Walking the Rite way

It was an interesting conversation in a small parish office - talking about RCIA - initiating adults - how challenging it could be to sort out irregularities in marriages of people coming forward to join the Church- the process of ensuring that people had begun to conform their lives to Christ - marking the journey to Baptism with various rites and making sure that the new Catholics were well-supported during the period of mystagogia.

We are all familiar with the process - but this was somewhat different as the office was in the parish of St Vincent de Paul, Koko, Bobo-Dioulasso in Burkina Faso. (If you’re not sure where Burkina is or what it is like, click this link to see what Wikipedia says about on Burkina Faso). I had gone out for the ordination of a new Missionary of Africa (White Father), Anselme Tarpaga, in the cathedral there and the opportunity to chat to people about the inculturation of liturgy and Christian Initiation was irresistible.

Pere Albert with young women from a local village in Konadougou parish

Among those who spoke of the culture in which the White Fathers and Sisters were evangelising was Père Albert, a German priest with 37 years experience of living and working among the peoples of Africa. He invited me to spend a few days out in the mission station of Konadougou in the south-west in the Diocese of Banfora.  This is pretty remote and Père Albert said that when he first came people hid behind trees as he passed in his truck… now they clamour for a lift as he passes at the end of the day! In such a place, evening meetings are impossible – people are understandably reluctant to risk meeting snakes on the way home! So much of the catechesis is done in basic Christian communities with leaders coming together for formation and to discuss how their catechumens are progressing. As the leaders can travel up to 20 km, meetings take place during the day and the people obviously need to be fed before returning home. Catechumens are brought together for a 7-day retreat each year with a two-week one during the Lent before their baptism – a chance to reflect together and deepen their spiritual lives… and a hefty commitment of time for subsistence farmers at the hottest time of year. Each week in Lent has its own rite – but given the distance between the Mass centres, not all can happen in every centre every week (as indeed Mass does not always happen).

A family's fetish in the village

The process takes 3-4 years – a one year pre-catechumenate and three year catechumenate – though this can be slightly less where candidates are literate and can undertake study and reflection at home.

Most of the people coming forward are animists, brought up with fetishes and animal sacrifices – and polygamy. It is the latter that often exercises the catechists and clergy and questions about the marital status of the catechumen form a significant part of the questionnaire the leader of the Basic Christian Community fills in to state the readiness of any given candidate. Where a man or woman is in a polygamous marriage, they cannot be baptised but, after their four years of formation receive a blessing during Eastertime. Where the marriage is to one other person, it is regularised as a religious marriage (to go along with the traditional and civil ceremonies that most people also have).

In the town, catechist Georges described a very similar process with candidates following a course of books which opens with the very simple question – who/ what is a catechist? (It prompts the thought about whether people coming to our sessions actually know who or what a catechist might be!) At the end of each year, the prospective new Catholic receives a small token to make the stage in their journey:
End of pre-catechumenate – a miraculous medal
Year 1 of catechumenate – a rosary
Year 2 – medaille croix – a cross with small images of the miraculous medal, St Christopher, the Holy Spirit, Christ and a Madonna
Year 3 – a crucifix
The main responsibility for the formation of the new Christian rests with the Basic Christian Community.

Lent is again marked by rites for each week – and, being in a town, means that people are more able to participate. Week 1 is the call of the candidate who seeks baptism and the vouching for them of the Base Community, catechists and clergy.
Week 2 is the formal renunciation of animistic practices and an exorcism of “esprits mauvaises”.
Week 3 is the giving of and recitation of the Creed by the catechumens.
Week 4 has the “Rite du Sel” – where candidates take salt as a sign of being salt of the earth. There is also the signing of the senses.
Week 5 is the choice of Christian name – where the catechumens give the name they have chosen and why.
The catechumens stay in Mass throughout their catechumenate – there is no dismissal after the Liturgy of the Word – and take full part in the liturgies of Holy Week.

The Easter Vigil starts at 21.00 with the Liturgy of Light and of the Word – and is timed so that the baptisms take place at midnight. There is then a thanksgiving Mass for the newly-baptised on Easter Monday with a blessing for those whose polygamous marriage prevents their being baptised.

Confirmation is deferred for a year and further instruction continues, reinforcing the new way of life the Christian is establishing. Various pictures are used for discussion and particularly significant seemed to be the emphasis on Christ as the perfect sacrifice and the need for the new Christian not to revert back to the sacrifice of chickens, sheep or goats of their animist past. There was also the interesting picture of a man beating a woman – with the explanation that this behaviour too is something that is not appropriate in a Christian marriage.

Of necessity, this really is just a brief summary of the conversations and experience of the Church in Burkina Faso – a country in Africa that prides itself on being an integrated nation where Moslems. Christians and animists live side by side. More snippets can be found on the blog I kept during my time there… including the experience of going to a place sacred to animists.  Click here to read more:  http://www.bilbosjourneys.blogspot.com/

Summer is here, schools are about to break up and those involved with RCIA will soon disperse -if they haven’t already- until september. So how does the community continue to exercise its responsibility in the initiation of adults, when formal RCIA meetings have a break?

… the community must always be fully prepared in the pursuit of its apostolic vocation to give help to those who are searching for Christ. In the various circumstances of daily life, all the followers of Christ have the obligation of spreading the faith according to their abilities. #9

In looking at how the ‘primary minister of initiation’ is the community, Thomas Morris (Morris, T. (1997) The RCIA Transforming the Church. Paulist Press, pp.67-8.) reminds us to ask, what is it about our particular community that makes it distinctive: why do we initiate, and into what do we initiate? This was the theme of the recent RCIA conference, and is a worthwhile exercise to consider. Identify what makes your parish community what it is. What is it that identifies those from your church? Remember that the typical community is made up of those who volunteer, as well as those who don’t.

For those who don’t think they are involved with the catechumenate why not try LIFT. Living in Faith Together is a meal based small group, designed for those who may be too busy to commit to a more formal church group, but want to continue to mature their faith. On the basis that everyone has to eat, we combine a meal while sharing the Gospel. We meet once a month in each other’s homes. The host provides the home, somewhere to sit and eat, and everyone brings a plate of food. The evening starts with a reading of the Gospel for the following Sunday. There is time for reflection, or for lectio divina, and then discussion throughout the meal. It can be adapted to involve a couple of families with the catechumens, or to integrate with other groups and members of the community. A meal for the team, or catechumens, or sponsors, would help keep the continuity of RCIA being year- round. You could concentrate on a section of the rite; look at individual ministries: sponsors, godparents; or just get together for Christian based conversation.

I make a few other suggestions:-

• For the team, ask everyone to read the rite and reflect on it.
• As a team, attend a day retreat.
• Explore and find new resources - when travelling in England or abroad, go into a local church and ask how they practice RCIA: this is a great way for picking up ideas, particularly when you get chatting to the local parishioners.
• Ask everyone to read a book, article, or resource and be prepared to give some feedback on it in September: for example, look at the last couple of years of Catechumenate. (Catechumenate published bimonthly by Liturgy Training Publications.The Liturgy Office offers a subscription service in UK)
• Consider RCIA 75(2) & (4) and involve catechumens, candidates and neophytes in something in the parish, SVP, charity, social justice, Fair Trade.
• What is going on in your neighbourhood that would be a living example of what it means to be a Christian?
• Go for a walk, journey together, tell your stories.
• Be prepared for when someone comes knocking at the door, so you haven’t got to turn them away, but can enable an enquirer to start their journey when they want to, at their pace, rather than on a fixed process dictated by the school year.

Share any good ideas, what was challenging, what worked well.

St Paul is at the heart of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults. In the Easter Vigil, the beating heart of the process, the reading from St Paul to Romans describes what we are about:

When we were baptised in Christ Jesus we were baptised into his death.

Other traditions in the Church taking a different set of imagery for Baptism based on the Baptism of Jesus and John’s writing of the water and the Spirit, but we have Paul and the intimate connection between baptism and the Paschal mystery - the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus. If the Paschal Mystery is the Big Bang it is Paul who is its Stephen Hawkings! Coming so soon after the event and realising that everything had changed. That Christ’s death and resurrection changed everything, but not only that but that we have a part in it.

For all his rhetoric Paul’s image of the body is central to his thinking — that we all have a part in being Christ, we are Christ’s ambassadors.

Paul is at the heart of the Rite in another way. At the very centre of all Paul’s writing is a person — Christ. Even though Paul never met Jesus in the flesh it is his response and devotion to the person who turned his life and all his thoughts around. Nothing was ever the same again.

In this year of St Paul:

• See how the second reading at Sunday Mass might feed your reflection and catechesis.
• Find out what your diocese is doing to celebrate the year.
• Have you a favourite passage — why not share it with your catechumens.
• Give a number of short passages from Paul for their prayer and reflection — there are times when Paul seems to be a string of familiar quotations

The tables are cleared, the taxis have come and gone, another Conference has come and gone. This page is an opportunity for some immediate reflections. If you would like to add something please contact Martin Foster.

Some photos from the Conference have been added to the website.

Martin writes:

The Conference has given me much to think about. Sheila remind us of the fundamentals and brought us back to what the Rite actually says. In particular the relationship of the catechumenate to the Liturgical Year. Not only that this was a key to the catechumens entry into, and conversion into, the mystery of Christ, but also that it is the celebration of the liturgical year. When we start to probe we discover that the rite has an integrity.

As ever it also the mixture of Conference sessions, informal time and prayer that make up a rich experience.

Sue writes:

What an excellent conference we have just had. I found it really beneficial to learn from the expertise of such an experienced RCIA practitioner as Sheila O’Dea, for whom weekly dismissal of catechumens within all-year catechumenate is the norm.

Participating in the scriptural reflection process within the liturgy was a deeply profound experience, as we feasted on the Word of God. It made the Liturgy of the Word integral and inseparable from the eucharist, when during mass the first reading Ephesians 2:19-22 was proclaimed twice, with time for reflection, and this was repeated with the Gospel. It illustrated how it could be accomplished during Mass: certainly with smaller gatherings, although it would need some preparation.

Sheila offered us a vision – for the Church to honour the Word of God and the Eucaristic mystery with the same reverence.

I see the challenge is to move to all-year round catechumenate with weekly dismissals.

I think this needs to be directed at diocesan level:-

• set a timeframe that all parishes will work towards,
• within the next year there should be a consultation process, in which the perceived difficulties and challenges are explored,
• certain key parishes should be encouraged to practice dismissal during this period, so living examples can be considered,
• the result of consultation should be diocesan guidelines for Forming Threshold Companions.

On a practical basis, I liked Sheila’s suggestion of encouraging readers to attain the additional skill to form part of a rota to lead the weekly dismissal.

Paula writes

What an amazing conference! Input, reflection, liturgy, eating together – and of course raising the occasional glass at the end of the day.

For me personally, the mystagogical reflections were perhaps the most powerful moments – carefully woven together strands of words and music which brought to life again the experiences of liturgy and conference.

Sheila’s input around the themes of apprenticeship, community, liturgy and catechesis reminded us anew of the pillars of our ministry in RCIA and the need to keep them in balance.

I experienced a great sense of community among those gathered, and an openness and attentiveness to each other.

The ‘conference hymn’ has certainly been running around inside my head since Friday:

Stand firm, oh stand firm
Stand firm, oh stand firm
Stand firm, oh stand firm and see what the Lord can do!

Veronica writes:

‘Forming Threshold Companions’ was an excellent three day opportunity to deeply reflect once more on the rich vision of the RCIA in its wholeness. I was particularly struck by the importance of the community and how we modelled a small community, within a larger community as central to the process of the conference. Much thought had obviously gone into enabling these small fellowship table groups to function as reflective, listening, learning and worshipping communities. I felt bereft when, on the last day, we said goodbye and formed a new group focussed on geography and charged with the mission of taking it all home. What remains for me is a renewed conviction of the importance of the RCIA for the Church of today in initiating people into the radical way of life that prioritises as Jesus did.

Ken writes

Forming Threshold Companions did what it says on the title. It was a good place to be. It touched into the heart of the Rite Of Christian Initiation of Adults by emphasing once again the role of the community as the prime influence in the formation of all inquirers, inviting us to take seriously the power of the liturgy . To see the Liturgical Year as key to formation and helping us to feast at the table of the Word. For me the rite that holds all these aspects together is the rite of dismissal. A rite sadly more observed in the breach than the observance. Sheila was uncompromising in stressing the importance of this dimension of the RCIA and hopefully those of us who were privileged to be at the conference will re-think our practice and take the dismissal more seriously. The way in which we were led to reflect on the experience of celebrating the liturgies by journeying deeper into the Word which was certainly made flesh touched the hearts and minds of all present. For these things and for the table companionship I give thanks. It was as a blessing.

Martin writes again:

A number of people commented positively on the music and the liturgy - thanks to Paul, Philip, the instrumentalists and cantors for their help. I have added a list of the music and where it can be found on to the website.