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Ittoop
Panikulam, SVD In the dining hall of the Haggai institute for advanced Leadership Training lies a framed caption from its founder, put there by his students: "Attempt something so great for God, it’s doomed to failure unless God be in it". That’s an apt advice for us; we want to achieve something great for God and our Society and we want God be in the centre and the whole process of it; we don’t want God or ourselves to fail. Managerial studies say that a direct relationship exists between leadership styles and the behaviour of those they lead. It is an important leadership knowledge. Each one of us is a leader in one way or another. And each one of you in this assembly holds a very important and special leadership role. And so may we begin with a prayer for leaders: Lord, you said I am among you as the one who serves. Your image of a leader is that of a servant. We want to understand your concept of leadership well and to put our feet into the sandals of a servant. We hardly ever had dreams of becoming servants; masters, yes. Who among us do not want honour, prestige, positions and fame? Who among us has a sincere ambition to be anyone’s servant? To serve or to be served? That is Your question. You made a master of a servant by kneeling at the feet of the servants who called you Master. What a paradox! Lord, teach us why you became everyone’s servant. Teach us your secret that to lead is to serve. Empower us that we may help others to live up to their potential. Amen 1. A spiritual person with the attitudes of a seeker, a disciple, an apostle and a prophet The conclusion of the first conference on healthy dispositions for discernment in a Chapter, opens up the first thought for the present reflection: we hope that the team of our central leadership be true seekers, committed disciples and zealous apostles, with a gift to discern and interpret the signs of the times and inspire the congregation to move forward confidently. Living those attitudes will be an integral part of the portrait of a spiritual leader. The head of a religious congregation can not but be a religious leader. 2. One who is truly human The best portrait of a spiritual leader for us undoubtedly is Jesus, Himself. And the attraction of His spirituality, of the special Rabbi, of the new type of teacher and leader who attracted people of 2000 years ago and now too is his humanness, expressed through the principle of love that governed all his actions. And for us human beings the only way to be spiritual is by being human. The life principle of Jesus, the law that governed Him and moved him was human needs. Nothing and no law stopped him from meeting a genuine human need. We would wish every religious leader which every one of us is, and especially our congregational leaders be genuinely human, and we hope that the honest human needs of the members and the institutes affect and move our leaders. 3. A person ready for dialogue and discernment. While giving the report on Nemi, three possible "Kairos moments" for our Society were mentioned. Let me repeat them: (1) Celebrating and prioritizing our original gift of inter-nationality. (2) Making a deliberate choice for inter- collaboration (3) Responding to the challenges of emerging inter-spirituality of our times. Wayne Teasdale, in a very recent article, "Finding the Mystic Heart in the World’s Spiritual Traditions," names the present age "the Interspiritual Age", explaining well the prefix "inter", indicating the spiritual interdependence of the religions, "inter", the eagerness to communicate with members of other faiths, "inter", the openness to learn from others, "inter", the trust that common wisdom will be found, and "inter", conveying the sense of responsibility to humankind as a whole, as Dalai Lama calls it, our universal responsibility to the global community of the earth. The attempt in many parts of the world, now including North and South Korea, is for ways of bridging what is on both sides of "inter". The material used laboriously to build this bridge is "dialogue". A word that captures a very positive attention in the world now, and will last for quite a few years to come, I assume, for at least 6 more years from now. When dialogue goes well, we read of "merging" happening. And so the leaders of today and tomorrow need to be persons, willing, prepared and ready to decide, plan and execute matters of importance with a sincere approach of honest dialogue. JIT(just in time approach) was a managerial methodology that revolutionized industry in Japan. One of its basic philosophy is total employee involvement through various simple, little ways of dialogue. The spirituality of dialogue lies in the process of discernment, be it individual or community discernment. Discernment asks you to move away from prescriptive (through slips of papers ) to participative ways of decision making. A person or a community in discernment is in a serious and sincere dialogue with multi-dimensional facets of his life, till he completes the process. And prayerful discernment was the spiritual path that Jesus took for His day to day walks through life. Should there be any other path for his disciples and especially the future leaders? In that light our constitutions become ever more relevant; "We seek to know and do God’s will. This implies that we as individuals and communities enter into a true process of discernment" (c.218). "All share the responsibility for our religious-missionary life and work. Superiors then should continually seek fraternal discussion of common concerns and consult with confreres and weigh their opinions, so that united in prayer they may discern the will of God". (c. 606) By the force of the theme of the 15th general chapter, we are internally and spiritually compelled, especially the members of this Chapter and the future leaders and very specially the new Superior General to continue to " listen to the Spirit for our missionary response" for tomorrow.
4. A person with a vision, one who sees what is coming alive. Gerald A. Arbuckle S.M. begins his article: Provincials as "Cultural Revolutionaries": The Role of Provincial Superiors Today, with an important insight coming from the findings of contemporary managerial and applied anthropological studies, namely "Innovation is the key to survival and growth". What struck me, was that even for survival and maintenance, not particularly for growth, innovation is the key. Accordingly the congregations that do not try for innovation will sooner or later be extinct, as has happened to numerous congregations. According to Arbuckle, "Innovation is the generation, acceptance and implementation of new ideas, pastoral methods or services, whatever can help develop within ourselves and in others the kingdom of God". It means that even a leader whose gift is only to maintain the status quo of an institute needs to be innovative. There is a simple principle that says, whatever grows, grows, does not grow old. And so for a congregation, like a living organism, to remain alive and kicking, the congregation needs, in Arbuckle’s term, change-agents. If the leaders do not use and allow other members to use the inherent gift of prophecy of religious life, that congregation can not even maintain the status quo, but will begin to die. And so we need a team of leaders who have clear visions, both foresight and far sight. If we want to grow, we cannot afford to sacrifice the gift of prophecy in our congregation. 5. One who knows how to handle power All of us know that the way the secular world understands and uses power has influenced the ministry of leadership in the Church and in the religious life. One can easily sniff at the attraction for power in ecclesiastical and religious offices. We have heard that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. How to hold 'power' in the vulnerable hearts and delicate hands of a religious leader? Every leader, be it inside or outside the Church, receives a special power. What we do with the gift of that power makes one a religious leader, an autocratic, a bureaucratic, laissez-faire or a democratic leader, a political leader, a military or a rebel leader. What the leader does with the gift of power, this mysterious stuff, which will appear and disappear after six years, how and for what purpose he uses it, is going to make him a good leader or a bad one. Jesus held in his hands, the greatest of powers but did not succumb to the normal human temptation of reigning like a King from the throne of dominance. He used all His power to empower the powerless. Saul, the Pharisee took a while to understand that "power is made perfect in weakness" (2 Cor. 12, 9). If the leader uses his power to let the power of others to develop, the power in the congregation grows. If he is afraid and insecure that others might become powerful, more powerful than him, we will have a serious power-cut in the religious congregation. What is it that the leader has and the others in the group don't have? I suppose, the gift of power. Authority, because of which special recognition, honour, prestige, the capacity to decide and act. Who gives this power? The rest of the members. Whatever a religious receives is a gift. And every gift is meant to be shared. The best that the leader can do with this special gift is to share what he has received with those who gave it to him. Psychological studies tell us that when love is on a low key in the leader, the temptation to use power to control others is much stronger. If you truly love; you will not lord it over the others. Is there something in the leader which makes the others feel at home with him? Usually it is the gift of being human. He will be loved as a member of a community. Is there is something in the leader which others can look up to? They will have discovered a mentor in him. A friend and a mentor is a great combination in a good leader. 5.1. One who knows how to share power and to empower others. The Leader needs to call forth the power of others to experience the power of the Holy Spirit in our Society. The superior finds ways to give space and hospitality to bring forth and affirm the personal power of others. He empowers others and all other institutes under him so that power is used in the service of mission and communion. Affirmation was the normal, usual approach that Jesus took towards all in need. And hardly is there any one who does not need it. 5.2. One who is ready for co-responsibility and stewardship delegation. Knowing the human limitations of good Divine Word Missionary leaders, our constitution, using some healthy managerial principles in the context of co-responsibility and subsidiary, asks our "superiors to delegate authority within their area of competence" (c. 603.1) "By virtue of the principle of subsidiarity each confrere and community has the right to function with full responsibility within each one’s sphere of competence" (c. 604). "Effective leaders learn early that they can increase their efficiency by delegating responsibility"; states Anthony D’Souza in his book on "Leadership" Delegation helps the leaders to concentrate on what he should concentrate on. He can follow the rule of a main leader i.e. "The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing". As an important side benefit, it develops other people. Effective leaders know to delegate smoothly, not only the job, but also the power and recognition. They assign responsibility and grant authority. Research studies say that, "leaders can use delegation as a way of motivating people to their maximum potential". Delegation is a "people builder". "Confrere builder" Let me conclude with the conclusion of the article of Arbuckle: "Together (all the virtues of Superiors) they could be united under one virtue – the gift of humour. He who has a sense of spiritual humour recognizes deep in his heart that ultimately he can do nothing by himself. He needs God, he needs other people. When he tries to do everything himself, he plays God." And he asks: "And what would be funnier!" It might appear that we are looking for leaders who are, if not perfect, at least nearly perfect human beings. The truth is that we are discerning for the best among the imperfect and yet good human beings, that every one of us is.
Text: From the author
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