Is religious life dying or is it simply changing? I pondered this question again recently as I presided at the final vows of two of our young missionaries who are giving themselves freely and joyfully to a life which, let’s face it, is slightly out of vogue.

I believe it’s changing, rather than dying, and while change is always uncomfortable and challenging, it usually leads us to new growth and, in this case, I believe, to greater authenticity.

The need for authenticity in religious life has never been greater than it is in our times, as revelations of abuse of children, scandals and corruption at the highest level continue to rock the Church, leaving many believers angry and betrayed.

I believe that religious life today is undergoing an immense testing, purification or pruning; a clarification which will serve to make it again a thing of challenge, prophecy, importance, witness and indeed, a thing of beauty.

What we are witnessing today is not the death of religious life, as some pessimists claim, but a change, or, as Canadian priest and author, Fr Ronald Rolheiser OMI rightly puts it, a metamorphosis, a paschal passage, a painful but fruitful wandering through the desert that has brought us to the edges of the promised land.

A religious life is being born within which there will be fewer numbers, but greater authentic witness.

Pope Francis takes every opportunity to challenge and denounce any temptation to compromise the evangelical way of life through things such as clericalism and elitism, as well as mediocrity or narcissism. His constant call to us religious to be less concerned with ourselves and to be more outward looking, encourages us to walk with our people in the ambiguities and complexities of their lives.

As religious and missionaries, we need to be at the forefront of a Church that is both humble and prophetic; a Church that brings the margins to the centre; a Church with the poor and for the poor; a missionary for today’s Church and today’s world is like Christ among the marginalised, the sick and sinner. It is like new wine in new wineskins.

Rare as we may be, the Church today needs us religious to be prophets – that is, people who not only speak the truth about God’s love, but people who live that truth every day of their lives. If we help others find the Lord through us and our prophetic witness, then we will be signs of God’s presence in the world.

Yours in the Word,

Fr Henry Adler SVD,

Provincial.