands was

much more a parallel occurrence than anything imitated or replicated. The Philippines

were followed about a decade later by Mumbai in India, probably the first place in the

subcontinent to introduce this new way of living Church. There was then a new wave of

BEC initiative about 10 years later again, this time originating from Lumko, South Africa,

and being promoted as the Asian Integral Pastoral Approach (AsIPA) by the Federation of

Asian Bishops Conferences (FABC). We shall look in some detail at these different

strands of BEC/SCC213 activity and notice how there are tensions between the promoters

and practitioners of both methods and that the BECs/SCCs themselves manifest some

important and distinctive differences. The term most frequently used about these base

communities is BEC in the Philippines but SCC elsewhere and this chapter will try to

respect both traditions by using the terminology most appropriate to each region.

213
In Asia terminology varies perhaps more than anywhere else. I shall try and use BECs/SCCs when
referring generically to the continent but when referring to each region I will use the terminology
appropriate there. Some commentators also use the term BCC but for consistency I will refer only to BEC
and SCC or the indigenous Filipino terminology.

109
The parish in Asia is for some commentators in need of strategic reform, but unlike Africa

there is little or no comment about the colonial origins of this level of Church or indeed of

a desire to be free from the influences of the former imperial powers. The debate about

the local Church is also very much alive here though nuanced in a different way to Africa.

The accusation that the Church is ‘foreign’ is similar to how Africans feel; however the

difference here is that Christianity remains very much a minority faith. The literature

suggests that although the documents of the Second Vatican Council refer only to the

diocese as the local Church, there has been a significant development since then on the

part of Asian theologians and BEC/SCC practitioners. Asian theologians bring to the

table their unique context of being the place where many of the world’s great religions

have their origin and this pluralistic environment casts a very different hue over the

development of and reflections on the BEC/SCC Asian experience. This will lead many

theologians to call for the development of BECs/SCCs from being merely ecclesial or

Christian communities into being human communities where everyone is welcomed into

the neighbourhood gatherings. This is a unique Asian contribution and offers a

considerable challenge to other cultures who share a similarly pluralistic faith context.

This chapter will also study the emerging ecclesiology of BECs/SCCs from within Asia

influenced strongly by their understanding of inculturation or as they prefer to call it the

gospel-culture encounter.214 Very much like both Africa and Latin America the socio-

economic environment is marked by the extreme poverty of the majority populations and

it is this bedrock that also strongly influences the challenges and focus of BECs/SCCs

throughout Asia. The literature is not as extensive as either Latin America or East Africa

214
Amaladoss M. SJ (2002) ‘The Challenges of Gospel-Culture Encounter’ In: Erasto Fernandes SSS and
Joji Kunduru SJ (eds) Renewed Efforts at Inculturation for an Indian Church. Bangalore: Dharmaram
Publications 13-26.

110
and perhaps shows that to date BECs/SCCs are still quite a marginal experience in most

Asian countries with the Philippines and India being the main exceptions and Korea also

beginning to produce articles on their experiences of growing this style of Church.

For this research to be authentic I visited Asia several times over a 4 year period in order

to gain first-hand knowledge of the BEC/SCC reality across a range of countries. I

attended the AsIPA IV General Assembly215 in Kerala, India in 2006 and the AsIPA V

General Assembly216 in Mindanao, Philippines in 2009. On each occasion I spent a month

in the country and travelled extensively to visit BEC/SCC communities and talk with a

wide range of personnel. I also participated in a Symposium of SCC Ecclesiology217 in

Bangalore, India 2007 and in 2008 made a 3-month visit to the region with Fr José Marins

from Brazil delivering workshops and seminars in India, Sri Lanka, Singapore and Korea.

I cannot overestimate the value of this direct encounter with the local Asian reality of

BECs/SCCs for my research and while being able to make the most of each visit to access

any available literature I was also able to sense the actual ethos of the process in each

country. But as I have acknowledged in the Introduction I remain an outsider with all the

limitations that implies.

4.1 A SEED IS SOWN IN THE PHILIPPINES

I begin the history of Asian BECs in the Philippines, as it is here that all the literature that

I have reviewed points to as being the origins of this new experience of being Church. Br

215
‘SCCs/BECs: Towards a Church of Communion’ Maria Rani Centre, Trivandrum, India, 15-23
November 2006.
216
‘Do this in Memory of Me (Lk 22:19): Bread Broken and Word Shared in SCCs/BECs’ Regional Major
Seminary, Davao City, Philippines, 20-28 October 2009.
217
‘Symposium on the Ecclesiological Foundations of SCCs’ NBCLC Bangalore, India, 8-10th July 2007.

111
Karl Gaspar CSsR writes that it was about a year or two after the crucial meeting of the

Latin American episcopate in Medellin, Colombia in 1968 that an international

community of Catholic missionaries became the catalyst for spreading BECs across the

world to Asia. ‘The Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers … served as the bridge to connect

Latin America and this part of Asia in terms of a sharing of pastoral praxis.’218 Members

of this religious community became familiar with the BEC process in Latin America and

shared their understanding with their colleagues not only in Asia I suspect but also in

Africa too. However the Maryknoll community in the Prelature of Tagum, Philippines,

immediately saw the possibilities that it offered them in their responsibilities of

establishing appropriate new Church structures in the south-eastern part of Mindanao

which was in the process of being handed over to local people. The first communities to

be started were called Gagmay’ng Kristohanong Katilingban or GKK.219

This inter-ecclesial sharing of pastoral practice soon influenced the process already

underway within the local Church and was to have far reaching consequences for the

growth of BECs/GKKs across the region. This was helped and supported by the

formation of the Mindanao-Sulu Pastoral Conference (MSPC) which commenced as a

regional meeting of the representatives of the laity, clergy, religious and bishops during

the decade of the 1970s220 and became the place where the pastoral discourse on GKKs

was promoted and developed. Over the years the MSPC was to promote a holistic model

of GKKs as witnessing, worshiping and serving communities. The young Filipino clergy

who were assigned to the Nabunturan Deanery to prepare to replace the Maryknoll

218
Gaspar K. (2004) ‘Will BECs Flourish or Self-Destruct in the Post-Modern Era?’ In Delgado J, Gabriel
M, Padilla E, Picardal A, (eds) BECs in the Philippines: Dream or Reality? A Multi-Disciplinary Reflection.
Rizal, Philippines: BUKAL NG TIPAN. 306-307.
219
This indigenous terminology is still used and in the Philippines and so I will also use the acronym out of
respect for the people.
220
MSPC I: 1972 Davao City; MSPC II: 1974 Cagayan de Oro City; MSPC III: 1976 Ozamis City.

112
missionaries when they would leave worked hard in order to build in the barrios and

among the people GKKs that were described as ‘self-nourishing, self-sustaining and self-

governing communities’ in the 1974 MSPC II. 221 This designation looks surprisingly

similar to the 1973 declaration of the AMECEA bishops in East Africa declaring that they

wanted their local Churches to become ‘self-ministering, self-propagating and self-

supporting.’222 Interesting as those statements are, they are not evidence of any direct or

indirect influence upon the formation of BECs/GKKs in the Philippines.

It is important not to overstate the influence of either continent on Filipino BEC

development. In fact a prior process had been at work in the Philippines just as it had in

other parts of the developing world that enabled BECs to grow rapidly and in a parallel

way. Perhaps the greatest influence of all did not come from any pastoral sharing

between missionaries of the same congregation but from the sheer impact of the

reforming teachings of the Second Vatican Council and the renewed vision of Church that

emerged from them. Given their shared history of Iberian Catholicism, which created

similar conditions and contexts, it only needed the identical triggering mechanism of

Vatican II for a parallel development to take place which gives the impression of direct

Latin American influence but is probably nothing of the sort.

It is important to enforce the idea that the GKKs did not emerge into a vacuum, but while

the Jesuits in Bukidnon were developing leadership formation programmes, others were

developing a liturgical movement that saw lay people trained and commissioned to lead a

221
This phrase was the title of MSPC II in document: Prelature of St. Mary’s in Marawi Dialogue of Life
and Faith Section II p.4 www.cpn.nd.edu/assets/14537/marawi_handout.doc Accessed 28.08.2012.
222
AMECEA (1973) 9-10.

113
Sunday Liturgy of the Word (Kasaulogan sa Pulong) in the absence of a priest. These

commenced in 1965 with the PME223 missionaries in the Prelature of Davao, and then in

1968, in the Prelature of Tagum with the Maryknoll missionaries in the Lupon Deanery,

who conducted experiments involving lay people as liturgical co-operators, catechists,

leaders, formators, programme and project managers in the chapels and parishes of the

area. This goes some way to explaining the GKK phenomenon that they seem to have

begun life first and foremost as liturgical communities delivering the Sunday worship in

the chapels of the parishes, which they indeed continue to this day.224 To other Asian

BEC/SCC practitioners this practice seems quite strange, is not understood and has been

criticised in personal conversations from around the region of which I have been a part.

Bishop Francisco Claver SJ states unapologetically that the first function of the BECs is

to come together for worship: ‘worship is the start of a process whereby the community

seeks consciously and deliberately to respond to the problems of daily living.’ 225

However Padilla offers a note of caution: ‘worship often does not flow into engagement

with life issues.’226

The historical, political, social and economic situation of the Philippines was remarkably

similar to that of Latin America and never more so than when President Ferdinand

Marcos declared Martial Law on September 21st 1972 and the fledgling GKKs suddenly

223
Priests of the Societe de Missions-Etrangeres from Canada.
224
Padilla E. (2008) ‘BECs at 40: Tumatanda Na?’ In: Arquiza Y. (2008) Creating a Culture of
Sustainability for BEC. CBCP-BEC Desk. ‘In Philippine setting, ‘going to the barrios’ and conducting
lay-led Sunday Liturgies of the Word started the formation of lay leaders and planted the seed for the birth
of local faith communities (BCCs/BECs) at the barrio level as early as the mid-60s. Moreover, not a few
regard the Baranggay Sang Virgen, a grassroots and lay-led prayer movement which started in Negros
Occidental in the mid-50s as a forerunner of BECs.’ 4. Also see: Picardal A.(1995) An Ecclesiological
Perspective of the Basic Ecclesial Communities in the Philippines. Roma: Tipografia Poliglotta della
Pontificia Universitas Gregoriana, 11 and Mendoza G. (1988) Church of the People: the Basic Christian
Community Experience in the Philippines Manila: Bishops-Businessmen’s Conference on Human
Development, 49.
225
Claver F. (2009) The Making of a Local Church. Quezon City, Philippines: Claretian Publications 108.
226
Padilla (2008) 5.

114
found themselves not only close to the people in each neighbourhood but right alongside

them in the daily struggles and repression to which they were subjected. The context for

the base communities was now one of aggressive militarisation, gross violation of the

people’s basic human rights, a growing impoverishment of the poor, massive corruption

in government and the non-delivery of social services. Not surprisingly the military

eventually attacked the GKKs227 and subjected them to harassment, arrest, imprisonment

and even the killing of some GKK leaders. The legacy naturally enough was mixed with

Gaspar saying that at the time ‘The GKKs flourished and made a difference in the lives of

the poor and powerless,’228 while Picardal states that ‘The military harassment and the

loss of support from some bishops and priests led to the weakening of BECs.’ 229 Both

positions reflect something of the complexity of both the actual moment and the aftermath

of the nine year Martial Law period. But it was this experience that also gave the GKKs

their prophetic stance which sets them apart from all other BEC experiences in Asia and

often leads to the unfounded accusation that BECs in the Philippines are more political

than spiritual.

Gaspar recognises that even before the final collapse of the Marcos dictatorship the

negative images of the GKKs among the military in the corridors of power gradually

reverberated also in ecclesiastical corridors. A campaign was launched to prevent Church

activities from being infiltrated by leftist elements and ideologies. Even before People

Power erupted in 1986 there were already moves to minimize the ideological

characteristics and political engagements of the GKKs. A shift was taking place in both

227
Picardal A. (2004) ‘In a Master’s thesis on “Contemporary Religious Radicalism in the Philippines”
which he submitted to the National Defence College in 1979, Colonel Galileo Kintanar wrote, that the
religious radicals were building up the BECs as “an infrastructure of political power” that could pose as a
threat to national security’ 142.
228
Gaspar (2004) 308.
229
Picardal (2004) 143.

115
Filipino society and Church as a new era dawned, one where those GKK activists whether

clerical or lay would no longer be trusted to define the vision and characteristics of the

base communities, henceforth it would be for the bishops to decide.

When the BCCs gave way to a more apolitical model and were no longer a threat to

those in power, these base communities became more acceptable among Church

people. As they became more popular, an increasing number of dioceses in the

Philippines jumped onto the bandwagon to organise their own model. As can be

expected, the model was mainly concerned with the worshipping aspect; consequently

their main activities were liturgical. With the rise of this model, the BEC turned

mainstream… However each diocese re-appropriated the BEC in whatever way they

wished; oftentimes moving drastically away from its holistic and prophetic

framework.230

In another much earlier article written in 1985 Gaspar challenges the myth of BECs as

revolutionary and politically influenced organisations stating that ‘most of the BECs have

remained liturgical in character.’ 231 He gives a realistic and thorough analysis of their

praxis which he says is a real paradox:

On the one hand it is the product of the post-Vatican II Church in search of a more

meaningful evangelising ministry; on the other, it is a mere extension of the pre-

Vatican II Church’s concern to keep the flock within the Catholic fold. There is lay

230
Gaspar (2004) 311-312. Also Padilla (2008) ‘BECs now a mainstream pastoral programme’ 6.
231
Gaspar K. (1985) ‘The Local Church and Militant Lay Participation. The MSPC Experience’ Pro Mundi
Vita: Dossiers (3) 21.

116
 participation, but it is always subject to the authority of the clergy and the ordinary.

There is an indigenised liturgy, but all it means is that the celebration is in the local

language, for both content and format continue to be directed from above. There are

Bible reflections, but these are done to equip the lay leaders with old, orthodox

theological frameworks that can better prepare them for debate (in order not to lose

face) with the Bible-carrying Christian Alliance or Southern Baptists.232

That level of insight and honest comment is what makes the Philippines unique in the

Asian context. Gaspar goes on to speak about the different types of BECs that have

emerged within the country. The ‘pastoral-developmental model’ is but a liturgical-

oriented BEC clothed in the finery of Vatican II and development jargon. He says they

have still got a long way to go before they fulfil the promise of a genuine pilgrim people

now being found in the ‘liberation model’. This model is the one that came through the

Martial Law years strengthened and purified, mature and aware, and totally engaged with

the poor people and their struggle and immersed in their lives and in the local

neighbourhoods. He mentions that various pastoral methodologies have helped along this

process and it is worth noting exactly what they were because again this input is not found

in many other Asian realities. He notes the training of the BEC lay leaders and catechists

involving the social teachings of the Church, the tools for social analysis, biblical-

theological reflections, Vatican II and MSPC documents, the history of the Philippines

from a nationalistic perspective and the action-reflection process, all of which ‘have

helped towards massive conscientisation.’233 This level of group consciousness and social

232
Ibid.
233
Gaspar (1985) 23.

117
awareness is what makes the Filipino BECs share the same DNA as their Latin American

counterparts.

Fr Louis Mascarenhas OFM in an article published in 1980 in the Pro Mundi Vita Bulletin

notes that ‘almost everywhere in Asia seminars and meetings are being held about the

building up of Basic Christian Communities.’ 234 However he notices that BECs have

developed in countries with Christian majorities and wonders ‘how relevant the Latin

American situation is for the Church in Asia.’235 He goes on to negate the success of the

BECs in the Philippines as having anything relevant to say about BECs/SCCs to the rest

of Asia ‘since the Philippines is so largely Catholic, and does not face the reality of other

Asian countries with their large non-Christian populations.’236 His point is interesting and

there is no doubt that among Asian practitioners the Philippines has a history that is quite

different from the generic BEC developments in other regions of Asia. Despite his

comments it is interesting to note that he mentions a seminar organised in 1978 for the

clergy of Multan and Karachi (Pakistan) by the Filipino East Asian Pastoral Institute

(EAPI) which ‘resulted in a greater enthusiasm for Basic Christian Communities,’237 and

also that in 1980 further seminars were being run in Karachi and Hyderabad on BECs

organised by two friars from Brazil. Many BEC practitioners from across Asia were

travelling to the Philippines to study at EAPI and that clearly had a significant influence

on them and their understanding of base communities. Certainly in the days before

AsIPA it is thanks to these Filipino practitioners and to other Latin Americans that there

was some level of accompaniment and outreach across the continent. From November

1980 until February 1981 Fr José Marins and his team from Latin America were invited to
234
Mascarenhas L. OFM (1980) ‘BCCs in an Islamic Setting in Pakistan’ Pro Mundi Vita: Bulletin 81 26.
235
Ibid.
236
Ibid.
237
Mascarenhas (1980) 27.

118
visit Asia delivering workshops and BEC training in a number of countries at the

invitation of local hierarchies and facilitated by both the Claretian and Maryknoll

missionaries.238

Reflecting back on the Filipino experience, Bishop Orlando Quevedo called for a re-

founding of BECs as they were ‘originally the product of a desire for a more efficient

parish organisation’ and that ‘this mainly administrative system continues to this day.’239

He notes that this system was only effective for a short time. What was clear from the

comments of Claver and Padilla as well was that the liturgical orientation of many of the

original BECs in Mindanao had not necessarily delivered all that was hoped for and that it

was time for them to be reviewed.

4.2 SIGNS OF A NEW DAWN IN INDIA

Bishop Thomas Dabre writing in the year 2000 describes Bishop Bosco Penha240 as ‘the

father of the movement of Basic Ecclesial Communities in India for he spearheaded the

cause.’ 241 The first indication of the significance of SCCs in India came at the 1980

Bombay Priests Synod; the concluding statement of the assembly indicated that SCCs, the

238
Japan, Hong Kong/Macau, Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand, Taiwan and
South Korea.
239
Quevedo O. (2008) ‘Renewing the Church: Pastoral Thrusts for BECs’ In: Arquiza Y. (ed) Creating a
Culture of Sustainability for BECs. Manila: CBCP-BEC Desk. 195-196.
240
‘The contribution of Bishop Penha deserves special mentioning in spreading the vision of BECs in many
parts of India’ footnote 132 Ponnunmuthan S. (1996) The Spirituality of Basic Ecclesial Communities in
the Socio-Religious Context of Trivandrum/Kerala, India. Rome, Italy. Editrice Pontificia Universita
Gregoriana 267. Also Lobo-Gajiwala A. (2002) ‘Inculturation Through Basic Christian Communities and
Basic Communities’ In: Fernandes E. SSS and Kunduru J. SJ (eds) Renewed Efforts at Inculturation for an
Indian Church. Bangalore: Dharmaram Publications 145-166.
241
Dabre T. (2000) ‘The Synod for Asia and the Ecclesial Community Formation’ Vidyajyoti Journal of
Theological Reflection. 64 (8) 578.

119
preferred term for BECs in Mumbai,242 were to be the priests’ first priority. The Synod

situated this task within the context of a collapsing parish model that was unable to

respond to the needs of the growing Catholic communities around the city. ‘We see that

the typical parish of today cannot, for various reasons, be the starting point for community

building. We have therefore to work with small units within the parish…’243 Looking

back almost 20 years later Nazareth244 states that the main reason for the thrust towards

SCCs seems to have been the ‘city culture’ which promotes individualism, impersonal

relationships, superficial religious practice and unconcern for others. This is not the

inspiration that led to the BECs emerging in Brazil and across Latin America in the

1960’s. This new motivation responds very much to a reality that is replicated all over the

world and not only in the countries of the south but in those of the north too.

Following from the earlier Priests Synod, in 1984 Bosco Penha, who was then the Rector

of Mumbai’s Major Seminary, initiated an experiment in the local parish of St Thomas,

Goregaon. He organised the parish into about 30 potential SCCs that he started to form

with the help of a large number of seminarians and lay volunteers. Initial progress was

slow,245 but two years later 25 parishes had embarked upon the adventure and Archbishop

Simon Pimenta appointed a diocesan team for lay formation and community building to

support this development. Writing in 2003 Penha sought to answer critics who said that

this venture of SCCs was imported from outside India. He countered by arguing:

242
Bombay is still the name of the Archdiocese and therefore their historic meetings and documents, whilst
Mumbai is the modern name of the city. As stated the acronym SCC is used when referring to India out of
respect for the people and their process.
243
Bombay Priests Synod Document 138 quoted in Nazareth A. (2003) Handbook of Small Christian
Communities for the Archdiocese of Bombay. Mumbai, India: FILMC 1.
244
Ashley Nazareth is the author of the official Archdiocesan Handbook for SCCs, which carries the full
approval of the hierarchy and is the authoritative account of the history and theology of SCCs in Mumbai.
245
“Fostering BCCs can become a very uphill task in the early years.” Lobo-Gajiwala (2002) 149.

120
 I have sometimes been asked whether we are following the Latin American model.

The idea of small communities certainly originated in Latin America but we are not

following the Latin American model. We have allowed this particular method to

evolve in the Mumbai culture and it is still growing and evolving. For one thing we

have not used communities for political purposes as was often the case in Latin

America; also we have not restricted ourselves to the poor as I understand has been

decided in the Philippines. Our model is more holistic embracing all aspects of

human development and we have successful communities in Mumbai also among the

affluent.246

Having myself worked as a member of the Marins Team both in Latin America and in

Asia I can say that they have no concept of models of BECs that they are attempting to

export. They concentrate instead on the process of becoming Church through the

formation of real communities that themselves must be rooted in their own reality and

must emerge out of their own socio-cultural environment responding in their own unique

way to the demands of the gospel and the needs of the people (usually the poor). The

Mumbai experience is exactly what is expected to happen, and now every parish in

Bombay Archdiocese 247 is organised into smaller communities at the neighbourhood

level.

What was striking in the literature from Bombay Archdiocese was the stress laid on the

underlying reasons given for the efforts made there to create SCCs. At the root of

everything was the basic assumption that the Church was first and foremost a community

246
Nazareth (2003) (i) foreward.
247
Nazareth (2003) ‘16 years later practically all the 114 parishes are fully into communities.’ 145.

121
of believers and that the parish must, therefore, provide an experience of community. In

assessing the Indian reality the Mumbai literature noted that ‘the number of parishioners

in the average Mumbai parish is so large that there is little semblance of this

community.’248 The Archdiocesan Handbook on SCCs went on to express the view that

though there might be some feeling of togetherness at the Sunday liturgy this sort of

community experience was mostly superficial. It was stated that many congregations

were just a motley collection of strangers and that even when the Sign of Peace was

exchanged it was not accompanied by a genuine desire to get to know the unknown

person being greeted. The majority of parishioners they claimed felt uninvolved if not

actually alienated.

However, the same documentation went further than simply reflecting upon the

experience of Catholics whilst at church and looked at the reality in the wider city and

neighbourhoods. Individualism and isolationism were heightened by the fast pace of life

in Mumbai and a widely-diffused consumerist mentality made it not uncommon to find

Catholics not knowing who their next door neighbours were. Criticism was levelled at

those Catholics who had lived together in their neighbourhoods for some years and yet it

was not unusual to find among them divisions created by prejudice, competitiveness,

casteism, communalism and selfishness. The Handbook of Small Christian Communities

warned that these rifts were conveniently hidden away and even white-washed by one’s

faithful and regular observance of Sunday Mass ‘at which the numbers being large, it is

possible to remain undisturbed under a veil of anonymous piety.’249 Not surprisingly the

author noted that in these circumstances whole congregations were drifting towards a

248
Nazareth (2003) 8.
249
Nazareth (2003) 9.

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form of Christianity where believers were defined by the doctrinal truths they adhered to

rather than by their commitment to the community of Jesus’ disciples. This kind of

anonymous, privatised and individualised Christianity offered an easy escape from the

social and communitarian dimensions of the faith.

4.3 THE EMERGENCE OF AsIPA AT THE CONTINENTAL LEVEL

The uncoordinated and disparate development of BECs/SCCs in Asia across two decades

took a significant step forward with the 1993 decision of the Federation of Asian Bishops

Conferences (FABC) to launch the Asian Integral Pastoral Approach (AsIPA). This

decision followed what has become known in BEC/SCC circles as the Bandung Statement

which was made by the FABC at the close of their V Plenary Assembly at Bandung,

Indonesia in 1990. Paragraph 8 of the penultimate section of the document,

‘A New Way of Being Church in the 1990s’ the bishops stated that: ‘The Church in

Asia will have to be a communion of communities’ and where the Risen Lord ‘…leads

them to form small Christian communities (e.g., neighbourhood groups, Basic Ecclesial

Communities and "covenant" communities).’ 250 This Church is described as being a

participatory Church, one which reaches out to those of other faiths in a dialogue of life

directed at the integral liberation of everyone and one that should be a leaven of

transformation in the world and a sign of prophetic witness among all people. In 1991 the

FABC tasked the Office of Laity251 with developing a formation programme aimed at

delivering this New Way of Being Church.

250
FABC V Plenary Assembly Final Statement ‘Journeying Together Toward the Third Millennium’ July
17-27 1990 Bandung, Indonesia 8.1.11.
251
‘The AsIPA was formulated at a conference called by the Bishop’s Institute of the Lay Apostolate
(BILA), one of the commissions of the FABC.’ Claver (2009) 100.

123
Claver commented on this moment:

When I first heard the term and saw what the approach was, I thought to myself,

‘There’s nothing particularly Asian about it’- especially since I knew that its original

formulation was similar to (if not adopted outright from) that of the Lumko Institute

of South Africa.252

Oswald Hirmer (later Bishop Hirmer) of the Lumko Institute was one of the workshop

facilitators at the Bandung Assembly, and he offered to rewrite the Lumko materials for

an Asian audience along with a specially developed team (ART: AsIPA Resource Team).

This action gave rise to the AsIPA process and programme. In 1995 he brought the

AsIPA programmes to India with Fr Thomas Vijay and they eventually came to be known

as DIIPA (Developing an Indian Integral Pastoral Approach). From 1990 to 1995 Hirmer

delivered SCC workshops of a month’s duration at the invitation of both Bishop Penha

and Fr Vijay on behalf of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India (CBCI) Laity

Commission.

With the support and backing of the Asian episcopate in place, AsIPA quickly delivered

to each participating country the materials to enable each Bishops Conference to

commence building this new style and structure of Church at neighbourhood level. This

was the same model and approach that characterised the AMECEA bishops of East Africa

in the decades of the 70’s and 80’s. The promotion and development of BECs/SCCs at

parish level was a hierarchical pastoral initiative that became the priority among both

national and international echelons. AsIPA had produced a comprehensive array of

252
Claver (2009) 100.

124
materials to aid local trainers in their task of forming lay people and clergy capable of

delivering this New Way of Being Church described in the Bandung Statement.

At the core of this approach was the concept of a ‘participatory Church’ arising from the

idea that most Catholic parishes were not really engaging with the vast majority of their

Mass-going people, who remained in various stages of passive indifference. The aim was

a parish community in which the majority were actively involved in the evangelising

mission of the Church. To achieve this end stress was laid on the concept of Training for

a Participatory Church. 253 This training entailed a three-step process: the ‘Code’ (to

present one particular life situation), the Bible Text (to reflect on the Word of God), and

the Action (to guide the community towards transformation). The methodology used was

variously described as the ‘participatory method’, the ‘participatory approach’ or the

‘participatory learning process.’ The AsIPA approach relied heavily on its pre-designed

texts, and a close adherence to those texts was urged. ‘The facilitator is requested to

follow the text as closely as possible and allow the participants to contribute when

indicated in the text.’254 This method of developing BECs/SCCs contrasts strongly with

the methods used in Latin America particularly and remains one of the few areas where

there is a radical difference of approach. The process used and the methodology

employed in Africa and Asia generally varies somewhat from the Freirean approach

popular in Latin America, as we have already noted in a previous chapter. Basically if

one attends a base community meeting in Latin America it would be unusual to find the

leader or facilitator using a text that he or she has to follow rigidly; though there are some

253
Short History of AsIPA given to delegates at the AsIPA V General Assembly in the Philippines and
produced by the AsIPA team. Four series of AsIPA texts: 1) A Series: Topics related to gospel sharing
methods. 2) B Series: Topics related to starting and maintaining SCCs. 3) C Series: Topics to reflect on the
vision of a participatory Church. 4) D Series: Topics for the training of the Parish Team.
254
Ibid.

125
countries that do send out guidelines for use in the base communities, they always use

Freirean pedagogy. However it was the norm in parts of Asia that I visited to find a text

being rigidly followed.

However, Claver was supportive of the AsIPA process because he situated it in the same

context that he had found operative in the older Filipino BEC tradition.

On closer inspection, I realised its genesis in the action-reflection-action methodology

… was already accepted as a method of anthropological research… The methodology

is actually a methodology of change based on dialogue about ideas from discernment-

prayer on social problems, participation in decision-making, planning, acting, and co-

responsibility in executing decisions and evaluating action on them.255

In 1995 research was carried out into BECs in the Philippines by the National Secretariat

of Social Action of the Bishops Conference identified two major activities which were

regarded as defining BEC. These were Bible-sharing and Pastoral Planning, both carried

out in a participatory manner. Claver states unequivocally that these ‘two activities and

the spirit in which they are done are actually all present in the Asian Integral Pastoral

Approach methodology…’ 256 The Philippines come to the debate from a pre-existing

BEC tradition and culture, and Claver insists that there is basically no discontinuity

between the new and the old approaches, identifying similar methods at work in them

both.

255
Claver (2009) 101.
256
Claver (2009) 115.

126
 When later the churches of Asia came up with the AsIPA as their own way of forming

BECs, it was only the name that we took to describe what was already substantially

being done at all levels of the diocese. The AsIPA, as we’ve repeatedly said, is no

different from the sociologist’s action-reflection-action method of social research.

Nor, for that matter, from the see/judge/act manner of action-reflection of Cardinal

Joseph Cardijn’s Young Christian Workers.257

Claver’s perspective assists a balanced and nuanced discussion about the comparable

processes of formation from Latin America and from Africa (Lumko) that actually now

meet up in the Philippines, but not in any other part of Asia. My own sense, however, is

that the different Latin American and African approaches have led to not only different

praxes but also to the expression of vastly different ethos in the way formation is

delivered and the meetings are run. The impact is different in each case; between making

people subjects of their own liberation through a process designed to enable them to make

choices and decisions about the transformation they want to see around them and people

being told what to do, when and how by a text prepared at another level which runs the

risk of maintaining them as objects of someone else’s decisions and choices. Where I

agree with Claver is that the theory as stated by AsIPA is undoubtedly similar in many

respects to what Claver was used to but my experience of delivering training in both Asia

and Latin America has revealed that the praxis can be quite different and therefore the

results can be too. It has to be said that if the texts are particularly good and enable their

users to put them to one side as they pursue an agenda of transformation that is emerging

from within their own reflections then there should be no reason why those participants

cannot become protagonists in an emerging new future.

257
Claver (2009) 197.

127
4.4 UNIQUELY ASIAN BASIC HUMAN COMMUNITIES

One of the most promising developments with BECs/SCCs in Asia was the emergence of

the idea that BECs/SCCs were probably a stage on a journey rather than the destination

they had become in other places. This was undoubtedly because of the pluralistic context

in which Asian Christians were very conscious of being an almost insignificant minority

throughout Asia (the Philippines and East Timor being the exceptions). Bishop Thomas

Dabre of Vasai, India, during a presentation to an international audience at Cochabamba,

Bolivia at the close of the last millennium258 made reference to the unique situation of

Asia and its consequences for the mission of the Church.

Small Christian and Ecclesial Communities are possible in homogenous settings,

when all profess the one Catholic faith. Both Catholic and non-Catholic Christians

are about 2% of the total population of India. The evangelising mission of the Church

and the actual multi-religious and multi-cultural setting of India demand that the small

Christian communities should be open to become basic human communities including

people of different faiths.259

This perspective carried potential significance for the northern hemisphere where many of

the countries of Western Europe and North America have large multi-faith communities

and where the practice of the Christian faith was fast becoming a minority activity.

Despite the feeling that these basic human communities were only going to develop in

places like India there were signs that they were also being found in the Philippines:

258
The International Consultation on Small Ecclesial Communities, Cochabamba, Bolivia, 31 st October – 5th
November 1999.
259
Dabre (2000) 581.

128
 In parts of the country where the Muslim presence is significant, Church workers have

promoted what is described as basic human communities. The shift of focus from

ecclesial to human communities highlights the commonality that exists among

neighbours. It is now directed to the promotion of human dignity and kingdom values

in our quest for total human development.260

A basic human community understood in these terms is one where the BEC/SCC was

aware that in order to transform the neighbourhood in a way that everyone desired there

was a need to make that project open to other neighbours in the vicinity. If the group was

merely functioning as a bible-study group or a prayer-group then that question or pressure

was unlikely ever to arise as they would feel completely self-contained within their own

faith world. It was in many ways a testimony to the larger vision both of BECs/SCCs and

of the mission of the Catholic Church in Asia that this option had become such a strong

possibility in the region. It was also another way in which we could evaluate the process

and development of the existing BECs/SCCs against wider criteria than whether they

were simply satisfied with their service to and connection with the originating Catholic

parish community.

This discussion was taking place especially in the Indian context where a number of

theologians had reflected that in order to be genuinely authentic within the challenge of

India’s multi-faith reality the SCCs must reject the older model of BECs coming out of

260
Gabriel (2004) 333.

129
the Catholic majority countries of Latin America and forge their own style of basic

community that responded to the situation of most Indian people.261

The Christian communities in India should not be closed and exclusive communities.

They must remain open communities where all people in each place, irrespective of

religion, caste, creed and ideology, should be brought together and basic human

communities to be formed.262

This understanding saw the BECs/SCCs as the possible creators of contact between

different faith groups at the most local level through an invitation extended to individual

neighbours living alongside those who participated in their BEC/SCC. A model of

Christian community as bridge-builder, a reaching out in a project of creating a new

humanity based on people’s common identification as sons and daughters of God and

members of the human race.

The Church’s objective in India must be the formation of basic human communities

where common life-styles and common strategies for the liberation of the Indian

masses and inter-religious approaches to the basic human problems and questions

must be developed.263

261
‘The South American model of the BCC where almost the entire population is Catholic or Christian and
the entire life of the community is organised practically on an ecclesial basis, seems to be not a viable
model for India.’ Pathil K. (2006) Theology of the Church: New Horizons. Bangalore, India: Dharmaram
Publications 216.
262
Ibid.
263
Pathil (2006) 216.

130
Pathil sees the SCCs of India as ‘only a first step towards the renewal of Christian life that

should lead to the creation of basic human communities.’ 264 This stance is replicated

throughout India as can be seen in the official Handbook of SCCs for the Archdiocese of

Bombay:

The people of other faiths living in the neighbourhood should also be invited for most

of the programmes – the earlier the better… Many activities can be undertaken

jointly. Living in close proximity many common interests and concerns are shared.

Every SCC should move towards becoming a Small Human Community. This has to

be the end product of our efforts keeping in mind the context of India as a plurality of

religions.265

Even at the national level, the Catholic Bishops Conference of India (CBCI) brought out a

statement at the end of their Millennium Conference in Calcutta in 2001 confirming their

support for this approach:

In the Indian multi-cultural context, there is a need to network with all people of

goodwill in promoting and nurturing small human/neighbourhood communities that

usher in a society based on love, justice, peace and harmony. SCCs, while preserving

their ecclesial identity, are called to play a vital role in promoting this process.266

264
Ibid.
265
Nazareth (2003) 33.
266
Concluding Statement No 3 Catholic Bishops Conference of India, Calcutta January 2001.

131
Perhaps the foremost promoter of Basic Human Communities (BHCs) in India was Fr

M.J. Edwin from Nagercoil, Tamil Nadu. He was a practitioner and an exponent of the

BHCs and has clarified how he saw them both emerging from and working alongside the

SCCs. There were many similarities between them. Both were small-group oriented and

were territory-based. Just as the SCC was the Church itself in a given neighbourhood so

the BHC was the nation itself in miniature in the neighbourhood. Both were committed to

non-dominating styles of leadership and both were developing a participatory world. The

guiding principle of them both was subsidiarity, that whatever can be done at a lower

level was done at that level and not at any level above it and the higher level only took up

those tasks that could not be handled at the lower levels. In a paper distributed to the IV

AsIPA General Assembly in 2006, he made it clear that BHCs were ‘kingdom

communities’, that the responsibility for ‘building Basic Human Communities forms part

of the core mission of the Church. That it is not an option but a contextual necessity

arising out of the very cause that gives the justification for the very existence of the

Church.’267 They were not in competition but were a structural tool for the realising of the

kingdom. They were forums where the voice of the smallest and least could be heard and

shared, where actions that initiate a fairer and more just world could be instigated. They

encouraged a practise of dialogue at the grassroots of society and were forums where

religious treasures could be shared and improvements to the neighbourhood planned and

executed.

This same perspective was found also in other writers such as K.C. Abraham who wrote,

‘What we need today is a new generation of Hindus, Muslims and Christians who will

267
Edwin M. J. (2006) Basic Human Communities a paper distributed at the AsIPA IV General Assembly in
Kerala, India, 15-23 November 2006.

132
recapture the humanising universal perspective and give shape to it in basic human

communities.’268

Lobo-Gajiwala offered an important reality check when she analysed the extent to which

most SCCs had remained aloof from peoples of other faiths. She asserted that as SCCs

started out as a ministry to and among Catholics they excluded other faith peoples from

the beginning. The models and materials that had influenced India mostly had come from

Latin America, Africa and the Philippines and these had as their context a Catholic-only

focus and as far as both parishioners and parish clergy were aware there was little

connectivity promoted through them with other faiths.269 Changing the culture of existing

group practice would be very difficult. Nonetheless she saw an opportunity for those with

the vision to actively promote basic communities as well as SCCs ‘since total human

development however, is the goal of evangelisation, (they) can promote a method of

community organising as well as a religious consciousness…’270

4.5 GOSPEL-CULTURE ENCOUNTER: ASIAN INSIGHTS

‘Being a community is first and foremost a cultural and symbolic reality, and not a matter

of structures and institution.’271 This important intuition will be explored through the work

of two Indian theologians Felix Wilfred and Michael Amaladoss, who contribute

significantly to the unique development of BECs/SCCs in an Asian context. Though the

question of inculturation was also crucial in Africa it seemed that the same issues here are

268
Quoted in Kumar Wesley A. (2007) ‘Condo Communes: Towards the Formation of Urban Base
Communities as Spiritual Centres’ Asian Journal of Theology. 21(2) 281.
269
Lobo-Gajiwala (2002) 156-158.
270
Lobo-Gajiwala (2002) 157.
271
Wilfred F. (1990) ‘Towards an Anthropologically and Culturally Founded Ecclesiology’ Vidyajyoti
Theological Journal of Reflection 54 (10) 510-511.

133
nuanced in a slightly different way. Wilfred began his analysis by noting ‘the lack of an

anthropological and cultural foundation for the very being of the Church among the Asian

peoples.’ 272 Basically he stated that the present-day ecclesiological orientations are

inadequate for Asia. He classified them in four major categories; Reformist, Liberal,

Liberational and Inculturational.

Reformist: This current began a few decades before Vatican II and made its mark on the

conciliar deliberations and documents. In contrast to the preceding ultramontanist

ecclesiology of the ‘perfect society’ it understood Church as communion and highlighted

the aspect of mystery. It stressed going back to the roots or the sources of faith for

inspiration and reform and from this approach developed the concept of the local Church.

Dialogue with all people was a core value. (Congar, Lanne, Legrand, Tillard, Dulles and

Komanchak are examples)

Liberal: This ecclesiology was concerned with the relevance of the Christian message in a

secularised and mature world-view. It was highly critical of aspects of Church life;

clericalism, authoritarianism, triumphalism, centralisation, papal primacy, infallibility and

paternalism. It sought to create a more flexible and open structure to the Church and

promoted freedom of thought and expression, the role of women and the importance of

the laity. (Kung, Swidler, and McKenzie are examples)

Liberational: This approach grew directly out of the Second Vatican Council specifically

in areas that didn’t receive the attention in the Council that they merited; Christian unity,

272
Wilfred (1990) 502.

134
openness to the world and the option for the poor. The context of extensive poverty,

misery and oppression among the masses of the developing world, especially Latin

America where they also happened to be Catholic, gave rise to an innovative and fresh

ecclesiology of liberation. BECs were a focal point for praxis and reflection. (Sobrino,

Boff, Segundo, Galilea, Gutierrez and Comblin are examples)

Inculturational: This orientation had grown significantly in the post-conciliar period

especially in the southern hemisphere where the aim had been to transform a Euro-centric

Church into a local Asian or African Church by assuming the cultural and spiritual

heritage of the indigenous peoples. This process received its impetus from a number of

documents of the Council including Ad Gentes. (Rahner and Buhlmann are European

examples but there are many others in each continent)

This brief synopsis suggests that the Reformist and Liberal trends were locked in a

controversy with reactionary and traditionalist forces in the Church where the debate

related to the reception and interpretation of Vatican II and the extent of continuity or

discontinuity with a pre-Vatican II Tridentine tradition. Liberational ecclesiology, on the

other hand, had come under sustained attack at both Vatican and national levels.

However, argues Wilfred, none of these four orientations however was adequate for Asia

because they all allowed the theological to precede the anthropological and the cultural.

Wilfred stated that ecclesiology should rest on anthropological and cultural foundations.

Rather than attempting to make the Church local by relating it to indigenous cultural

forms, there was a need to ‘perceive, understand and re-appropriate the essence of the

135
Church itself in terms of Asian cultures, ways of life, inter-human relationships and

communitarian existence.’273

The concrete shape of the Church, therefore, could not be a priori, something pre-given,

pre-defined, but had to be constructed and fashioned from within the ways of being a

community found among the diverse peoples of the world. ‘The anthropological and the

cultural are not simply the context of the Church-community to which it has to

accommodate and adapt, but form in a way part of the very text of the Church.’ 274 That

meant essentially that the Church actually emerged from and discovered its very nature

and identity resulting from the hermeneutical praxis of a movement from the

anthropological and the cultural to the theological. The implications of this we will

explore shortly.

Amaladoss has taken a very similar approach: ‘the incarnational paradigm embodied in

the term inculturation’, he argues, ‘is inadequate to explore the challenges of the

encounter between gospel and culture(s).’275 He carefully defined his terms in this debate

- Acculturation: A process through which a foreigner adapted themselves to a new

cultural context; Enculturation: The process through which a child grew into the culture of

the community; Inculturation: A theological notion that did not describe an

anthropological process. He argued that incarnation was from above and from the outside

and in the interaction between the gospel and culture there was never as close and neat a

fit as in an incarnation. The relationship between religion and culture was always a

273
Wilfred (1990) 504.
274
Wilfred (1990) 505.
275
Amaladoss (2002) 13.

136
dialectical one and the agents of the process had got to be the people themselves. In

practice the agents had been the missionaries who had laid down the norms and

conditions for entry into the Church as well as defining the symbols and rituals used in the

process. The response was at the very least complex, confused and ambiguous and was

experienced as imposed and imported. It was a process tightly controlled by the local

hierarchy who in turn owed their allegiance to Vatican officials who would make all the

decisions about what could and couldn’t be allowed, what could and couldn’t be adapted

or changed without themselves being from that culture or often having any experience of

it. The gospel that was proclaimed in a new culture was a much-mediated experience

having emerged from centuries of cultural adaptation in very different settings.

The coming into being of the Church in Asia had firstly to emerge out of the very nature

and experience of Asian peoples themselves as the agents in this process. Before the

gospel arrived there was already an understanding of community and human relationships

for instance. Out of the way Asian people lived and conceived community, emerged a

characteristic cultural trait of inclusivism. For example among Asian cultures boundaries

were not fixed and inflexible, structures were not rigorously policed and conditions for

belonging not strictly laid down. Community existed in the people, in their attitudes and

values, in their vision and experience. Belonging therefore to the community of Jesus felt

quite different in Asia than it did in Europe for example. The conception of one’s self-

identity (individual or group) being in opposition to or in contrast with the self-identity of

another was quite alien in Asian culture where one’s identity was not in contrast to the

other but in relation to the other. It was the relationship which defined identity. An

either/or way of thinking was quite foreign; Asians failed to be moved by the idea that

137
you were either in or out, relationships were fluid and open and so were their expressions

of community.

‘In the Asian way of being a community,’ Wilfred argues, ‘the boundaries are so fluid, the

relationships are so open that one could be in the Jesus-community without ceasing to be

a participant in other religious experiences and community expressions.’276 In fact what

mattered to most people in the continent was not one’s external religious identity but the

deeper religious experience one had and the path one followed to attain it. Asia seemed to

be a place where it was imperative that one accepted various levels of ecclesiality, within

which not all the followers of Jesus belonged to his community in the same way. This

could be seen in the New Testament even in a superficial way simply by looking at the

role of the crowd, the seventy-two, and the twelve and amongst them the threesome of

Peter, James and John. Then there was Mary Magdalene, Nicodemus, Joseph of

Arimathea, Zacchaeus, and Lazarus etc. This openness, fluidity and inclusivity

corresponded to the Asian culture, ethos, and understanding of community.

The truth that different kinds of people were in Jesus’ company in different ways and in

various grades of relationships had been obscured by Christian history where for most of

the time only one form of belonging had been permitted and that enforced by the

theological principal of ‘extra ecclesiam nulla salus’ (outside the Church there is no

salvation) which attempted to draw very clear and distinct boundaries between the true

believer and those deemed outside the flock and therefore unsure of their eternal

salvation. This model of Church identity was derived from Christendom and despite

276
Wilfred (1990) 506.

138
renewal and rethinking in the field of ecclesiology remains the model in force today. ‘An

anthropologically and culturally founded ecclesiality in Asia will find embodiment in a

wide variety of forms.’277 When the shape of the Church community arises from within

the culture and genius of the people one should expect to see ecclesial forms and patterns

quite different from what is considered to be the norm in a European context. As

Amaladoss explained ‘Any Gospel-Culture encounter that starts from below is bound to

be pluralistic.’278 In India for example the Ashram could be an authentic expression of

ecclesial identity; as could the many grassroots groups and movements across the

continent also be other forms of ecclesial community. What was clear was that the

present-day Asian cultural situation with its religious pluralism was certainly not foreseen

as the environment of Jesus-community when certain institutions and ecclesial structures

evolved. As Wilfred had said being a community was first and foremost a cultural and

symbolic reality, and not a matter of structures and institution. Amaladoss succinctly

stated it thus:

To be oneself is a basic human and social right. This right to one’s identity is never

given spontaneously by those who dominate the collectivity. It has to be taken,

asserted and celebrated. Such freedom is the gift of the Spirit. The Spirit is the

ultimate guarantor of communion in pluralism.279

277
Wilfred (1990) 508.
278
Amaladoss (2002) 26.
279
Ibid.

139
4.6 BECs RENEWAL FROM THE PERIPHERY

Aloysius Pieris SJ from Sri Lanka related to Marins and myself during a visit to his home

in 2008 a personal memory about Karl Rahner’s advice to him and others during the

Council that their task was to fully allow the spirit of the Council to impact upon them by

entering deeply into its ethos while it was actually happening so that after its closure they

could move forward, building upon what it proposed, using the new perspectives it was

opening up. They were to proceed from where the Council would leave them; ‘In other

words, our mission was to complete its unwritten agenda by means of a theopraxis that is

commensurate with its new orientation.’280 Many of the participants at Vatican II took

this approach with them when they returned home. It is perhaps in this context that we

can better understand the extraordinary growth of BECs/SCCs that began during the years

immediately following on from the Council.

Pieris saw the Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15:1-29 as a very useful template for

understanding and analysing the more recent Second Vatican Council. 281 He looked

particularly at the ‘crisigenic’ nature of the pastoral ordinances flowing from both

councils noting in passing that every ‘praxis’ was a tacit formulation of a ‘theory’. Just as

the first Council initiated a crisis provoked by the rupture with a twenty centuries-old

tradition of Jewish circumcision, so the latter council gave rise to a crisis as yet

unresolved, provoked by the radical rupture with the West.282 That is the release of the

universal Church from the hiero-partriarchal local Church of Rome that had for centuries

imposed itself on others as the one and only Catholic Church. This crisis also triggered

280
Pieris A. (2005) ‘Vatican II: A ‘Crisigenic’ Council with Unwritten Agenda’ East Asian Pastoral Review
42 (1/2) 9.
281
Ibid.
282
Rahner K. (1979) ‘Toward a Fundamental Theological Interpretation of Vatican II’ Theological Studies
40 (Dec) 716-727.

140
off a chain of new beginnings in almost every sphere of theology, spirituality, sacramental

life, and social praxis. What I have been asserting is that the activities of the BECs/SCCs

are precisely part of these ‘new beginnings’ and are both a structural and attitudinal

change within the whole Church.

Pieris went on to focus on the centre-periphery conflict which also had antecedents in the

first Council in the early Church. He suggested that the uniqueness of Vatican II was that

in its origin and development as well as its conclusions the entire Church was moved by a

desire for a radical renewal rather than a mere institutional or dogmatic reform. Renewal

he stated moves from the periphery to the centre whereas reform trickles down from the

centre to the periphery. Renewal by its nature is a fringe-phenomenon, and although the

Vatican Council made a number of crisigenic decisions in its documents from the centre,

an unwritten agenda had to be discovered and executed on the periphery. It is precisely

here that both fidelity to and reception of the Council still need to be worked out today.

‘The survival of the Council’s renewalist project depends not only on the local Churches

of the periphery, but also on the periphery of those local Churches themselves!’ 283

BECs/SCCs are indeed a phenomenon of the periphery of both the universal Church and

the local Church and the centre has received this renewal as a challenge and a crisis and at

times has strenuously attacked them especially in Latin America.

Amaladoss in a further article in 2008 asked an important question about the Church in a

discussion dealing with the issue of globalisation. Faced with this new reality he wanted

283
Pieris (2005) 23.

141
to know if the Church was a credible witness or does it need re-founding?284 BECs/SCCs

were a way in which the Church at the most local level was enabled to respond to the

basic needs and issues that people had to face where they lived. It was there that amongst

the neighbours the whole question of credibility was worked out as the members of the

ecclesial community witnessed to gospel values and in their service of those around them

they helped to bring about the reign of God and they established kingdom values in this

globalised world. He believed that the Church had to be involved in the world in new

ways, focusing on the world rather than on itself, on life rather than on the sacraments.

BECs/SCCs were indeed a way in which this could happen; already many such groups

were realising the mission of the gospel by immersing themselves in their neighbourhood

and making the cause of the people their cause too.

Arun Kumar Wesley made the simple point that the early Church relied on living as a

witness to the gospel 285 and it was this predominantly lay initiative that proved so

effective in evangelising the ancient Greek and Roman communities. He spoke of Base

Communes in urban areas and envisaged that they would provide the neighbourhood with

a creative space where the very fact of getting to know each other as neighbours became a

learning process in itself. The transformation of the neighbourhood was an object of the

BECs/SCCs; bringing about change in the neighbourhood and in society at large but

starting at the intersection between society and where it is lived, formed and experienced

in the interactions and interrelations between people who live alongside one another in the

neighbourhood.

284
Amaladoss M. (2008) ‘Mission in Our New Global Context’ East Asian Pastoral Review 45 (4) 325.
285
Kumar Wesley (2007) 282.

142
The same intuition was found in the work of Felipe Gomez who stated that the early

Church communities were not only dynamic but they were on a much smaller scale than

parishes and diocese today and they ‘evangelised their neighbourhoods by personal

contacts… In Asia this system makes even more sense: we are dispersed minorities like

them.’286 He also agreed that in the work of spreading the gospel or evangelising it was

life witness that became the convincing argument. He noted that in the reception of the

Second Vatican Council that began in Medellin in 1968, on the periphery some might

think in Latin America, the Church had been in a process of being converted to the human

person. That is, in making the Church truly available to respond to the real needs of

actual people, particularly the poor and especially in their sufferings. Gomez took from

this a basic pastoral priority of brotherhood over worship and of course it was precisely in

that aspect of Christian fellowship that the BECs/SCCs specialise. There was a need for a

radical rethink of the way the Church operated in Asia and throughout the developing

world thought Gomez. He cited the main problem being the inherited structures,

institutions, values and attitudes that had come down to us from the Constantinian period

of ecclesiastical-imperial power and that made the Church unfit and unprepared for her

mission in a context such as Asia.

4.7 NEIGHBOURHOOD – COMMON GROUND FOR CIVIL SOCIETY

The concept of civil society which was discussed by Wilfred 287 denotes the space that was

open for citizens to meet together, to discuss, to debate, to voice their views and also to

critique and make demands for change and reform. Participation and dialogue in civil

286
Gomez F. (1982) ‘Christology and Pastoral Practice from below’ East Asian Pastoral Review 19 (1) 12-
13.
287
Wilfred F. (2005) ‘Asian Christianity and Modernity: 40 years after Gaudium et Spes’ East Asian
Pastoral Review 42 (1/2) 191-206.

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society could help individual Christians and their community groups and organisations

make important contributions and so affect the society and its transformation. Often the

Church had given the impression that it was unconcerned with any serious engagement

with civil society as it attempted to run parallel structures in education, health-care, and

welfare. Across Asia the picture was diverse; in some countries civil society was vibrant

in others dormant and in others practically absent because of centralisation and totalitarian

regimes. Christians could contribute to the creation of civil society even from their

minority position. They would begin in their neighbourhoods through the BECs/SCCs

and the BHCs (Basic Human Communities) reaching out to those of other faiths to join

together in tackling the simple issues that it was in their hands to resolve and improve.

Conversation and dialogue were important and vital first steps in the construction of a

civil society. The concept of neighbourhood understood as a meeting ground or a

common space where everyone felt comfortable and ‘at home’, enabled those who wanted

to promote a common vision of human community to come together and start a process

that would be inclusive and responsive to the real demands and needs of the people who

lived there. This idea will be developed further in the next chapter and in the conclusion.

4.8 CHALLENGING THE STRUCTURES

Almost 30 years ago Gomez provocatively wrote that ‘If all Christians are to build the

Church, the present system must be changed and the sooner the better.’ 288 In 2006 an

Indian theologian highlighted the same issue when he said: ‘BCCs are new ecclesial

models and structures and they seem to challenge the traditional structures of the parish

and diocese.’289 Pathil argued that the emergence of SCCs as a phenomenon in recent

288
Gomez (1982) 12.
289
Pathil (2006) 214.

144
times was a very significant development and a sign of hope for the Church. As people

became more aware of the BEC/SCC phenomenon it seemed to become clearer that the

sheer size of the large and often anonymous parish structures made them incapable of

delivering both the missionary outreach and the communitarian experience required of

authentic ecclesial communities. This was the position of Jose Marins speaking in an

interview also in 1982, ‘But the parish, as it is now, first of all, is too big, and secondly, it

has long ago stopped being a community experience.’ 290 Marins then went on to

formulate the question that this analysis raised for him:

… how to remake the basic tissue of the Church, the groundwork of the Church,

through small communities… how will the Church recondition her basic level, how

will she restructure herself so as to fit in today’s world… This is the basic problem of

the whole Church.291

The interviewer had asked Marins whether he saw ecclesial communities as the exclusive

manner of being Church in the world today. Marins tried to reformulate the question by

suggesting that the question to be asked should be: where does the baptised person live

out their Christian calling and experience? And the response he gave was that the

Christian could not live out their calling isolated and alone obviously, but it had to be

amongst the community of disciples that continued the mission of Jesus. If the Church

was therefore a community the question was one of exactly where was the community of

each baptised person? The traditional answer was the parish; whether or not this was an

290
Marins J. (1982) ‘Basic Christian Communities: An Interview with Fr José Marins’ East Asian Pastoral
Review 19 (2) 65.
291
Ibid.

145
authentic expression of community was now disputed. The parish, Marins argued, was in

fact part of the wider problem of the ecclesiology that informed much of present day

Catholic thinking; namely, that most Catholics saw their parish as a kind of spiritual

service station where they went to receive the sacraments, to practice their devotions, to

fulfil their obligations but not to have a deep experience of life-sharing or even to find the

support and vision necessary for their mission as baptised Christians transforming the

world with kingdom values.292

BECs/SCCs are forcing the wider Church to ask questions about the nature of community

as lived and experienced within the Church. The presence of the BECs/SCCs in the

Church called to the attention of all the members of the Church that each one must decide

where their ‘basic community’ was, where they experienced the fullness of faith and life

as a disciple of the Lord. The significance of the Church hierarchy making a pastoral

option for BECs/SCCs as they had done throughout Latin America, in the AMECEA

countries of Africa for example and through the AsIPA process in Asia, was that this

helped the individual believer to make their option for the same commitment to

community and mission.

This vital aspect of the BECs/SCCs in raising questions for the Church to respond to was

faced head-on by Bishop Tagle of the Philippines when he wrote: ‘The acceptability or

non-acceptability of the BECs depends in large measure on the ease or un-ease with

292
Ibid.

146
which we face the questions raised by the BECs.’293 Tagle went on to reflect that the

presence of BECs/SCCs and the experience of living both with them and within them

asked the Church what those at the base meant in the life and mission of the Church. He

also felt that the BEC/SCC experience asked the Church what was the basic or

fundamental reality that made a community ecclesial or Church. These questions and

others were not so much addressed consciously by or from the BECs/SCCs but they

emerged from within the impact they had on the wider Catholic community and called

forth a response on a number of levels.

Many Catholics as has been said already experienced the parish more in terms of

structures than human inter-action. BECs/SCCs provided people with direct relationships

and were a real alternative to the ‘prevalent anonymity of parishes and diocese.’294 Tagle

asserted that they reawakened a sense of community in a highly institutionalised

organisation. He also raised another important consideration that of whether the

BECs/SCCs deserved to be called local Churches. That they are mostly neighbourhood

communities settled their localness, but were they truly Church in a particular locality?

Gutierrez worked towards some kind of response when he stated that BECs/SCCs were

not just a pastoral programme but they were Church in the neighbourhood, they were in

effect believers in a neighbourhood living a gospel life-style within daily settings.

BECs/SCCs were indeed a way of life. His response was not from any juridical or

institutional perspective but came at the question from the angle of human relationships

and the life that flowed from people’s interactions. ‘If we treat BECs as a basic structure

293
Tagle L. A. (2004) ‘Some Theological Questions BECs Love to Ask’ In: Delgado, Gabriel, Padilla,
Picardal, (eds) BECs in the Philippines: Dream or Reality? A Multi-Disciplinary Reflection. Rizal,
Philippines: BUKAL NG TIPAN 79.
294
Tagle (2004) 82.

147
of parish life, then it is not just an organisation but an organism that makes Church alive

in every member, in every moment, in every corner of the parish.’295

4.9 ARE THE BECs A LOCAL CHURCH?

The question of the local Church was being raised in every area where BECs/SCCs were

in existence. Pieris claimed interestingly that the idea of ‘local Church’ was tautologous

for there could be no Church that was not local.296 Segundo in Latin America agreed

when he affirmed that the Church was and always would be a particular community

which also had claims to universal significance.297 Schillebeeckx 50 years ago recognised

that there was an implication to linking the idea of local Church to ‘territoriality’ and that

was that it raised the question of the status of Basic Ecclesial Communities in relation to

the Church. 298 Bouyer also believed that the first manifestation and realisation of the

Church was the local communities.299 And other theologians too believed that the local

Church was the full presence and manifestation of the one Church of Christ in history.300

Claver noted that in Vatican II the term ‘local Church’ was seldom used, the more

common phrase was ‘particular Church’ by which the Fathers of the Council meant

primarily the diocese. However when Claver was present at the Synod on Evangelisation

in 1974 he noticed the idea was gaining strength: ‘In that Synod the concept of the local

Church took a more definite shape. Most of the bishops from the Third World wanted the
295
Gutierrez A. (2004) ‘Church Associations: Moving from Organisation to Ministry’ In: Delgado, Gabriel,
Padilla, Picardal (eds) BECs in the Philippines: Dream or Reality? A Multi-Disciplinary Reflection. Rizal,
Philippines: BUKAL NG TIPAN. 79.
296
Pieris A. (1988) An Asian Theology of Liberation. New York: Orbis Books. 36
297
Segundo J. L. (1980) The Community Called Church. Dublin: Gill and Macmillan. 5-7.
298
Schillebeeckx E. (1972) Editorial Concilium 1972/1 9.
299
Bouyer L. (1982) The Church of God. Chicago: Francisco Herald Press. 278.
300
Legrand H. (1972) ‘The Re-evaluation of the Local Church: Some Theological Implications’ Concilium
1972/1 57. Komonchak K. (1986) ‘Towards a Theology of the Local Church’ FABC Papers 42 34-35.

148
idea of the local Church developed but the document the Synod was to issue was not

passed.’301 The main reason being he stated was the chapter on the local Church was not

approved. The bishops had wanted to see development in four main areas; law, structures

of the Church, theology from indigenous perspectives, and liturgy in tune with people’s

cultural milieu. This proved too much for the majority of the bishops but the bishops

were using the term as synonymous with national Church and the Vatican II term was

being slowly replaced with the shift from the individual diocese to a collection of dioceses

with commonalities. The debate was becoming more focused on the local in the sense of

common languages, cultures and territories; this perspective, however, has not proved to

be the final word on the question of ‘local’ or indeed ‘Church’.

Claver returned to certain key ideas of Vatican II that when taken seriously would

‘inevitably lead to the formation of local Churches and hence of BCCs.’302 These simple

ideas of dialogue, involvement and co-responsibility when put into practice he believed

would bring about a transition from a passive institutional model of Church to a more

active participative model. This involvement of a participatory people was not something

that occurred at the distant level of the diocese but could in fact only take place at the

nearest level for the people, at the grassroots and that was in the BEC/SCC close to where

they lived. Now Claver made the point that in areas where the Christians were in a

minority a territorial meeting might not be possible so they would have to find another

way of meeting, another base that united them either through interest groups, professional

groups or worship groups but there had to be a mechanism whereby people met together

and communicated with one another.

301
Claver (1986) ‘The Basic Christian Communities in the Wider Context’ East Asian Pastoral Review 23:3
362.
302
Claver (1986) 364.

149
Several years later the East Asian Pastoral Institute held a Summer Course in 1979 where

the central theme was ‘Local Church’, with participants from many parts of Asia. No

doubt influenced somewhat by the recent Synod on Evangelisation the course participants

while debating the local Church and the formation of small ecclesial communities

identified evangelisation as a core component for ecclesial authenticity.

It is one thing to experience the need for small ecclesial communities and to observe

the dynamics of the growth of the small group; it is quite another to bring into being a

small group which is an authentic ecclesial community… the dream of becoming truly

local Church cannot possibly be realised unless our small community becomes an

evangelised and an evangelising group.303

The seminar took its lead from the Second Vatican Council theology of the Church as

sign and sacrament.304 They focused on the question of ‘sign’ and asked themselves how

to become the kind of sign that was actually credible and meaningful for concrete people,

living at a particular historical moment within a given culture and situation. The seminar

clarified what people already knew: that actions always spoke louder than words and

therefore to be truly credible and authentic people had to experience the Church as being

totally consistent and believable as a sign of the presence in the world of the values of the

kingdom. Now that in 2012 it is 50 years since the opening of the Council, it is opportune

to ask the question to what extent has this theology of sign and sacrament been fully

understood or implemented in ecclesiological development? It offered immense

303
Calle J. (1979) ‘Dimensions of the Local Church’ East Asian Pastoral Review. 16 (1) 260.
304
Lumen Gentium: ’Since the Church, in Christ, is in the nature of sacrament – a sign and instrument…’
Flannery (1992) paragraph 1 350.

150
possibilities for the renewal of the whole Church given that the BEC/SCC experience

emerging from the margins of the world and the Church was the first-fruits of a renewal

of ecclesial behaviour and therefore ultimately of structures which responded very much

to the intuitive insight that saw the light of day in the Council.

The Vatican II document Gaudium et Spes eloquently spoke about the nature of the

Church as community in paragraph 32, but as Calle noted, this theme required further

practical development, ‘Since the Church is a sign which is at the same time a

community, she must be seen, recognised, and experienced as a community.’ 305 The

challenge to authenticity was perhaps the greatest challenge facing the Church in the

sense that it was never enough to formulate statements of belief or action but if the

perception on the ground differs or if people’s experience was at variance with the

doctrinal declarations then the credibility of the whole Church suffered and so did her

potential for mission. Therefore it was crucial that the local Church truly witnessed in a

tangible and visible way, through the quality of her mutual relationships, through the

styles of leadership she employed, through the pastoral structures she operated, through

the liturgies she celebrated and the generous open-handed service she offered the world,

that she was indeed a community.

Yet for this to happen, namely to give visibility and tangibility to what the Church is

in her inner mystery, the local Church must be envisioned and structured at all levels

as a community of communities… though small they are the most essential, basic

units because only within them is it possible for a group of persons to experience the

305
Calle J. (1979) ‘Profile of the Local Church’ East Asian Pastoral Review 16:1 269.

151
 Church as a community, and to become together a concrete expression of what the

Church tries to signify as a credible sign of salvation.306

If it was possible to infer from the creedal formulation of ‘One, Holy, Catholic and

Apostolic’ that the oneness of the Church actually implied community in some sense then

it became clear that to be truly Church she had also to be truly a community and that

despite all their faults and limitations BECs/SCCs were indeed an authentic ecclesial

expression in that they were a genuine attempt to create community and to be experienced

as community at the level where they operated, the neighbourhood or sub-parish level.

The same was true also if we were to examine the identity of the Church as an

evangelising community, an apostolic community; one could understand how through the

daily efforts of the people in their BECs/SCCs to live the gospel amongst their neighbours

they were giving authentic witness to the true mission of the Church in the world. These

two critical marks of an authentic Church – community and evangelising mission – were

given expression within the BEC/SCC.

Ponnumuthan in his Doctoral Thesis delivered at the Gregorian University in Rome made

a number of significant points about BECs and the local Church; indeed he situated his

entire research in the context of the theology of the local Church but addressing himself

beyond Vatican II to the New Testament. That is more than this research allows but I

want to acknowledge some of his important findings. He noted that the BECs were new

forms of being local Churches. They were the whole Church in a concentrated form.

They were another form of ecclesial expression. ‘The emergence of BECs is to be

306
Ibid.

152
considered as a gift of the present times to live Church and to build communities.’307 He

saw the vision that gave rise to the BEC/SCC phenomenon in the developing world being

implicit in the ecclesiology of the Second Vatican Council. Ponnumuthan went further

than many other theologians in insisting in ‘the inability of living a true ecclesial life in

the existing structure.’308

This chapter has examined the BECs/SCCs challenge to the structures of the Church, and

in Trivandrum the structures have evolved to fully take into account the new insights

coming from this new experience and expression of being Church. BECs/SCCs became a

diocesan pastoral option in 1991 and their form and structure was decided upon at that

level. As in South Australia, as we shall see in the next chapter, the diocese decided that

everyone became automatically a member of the BEC/SCC. ‘In Trivandrum, the

diocesan structures are set up on the basis of the BECs. One cannot become a member of

the Pastoral Council unless one does frequent the BEC gatherings.’ 309 Ponnumuthan

claimed that they were the first diocese in Kerala to ‘fully implement BECs.’310 Having

researched the phenomenon of BECs/SCCs across the world he arrived at his conclusion

that: ‘More similarities than differences have been noticed in the functioning of BECs in

most of these countries.’311

It is important in a chapter devoted to Asia that the role of the FABC should be properly

acknowledged in the development of ideas about the local Church. Since its inception in

307
Ponnumuthan S. (1996) The Spirituality of Basic Ecclesial Communities in the Socio-Religious Context
of Trivandrum/Kerala, India Rome: Editrice Pontificia Universita Gregoriana 25.
308
Ponnumuthan (1996) 38.
309
Ponnumuthan (1996) 259.
310
Ponnumuthan (1996) 265.
311
Ponnumuthan (1996) 269.

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1974 and as a preparation for the Synod on Evangelisation the first FABC Plenary

Assembly held in Taipei, Taiwan, on the theme of Evangelisation in Modern Day Asia,

made a clear commitment to the concept of a local Church. ‘The primary focus of our

task of evangelisation then, at this time in our history, is the building of a truly local

Church…’312 At the Asian Colloquium on Ministries in the Church (ACMC) held in 1977

in Hong Kong another impetus was given to the idea of local Church:

… the decisive new phenomenon for Christianity in Asia will be the emergence of

genuine Christian communities in Asia – Asian in their way of thinking, praying,

living, communicating their own Christian experience to others… If the Asian

Churches do not discover their own identity, they will have no future.313

The centrality of the local Church in the theological-missiological thought in the Asian

area was highlighted by the FABC commitment to study the question in depth. They

formally established the Theological Advisory Commission (TAC) in the 1980s and there

followed a five-year period of research and consultation culminating in the report Theses

on the Local Church: A Theological Reflection in the Asian Context. 314 ‘This is the

longest document ever produced by the TAC. It was released in 1991 and is arguably the

best and most comprehensive document to date on local Church.’315

312
FABC I, 9-10 quoted in Kroeger, J. (1998) Asia’s Emerging Catholicity: FABC insights on the local
Church. AFER (1998) 40 86.
313
Kroeger (1998) 87 ACMC paragraph 14.
314
FABC Papers 60 http://www.ucanews.com/html/fabc-papers/fabc-0.htm Accessed 18.09.2012.
315
Kroeger (1998) 91.

154
This chapter has brought to a conclusion the survey of the main geographical areas of the

world where the phenomenon of BECs/SCCs has been developing over the past 50 years

or so. We have explored their history and impact in the Philippines and India and indeed

due to the restrictions of space and scope we have hardly done justice to the many

different areas that we could have developed about BECs/SCCs in Asia. In this chapter

we have focused mainly on their origins and influences, as well as on the work of AsIPA,

which is a unique contribution to the development of BECs/SCCs in any part of the

world. We also explored briefly the emergence of Basic Human Communities,

predominantly from within the Indian experience though it is also spoken of elsewhere.

The gospel-culture encounter has particular resonance in Asia and has exercised many

theologians as we have seen. This has drawn out the theme of ecclesiology that has also

been reflected upon in both the Africa and Latin American chapters. We briefly looked at

the challenges to ecclesial structures from the BECs/SCCs before finally reflecting once

again upon the concept of local Church as understood in the writings of the theologians

from the region. This complemented a similar exploration in the previous two chapters.

We shall now move on to review the final BEC experience and then look at the nature of

the debate about neighbourhood and community from a variety of non-theological

sources.

155
 CHAPTER FIVE

EXPLORING NEIGHBOURHOOD

In this thesis so far we have been looking at the phenomenon of BECs in Latin America,

Africa and Asia. We have seen that they exhibit differences as well as similarities and

though they are not rooted in a common ecclesial setting nonetheless they reflect upon the

same geographical setting – the neighbourhood. This chapter focuses on the particularity

of neighbourhood as the location for community and mission and take inspiration from a

number of non-ecclesial writers and contexts who will also draw our attention to the

importance of the neighbourhood in our day. Although the Roman Catholic Church has a

strong centralising tendency, there is considerable difference in emphasis and direction

between the younger Churches, usually those in the poorer regions of the world and those

Churches of Europe and North America. Without neglecting all that is normative within

the universal Catholic tradition, the Churches we have looked at in the previous three

chapters have in common an ability to focus not only on the big picture, the universal

concerns and interests of a world-wide Church, but also on the smallest part, the streets

that together make up a neighbourhood and in which the Catholic faithful from a

particular parish will meet to form community and to exercise their task of mission to

their neighbours. Within the context of Churches from the developed world that have

shown little or no interest in this growing phenomenon of BECs there is one exception

and that is the Archdiocese of Adelaide, South Australia to which we shall turn in a

moment before leaving behind the ecclesiastical sphere to focus our attention on insights

that have been gathered from the secular sphere.

156
This chapter of the research will draw upon the work of theologians such as Sally

McFague and Yves Cattin as well as Felix Wilfred who have used ideas of neighbourhood

and neighbour in their work. Their work will shed light upon the value and significance

of the concept of neighbourhood for theology. This chapter will also be using the work of

Lewis Mumford, Richard Sennett, Robert Putnam and James Vela-McConnell to

highlight the importance of neighbourhood and the relations between people who live in

the neighbourhood to urban geographers and sociologists. They have much to teach us

about why efforts towards neighbourliness and community ought to be made by those

parties concerned with the present and future directions that our cities are taking.

5.1 ADELAIDE: AUSTRALIAN EXCEPTIONALISM

Each of the geographical areas studied in this project has brought its own unique

contribution and insight to the debate about this form of ecclesial life and structure. No

survey of BECs, especially one that purports to connect the experiences of the global

south with the experience of Church in the post-industrial and indeed post-modern world

would be complete without some reference to the important and ground-breaking work

done in the Archdiocese of Adelaide, South Australia. This took place under the

leadership of Archbishop Leonard Faulkner (1985-2001) and was influenced significantly

by Fr Bob Wilkinson, an Adelaide diocesan priest, and a team of religious and lay people.

Over a number of decades, the Archdiocese had attempted to respond to the fast-changing

scene within Australian society and Church by facing the challenges that were emerging.

I spent a number of months working with the BEC Team at the end of 1999, where I

noted many similarities that made the different ecclesial and socio-geographic contexts so

157
comparable. Adelaide’s experience of BECs grew out of years of lay-formation

programmes and generations brought up in Catholic movements and groups such as

Young Christian Workers, Christian Life Movement and the almost ubiquitous St Vincent

de Paul and Legion of Mary. As membership within these organisations and Mass

attendance began to decline, leaders in the diocese sought a way to respond to this

unfolding reality. In 1988, three years after taking the helm, Archbishop Faulkner

presented to the priests of the archdiocese a vision statement 316 in which he outlined

principles around which his pastoral energies would be directed, and therefore he hoped

those of his clergy and people as well. There were four main areas for attention. The first

was to read the signs of the times; the second was the mission of each Catholic to shape

the world with the gospel; the third was the formation of Small Christian Communities in

every parish and the fourth was the key question of lay leadership. Wilkinson

acknowledged the difficulties involved; ‘… the concept of small Christian communities in

every parish proved a tough theological nut.’317 There followed years of experimentation

with many attempts to deliver this vision but there was, alongside this process, a

continuous search for that elusive missing piece of the jigsaw that, when found, would

enable the entire project to be enthusiastically embraced by the majority of clergy and

people alike.

Throughout this period Wilkinson used the work of French sociologist François Dubet318

to influence his reflections on the Adelaide ecclesial scene. Dubet made a systemic

316
Faulkner L. (1988) Community for the World Adelaide: Catholic News Centre
317
Wilkinson P. R. (2001) Adelaide’s Basic Ecclesial Communities Project 2.
http://www.adelaide.catholic.org.au/sites/ParishNeighbourhoodChurch/media/files/1109pdf
Accessed 09.05.2012.
318
Dubet F. (1987) La Galère: Jeunes en Survie, Paris: Editions Fayard/Seuil. In Sociologie de
l’Espérience (1994) Paris: Seuil. Dubet expands his research into a general theory for post-industrial
socieities.

158
analysis of post-industrial society looking particularly at marginalised youth in France,

which Wilkinson understood to have a far wider application. Dubet named three major

systems each with its own logic that impacted upon individuals and groups: the erosion of

traditional community systems, the individualistic competitive ethos of the market place,

and the ‘subjectivation’ which is evident in modern social movements. Wilkinson

commented that the power of traditional Church community systems to socialise the

young was in marked decline, massively influenced by the impact of the second system

defined by free market economics with its ensuing competitiveness that undermined

forms of solidarity and social cohesion replacing subsidiarity with new forms of fiscal and

social control. Dubet’s third system was that of the individual choosing to be a subject of

life rather than the object of someone’s or society’s expectations. He found in the social

movements of our time an embodiment of a desire on the part of a growing number of

younger people to seek identity in some model of creative struggle for authenticity,

freedom, integrity and honesty that does not exclude a desire also for some form of

solidarity and commitment. ‘Using that analysis, we can see that the Church is clearly a

victim of the atrophying of traditional processes and forms,’ wrote Wilkinson.319

This led Adelaide Archdiocese to search for a creative way to reach out and connect not

only with those disaffected and searching young people where they live but also to all

others who are found and encountered in the streets of South Australia’s many

neighbourhoods

319
Wilkinson (2001) 4.

159
 If any traditional institution is to be heard, it needs to show unexpected and creative

structures within itself, offering a voice to the voiceless as equal partners. This is

very similar to the experience the early Church presented to its world. Somehow new

forms of community experienced by the majority as creative and life-giving, because

open to healthy tensions, are vital for the Church.320

In 1994 Wilkinson and his team invited the Marins Team321 to share their experiences

with the Archdiocese of Adelaide. The result was a growing understanding of the gospel

imperative to reach out to the 100%; something that traditional Catholic parishes and

organisations had failed to grasp or understand. The Marins Team shared from their own

experience that in any given parish, no more than 1% of the parish was seriously involved

in any form of leadership with the parish priest. This small percentage was

complemented potentially by up to another 20% that regularly attended Sunday Mass;

some of them would also be members of parish groups and organisations. That left about

80% or more in some cases, of baptised Catholics who rarely touched base with the

Church except through the parish school or, when they celebrated a birth, marriage or

death. Marins suggested that around the world most pastoral energy in the Church was

directed to getting the 20% to become part of the 1%.322 There was very little sense of a

mission-to-the-majority at parish level and there was little or no re-structuring of parishes

to facilitate this vision of a mission-centred parish community. In the face of these

320
Wilkinson (2001) 5.
321
It is worth noting a comment of Wilkinson’s about the Marins Team, given an oft repeated but
completely false criticism I heard about them and their work in both Asia and the UK: ‘At no stage did they
burden us with details of Latin American practice or methods or presume to promote any ideas of what
action was appropriate for Australia.’ Wilkinson (2001) 6.
322
‘Marins suggested that around the world, parish pastoral energy usually goes in getting some of the 20%
(the Mass-goers) to join the one per cent (active responsibilities). He wondered if the 80%, (the non-Mass-
goers) would still be there in one or two generations, unless we found a way to include them in church
community more fully, more consciously and more actively.’ Ibid.

160
figures the Adelaide BEC Team decided that it was imperative that they made strenuous

efforts to connect with 100% of their Catholic community. To facilitate this commitment,

they developed an understanding of parish where everyone was organised into

neighbourhoods of about 100-150 Catholic families and a small team of local people were

recruited to visit them on a regular basis in their own homes. These were known as the

Neighbourhood Pastoral Team (NPT) and their objective was to give flesh to the sense of

community and communion that the Church had committed itself to at the baptism of

each Catholic. The members of the NPT would visit between 12-16 Catholic neighbours

in a geographic locality and simply try to make real the bonds of love and communion

that united all those within the Church.

Wilkinson was influenced by his background in sociology, social theory and social

practice and was committed to the concept of formation through action 323 believing that it

had a greater effect on changing people than any amount of discussion and debate. This

novel way of preparing people for their work in the NPTs, through a commitment to

action first and then reflection upon the action, was something particular to Adelaide that

addressed the problem of many Church groups in the West. Bible Study groups, Prayer

Groups, and Faith Formation seldom enabled their members to move beyond discussion

into action. He identified that this approach was hardest for clergy and religious who

were wedded to the idea that preaching, teaching and discussing were the best, if not the

only ways, of keeping alive the faith. He called this the incubation method where the

323
In 1989-90 Wilkinson studied under Alain Touraine in the École des Hautes Études en Sciences
Sociales, EHESS, or the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences. It is said that Touraine was
the first to use the term ‘post-industrial society’ and his work is based upon a ‘sociology of action’ and
teaches that society shapes its future through structural mechanisms and its own social struggles. Touraine
defined historicity as the capability of a society to take action upon itself. He has spent his life researching
social movements which he defines as a non-violent struggle within a society to interpret that society’s
common culture. These ideas had a profound impact upon Wilkinson who drew upon them with great
effect for the work he was engaged in with BECs in Adelaide.

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practitioners were prepared through study and the acquisition of knowledge before they

were allowed to go out and engage with people. However, Wilkinson suggested an

alternative approach was necessary, one that enabled parishioners in the NPTs to learn on

the job. Simply put they would reflect upon their experiences after having done

something they were all well equipped to do, and that was to hold a conversation, to be-

friend, to listen to and chat to a neighbour. And all that despite the obvious reticence to

knock on a stranger’s door.

Another aspect of the Adelaide experience was that it was one of the few examples of an

entire Archdiocese in a post-industrial society choosing to follow a pastoral plan that

involved total commitment to the BEC model of Church. For that reason alone it was

worth bringing an academic analysis to bear upon it. The Practical Theology question of

‘normativity’ is useful here in that Faulkner drew upon several papal pronouncements324

to establish the fact that what was being proposed was in line with official Church

teaching; in other words his approach was presented as normative for the Catholic Church

in the sense that what was being proposed was in communion with that which was truest

and deepest in the Catholic faith and was authenticated by the magisterium in the person

of the Pope. However, it clearly was not the norm in the sense of reflecting the majority

approach, at least within those countries that were considered to be ‘developed’.

In a Pastoral Letter of October 1994 Faulkner wrote:

324
In his Pastoral Letter of 1994 he mentions Vatican II twice, Pope Paul VI, Pope John Paul II twice,
Synod of Bishops (1985) and quotes from Papal and Synodal Documents four times.

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 I believe that the world-wide emergence of BECs is the work of the Holy Spirit in our

time, a gift of God to the Church. For this reason, they have a central place in our

diocesan vision and I encourage parishes to move towards them as a long-term

orientation and 'preferred way' for our local church.325

Here he made a connection between a phenomenon that he recognised was taking place

all across the globe and the action of God in the world through the Holy Spirit. This

statement claims a high degree of normativity by linking the whole concept of BECs

directly with the Divine inspiration that he affirmed was behind it. In the same letter he

also quotes from the Synod of Bishops Final Report document from 1985:326 ‘Because

the Church is communion, the new ‘basic ecclesial communities’ as they are called, if

they try to live within the unity of the Church are a true expression of communion and a

means for the construction of a more profound communion.’327 The Archbishop went on

to conclude his letter328 by quoting from some of the favourable words that Pope Paul VI

had spoken about base communities in his Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Nuntiandi

(1975).329

But this was not the only avenue for staking a claim to normativity. It was important to

the Archbishop to also draw attention to the roots of BECs in the gospels, the experience

325
Faulkner L. (1994) Basic Ecclesial Communities Pastoral Letter 1.
326
II Extraordinary General Assembly 24 November - 8 December 1985. ‘The Twentieth Anniversary of
the Conclusion of the Second Vatican Council.’
http://www.saintmike.org/library/synod_bishops/final_report1985.html Accessed 24.07.2012.
327
Faulkner (1994) 3.
328
'I believe that BECs can help to overcome the isolation that so many people experience. They can bring
not only a sense of mutual belonging but also a stronger sense of discipleship and mission. As Pope Paul VI
said in 1975, BECs are a cause of great hope for the life of the church'. Faulkner (1994) 4.
329
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/paul_vi/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_p-
vi_exh_19751208_evangelii-nuntiandi_en.html paragraph 58 Accessed 24.07.2012.

163
of the Early Church and in Catholic doctrine. He stated immediately that the BEC ‘is a

community born from the Divine Trinitarian communion.’ 330 He referenced BECs to

sacramental doctrines such as Baptism and Eucharist and spoke of them as being ‘the

Sacrament of Salvation in a local area.’331 He also referred six times to Jesus, the gospels

and the Word of God. But his most extensive BEC scriptural referencing stated that ‘In

many ways they reflect the Church of the first centuries’332 where in no less than seven

New Testament references he draws parallels between the BECs of Adelaide and the

early Church communities gathering in the homes of Stephanas, Phoebe, Prisca and

Aquila.333 It is clearly important for Adelaide to be able to show to its people that what

was being proposed for them as part of the diocesan plan was within the ancient tradition

of the Church even though it sounded quite new, innovative and possibly even radical to

many of them. I will return to the question of normativity more fully in the concluding

chapter.

A number of people were engaged in theological reflection within Adelaide and, among

them, a key contributor was BEC Director Cathy Whewell. Following some discussions

and reflections that she and I had during my time working in her office, we became aware

of the theology of Walter Brueggemann. 334 Whewell produced a significant piece of

work in which she allowed her theological reflections to emerge from the years of BEC

practice, entitled: ‘We are bound to a God for whom the neighbour comes first.’335 There

330
Faulkner (1994) 1.
331
Faulkner (1994) 3.
332
Ibid.
333
I Cor 1:16, 16:15-17, 19; Rom 16:1-3; Acts 18-19; 2 Tim 4:19; Faulkner (1994) 3.
334
Brueggemann W. (1999) The Covenanted Self – Explorations in Law and Covenant. Minneapolis:
Fortress Press.76-90.
335
Whewell C. (2000) We are bound to a God for whom the Neighbour comes first.
http://www.adelaide.catholic.org.au/sites/ParishNeighbourhoodChurch/media/files/1020.pdf
Accessed 09.05.2012.

164
she described fully the theological understanding that lay behind the Adelaide

commitment to neighbourhood. She defined their BEC project in these terms:

The work of Basic Ecclesial Communities (BECs) is a story about ordinary Catholics

honouring and exploring, in this moment in history, the intimate link between their

love of God, the place where they live, the people who are their neighbours and what

it means to be Church.336

Whewell started from the baptismal reality that it was the community of the Church that

welcomed, received and baptised the infant (regardless of the motives that the parents

might have had for presenting their child for the sacrament) and that same community

(the Archdiocese and its parishes) should then draw out the full meaning of the

sacramental event of becoming members of the Church. She suggested that the work of

the NPTs337 was simply to animate that sense of original belonging and incorporation by

making sure all the baptised in any given geographical area were included in a

programme of visits that reached out to every Catholic in the neighbourhood. What was

historically unique here was that the baptised were not asked to join anything; they were

visited and included just because they already were joined to the local Church through

being baptised into a particular parish community. Whewell argued that the initial

response to the baptism rested firmly with the local Catholic community. It had to make

sure that it lived out and actualised what had been celebrated sacramentally in the parish

church. It was not primarily the responsibility of the newly-baptised or their family to

336
Ibid.
337
‘The NPT has three main responsibilities: to meet the people and to help them know one another, to
ensure that any needs that are found will be responded to, and to form a community with the people in the
area.’ Whewell (2000) 4-5.

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decide if they wanted to join in or not. In reality no-one was asked if they wanted to join

the BEC community in their neighbourhood; by virtue of living where they did within the

parish they were members of it by right. They might become aware of the BEC existence

when they received their first NPT visit; that and subsequent visits actualised and made

evident the reality of the community of Church that they were members of through

baptism. Baptism is intimately connected with mission and actually gives identity to the

community of Church, which is a gathering of people called out from the world and given

a mission to share the gospel with that world, and Whewell goes on to explain who it

involved and how it was lived out through the BEC experience of Church:

In Adelaide we are responding to the need for stronger communities in our culture, by

identifying a new mission-ground - the local neighbourhood. This is where we rub

shoulders with those we do not choose for community, but rather with those whom

God has called us to love, literally, our neighbours. This new mission-ground not

only holds within it, the stranger, but also the whole range of social experiences in our

society: domestic violence; racism; loneliness; poverty and inequality; the frail aged;

family life in all its forms; sexual orientation; heroes and villains; those living with

illness, mental or physical; young people; and our impact on the physical environment

in which we live.338

Whewell understood that it was within neighbourhoods that ‘the drama of life’ was played

out and neighbourhoods became the stage where God was active and waiting to be

rediscovered in new and powerful ways. ‘Neighbourhood’ she said ‘is also the place

338
Whewell (2000) 2.

166
where nearly every social justice issue we are confronted by has a personal face.’ 339 For

Whewell this emphasis on neighbourhood pointed to the uniqueness of the Adelaide

approach: ‘This decision,’ she wrote, ‘has set the work of the Church in Adelaide apart

from the forms of BECs in other countries. There has been a deliberate and conscious

decision to enable the 100% to be neighbours for each other and for the world in which

they live.’340 The work, insights and influence of Marins from Latin America had indeed

played a significant part in the development of the BEC project in South Australia, but not

in the way that BEC/SCC writers or practitioners often write about. Adelaide did not

directly copy a model from elsewhere, but acknowledged that the lessons learned on the

BEC journey in one place could be successfully shared with people in a very different

place and context.

Whewell summarises the ecclesiology implicit in all her work in this statement:

There are many leaders in the local Adelaide church who have not grasped the

significance of forming relationships with our neighbours, both as an authentic

response to the gospel and as a loving response to the neighbour-hungry world we live

in. They see their future as repeating the past, and feel the scarcity of people to help

with that task. Their view of church is ‘those who come’ and this feels like more than

enough people to care for – how can we care for the other 85% of Catholics living in

our parish boundaries when we are becoming a smaller and smaller community? On

the government census, Catholics are increasing in number in Australia, but the

numbers in church are in fact declining. Owning the 100% of baptised Catholics in

339
Whewell (2000) 5.
340
Ibid.

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 our neighbourhoods as belonging because of baptism is the first step out of our

perceptions of scarcity into abundance.341

Adelaide, though exceptional in many ways, stands in the tradition of a BEC Church

which is undergoing an ecclesiogenesis in that something new is coming to birth but from

out of a rich and ancient tradition that is rooted in the scriptures and is restoring that

which is central to a gospel-inspired Church – mission and community. BEC advocates

there are also keenly aware that a person’s underlying attitude towards the Church, their

basic understanding or vision for the Church, their ecclesiology in other words, is crucial

to the whole project. BECs risk becoming another unnecessary burden for those who

cannot see why anyone would bother themselves with either the notion of community or

with the concept of mission to the 100%. The reality is in the Catholic community at the

moment we probably have a majority of clergy who think and act out of an ecclesiology

that emphasises not community but access to the sacraments, and growth in personal faith

rather than mission. The BEC project is indeed an up-hill struggle on so many levels –

not least of which is among the leadership echelons of the Church.

5.2 NEIGHBOURHOOD AS PART OF THE CREATION

The ecclesiological make-up of the Church in the British Isles is not very far removed

from that of Australia. That means that we will have to look beyond the ecclesial scene if

we wish to engage further with the notion of neighbourhood and so the remainder of this

chapter we will be a reflection upon the nature of city and the meaning of neighbourhood

from a variety of authors as a way of understanding and appreciating the importance of

341
Whewell (2000) 11.

168
place for human identity and even for the health and well-being of society. We will be

laying foundations using arguments from a sociological and geographical perspective that

I hope will lay a firm basis upon which to construct a theological edifice that will pursued

the Church to re-engage with its base (congregations) at the base (neighbourhood).

Firstly, however, we consider a theologian who is engaged with ideas of neighbourhood.

McFague uses the concept of neighbourhood to localise her concerns about linking the

world, which can seem to be remote and out there, with God who is also felt by many to

be remote and out there. She explores the God-world relationship through the prism of

neighbourhood, which she uses as a metaphor for engaging with ideas of distance and

closeness, transcendence and immanence. In a carefully argued and well thought through

article342 she exposes the lacuna in the traditional myth of creation revealing how, using a

quotation from the decrees of the I Vatican Council (1890),343 the relationship between

God and the world is often seen as one of total distance and difference. For centuries it

has coloured how we feel about the world, society and the God who created them. ‘What

is left out of this story of creation is creation itself, that is, ‘the neighbourhood’, the lowly,

concrete, particular – and fascinating, wonderful – details of physical reality.’344

She suggests that the mythic retelling of the creation story in doctrinal teaching tells us

very little about created reality but much about the God who is its origin. The assumption

342
McFague S. (2004) ‘Imaging God and a Different World’ Concilium 2004/5 42-50.
343
‘The Holy, Catholic, Apostolic, Roman Church believes and confesses that there is one true and living
God, Creator and Lord of Heaven and earth, almighty, eternal, immense, incomprehensible, infinite in
intelligence, in will, and in all perfection, who, as being one, sole, absolutely simple and immutable spiritual
substance, is to be declared really and essentially distinct from the world, of supreme beatitude in and from
himself, and ineffably exalted above all things beside himself which exist or are conceivable.’ McFague
(2004) 43.
344
McFague (2004) 44.

169
behind this understanding is that spirit and matter are completely distinct and set in a

dualistic and hierarchical relationship. ‘God - and all things spiritual, heavenly and

eternal – is perfect and exalted above all things material, earthly and mortal, the latter

being entirely different from the former and inferior to it.’345 She poses the question what

if spirit and matter were intrinsically related and not diametrically opposed? Then perhaps

we could rediscover that basic Christian insight that God is always incarnate, is made real

and actual in the flesh of Jesus Christ, that it is in God’s nature to be embodied, to have a

physical presence, a material dimension, not identical with the earthly but in continuity

with it. It is right in our day to interrelate incarnational and creational theologies. At the

very least they manifest a Divine interest in the material universe, a closeness of body and

spirit, a relationship of intimacy and profound care and respect, which ought to be

mirrored by the followers of Christ in their commitment to and involvement with the

world and neighbourhood in which they live. ‘This understanding of creation asks us to

find out about the neighbourhood so we can take care of it.’ 346 We can see in her

reflections that there is a theological basis for taking the neighbourhood seriously, even

though this is not something that is often written about by theologians or indeed church

leaders.

5.3 THE CITY AS PLACE OF DIVERSITY

On the secular level Aristotle is credited with a defining insight, pin-pointing something

which is at the very core of what we all experience in a city - its diversity. ‘A city is

composed of different kinds of men; similar people cannot bring a city into existence.’347

345
Ibid.
346
McFague (2004) 46.
347
Quoted in Sennett R. (1994) Flesh and Stone – The body and the City in Western Civilisation London:
Faber and Faber 56.

170
The urban experience both fascinates and challenges. It is the majority place of habitation

for the peoples of this planet. The significance of the city cannot be underestimated in

any attempts to re-evaluate the role and place of Christian theology in the world of today.

Indeed one of the real challenges facing the Church is the very pluralism found within the

cities of Europe, their great diversity of ethnic origins, of faith traditions, of secular

values, of relativistic attitudes. The Catholic Church today finds it extremely difficult to

come to terms with the presence and activity, the power and influence of thoughts and

ideas of which it does not approve or which directly oppose its received wisdom.

And yet the city and its quarters or neighbourhoods is the place where we meet these

diverse views and the people who espouse them. Lewis Mumford, in his seminal work

The City in History, defines the city as a ‘place of conversation’ 348 where the

differentiation of characters and occupations leads to the inevitable challenge towards

dialogue. He contrasts this with the development of the village where the individual was

subordinated to the collective ‘we’ and the sense of identity was crafted out of the shared

commonality of the villagers. Difference was not tolerated and uniformity was enforced.

The only voice that mattered was that of the village headman, secular or religious.

The city brings together the actual diversity of the human experience; it celebrates

richness and difference within the human family, it allows its many voices and indeed

languages to be heard. It is not uncommon for cities to market themselves today on the

348
Mumford L. (1961) The City in History – Its Origins, Its Transformations, and Its Prospects London:
Secker and Warburg 116.

171
perceived strength of their diverse citizenry. 349 But this very strength contains also a

potential weakness, that is, what is capable of holding this mass of difference together? Is

there a unifying principle or force that can hold in tension the diverse ideas and customs

that threaten to tear the populous apart? Will we ever be able to speak of community with

any meaning in the urban environment?

‘What is needed is some neutral ground where people come together,’350 noticed Gibson

in his research into neighbourhood-based activism. Where can we find the common

ground on which to construct a platform from which conversation and dialogue can

commence? Perhaps the very expression ‘common ground’ suggests a way forward. Too

little attention is paid today in the West to the value of place, of ground, as the unique

point of connection between ourselves as human beings and the earth from which we are

born. In the Judaeo-Christian tradition that relationship is most intimate in that creation is

believed to have its origin ‘from the soil’351 and is therefore referenced to and related with

the earth, the ground under our feet, the very place where we live and establish our

homes. The designation of this small place of earth in our urban culture is usually called

‘neighbourhood’, it is our continuing connection with the earth as component element in

the creation of our being. It is also the place where we locate the ‘neighbour’, the one

whose very presence and existence constructs with us the core of our identity. Neighbour

is the other without whom we cannot make sense of our lives, our point of reference for

discovering the human dimension of our relational selves and the one who is birthed from

the earth alongside us. And the neighbour lives, creates home and family, relaxes and

349
‘The World in One City’ was chosen as the theme to be used by Liverpool City Council in their bid in
2003 to become European Capital of Culture in 2008.
350
Gibson T. (1996) The Power in our Hands: Neighbourhood based – World shaking. Oxfordshire: Jon
Carpenter Publishing 258.
351
Genesis 2:7, 9, 19.

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recreates, celebrates and gives expression to their culture and faith in the neighbourhood

where they have chosen to reside and where to some extent and for some period of time

they belong.

As Gibson has noted, ‘The neighbourhood is within everyone’s reach. And it is common

ground to everyone who lives or works there.’352 He is realistic enough to state that most

don’t see things that way. He states in the same study that ‘neighbourhoods are the cells

which keep society whole … A neighbourhood means the place plus the people, one

whole, which is common ground for everyone.’ 353 This is not the first time in this

research that we have come across the notion of neighbourhood as common ground.

5.4 FROM INHOSPITABLE SPACES TO HOSPITABLE PLACES

It was a French writer Yves Cattin who reflected that the ‘body is this first and original

territory of humanity, at the origin of all territories and all geographies.’354 Like McFague

he also critiqued the dualistic dialectic of body and soul, matter and spirit, outside and

inside in order to lay-out a coherent description of the original totality of the human

experience. These were not distinct and opposed realities, he suggested, but two words

describing two aspects of the same reality – being human. In great detail he argued for an

integration of these two aspects of the human condition. Human beings, if they were to

exist in a human way, must develop in two directions, ‘they must become the world by

becoming the body, and they must become themselves by becoming spirit.’355 No human

352
Gibson T. (1984) Counterweight: The Neighbourhood Option London: Town and Country Planning
Association 5.
353
Gibson (1984) 3.
354
Cattin Y. (1999) ‘Human Beings Cross Frontiers’ Concilium 1999/2 5.
355
Ibid.

173
being could become fully human in isolation, separated from the socialising impact of

other persons, commencing with the mother and father at birth and before.

Cattin identified a movement intrinsic to all humans, that of going to the world and

returning to oneself, of passing towards the other than oneself in order to become and be

oneself. Thus the metaphors he used were those of exile and migration, of limit and

frontier. As humans we are constantly having to abandon our being, leaving it behind if

we were to enter realistically into the alien-other world that was beyond us and different

from us so that through that encounter we were brought face to face with that which was

not us but which in the experience of inter-relationality gifted us with a new aspect,

insight, understanding that meant we became more than we were before departing from

our limited, historical being. I am more completely myself as a result of that process, or

movement. The limit and frontier that was my body delineated my spirit, described that

which made the spirit a human spirit. It determined the space required for a being to exist

as a being in the world. Yet it also prevented this being from going beyond what it was.

This limit and frontier were also what had to be crossed for a human being to set out to

exist in the face of the world.

‘So human beings are migrants: they ceaselessly cross and re-cross the frontiers of their

bodies in order to go to what is not themselves and in order to become themselves.’356 He

then spoke of the action that human beings undertook in this process as the invention of

space, of human spaces or modes of presence in the world. He argued that we realized

our humanity in a concrete way only by creating space as a place of being and existing. It

356
Ibid.

174
would seem to me that here we had a very fruitful concept that stimulated our

understanding of the role of the Christian in society as being the ones who knew that they

were called to invent or create spaces for the humanizing of humans, for the fulfilling of

the fullness of the human being in its entirety, places thus consciously made where all

could come into being.

In inventing the place, human beings invent a place for being themselves, for

becoming themselves, and a place for being together. Then it is possible to realise

what is called the encounter, the communication or the society, in other words a

limitation of space and time, and in this space-time words, gestures and silences.

Thus by inventing and occupying their places, human beings draw a provisional and

complex geography of diverse and multiple humanities which are both distinct and

always interconnected.357

Crucially someone has to articulate the desire of all humans for meeting and becoming,

for communication and communion, by making real actual places where this could be

effected and experienced. In these places what was experienced was what Christians

referred to as the kingdom of God, the space where Being encouraged becoming, and it

only happened in the physicality of space and time, in the neighbourhoods that all human

beings inhabited and where they created a place for living.

There were also tendencies within our world that worked to inhibit and imprison the

human person and societies within material and spiritual frontiers where men and women

357
Cattin (1999) 8.

175
became solidified and fixed so that there was little or no possibility of change. Frontiers

had become barriers and this could have serious consequences for peoples and

individuals. Yet frontiers paradoxically were also crossing points, they must be otherwise

they became prison walls. Cattin argued persuasively that ‘hospitality is the basic rule of

the humanity of human beings and their humanization.’358 This hospitality was not only a

welcome to the friend and neighbour next door but also to the one who comes from afar,

the stranger and the foreigner. This attitude of hospitable welcome ‘makes of the one

who approaches me my neighbour.’ This concept places demands on us because, as Cattin

explained, what was exchanged between human beings was their ‘being human’, and not

their lack of humanity or inhumanity. The value and exercise of hospitality created places

for living together, spaces where the operative energy was a mutual becoming human, it

was the invention of a new type of neighbourhood where every person who shared that

piece of earth was encouraged and permitted, by the free actions of others, to experience

the liberating and limitless infinite value of being welcomed and accepted so that each

enabled the other to grow in being human.

However this is not the general experience in society today. Places for encounter are

becoming increasingly rare and more difficult to find. A lack of contact space and the

concomitant loss of time were making of our world an uninhabitable place. ‘Thus without

our noticing it, the places and times of life are becoming non-places of life, places through

which one passes, in which one can no longer stop, take one’s time, waste time.’359 Cattin

argued that the places we experienced, especially in the West, were increasingly

experienced as places of transit or non-places of being. He drew attention to the

358
Cattin (1999) 12.
359
Cattin (1999) 13.

176
‘progressive and perhaps inescapable disappearance of the places where human beings

are, the places where they are themselves.’ 360 In this forgetfulness of places and this

lostness in space without places, individuals lost their bodies and familiarity with their

bodies, which became a kind of strange alien or foreign body, existing in undifferentiated

spaces. This was the opposite of the kingdom of God and therefore was an eloquent

testimony of the need for the Church to rediscover the value of the temporal and

territorial, to refocus on the neighbour and the neighbourhood, as the locus for an

evangelising action that encouraged all the faithful to be at the forefront of the invention

and creation of places or territories of hospitality and welcome where each found a home

to be themselves and to grow into the person they were capable of becoming.

5.5 CITIES IN DECLINE

Jesus was often known as ‘of Nazareth’ designating the actual place where he lived, the

streets and neighbourhood where he grew up, matured, flourished, became a full person.

It seems important today to explore the perceived dislocation, or disconnection with

place, flagged up by Cattin and which is experienced by many in our European and North

American culture. One of those charting the decline in connectivity is the political

scientist and professor at Harvard University Robert Putnam. In his controversial book,

Bowling Alone, he lamented the demise of ‘place-based social capital’ stating, ‘We are

withdrawing from those networks of reciprocity that once constituted our

communities.’361 He also noted the impact of mobility on the greater or lesser availability

of people for involvement in their local community.

360
Cattin (1999) 14.
361
Putnam R. (2000) Bowling Alone – The Collapse and Revival of American Community New York:
Simon and Schuster 184.

177
He brought to our attention the simple fact that social networks had value, that social

contacts affected productivity and that social capital was the most powerful civic virtue

when embedded in a dense network of reciprocal social relations. Perhaps the first to use

this language was L. J. Hanifan in 1916.

The individual is helpless socially, if left to himself…. If he comes into contact with

his neighbour, and they with other neighbours, there will be an accumulation of social

capital, which may immediately satisfy his social needs and which may bear a social

potentiality sufficient to the substantial improvement of living conditions in the whole

community.362

Putnam defined social capital as that which ‘refers to connections among individuals –

social networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arise from them.’363

He was perhaps most renowned for his distinction between bonding and bridging social

capital. Bonding occurred when you were socializing with people who were like you,

those who were similar in age, race, religion, outlook etc. But if we were to build

societies that were harmonious in a multi-ethnic and pluralistic world we also needed to

create another type of social capital, bridging. This was what you did when you made

friends with people who were not like you, those from other cultures, ethnic groups, and

rival gangs etc. These two forms of social capital were declining at an alarming rate

opined Putnam.364

362
Hanifan L. J. quoted by Putnam (2000) 19.
363
Ibid.
364
‘For the first two –thirds of the twentieth century a powerful tide bore Americans into ever deeper
engagement in the life of their communities, but a few decades ago – silently, without warning – that tide

178
This distinction in social capital was helpful in another area. The bonding type was

typical to the exclusive community, which was modelled by the ghetto, whereas the

bridging type was inclusive and typical of the neighbourhood model of community.

Indeed without the latter the entire existence of our modern urban culture was threatened.

Groups in society today were often tempted to withdraw into a ghetto of their choosing.

A question this posed for me was could theology and ecclesial experience offer any

guidelines as to how Christians in the West might resist the pull into the ghetto and

exclusivity and embrace the challenge offered by the actual neighbourhood to inclusive

relationships and attitudes?

There was a real need to rediscover neighbourhood as a place of commonality, a unifying

location where each was equal in being neighbour, in sharing this same space, in putting

roots down into the same soil. It was, in Mumford’s phrase, a place of conversation

where no one had an advantage over the other, where each was confident in their shared

humanity and residency whatever their differences seemed to say. It was a place where

one tried to avoid all tendencies to separation, to close in, to demand order, conformity

and control. Neighbourhood at its best was welcoming, was open-minded and

openhearted, accepting difference and celebrating diversity, and recognised and lived with

the plurality of ethnic and religious groupings. Neighbourhood was pre-eminently a place

of encounter and a place of living and the question we must ask was how could this be

encouraged and facilitated in an age of rampant individualism and alienation?

reversed and we were overtaken by a treacherous rip current. Without at first noticing, we have been pulled
apart from one another and from our communities over the last third of the century’ Putnam (2000) 27.

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Vela-McConnell attempted to address this question:

The modern world has become very impersonal. We have become detached from

those around us. We value the competition that drives us apart rather than the

complementarity that could bind us together…. We have become strangers in our

own society…. We have become alienated from one another.365

He described social affinity as encompassing the empathy and identification between

individuals or groups that lay at the heart of the classic notion of social cohesion.366 He

recognised that the challenge in our global context was to establish social affinity between

diverse and disparate individuals in order to reinforce the cohesiveness of society. He

identified the paradox of modernity as being symbolized by the tension between

proximity and distance. There were three distinct variables that impacted upon social

affinity; spatial proximity, temporal proximity and social proximity/distance. As the

distance between others and ourselves increased, the possibility of establishing social

affinity with those others was strained, undermining our relational embeddedness and

interdependence.

The unique place where each of us stood was called by Vela-McConnell ‘social location’,

it encompassed the totality of our lived experience at any given moment, and it was what

was available to us in the present our ‘here and now’, our actuality. Vela-McConnell

recognised that social interaction was a major part of everyday reality, because no one

365
Vela- McConnell J. (1999) Who Is My Neighbour – Social Affinity in a Modern World New York: State
University Press 10-11.
366
Vela- McConnell (1999) 8.

180
was an island. People best experienced one another in face-to-face encounters and

through this interaction the ‘here and now’ of two people overlapped and there was

continuous reciprocity between them. ‘Without these direct and personalized interactions,

the emergence of social affinity – the sentiment of interconnectedness – is jeopardised.’367

Mumford, who was writing his magnum opus during the years of an anticipated nuclear

catastrophe, was heavily influenced by the threat of total obliteration that the nuclear arms

race symbolised. But he was also acutely aware that the dominant capitalist neo-liberal

economic model of continual expansion also brought with it the threat of disaster. These

powerful negative influences gave rise to his description of the city as ‘semi-

annihilating.’368 Though this would not necessarily be an appropriate metaphor today it

nonetheless forced him to look to images of nurture and love as a means of finding hope

for the city in an uncertain future. These images for him were pre-religious and went

right back to the beginnings of Neolithic settlements, which were organised around the

cherishing and nurturing of life. They remain valid and helpful images still.

He noted that prior to the emergence of city we had villages and it was in the village that

we first discovered the idea of ‘neighbour’ and to some extent he argued this had been

retained in the city through the neighbourhood unit, or small village-like community

within the city boundaries consisting of no more than 5,000 people.369 It was within those

first primitive settlements from 9,000 – 4,000BC that anthropologists told us that the

concept of a shared life developed, at that stage the ‘us’ and ‘I’ were one and the same,

367
Vela- McConnell (1999) 11.
368
Mumford (1961) 545.
369
Mumford (1961) 62.

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there was little differentiation. The growth and development of the city took humans

living in society to another level. One of Mumford’s main arguments was that we could

not function in the large grouping, that we needed to maintain in our cities a passion for

the small. It was only at such a micro level that cherishing and nurturing became

possible. He was an advocate for making sure our cities were organised with small units

in mind.

The future of the city would depend to a great extent said Mumford on its ability to

facilitate the essential, basic elements of the primary group, the family and

neighbourhood. He was a great proponent of the human dimension of everything. This

insight and attitude dovetailed in very well with a rediscovering of the role of place in

theology. It helped us to realise that there were many others who were struggling with the

challenges that modern living throws up for every society and were finding ways of

encouraging the very values and approaches that would naturally flow from a renewed

understanding of a Christian theology for the urban environment. However, the vision

that some of these authors had for the city and for humanity was being developed at a

time when in the West it often seemed that Church leaders expressed insufficient

encouragement for the faithful to seriously engage with the world in which they lived.370

Mumford for example gave a very clear mandate to the modern city: ‘Its new mission is

to hand on to the smallest urban unit the cultural resources that make for world unity and

co-operation.’ 371 We can see here that Mumford expected each city to aspire to the

highest ideals of human existence; he challenged cities to create ‘a visible regional and

civic structure, designed to make man at home with his deeper self and his larger world,
370
The great exception being the Second Vatican Council 1962-1965 which amongst many things promoted
dialogue as a way of living and engaging with the world; especially the post-conciliar document Humanae
Personae Dignitatem (On Dialogue with Unbelievers) in 1968 Flannery (1992) 1002-1014.
371
Mumford (1961) 561.

182
attached to images of nurture and love.’372 If this was a secular vision for the world in

which we live surely it was one in which Christians could make common cause bringing

to the project the skills we have developed for the formation and nurturing of community.

He concluded his study with these words ‘For the city should be an organ of love; and the

best economy of cities is the care and culture of men.’373

5.6 IS COMMUNITY POSSIBLE GIVEN URBAN DIVERSITY?

Sociologist J. Scherer examined the many different facets the concept of community had

for an urban population and enquired if there was such a thing as community. Developing

the ‘we’ feeling, as she called it, happened continually when people invest in the process

of being neighbourly. ‘Community is a by-product that develops when people have an

opportunity to interact over a period of time.’374 It is an identical fascination with the

concept of community that encourages Christian theologians and practitioners today to

engage with the process of human living in urban environments.

The question of neighbourliness and therefore of hospitality and openness found an echo

in the feminist perspective of Kanyoro who noted that women in particular, but also

people in general, were discarding yesterday’s limited exclusiveness; which was another

echo of the ghetto model of living in society described by Putnam earlier where bonding

social capital was perhaps at its strongest. This exclusivity was especially experienced by

women in the Church who found that patriarchy actively worked to exclude them from

any roles or functions within the community of the faithful that were commensurate with

372
Mumford (1961) 573.
373
Mumford (1961) 575.
374
Scherer J. (1972) Contemporary Community – Sociological Illusion or Reality? London: Tavistock
Publications 24.

183
their baptismal and human dignity. So they were well placed to comment on the impact

of places of welcome where they had a voice and could make a full contribution: ‘It is no

wonder that the open hospitality of secular social forums is a place where those in the

margins find room to be heard.’375 She noted in her article that what motivated people in

their engagement with social action was the search for community. There was

undoubtedly here an important insight from which the Church must learn that of how to

create within its own communities that kind of welcome and hospitality to everyone that

made a genuine experience of city and the secular spaces found in its neighbourhoods to

be so life-affirming to many.

Cattin had previously introduced the idea of frontier and border and it was consistent for

this thesis that has spent much time beyond the borders of the European Church to listen

critically to some further reflections that come from the margins of the Church, from the

frontiers of Christianity, where the faith shares a border or frontier with other world

religions. ‘Religion comes into its own in border situations, where compassion like

equilibrium is a basic requirement and relations have to be forged anew.’ 376 This of

course continued the discourse about hospitality as a resource for the present moment of

ecclesial life. Troch understood God to be a beckoning horizon towards which we might

advance, beyond the exclusive limits and unchanging attitudes that were imposed on

human beings. She stated quite strongly that the God who cares dwelt in the borderland;

frontier areas were places where contact zones could be established, where an encounter

could take place between people who were different, and God could be experienced anew

as the One who was beyond the limits we imposed on ourselves and on others. This

375
Kanyoro M. (2004) ‘The Shape of God to Come and the Future of Humanity’ Concilium 2004/5 56.
376
Troch L. (2007) ‘Mystery in Earthenware Vessels: The Fragmenting of Images of God within New
Experiences of Religion’ Concilium 2007/1 80.

184
insight was particularly apt in our consideration of neighbourhood, because as we have

seen the neighbourhoods of our cities today were often places where those from beyond

our borders dwelt alongside us. They created in our midst frontier areas and contact

zones close to home where encounters could take place, where we were afforded

opportunities to practice all the skills and virtues necessary for the creation of welcoming

and hospitable neighbourly communities. If Christians had this simple vision of where

their God could be found and encountered there would be a motivational impetus given to

them to engage more enthusiastically with the rich and varied cosmopolitan environment

that was found in our cities today.

Wilfred had developed a most original and constructive concept of ‘religious

cosmopolitanism’ that took these insights and systematised them into a basic attitude that

fully respected the otherness of the different religious traditions and yet freely entered into

relations with them as being the patrimony of all humanity. He suggested that

civilisational and humanistic cosmopolitanism was rooted in the particular and in

solidarity with the local. This cosmopolitan attitude consisted in the search for alternative

modes of life in the company of other groups, peoples, and cultures.377

Wilfred noted carefully the dialectic of identity and transcendence, of rootedness and

detachment contained within cosmopolitanism. He correctly stated that to live was to put

down roots and yet all of life was a journey. The two experiences needed to be integrated

into our understanding of what it was to be human in order that we could appropriately

develop values and attitudes that corresponded to that which was deepest within the

377
Wilfred F. (2007) ‘Christianity and Religious Cosmopolitanism: Toward Reverse Universality’
Concilium 2007/1 117.

185
human condition. Though at first sight there appeared to be a contradiction between the

stability implied by being rooted and the movement lying behind the metaphor of journey,

in reality they were both aspects of human existence. We had at the same time to

acknowledge our origins and the history and traditions that have formed us while being

detached enough to be open to the journey towards the other, that which was different and

distinct from me, so that in a creative act of communitarian listening and sharing we could

discover anew deeper aspects to our common humanity. Religious cosmopolitanism was

the attempt to construct a collective non-tribal self of a particular religious group.

5.7 ENGAGING WITH THE CITY AND ITS PEOPLE

There was little likelihood of ever creating true communities in our disjointed and

fragmented world if religions or cultures, groups and ethnicities had no connections, no

places to meet, to gather, if they remained isolated and scattered. In religious

cosmopolitanism the point of reference was the other, as person, as relational being, rather

than the doctrines, systems of belief, rites and practices of the other religion. In this sense

the other became ‘the source of reverse or incoming universality.’378 They were enabling

the emerging of a planetary and universal human being who while being deeply connected

to their roots was also able to make the journey into the space of the other. This seemed

to be a stage further on than a mere formal embracing of pluralism with its attendant

tolerance of diversity; in cosmopolitanism there was an attempt to fully engage with the

totality of the other precisely as other and therefore while not denying one’s roots one was

able to encounter the other as an aspect of oneself that had yet to be fully discovered or

explored in a journey of mutual connection.

378
Wilfred (2007) 120.

186
Barros offers a path for developing this idea theologically, taking as his point of departure

the simple statement of faith found in the Acts of the Apostles: ‘We are only human

beings’ (Acts 14:15) and ‘I am only a man’ (Acts 10:26). It was this focus on the human

project that seemed to offer the best way forward for Christianity in attempting to

reconnect with increasingly alienated societies and faithful. And this approach best

happened at the local level, within the neighbourhood, between people of open and

hospitable dispositions. ‘Religious cosmopolitanism is very often practiced most

effectively at the grassroots level and in very local circumstances.’379

Putnam held faith communities to play a significant role in regard to increasing social

capital in the USA. He stated that they also create, or ‘incubate’ social capital and had

been identified as motivational institutions that inspired people to develop their capacity

as agents of social capital.380 This question of what would motivate people of faith to

engage with the place where they live has been one of the driving questions behind this

thesis. I have a sense in which in the UK at least the Roman Catholic Church is becoming

disengaged and disconnected from neighbourhood and the small localised expression of

faith-community; the dynamic at present seems to be in the opposite direction. But there

is a rich seam of thought and experience which if excavated will undoubtedly enable

Christian people to become major players in the development and extension of social

capital or social affinity in the urban centres of each continent. Putnam towards the end

of his book made a heartfelt plea: ‘… it is now past time to begin to reweave the fabric of

our communities.’ 381 It is my intention that this thesis should contribute towards this

379
Wilfred (2007) 120.
380
Putnam (2000) ‘Faith communities in which people worship together are arguably the single most
important repository of social capital in America’ 66.
381
Putnam (2000) 402.

187
process in the UK specifically by influencing faith communities to re-orientate themselves

towards the city and its neighbourhoods.

There is a growing body of professional opinion 382 that is committed to ‘the urgent

political priority of constructing cities that correspond to human social needs rather than

to the capitalist imperative of profit-making.’383 Putting people first is a priority that is at

the core of the global South’s experience of BECs within the Catholic arena and this does

indeed translate to the global North but not with voices from within the faith community

but with professional voices. Some of these voices are very radical in their analysis, and

like Harvey, very critical in their assertion that cities are founded on the exploitation of

the many by the few. He says that an urbanism founded on exploitation is in fact a legacy

of history. ‘A genuinely humanising urbanism has yet to be brought into being. It

remains for revolutionary theory to chart the path from an urbanism based in exploitation

to an urbanism appropriate for the human species.’384

Short asserted in his work The Humane City that ‘Society needs reordering so as to create

more humane cities, but through a collective endeavour in which people have the

opportunity to change the circumstances of their own lives.’385 He made the point that the

best way forward to renew city living was for enlightened top-down initiatives to make

sure they enhanced the purchase of bottom-up social progress. Short believed that lasting

and beneficial changes to the lives of ordinary people came about by facilitating in them

382
Writers such as Jacobs J. (1962); Lefebvre H. (1968); Harvey D. (1976/1989); Smith N. (1996);
Brenner N. and Theodore N. (2003) quoted in Brenner N. (2009) ‘Cities for People, not for Profit’ City
13: 2-3 176-177.
383
Ibid.
384
Harvey D. (1976) quoted in Brenner (2009) 177.
385
Short J. (1989) The Humane City: Cities as if People Matter Oxford: Blackwell 73.

188
the development of confidence in their individual and collective abilities. ‘The creation

of better cities fundamentally involves questions about the shape and quality of social

relations.’386 Short goes on to explain that this would come about to the extent that all

citizens could be both empowered and engaged. Empowerment means devolving real

power over decision-making through better administrative structures and improved social

arrangements. Engagement means the genuine involvement of people in all the various

activities of their public life and a democratisation in the way we arrive at social goals. ‘I

believe there is a deep human need for engagement. People require a sense of linkage

with others in their community, and society can benefit from enhancing and encouraging

these connections.’387

This element of the research confirmed what I had been working on for the past decade in

that I have been involved in the slow process of working with a bottom-up resident-led

organisation bringing together everyone who was a leaseholder (owners of apartments)

and those who also lived in leasehold property without owning (tenants paying rent to the

leaseholders) in the residential apartment developments along the Liverpool

Waterfront, 388 which eventually in 2008 matured into a city-wide organisation called

Engage Liverpool389 which now speaks on behalf of all those who live in apartments in

the city centre and waterfront. Engage is characterised by a determination to pursue

policies and tactics that promote dialogue and engagement as we attempt to influence

decision-makers and stakeholders in the city to work with us to improve the quality of life

for everyone who lives in the city centre. However though as citizens we have become

engaged with the city and its political and civic organisations we have not been truly
386
Short (1989) 75.
387
Short (1989) 76.
388
FLWRA: Federation of Liverpool Waterfront Residents Associations.
389
www.engageliverpool.com Accessed 25.09.2012.

189
empowered, in that though residents’ representatives now sit on many of the major bodies

that are making decisions about the future growth and direction of the city there is still

real resistance from certain quarters to the idea that ordinary non-professional people

should have an important and vital role to play in actually influencing the design and

build of future apartments and the communities in which they are built.

5.8 ATTEMPTS AT DEFINING COMMUNITY

Just to mention the word community in the context of the city is indeed a challenging and

controversial stance; not least in terms of what is meant by community and how it is

defined. König, writing during the 1960’s, attempted to get to grips with certain

terminological difficulties; writing in his native German he felt it necessary to define

carefully the terms being used to describe community. He noted two quite different and

distinct ideas behind the word community and warned against their misuse: ‘… it would

be better not to use the term community in general (Gemeinschaft) for the local

community (Gemeinde).’ 390 In English he said that the term was equally ambiguous

because on the one hand it could refer to the local community in a very strict geographical

sense and on the other hand to its more general sense of social relationships. But he noted

that in English we did not use the term in quite the same way as the Germans did when

using Gemeinde which could imply an intimacy of relationships whereas in English when

we used community to mean the community at the local level it was not usually

understood as a community in a particularly close or intimate sense. In English the more

usual term that described the local instance of community was neighbourhood whilst the

German Gemeinde already had an exact territorial implication. He then analysed the term

390
König R. (1968) The Community London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. Translated from the German by
FitzGerald E.

190
community Gemeinschaft in French, Italian and Spanish noting that their usage came

closer to the German Gemeinde as it often had a local connotation but when they wanted

to express a particularly close form of association in a relational sense they used the term

‘communion’. This term was of course religiously ambiguous and not only for

sociologists.

This research focuses on the concept of neighbourhood which does not exclude a

discussion about the possibility or potentiality for community or communion at

neighbourhood level. König defined it thus: ‘A community is first of all a global society

of a local type embracing an indefinite multiplicity of functional spheres, social groups

and other social phenomena, and conditioning innumerable forms of social interaction,

joint bond and value concepts.’391 In other words, for König, community could never be a

simple gathering of like-minded similar people as it had to be a reality that transcended

the limited and the narrow and therefore was inclusive in attitude, universal in potentiality

and global in tendency, transcending both family and neighbourhood. König

distinguished between the principle of neighbourhood and the concrete and practical

neighbourhood that he defined as an ‘integrated neighbourhood.’392 He noted that even

when a community was small in size it was no guarantee that those living together in

close proximity would necessarily be integrated into one neighbourhood. In fact he

believed that purely physical proximity seemed to create only quite loose relationships.

His study stated that ‘proximity alone is an important direct factor in the development of

social interactions only with newly-formed and perhaps even temporary groupings.’ 393

391
König (1968) 26-27.
392
‘Even the village community, as the most important form of the reality of the neighbourhood principle, is
invariably made up of a number of concrete or integrated neighbourhoods, held together by kinship or
friendship, cliques, a similar class situation, common cultural traits, and so on.’ König (1968) 51.
393
König (1968) 53.

191
High-rise, city centre apartment living bears this out; proximity does not at all facilitate

neighbourliness and community integration; though the potentiality is there the actuality

isn’t. He recognised that there could be serious problems in neighbourhoods and that the

level of intensity of integration varied considerably. Neighbourhoods created not only

social attachments but also social tensions too. König decided that he would like to see

the expression neighbourhood ‘limited to small and very small units which are in fact

characterised by a closer social relationship.’ 394 And he went on to write that he was

inclined to accept the opinion that ‘the neighbourhood is in some way parallel to the local

environment which can be surveyed with the eye.’395

About twenty five years after König’s work was published British sociologists Crow and

Allan396 continued this exploration of the meaning of community and referenced the work

of Willmott 397 who defined community in three main ways: territorial or place

community, interest community and community of attachment. The first was the concept

of community as shared residence, a clear geographical element being that which the

people held in common. The second was where the basis of community was shared

characteristics other than place, such networks could be structured around common

interests; though these first two concepts could coincide they might be and often were

geographically dispersed. The third sense of community involved a level of social

interaction and sense of shared identity. They also reported that similar conclusions were

reached by Lee and Newby 398 whose three definitions though not identical were

394
König (1968) 71.
395
König (1968) 72.
396
Crow G. and Allan G. (1994) Community Life: An Introduction to Local Social Relations London:
Harvester/Wheatsheaf.
397
Willmott P. (1986) Social Networks, Informal Care and Public Policy London: Policy Studies Institute.
chapter 6.
398
Lee D. and Newby H. (1983) The Problem of Sociology. London: Hutchinson. Chapter 4.

192
nonetheless very close: locality was the weak sense of community, meaning simply the

living together in a particular place, their second local social system retained a

geographical referent but implied that individuals were linked together in social networks;

their third definition of community involved a shared sense of identity which they called

communion, a term we have previously come across in König. If commentators were

looking for community to encapsulate all three definitions then it seemed to Crow and

Allan that that would be such an idealised standard as to be of little use as a sociological

tool because the reality would always fall far short. ‘It is from such idealised notions that

the pervasive ‘loss of community’ thesis gains misplaced credibility.’ 399 Although this

study pre-dated Putnam and Vela-McConnell these comments nonetheless are significant

in placing their ideas in a longer history of the decline of community theory.

5.9 LOCALITY IS NOT EVERYTHING

Crow and Allan went on to state in their work that the emergence of community life

required not only favourable local social structures but also the active creation of

‘community’. Suttles400 had previously drawn people’s attention to this idea over against

the common notion that community simply emerged automatically or naturally from the

fact that people lived closely together. Suttles said that this notion was appealing because

it played into the idea that community was the product of personal and human nature and

needed therefore no help, support or encouragement from any agency or individual.

‘Endeavouring to create communities is hampered by the perception of community life as

‘natural’ and thus antithetical to planned intervention.’ 401 Even in rural areas the

399
Crow and Allan (1994) 5.
400
Suttles G. (1972) The Social Construction of Communities: Studies of Urban Society Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
401
Crow and Allan (1994) 133.

193
community still needed working at if it was to be defined by the quality of the

relationships between the participating members, and in urban areas, especially the new-

build apartments of the city centre, without some level of conscious attempts to contact

and connect neighbours community would not be generated. As Crow and Allan stated

‘communities are active creations.’402

They also went on to note how important it was in any study of the notion of community

to look at the question of boundaries. They made the valuable point that ‘communities

are defined not only by relations between members, among whom there is similarity, but

also by the relations between these ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’, who are distinguished by

their difference and consequent exclusion.’403 Studies into the importance of boundaries

in developing community identity in urban contexts had shown different criteria being

used in different areas. 404 In any discussion on the nature of community it remained

crucial to be able to factor in the whole concept of insider/outsider and included/excluded.

Many mechanisms were used to determine levels of exclusion and it remained true that in

general communities gain much of their coherence from being exclusive. Cohen, writing

almost 30 years ago from Manchester, also stressed the importance of boundaries: ‘This

consciousness of community is, then, encapsulated in perception of its boundaries,

boundaries which are themselves largely constituted by people in interaction.’405 Cohen’s

main argument was about the essentially symbolic nature of the idea of community itself.

402
Ibid.
403
Crow and Allan (1994) 7.
404
Wallman’s study of Battersea showed that newness to the neighbourhood was more important than race
in giving outsider status (1984:7) while Cornwell’s study of Bethnal Green revealed that ethnic origin had
considerable importance attached to it in determining insider/outsider status (1984:53) quoted in Crow and
Allan (1994) 8.
405
Cohen A. P. (1985) The Symbolic Construction of Community. London: Ellis Horwood Ltd and
Tavistock Publications Ltd 13.

194
Whilst noting that defining community was notoriously difficult, Cohen insisted that

locality was not the only definitive element of community. Community was that entity to

which one belonged, greater than kinship but more immediate than the abstraction called

society. He went on to say that it was where one learnt how to ‘be social’ and where one

acquires ‘culture’; what he meant by that was that people learnt the symbols which would

enable them to be social. He delved at length into the whole array of interpretation and

the enormous variety of meanings attached to the symbols that helped us to delineate,

define and experience community. Interestingly he proposed that rather than thinking of

community as an integrating mechanism, it should be regarded instead as an aggregating

device. 406 Cohen believed that in community there was a commonality of ways of

behaving (forms) whose meanings (content) would vary considerably amongst its

members. ‘The triumph of community is to so contain this variety that its inherent

discordance does not subvert the apparent coherence which is expressed by its

boundaries.’407 And in this endeavour the use of symbols in creating and defining the

community and the meanings that people attached to the symbolic expression of their

community would ultimately decide whether that community flourished or declined.

Cohen’s point about the symbolic construction of community was an important

contribution to the research question of a commitment to the creative possibility of

community at neighbourhood level. It was vital to pay attention to the symbols that were

undiscovered yet available within an urban milieu and to enable various meanings to be

formulated and potentially shared as neighbours in apartment buildings searched out

better ways of living together in the centre of cities. ‘The reality of community lies in its

members’ perception of the vitality of its culture. People construct community

406
Durkheim’s abiding concern was with solidarity, identifying the bonds that could unite people; despite
their differentiations in the labour market they were held together in an interdependency through being part
of the productive endeavour of the whole. His aspiration was to integration. Cohen (1985) 20.
407
Ibid.

195
symbolically, making it a resource and repository of meaning, and a referent of their

identity.’408

Scherer in her 1972 study already referred to concluded that in the modern era of

technologically advanced urbanised societies communities were divorced from place and

she argued strongly that mobility had made choice possible and therefore the idea of

stable, enduring communities rooted to a fixed place were a thing of the past. 409 Her

research argued that in the future communities were not going to be limited to locality;

and undoubtedly much of what she spoke of has come to pass. Like others before and

since she commented upon the romantic and mythical ‘good’ rural image of community

life against the perceived ‘bad’ urban view of individuality and anonymity. Scherer made

a cogent argument that ‘Geography may be the way man has located himself in the

universe – but other instruments are more effective in locating himself among men.’410

She cites Mead and McLuhan who both concluded that there had been a massive erosion

of place as a focus for social activities and that people now had the freedom to accept or

reject place as they wished. 411 It is worth noting that she arrived at a similar

understanding to Cohen (though obviously over a decade earlier) when she wrote that ‘in

talking about any community we are dealing with the symbolic images held by

persons.’412 Scherer especially took this forward in her 1966 unpublished case study of

an Anglican parish and its understanding of community, in which she made the insightful

comment that the people she interviewed tended ‘to view religious communities as

isolated independent units, whereas the essence of modern urban living is the

408
Cohen (1985)118.
409
Scherer J. (1972) Contemporary Community – sociological illusion or reality? London: Tavistock
Publications 15.
410
Scherer (1972) 19.
411
Scherer (1972) 18.
412
Scherer (1972) 39.

196
interdependence and relatedness of people, communities, and beliefs to each other.’ 413

Scherer noted in her study that it was necessary to both investigate the ecclesial

community both from within as well as from without if the sociologist was to get a full

picture of the true nature of that community. These insider and outsider perspectives were

critical in grasping the different perceptions of communal and individual identity. She

wrote:

It is no wonder, then, that those in religious communities who cannot evaluate the

reality of their existence as defined by others outside – or understand the identity of

the community as given by outsiders – may become unable to meet modern man’s

needs.414

That was a very challenging perspective and one that would need careful addressing if the

ecclesiastical community to which I belong was to respond appropriately to the reality of

urban life and the new experience of the thousands who are living in apartments in our

city centres.

It is important, finally, to comment on two authors who have made a significant

contribution to the debate about community at the level of the city. The first is Allan

Cochrane, who gives a masterful account of the varied responses from within urban

policy to the question of community, social inclusion and social cohesion. 415 For

Cochrane, ‘… if community meant no more than the population of a particular area, it is

413
Scherer (1972) 47.
414
Scherer (1972) 49.
415
Cochrane A. (2007) Understanding Urban Policy - A Critical Approach Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

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unlikely that it would have quite the same (almost iconic status) in the language of urban

policy.’416 He counsels against any simple theories about community acknowledging that

‘the notion of community is not only elusive, but also ideologically slippery.’ 417 The

second writer that merits attention is Loretta Lees whose work on Gentrification and

Social Mixing418 has been crucial in unmasking some of the rhetoric around regeneration

work in inner city neighbourhoods. She states that:

Social mix policies rely on a common set of beliefs about the benefits of mixed

communities, with little evidence to support them, and a growing evidence base that

contradicts the precepts embedded in social mix policies that should make policy-

makers sit up and take note.419

Lees calls for a re-focus on urban design, disallowing fortress-style architecture and gated

communities and re-thinking the architecture of insecurity and fear. She remains critical

of state-led policies of gentrification that in reality become vehicles for social engineering

or worse social cleansing of city centres.420 Her work is really important if we are to

appreciate more fully the complex issues behind the regeneration of city centres.

This chapter has concluded the review of BECs within the Catholic community with the

addition of the Adelaide experience revealing what they consider to be unique in the

416
Cochrane (2007) 48.
417
Cochrane (2007) 49.
418
Lees L. (2008) ‘Gentrification and Social Mixing: Towards an Inclusive Urban Renaissance?’ Urban
Studies Journal 45 (12) 2449-2470.
419
Lees (2008) 2463.
420
Lees (2008) 2465.

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context of the world-wide Church. It then moved beyond the ecclesial to look at the

wider and more generic questions of city, neighbourhood and community from within the

perspectives of various writers. This has shown that despite there not being a great deal

of interest in the concept of BECs and what they have to teach us within the Roman

Catholic tradition in England and Wales there is nonetheless a most enlightening and

useful contribution from secular writers who are passionate about the nature of

neighbourhood and the possibility of community in an urban environment. This is what

we will now take forward into the final and concluding chapter of the research.

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 CHAPTER SIX

CONCLUSION

The Introduction to this thesis described the process and methodology that would be

followed throughout the research. Practical Theology is a dynamic movement from

experience through to reflection and moving on to action. The experience of BECs has

been examined at some length taking an almost global perspective as the work studied the

practice of BECs from Latin America to Africa, Asia and Australia – a veritable tour de

force of southern hemisphere continents. A narrative description of this fairly recent

phenomenon in the Catholic Church has been attempted in order to lay the foundations for

an academic reflection upon that lived reality. An analysis has accompanied the

descriptive elements using commentators and practitioners from within the continental

regions. There is so much material on this subject that it became clear in the process that

the aspects treated during the research were mere fragments of a much larger whole which

would have merited further and deeper examination. The focus in each continent has

been on establishing the origins and history of the growth of BECs. This was then

followed by an exploration of the main issues being developed within that geographical

region; the most frequently commented point was with regard to the impact of the BEC

phenomenon on the theology and ecclesiology of the local Church. Hypotheses were

established and critiqued, for example that BECs were a normative part of being Church,

a question that their very existence had provoked across the board. Another one would be

that neighbourhood is an intrinsic element and a unique dynamic within the structure and

organisation of each parish community.

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In the four-stage process followed in this research it can be seen that the first stage, a

description of the practice of BECs and a subsequent analysis of their occurrence, was the

methodology pursued in chapters 2-4; while the second stage in the process was

interwoven throughout those chapters as the subject arose and hypotheses were developed

and explored. Chapter 5 both concluded the BEC material with a visit to the Archdiocese

of Adelaide, South Australia, following the same methodological process outlined above

and then drew on new material from secular academic sources drawing upon theories

around cities, neighbourhoods and the nature and possibility of urban community

experiences. The theories being espoused about neighbourhood community in the urban

milieu will form the basis for the reflections upon praxis in this conclusion. Stage three of

Practical Theology’s methodology whereby an examination of the normative phase is

carried out forms a major part of this concluding chapter where the vision, meaning and

values behind the phenomenon of BECs will be analysed. That leaves the final stage

where suggestions and recommendations mostly from the global South will be made to

improve existing practice in the ecclesial sphere in the global North.

6.1 THE NEIGHBOUR IS COMMON TO US ALL

Challenges posed by the rapid transformation of our social and cultural geography suggest

that this is a good time to relook at some of the basic principles that at one time would

have been taken for granted; neighbourliness is an example. It is much harder to be

friendly with neighbours who are perfect strangers and bring with them cultural, linguistic

and religious differences that make the indigenous people nervous about making initial

contact. All the taken-for-granted common starting points have gone, like being born

locally and going to the same schools and churches. Tobias Jones, freelance

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writer/journalist and founder of the Windsor Hill Community in Somerset has noted that:

‘It’s the very lack of choice inherent in neighbourhood, the fate of whom modern life has

thrown our way that makes the neighbour a person of such symbolic importance.’421

The easy superficial similarities drawn by previous generations have now given way to

something at once both more challenging and difficult and yet more rewarding and much

deeper. The neighbour now has to be confronted in all their difference rather than in their

sameness and similarity to us. So it is no longer possible to make friends simply because

the neighbour is just like us, because the likelihood is that they won’t be just like us at all.

They could be very different. And so, as Jones stated, the neighbour has become

symbolically important. It seems to me that this is really positive as it forces everyone to

look more deeply for what commonalities there might be. This is both on a personal as

well as a geographical level. Without being able to find common purpose or common

ground it will become ever more difficult for human beings to live together in any kind of

cohesive and harmonious way. Each person now whose life is lived primarily in a

western-European or north-American city will have no choice but to either retreat into

small exclusive groups, centred on resisting and opposing the multi-cultural context, or

will have to embrace the challenge to see beyond difference. This will mean overcoming

any natural fears in this regard, and being challenged to forge meaningful relationships

with neighbours and colleagues, where diversity is valued because it is enriching.

The quality of life in the city will depend hugely upon being able to make of the human

person, their needs and concerns, the centre of all policies and the measure of all success.

It is a task that I have found immensely challenging and yet very necessary - to attempt to

421
Jones T. (2007) Utopian Dreams: In Search of a Good Life. London: Faber and Faber 191.

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humanise the city, its structures, its leadership and vision and its neighbourhoods.422 It is

something that I have tried to live out myself during 12 years in Pastoral Ministry and

now, outside public ministry for the past decade, in the purely secular realm of the city of

Liverpool.

This search for commonality is not only undertaken on a social and anthropological level

but must also be pursued on a geographical level too. As has been demonstrated in

chapter 5 and remarked upon especially in Asian chapter 4, if we are looking for common

ground between people today one place to find it is the neighbourhood. Starting small

with the immediate place where my apartment or home is situated and expanding

gradually to include a wider neighbourhood and city, it isn’t too difficult to imagine that

what unites us is our living together in this city and in this neighbourhood of the city. As

human persons we share the same humanity and the same place of abode. This is not

meant to pit us against those from other neighbourhoods or cities but as the movement

inherent within this way of thinking is towards the other, embracing them in their

difference, so it is to be hoped that the same movement and method will apply towards

those from other areas. The thesis has argued, I hope persuasively, that territory is an

integral part of the process of finding commonality and forming community. As Gorringe

has similarly concluded territory, ‘… remains important, even in an age of migration and

identity politics.’ 423 What we seem to have in common everywhere is that we are all

neighbours. And without doubt all the major religious traditions promote respect for and

422
I was invited to become a member of the Strategic Investment Framework Working Group organised by
Liverpool Vision and reporting to the Mayor and City Council in my capacity as Chair of Engage Liverpool
and representing at its meetings the needs and aspirations of the city centre’s resident population. I have
found not only that there is something distinctive and valuable to offer around the humanising of the city
but that there is indeed an appetite for hearing this message and a desire to rebalance the consequences of
previous market-driven approaches.
423
Gorringe T. (2002) A Theology of the Built Environment: Justice, Empowerment, Redemption.
Cambridge: University Press 163.

203
even love of neighbour; but in the Christian religion love of neighbour is elevated to the

same level as love of God. Yet that mandate doesn’t quite seem to have translated into

basic structures or guidelines for how to lovingly respond to the actual neighbour

alongside whom we live. There is not an officially developed or promoted spirituality for

neighbour or neighbourhood.424 There is a re-balancing required here that is urgent.

6.2 MOTIVATING THE FAITHFUL

A question that has continually inspired me throughout the research has been what it

would take to motivate the members of the Church to see the neighbourhood and their

neighbour as a spiritual and moral imperative worthy of engaging their energies and their

desires for holiness in a way that has meaning for today. This thesis is an attempt to

uncover elements of a theological motivation that would inspire further dialogue with the

subject. In exploring the theology behind neighbour, one element that cannot be

overlooked is the linking of the God-neighbour connection that was a constant rabbinic

theme and in which Jesus was also drawn. It is the question of the greatest

commandment.425 Jesus answers it traditionally with the shema of Deuteronomy 6:4-5 as

would have been expected of any good Jew but then much less obviously he doesn’t

pause at all and adds v31 about the love of neighbour taken from Leviticus 19:18, linking

the two mandates and declaring them to be equal in greatness and importance. This was

understood by the early Church and was made explicit in the letter of St John.426 You

cannot in this tradition say ‘God’ without saying ‘neighbour’, almost hyphenated ‘God-

424
However the subject has been researched by Holt, S. C.(1999) God Next Door: Towards a Spirituality of
Neighbourhood. Doctoral Thesis at Fuller Theological Seminary. Also a paper by Rev Dr Jacob Kurien
(2004) from Kerala, India for the World Council of Churches Commission on Faith and Order Being
Christian Neighbours in the Context of Religious Plurality FO/2004:20
425
Mark 12:28-34
426
1 John 4:20-21

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neighbour’. Brueggemann makes the startling point with regard to the Church that ‘our

common life is nearly destroyed by forgetting the simple, elemental mandate of

neighbourliness that is intrinsic in the God command.’ 427 Even the faith we share in

common has not been enough to maintain a sense of a common life, an experience of

commonality or community; and therefore it comes as no surprise to discover that the

Church is not at the forefront of promoting a common life or community life among the

general population in our cities or elsewhere.

What inspires and motivates me now is the common humanity of our neighbours and our

common footprint in the neighbourhood. Secularists seem more capable of grasping this

and leading the way than many religious groups, whose leaders and members continue to

focus their efforts on their own kind. Religious leaders seem to so obviously struggle

with concepts of difference and diversity; the message they communicate therefore is

often experienced by many as sectarian, elitist and exclusive. If the ‘other’ is seen as

being there only for the purpose of conversion, to make ‘them’ one of ‘us’, then it is no

wonder that many people today are more attracted by and more comfortable with

secularity. These non-religious movements, organisations and leaders are happy to accept

each person as they are, regardless of their ethnicity, sexual orientation and gender

identity or faith background.

6.3 MOTIVATING THE PARISH- ST MARGARET MARYS

Influenced heavily by my experiences with BECs in Latin America generally and

Adelaide in particular, during the years when I held responsibility for the large Catholic

427
Brueggemann (1999) 79.

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community in the Liverpool districts of Dovecot and Knotty Ash, I was able to put into

practice much of this vision. Turning a parish community around from being an

inwardly-preoccupied group to being an outwardly-facing outgoing community was a

challenge for more than one lifetime! Whatever success there was, flowed from the

process suggested by the Australian Fr Bob Wilkinson, that of trusting in the

transformative power of action. Parishioners were challenged to visit a number of people

around where they lived, getting to know them and gradually becoming friends.

Archbishop Len Faulkner had said to me during my time in Adelaide that for him there

was no other agenda; simply the struggle to form genuine friendships was enough,

everything good that happened subsequently would be as a result of that. He understood

his Archdiocesan experiment with BECs to be based upon the words of Jesus ‘I call you

friends.’ 428 This simple intuition was also grasped by St Paul, who encouraged the

Ephesians to ‘Be friends with one another,’ 429 focusing on the quality of relationships

among the new converts to Christianity. The Archbishop had somehow grasped a

profound reality, which of course remains normative for the whole Church, and that was

that living the gospel challenge to ‘love your neighbour’430 cannot be left simply to the

personal devotion of individual Catholics but must become part of the strategy, process

and very structure of the ecclesial mission. This is precisely what BECs have done across

the developing world; they have enabled the Church to put into place a system or

methodology for putting the faith into practice. In a sense it has moved the debate about

the believer from purely ‘believing’ to ‘doing’ or ‘acting’ out of that belief. And so in a

very profound way believers in the BEC Church are not only believing, adhering to

doctrinal normativity, but they are also attempting to live out that faith in the concrete

428
John 15:15
429
Ephesians 4:32
430
Mathew 19:19; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14; James 2:8.

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situations of their daily life. They have a growing and ever more clear sense that to be

Catholic they have to both ‘love their neighbour’ alongside whom they live, as well as to

manifest in a way that those very neighbours can see and experience, a lived community

existence that flows from the doctrinal truth of the Trinity - communion and community

of the Divine Persons.431

In my experience attempting to motivate and transform a Catholic parish was in fact an

uphill task. Especially from one where attending Mass, celebrating the sacraments and

signing up to pilgrimages was considered to be the fullness of being Catholic, to one

where parishioners realised that they were called also to live out in their lives the mission

of the Church to become community and to reach out to those in need around them by

befriending their actual neighbours. Many could not comprehend a need to alter the

habits of a lifetime; being good and practicing the rituals of the faith was sufficient. The

concept of making the faith a lived reality in history and locality seemed to some to be a

step too far, an unnecessary task.

What was interesting to me as the priest was the discovery that the parts of the parish that

understood what we were attempting and were the first to get the Neighbourhood Pastoral

Teams (NPT) off the ground were predominantly in the sector of the parish that was

considered by many to be the poorer and more socially-deprived part; whereas others,

considered by some to be the more middle-class areas, struggled to find a handful of

parishioners prepared to make even a small start with the visiting. Many were just too

431
Kurien (2004) paragraph headings include: Holy Trinity - Perfect Model of Neighbourhood; Christ –
Eternal Neighbourhood Manifesting in Historical Neighbourhood; Holy Spirit – The Real Touch of Ideal
Neighbourhood.

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busy and too nervous about knocking on the doors of neighbours who still after many

years had remained strangers. There were some notable exceptions of course, but the

generality remained true. Nonetheless where groups emerged the reactions and results

were indeed impressive. It was Church on the street. Making Church smaller and making

it possible to experience community and to actively engage with the Church’s mission did

indeed transform lives – both those actively engaged members of the parish in the NPTs

and those on the receiving end of the befriending experiments.

Leaders emerged from among the people, some of whom had been estranged from the

Church for many years. They were inspired and were inspirational. The ethos of

becoming an outward-focusing Church community touched all levels of parish life, from

the liturgy to the catechesis, from the junior school to deanery and diocesan meetings.

We had decided that ‘being known personally mattered’ and so at every single event great

efforts were made to get to know each other and time was set aside to allow friendships to

form and develop. The Parish Catechist was an exceptional woman who was herself

inspired by the BEC vision of Church and wrote the vision into every aspect of the

sacramental programmes - including having the children meeting in the neighbourhoods

in each other’s homes; another first for the parish and another inspired initiative. Over 70

volunteer catechists worked at any one time on the various catechetical programmes, and

there were hundreds more who had worked with the programmes and had moved on as

their children grew up and left school. That was another sign of the immense life that was

released within the parish by the BEC phenomenon and the efforts being made to contact

and connect with people at whatever stage they were at on their faith journey.

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6.4 LEARNING FROM THE GLOBAL SOUTH

BECs are a vision of Church from the global South. Their insights are as applicable in

Europe and the western world in general, as much as in the developing world, because

they are about a new level of Church at the grassroots. This is the one place where no-one

needs a theology degree to set about the task of building friendship among people at the

smallest level, making a connection between the Christian and the world, specifically that

part of the world where they live. As a vision of Church it puts responsibility onto

laypersons for becoming and being Church, for promoting the mission of the Church by

building community at the base. It has to be the future of the Church even in Europe and

North America simply because it recognises the full baptismal calling of all the faithful

and transfers power and responsibility for the Church onto their shoulders and gives them

authority to create Church from the bottom, at the base where they live out their lives as

neighbours among neighbours.

In those emerging communities faith is shared and celebrated as well as lived and

reviewed. Prayer, bible reflection and para-liturgies around feasts and seasons are all in

the hands of baptised parishioners. And so of course that will be the main reason why

many priests and bishops will not be supportive; it alters the traditional function and role

of the priest. It challenges the idea that the ordained cleric is the only one with

responsibility for the mission of the Church and encourages him to let go and share power

and responsibility. This is again the place where an individual’s ecclesiology comes to

the fore; those whose vision for the Church is one of participative leadership where the

priest enables the laity to assume their full role and responsibility for mission will

welcome the BECs and those who understand their training and ordination to have

209
admitted them into a hierarchy where they are set apart from lay people and are

ontologically different to them will find this level of power-divesting to be beyond them

and will resist BECs. Both ecclesiologies are present in the Catholic Church and as was

noted in African chapter 3 the latter approach can significantly undermine the

development and acceptability of the BECs. The same story is repeated here in the UK.

This thesis is not only about examining a new phenomenon in the Catholic Church but is

also about raising the same question here that Church leaders in the developing world

asked themselves many decades ago: Is the way parish is presently structured enabling

both mission and community to be fully experienced and clearly expressed by the

Church? In other words is there any sense yet that the present model of parish isn’t

functioning to the best advantage of the Church? The answer came easier in the southern

hemisphere for many reasons, not least among them was the impact of colonialism; but in

the place that gave the present model and structure to the world the answer seems to be

that there is little wrong with the historic model familiar to every diocese in Europe, save

a shortage of clergy to run the system but nothing that a few parish amalgamations and

closures can’t resolve. There are some within the Church who are diagnosing this as a

crisis of faith and not a crisis of structure; they seem to think that Europe is losing its

Christian soul rather than the model or structure of ecclesial experience is failing the

needs and expectations of new generations of Europeans.432 Of course the reasons why

Europe is in many ways in crisis about institutional religion are many and varied but the

fact remains that the parish and therefore the Church is an institution shrinking, ageing

and in decline. It is in this very context that we are being offered an insight, an

432
For a full discussion of this issue see Sobrino J. and Wilfred F. (eds) (2005) Christianity in Crisis?
Concilium 2005/3 London: SCM Press.

210
inspiration and a new motivation for transforming our way of being Church that is

emerging from the global South.

6.5 VISION OF COMMUNITARIAN MISSION

The Church in general, and the parish in particular at a smaller more local level, are in

need of being revitalised as the base for liturgical and faith-based communities that

understand the importance of being rooted in a particular place and having a mission to

that particular place. It needs to rediscover itself as truly catholic and therefore universal

and all-embracing, inclusive and welcoming to everyone. Marins would often describe

the Church as a ‘missionary community with a communitarian mission’. Wherever he

was invited he would share with people what he considered to be a Vatican II vision and

ecclesiology of Church. The definition of Church he had received, from the Council and

from his Latin American bishops, was of a group of people whose faith in Jesus and

whose spirituality inspired by the Holy Spirit, enabled them to create a community

experience that was saved from being inward-looking and exclusive by focusing upon its

mission to love the neighbour. Especially loving the poorest and most vulnerable that

lived close to them in the neighbourhood, regardless of their faith, ethnicity or racial

background, or sexual orientation or educational and social grouping. Their aim was

simply to befriend the neighbourhood by small and simple gestures that would help to

build understanding, respect and community among a diverse population. There is no

right model for doing that, neither is there a one-size-fits-all approach either but there are

some principles that could be taken into account in any attempt at structural

transformation. These insights for renewal are coming from the edge, the margins of our

world, from the global South.

211
Europe is in need of people who have a vision for the knitting together of communities of

diverse and different people, who nonetheless live close by and alongside us in the

neighbourhood. This thesis claims that this vision is present in the best theology,

ecclesiology and experience of the Church, and perhaps precisely because the challenge is

coming to us in the north from the southern hemisphere, many here seem incapable of

being open to that vision of communitarian mission. People at the centre seldom like to

take notice of those at the periphery. What this research has shown is the potential for

mission and community that the BEC experience offers the Church. My encounters with

BECs across each of the continents visited have impressed me with the intense

commitment and motivation that the people have for transforming their neighbourhood

and also their Church. Motivating parishioners here is a huge challenge and in reality will

only commence once the Church as a whole has faced the deeper theological issue of the

kind of ecclesiology that it is operating out of and promoting at both national and

universal levels.

6.6 DEEP ROOTS IN THE TRADITION

Brueggemann traces the normativity of a faith-based ‘place’ understanding right back to

the Sinai covenant and Israel’s entry into the Promised Land. BECs are rooted in place,

they stand upon a specific piece of the land, and they draw the attention of the Church

universal back to its origins as a land-inspired religious tradition. He makes the point that

the Decalogue or Ten Commandments are an attempt to construct within a particular part

of the earth, in a specific country and in all parts of that country, a boundary within which

heaven will be experienced; and the Jewish vision of heaven on earth is a place where

everyone can be touched by the beauty of rightly-ordered human relationships, building a

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society and neighbourhood which promotes justice, peace and harmony amongst

everyone, even the stranger and the poor, all of whom are neighbour. In other words the

Decalogue is the divine commitment to the construction of a neighbourhood in the divine

image. And Israel in its commitment to the covenant accepts the mission of realising that

heaven-on-earth by challenging the dominant economic and social manifestations of

power that distort the land, and therefore people’s experience and enjoyment of life, with

their well-established, conventionally-legitimated, exploitative social relationships. Israel

must transform what it finds in the land of Canaan into something that God prefers and

not replicate what it finds.

…the people of Israel, when powered and energised by an intentional vision, can

indeed change their place and make it a liveable, life-giving place. This is a

remarkable faith claim that has been decisive for western culture. The ‘place’ is not

fated but can be brought to an alternative destiny by the intentionality of the new

vision-driven inhabitants.433

Whilst I would very much want to encourage the Church here to reform and restructure

parishes through a return to a deep-rooted and normative tradition, of a land-based faith-

inspired vision for delivering a real community experience that is definitively mission-

oriented, I am also realistic and understand that this is unlikely to be understood or

grasped anytime soon. 434 Therefore it seems to me to be more practical to liberate

individual parishioners and small groups of Christians, who will be sufficiently reform-

433
Brueggemann (1999) 101.
434
Though there are developments in Germany where the Roman Catholic development agencies Adveniat
and Mission have been promoting BECs for many years; they have invited me to participate in their
conference in January 2013 in Tubingen: BECs in Global Perspective.

213
minded and renewal-orientated to respond to the divine covenant to love the neighbour in

the neighbourhood, by becoming humanisers of the urban environment. They will be

people with a vision and a mission who will sow the seeds of community among the

apartments, offices and public spaces of the city centre. This is already happening among

some evangelical churches as I discovered during a recent meeting in Liverpool to discuss

‘Public Open Spaces in Ropewalks’435 when an impressive group of young professional

people attended and told me at the end of the gathering that they all belonged to a church

that had sent them to live in apartments across Ropewalks with the mission of engaging

with the many young people who inhabit apartment complexes. Sadly, this is not only

virtually unheard of in the Catholic community in the UK, but almost unimaginable.

Antony Cohen makes the point that people domesticate the city, mark out their own

territories, and invest the city with culture. ‘People en-culture the city, rather than

responding passively to its deterministic power.’436 He goes on to state that people must

be given credit for the ingenuity and creativity with which they construct social

relationships through which they can adapt the spatial and physical environment of the

city to their own capacities and resources. One day it is to be hoped that the Catholic

Church in the West will find inspiration in the experience of its co-religionists in the

developing world and release the power inherent amongst the faithful for the

transformation of the urban milieu with gospel values. In the meantime it will be up to

individuals and small groups to take up the challenge and seize the opportunity for

evangelisation that lies at the heart of our cities.

435
November 23rd 2011 at the Brink on Parr Street, Liverpool.
436
Cohen A. and Fukui K. (1993) Humanising the City? Social Contexts of Urban Life at the Turn of the
Millennium. Edinburgh: University Press 5.

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6.7 REFORM FROM THE CENTRE AND RENEWAL FROM THE EDGE

I’m not sure if the analogy of the Big Bang or of a nuclear explosion are any use here but

it seems to me that it is possible that Europeans were too close to the geographical and

theological epicentre of the reforming Vatican Council to be able to fully appreciate the

extraordinary release of renewing energy that was instinctively and spontaneously

captured and harnessed further afield in many parts of the southern hemisphere at the

extremities of ecclesial life. The challenge undoubtedly for those at the centre of Church

life and politics today is to be open to this simple lesson from the south that there can be

no reform from the centre while ignoring and even opposing the renewal coming back to

it from the edge. BECs are offering that renewal opportunity from the margins of a

Eurocentric ecclesial structure. And secular professionals are offering a similar renewal

opportunity from their marginal place in relation to religious institutions.

It is possible of course that an apparent lack of vision on the part of Church authorities is

simply a question of maturity, a matter of time. That is in the sense that the challenges

that the city and its pluralistic, multi-faith and multi-cultural communities are throwing

up, are demanding a mature and considered response that the Church has barely started to

consider. It is worth noting that in the secular sphere this has been faced since at least the

1970s when Richard Sennett in his influential work The Uses of Disorder argued that the

demand for community, purified of all that might convey a feeling of difference, is built

upon an adolescent fear of the pain and challenge of participation. He argued that the

family in particular acted as a shield against diversity and one could say the same of the

family of the Church. To grow to adulthood we need to be able to tolerate painful

ambiguity and uncertainty and we therefore need the anarchy that the city can provide.

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‘The great promise of city life is a new kind of confusion possible within its borders, an

anarchy that will not destroy men, but make them richer and more mature.’ 437 In the

healthy city there will be no escape from situations of confrontation and conflict, and this

depends on diverse and ineradicably different kinds of people being thrown together and

forced to deal with each other for mutual survival.438 ‘The neighbour is the irreducible

condition of healthy, peaceable, productive place,’439 insists Brueggemann.

The premise of this thesis is that this whole approach to community in the neighbourhood

is fully normative for the Church. As was stated earlier in the Conclusion the doctrine of

the Trinity is the insight that Godself lives and is community. ‘Nothing was more

remarkable in the history of twentieth century theology than the recovery and

development of this insight.’440 As Gorringe goes on to state the recovery of the doctrine

has important implications for our understanding of community and the built

environment. This view of community, as rooted in Trinitarian relational theology,

privileges face to face community and defines the divine persons of the Trinity primarily

by their relations, whilst remaining distinct. This understanding of the nature of God is

predicated both on real difference and on real unity. Could there be a better model for

understanding what we are setting out to achieve in our desire to instantiate community

within the city? ‘If human beings are made in the divine image then it is this form of

relationship to which we have to aspire.’441 The divine nature is both open and outgoing;

it is inherently creative and missionary in that the entire movement of the Godhead in

437
Sennett R. (1970) The Uses of Disorder. New York: Norton 108.
438
Sennett (1970) 163.
439
Brueggemann (1999) 106.
440
Gorringe (2002) 183.
441
Ibid.

216
mutual relationship is an energy moving out and beyond itself, that encompasses the

whole of creation which is the product of that artistic endeavour.

BECs are also a continuation of a vision of Church that is described in the Acts of the

Apostles and the letters of St Paul and reveal that those early Christian communities are

once again becoming the models and inspiration for declaring that mission and

community are normative for the Church. BECs in their actual incarnation in the

developing world offer an example and an encouragement to the entire ecclesial

enterprise but not a model or template that can be copied or followed exactly and in every

situation. They extend a prophetic challenge to examine how faithful members of the

Church are to its foundational ecclesial narrative that is still emerging from within the

tradition and thanks to BECs is being rediscovered and re-evaluated in our day. However

to properly explore this New Testament element requires more than this present thesis

allows and that will have to be undertaken elsewhere and perhaps by others.442

442
Perhaps the most definitive and extensive study so far to have been produced but only available in
Spanish: Marins J. (2004) Hasta Los Confines de le Tierra - Las Primeras Comunidades Cristianas.
Dominican Republic: Paulinas.

217
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