Exploration of the Relationship between Social Critical Consciousness and Pastoral Ministry in International Missionary Congregations: A Case Study of the Comboni Family in Kenya.
Date
2020-10
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Publisher
Tangaza University College
Abstract
The present research is a qualitative exploration of the relationship between social critical consciousness and pastoral ministry in international missionary congregations within Catholic Church. The research focused on the case study of two international missionary Institutes, the Comboni Missionaries and the Comboni Missionary Sisters, in Kenya. In the present study, critical consciousness is not limited to personal transformation but has a clear orientation towards social transformation. Hence, it is defined as social critical consciousness, which is analysed in the three dimensions of social identity, positionality, and intersectionality. A vast literature in various fields has been produced to show how essential it is for today to develop a social critical consciousness in order to engage the challenge of complexity, expressed through the realities of coloniality and multiculturalism. The same complexity exists in the Catholic Church, more and more global, and it is particularly experienced in international missionary congregations. However, there is neither reflection nor study of the topic in Church’s environments and among pastoral practitioners, dangerously posing the basis for an ineffective pastoral action for social transformation. The present study aimed at introducing the concept of social critical consciousness in the missionary narrative and praxis. It investigated the pastoral practitioners’ awareness of social critical consciousness through the exploration of their perception of the self, their pastoral action, their multicultural relationships, and their collaboration in the context of a multicultural community. A typological and thematic analysis of transcripts from twenty-nine personal interviews and three focus groups in different locations in Kenya was performed. Life and field experience of the participants was integrated with the vision emerging from archival documents of the two Institutes. Four main challenges emerged: the tendency of pastoral practitioners to describe themselves through one dominant charismatic identity, which leads to the prevailing of mission over personal identities; the de-politicisation of social identities and pastoral action; a disorientation as the common experience of the participants in multicultural contexts; an acritical acceptance of pluralism in ministry, which limits collaboration and enhances fragmentation. The study showed that there is an insufficient awareness of social critical consciousness among pastoral practitioners and proposed four recommendations for strategies for integrating social critical consciousness in pastoral ministry for social transformation: a social critical pastoral methodology, a social critical partnership, a social critical community, and a social critical training.
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Keywords
Social Critical Consciousness, Pastoral Ministry, International Missionary Congregations:, Coloniality and the Urgency, Decolonial turn and social transformation, Social identity, Intersectionality