Responding Together

From 8-9 October, we celebrate the Jubilee of Consecrated Life.

As we celebrate the Jubilee Year 2025, we have the opportunity to reflect on various aspects of our Church family, one of which is Consecrated Life.

Pope Francis, the first Pope from the religious congregation the Society of Jesus (better known as the Jesuits), is the first Pope to open the Holy Door of a Jubilee Year but not to close it. His successor, Pope Leo XIV, another member of a religious congregation and the first from the Augustinian Community, will close the Holy Door on 6 January 2026. How symbolic is this that even though it will be two different popes who will open and close the Holy Door, both these men, like many women and men throughout the world, live the consecrated life – one of dedication, love and fidelity expressed in their commitment of the vows of chastity, poverty and obedience.

With Father Julian Tenison Woods, Mary MacKillop, who proclaimed her vows in Adelaide on 15 August 1867, pioneered a new way of living her commitment to the call of God. Mary and the Sisters travelled to rural and isolated areas throughout Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand in response to the emerging needs of the developing countries. No one was excluded from their love and generosity, whether in education, housing, caring, praying and being a presence of hope. Over the past 159 years, Josephites have continued the mission of Jesus entrusted to them by living the Gospel joyfully, upholding the dignity of all, with a focus on those most in need.

“The Jubilee of Consecrated Life [which] celebrates the men and women who faithfully and generously devote themselves to God in consecrated life,” (Australian Pilgrims of Hope) will be held in Rome from 8-9 October. Many will gather in Rome to celebrate this event. What does that mean for us? Our Baptism immerses us into the call to be priestly, prophetic and kingly people. For women and men religious, it is the prophetic call to which we aspire.

We see this expressed in many simple, ordinary ways through faithfulness of members to their relationship with God and God’s people; witnesses of the presence of God in our midst, being available when a response is required from a ‘pleading’, in a phone call, a knock on the door, or even a chance encounter; being voices for those who are voiceless and the ministry of prayer.

How often we see pilgrims file into the Chapel at Mary MacKillop Place, North Sydney, and other areas, imploring the intercession of Mary, especially at her tomb; alternately asking the Sisters for prayers for specific needs.

Today as the number of members in some forms of consecrated life decline, a question is raised what the future of religious life will be in the years to come. Over the centuries, there have been a variety of ways women and men have responded to the call to live out the Gospel. Some communities have come and gone, yet the living of the Gospel to which we are all called continues. I believe that there always will be some form of consecrated life; what it will look like, most likely will be different to how we express it today.

Like the “Anawim”, (“In your midst I will leave a humble and lowly people.” Zephaniah 3:12 – this small group came to be known as “the Anawim” i.e. those who wait for God with trustful hearts and whose lives reflect goodness), members of consecrated life will remind us of the centrality of God in our life and like a lighthouse shining brightly, draw all to God and God’s people.

Maureen McDermott rsj