What follows is a summary of Decree 2, one of 26 Decrees dealing with the Mission of the Society Jesus today issued by the 34th General Congregation [GC34] of the Society of Jesus. The congregation met in Rome in the first three months of 1995. Its work affects the immediate future of Jesuits worldwide.
In the 30 years since General Congregation 32, the service of Jesuits, especially among the poor, has deepened our life of faith, both individually and as a body: our faith has become more paschal, more compassionate, more tender, more evangelical in its simplicity.
The Society of Jesus is also more diverse and is engaged in a variety of ministries at the crossroads of cultural conflict, social and economic struggles, religious revivalism and new opportunities for bringing the Good News to peoples all over the world, i.e., in Africa, Asia, Oceania, Latin America, former Communist countries, Western Europe and North America. We have one mission shared by priests and brothers and many ministries which we undertake as a service of Jesus Christ and his work of reconciling the world to God.
We exercise our Jesuit mission within the total evangelizing mission of the Church that exists not for itself but for humanity. That mission is the service of faith and the promotion in society of that justice of the Gospel which is the embodiment of God's love and saving mercy. The vision of St. Ignatius at La Storta confirms the call of Christ the King to all Jesuits. We are companions with Christ in a world still marked by brutality and evil. Our identity is linked to our mission. Thus, we are present in solidarity and compassion, where the human family is most damaged.
Ministries of the Society of Jesus are preserved and fostered only by the hands of Christ. Christ has begun a new presence to the world in the Spirit. He is the firstborn who enters God's embrace. He fulfills God's promises and creates a new humanity in the Spirit.
The mission of the Society of Jesus, the prophetic proclamation of the Gospel that challenges people in the name of the Kingdom, derives from our continuing experience of the Crucified and Risen Christ.
Christ's call is accompanied by his power. A particular grace exists in the main focus of our work and spirituality to strive especially for the defense and propagation of the faith and for the progress of souls in Christian life and doctrine through ministries of the Word, interiority, sacramental service, teaching catechism and through social ministries. We have recovered, for our contemporary mission, the centrality of working in solidarity with the poor in accord with our Ignatian charism. Being friends in the Lord means being friends with the poor because of Christ's preferential love for the poor.
We cannot refuse the summons of Pope John Paul II to become aware of the urgent need to change the spiritual attitudes which define each individual's relationship with self, with neighbor, with even the remotest human communities, and with nature itself.
Ours is a service of faith and of the radical implications of faith: the desire to find God in a world scarred by sin, and then to live by his Gospel in all its implications. This faith is social in its implications. A faith that looks to the Kingdom generates communities which counter social conflict and disintegration. Justice results.
Therefore, we reaffirm Decree 4 of General Congregation 32: The service of faith and the promotion of justice ... is the integrating factor of all our ministries and our inner lives as individuals, communities and a worldwide brotherhood. The aim of our mission and its integrating principle are dynamically related to the inculturated proclamation of the Gospel and dialogue with other religious traditions as integral dimensions of evangelization. Our experience shows we cannot avoid these dimensions.
Justice flourishes only when it involves the transformation of culture. There can be no effective proclamation of the Kingdom unless the Gospel touches all structural, cultural and religious aspects.
Our mission of service of faith and promotion of justice must be broadened to include, as integral dimensions, proclamation of the Gospel, dialogue and the evangelization of culture.
Synopses of Other Decrees which are available.
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