JULIET K. & JACINTA LAKRA
The Small Christian Community Commission (SCC C) efforts to strengthen its foundations to grow and spread in the Calcutta Archdiocese continues on track with Phase 1 SCC Animators’ Formation workshop held at Seva Kendra Calcutta on 30th and 31st January 2021. This residential workshop, the first in a series to be followed at regular intervals and at different levels, was attended by 40 lay persons, 7 priests and 6 Religious including Sr. Christin Joseph (National Service team member, Fr. I.P. Sarto ( SCC Regional Director for West Bengal & Sikkim region & SCC Commission Head for the Archdiocese, Fr. Dominic Gomes.Starting with a fun-filled icebreaking self-introduction session, the pre-lunch sessions disseminated knowledge on key concepts of Adult Learning that highlighted that ‘Formations’ should be a life-oriented, inclusive, fully participatory process that is ongoing, systematic and goal oriented. Only in this way will the Formation journey be a joyous process of accompaniment that fosters maturity, equality, and co-responsibility. It stressed that Formation is not a linear but spiral process executed with interdependent effort by lay leaders, priests and religious, fully involving the community at all stages, thereby ensuring growth of all leading to a genuine Communion of Communities.
The unique process of making every participant read and reflect on portions of a 9-pages presentation in sequence followed by the required inputs from the resource persons, Sr. Christin and Fr. Sarto, kept-up the focus of the participants and impressed the lesson.
One topic of the first lesson in the DIIPA Introductory Manual ‘We need Small Christian Communities’ was facilitated by the Diocesan group of volunteers. This was explored through two questions, ‘Is there a feeling of community in the Church today?’ and ‘Is there a misguided sense of faith?’. The first question was presented through a Role Play and the second by Story Reading processes, both followed by ‘Bible Study’ of reading specific scripture passages in groups to examine what the Word of God teaches us about being a true community and having the right sense of faith. This was followed by a feedback from the participants that was summed up by the facilitators along with specific supplementary information and inputs. The entire three step process helped to impress learning and consolidate the knowledge gained by the participants.
This was followed by an action-reflection (not evaluation) process where each of the facilitators were led through a self-examination exercise to understand what they did right and where their technique needed improvements. Here the resource persons and participants also contributed with their own observations. This process will help Animators and Facilitators to ‘empty themselves’ mainly of their ego and fill the space with fresh knowledge with love and compassion.
The Bible was enthroned at the beginning with some innovations and closed with blessings on each day. The hour-long Adoration towards the end of the first day allowed all to surrender their efforts to Jesus as the only Lord and Master and sing praises with grateful hearts. The second day began with a very inspiring Sunday Mass where Fr. Sarto delivered the Homily to remind us of our Prophetic Christian role of being rooted in the Word of God, to live and proclaim it.
The last session of the workshop was devoted to planning for the immediate future. After a brief presentation of the scope of the work ahead in the SCC growth and strengthening process, the participants deliberated in Zone groups. The outcome of their planning had details of how and when they would approach other parishes and gave tentative dates when the Diocesan Group of Volunteers led by Fr. Dominic would visit the different Zones in the four Deaneries to start the Zone Service Team formation workshops. It is expected that members of the National Resource Team, especially Fr. Sarto and Sr. Christin, will also be present at some of these workshops from time to time.
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