The Christian Life Community
The Christian Life Community(C.L.C) is basically a lifestyle for lay people in order to build up the kingdom of God on earth. Spirituality, Community and Mission are the three basic pillars of C.L.C. It is not meant only for a particular group of people. People of all ages and of all categories like, workers, students, seminarians, street children and priests can become a member of it. However it has a special focus on the young and aims at the formation of a young generation who are committed to serving the family, the Church and the nation.
St. Ignatius of Loyola and Blessed Virgin Mary are considered to be the heavenly patrons of the Christian Life community. While St. Ignatius is the source of their spirituality, Blessed Virgin Mary is their model for total self-surrender.
1. Origin and Growth
The historical roots of the Christian Life Community can be found in the Order of the Society of Jesus founded by St. Ignatius of Loyola in 1540s. From the very beginning of the Society, Ignatius and his companions invited lay persons to cooperate in the apostolate and even to assume the responsibility of some specific programmes. Ignatius also invited them to form groups and introduced them into the experience of his spiritual exercises.
Encouraged by the Ignatian invitation, Fr.Jean Leunis, a Belgian Jesuit gathered around seventeen students in the Roman College and initiated them into prayer and spirituality and prepared them for apostolic work in the city of Rome. It was really a remarkable movement especially in a period when the entire Christian Europe was in turmoil with the Islamic invasion and the Protestant revolution. In 1563, on the feast of Annunciation the members of this group surrendered themselves before the statue of Our Lady and named their group as Sodality. The members of Sodality practised spiritual exercises and had daily meditation. Fr. Leunis encouraged them to work in prisons, in hospitals and among the poor and thus helped them integrate faith with studies and service.
In 1584, Pope Gregory XIII approved the sodality, and made Roman college sodality the head of all sodalities and all the sodalities were put under the General of the Society of Jesus. The official name was Sodality of our Lady and the patroness was Our Lady of Annunciation.
Around this time, the Council of Trent was summoned to renew the Church. The sodalities helped foster this renewal and helped lay people find their vocation in the church and the world. Wherever Jesuits went they spread the sodality also, even in China, Japan and India. Sodalists participated in the apostolate of Jesuits. They collected arms for the poor, helped to spread faith and taught catechism.
In India, the first sodality was formed in Goa (Santa Fe College) in 1607 by St.Francis Xavier. The first Sodality in Kerala was formed in the Vaippikkotta seminary (Chennamangalam) in 1644. Then sodalities were formed in Kochi (Kerala), Tuticorin (1644-1648), Quilon, Santhome Nagapatnam and other areas of Tamil Nadu, Vasai and Bombay. In the Archdiocese of Verapoly, the Sodalities had been functioning from the very beginning of the formation of the Archdiocese. But, it was in 1945, a priest - Rev. Fr. Joseph Vyppisserry -was appointed as the director of Marian Sodality. His efforts and encouragement strengthened the Sodality very much.
The history of Sodality has been marked by a period of ordeal which emerged with the severe political protest in the countries like France, Spain, and Portugal to ban the Order of Jesuits and the Sodalities. Following the politically backed agitation, in 1773 Pope Clement the 14th suppressed the Order of Jesuits. However, he allowed Sodalities to continue.
In 1814, Pope Leo the 12th restored the Society of Jesus, but he kept the Sodalities under the Bishops. In the course of time the apostolic and spiritual vigour of Sodalities began to diminish. It was with the famous apostolic letter Bis seculari of Pope Pius XII that we see again a spiritual renewal of the Sodalities.
In 1967, in order to avoid the wrong image given by sodalities in some countries, the world assembly of Sodality decided to change the name from sodality to C.L.C. On 31 May 1971 Pope Paul the VI officially approved the new name of Sodality.
2. Structure
The individual units of C.L.C working in association with parishes or institutes are generally known as the local communities or small C.L.Cs. They are often a part of a wider community based on a city, diocese or a specially defined geographical area. These wider communities or federations are affiliated to the national federation which functions as the branch of the World Federation.
All the local or small C.L.Cs are to fulfil three basic requirements in order to get officially approved by the ecclesiastical authorities. They are :
a. The submission to the hierarchy
b. The communion with the federations.
c. The observance of the general principles.
The patron of the Archdiocesan federation of C.L.C. is always the Archbishop. He appoints a priest according to his discretion, as the promoter of Archdiocesan federation. The promoter is accountable to the Archbishop for all the decisions he makes with regard to C.L.C in association the executive council of the federation.
3. Philosophy
The philosophy of C.L.C is clearly expressed in the emblem of C.L.C. The emblem contains three Greek alphabets X (Chi) and P (Rho) and M. X and P represent Christ and M represents Mary. Through these three letters, the emblem conveys the motto of C.L.C i.e., Through Mary to Christ . All the members of the C.L.C are invited to submit themselves at the feet of the Blessed Virgin Mary and to reach at Christ by way of imitating her.
4. Statistics in the Archdiocese
There are altogether eighteen C.L.C groups in the Archdiocese of Verapoly. All the groups function in association with parishes only. The members of C.L.C in the Archdiocese are supposed to have a minimum age of 15. According to the bylaw, they can continue as a C.L.C member up to their late adulthood. In many of the existing C.L.C groups, the age of the members goes up to thirty or thirty five.
5. Training Package
Just like any other youth movements in the Church, C.L.C also has various training programmes in different levels. It organises occasional formation camps and leadership training courses for C.L.C leaders both in the forane and the diocesan levels. Moderators and promoters of C.L.C also are offered yearly trainings in the diocesan as well as state level.
Besides all such training packages, C.L.C also has a unique and effective formation programme designed for those who wish to join C.L.C. This has been patterned on the basis of the different steps of the Ignatian meditation. One who undergoes this training programme goes through five different stages which help the participants acquire formation for their spiritual, community and apostolic life in the Church and the world. The five stages are the following.
a. The pre-community stage: This is a stage of inquiry and aspirancy. During this stage the aspirants are made aware of the real nature of their call to become a C.L.C member. It lasts for 3-12 months and they are supposed to do at least three times the Ignatian mediation during this period.
b. The stage of initiation: At this stage the aspirant is introduced to the C.L.C way of life. If after passing through this stage of formation that lasts for 1-4 years, the aspirant expresses his will to become a member of C.L.C, then he is given a temporary membership.
c. The stage of redemption: This is a period of Christ-experience during which the participant becomes aware of his need for personal redemption and submits himself to Christ. At least eight times of Ignatian meditation are recommended during this stage.
d. The stage of deepening: It is during this stage that a temporary C.L.C member comes to the fuller awareness of the depth of his vocation to live a committed life for the service of the Church and the society. Being convinced of it, he then becomes a permanent member at the end of this stage.
e. The stage of continuing growth: This can also be called the apostolic stage, because during this stage the C.LC ier takes up the apostolic responsibility of witnessing Christ through his words, deeds and attitudes. One who reaches this stage of formation can be considered as a mature and committed C.L.C member.
6. Achievements and Strengths
As members of an Apostolic movement that is called to share with the Church in the salvific mission of Christ, the C.L.C members, have always tried to make them available, open and free as possible as they could, for the ecclesial and other benevolent activities. The history of C.L.C in the Archdiocese of Verapoly testifies to it.
During more than hundred years of its existence in the Archdiocese of Verapoly, C.L.C has considerably contributed to the spreading of Marian devotion among the youth and the children. With their deep rooted spirituality and devotion to Mary, many C.L.C members could enliven the faith of a number of straying youngsters.
The C.L.C units in the Archdiocese have always showed a laudable maturity in their response to issues pertaining to society and the Church. Though C.L.C is basically a spiritually oriented community, it has also often involved in matters concerning the social and material wellbeing of people; but all these they did without sacrificing their spiritual focus.
One can also very well recognise a prophetic dimension in the activities of C.L.C over the past years. They have very often responded constructively and proactively to the corruption, injustice and exploitation that pester the society. The recent protest of C.L.C against the injudicious move of the Government of Kerala to introduce atheistic and communist ideologies to school children through the revised text books, is a good example for C.L.C’s social commitment.
C.L.C has always been in the forefront in organising various activities that contribute to the physical and mental growth of the individuals as well as to the advancement of the society. Medical Camps, eye, blood donation camps, free distribution of uniforms and text books for children, visit to the sick, building house for the poor, conscientisation about the ill-effects of alcohol and drugs, art and literary festivals, symposiums, dialogues, seminars, and retreats are some of the activities that they regularly organise. The social transformation and the intellectual and cultural enhancement brought about by these C.L.C undertakings are indeed, commendable.