8 • The New Wine Press • November 2016
Mixing It Up by Vicky Otto, Co-director of Precious Blood Companions
I have a confession of sorts to make; I am not a great cook. But I do like to watch cooking shows on television. One of my favorites is a show called“ Chopped.” For each dish the contestants have to make they are given a basket of some rather strange ingredients that have nothing to do with the dish they are tasked to prepare. Imagine if you were given ingredients like rutabaga, chicken livers, graham crackers and cherry soda and told you had to create an entree with them. The chefs have to reimagine them( with other ingredients) into the dish they are assigned. After watching the show for a while, one gains a whole new appreciation for the creativity of those who love to cook.
As I have been reflecting upon Gather, Send and the vision of the Companions to invite people from different cultural traditions and from younger generations, I can’ t help but reflect that, like the ingredients in“ Chopped,” Companions may be reimagined into something they have never anticipated through the vision they share.
There is one sentence of Gather, Send that Companions and members have been drawn to over the last several months:“ We bring the cup of spirituality to ever-widening circles, to people of all generations, races and cultures. We seek out those who are yearning for this message, and invite them, the way that we were invited.” While one can be drawn to the invitation action of this statement, one would hope there is a willingness also to allow the group to change once the new Companions are included. For our Companion Movement to truly live into Gather, Send we must not only embrace the new Companions but also the change that will occur.
Fr. Anthony Gittins, C. S. Sp. discussed this topic in his book Living Mission Interculturally. Fr. Gittens was writing to religious communities who were struggling with welcoming new priests into their communities, but many of his ideas are applicable to our Companion Movement. He discussed the challenges of intercultural mission, writing,“ A community that is polarized into‘ us’ and‘ them’ will never achieve intercultural living; only in a community striving to become‘ we’ can it possibly succeed.” He encouraged the community as well:“ Intercultural living demands graciousness, diplomacy, compromise, mutual respect, serious dialogue, and the development of a common and sustaining vision. A vision is something that inspires the common effort of a lifetime and also provides appropriate means to achieve a desired end.”
He also shared three guidelines that the Companion Movement should also embrace as we welcome Companions of different cultural traditions. The first guideline he suggested was“ We are called to build a home together.” The image that he encourages communities to strive for is the same feeling that one has regarding a family home. He writes that the home is“ an evolving, organic entity and its shape is forever changing.” Think of your own family home. Harmony