Life of the Congregation

In the process of growing up, the limbs of the body develop and change into an organic and well-balanced system.
The same process takes place in our Congregation: the goal remains the same, but it develops and adjusts itself to answer the needs of our time..
On the one hand the religious must get ready for new challenges, on the other hand economy must know how to adjust to new situations in order to deal with the new fields of the mission. It may sound like a paradox, but actually it is not. Let us listen to these thought-provoking insights of the General Busar!

What is the meaning of “being the General Bursar”?

I feel like saying that I am discovering it day after day. At the beginning of my mandate I used to be in a cold sweat seeing all the good works under the care of the Congregation, for I am not an expert in matters of accountancy nor have I ever done any studies in this department. Luckily I soon realised that we are helped by a certain number of qualified and competent persons. I said to myself that my main care should be the purpose of goods rather than their use and management. Before tackling the question of the administration of goods our Rule of Life introduces us to its fullest meaning. It helps us to discover and contemplate the obedience and fullness of the Incarnate Word who “from rich that he was became poor to enrich us with his poverty” (2 Cor.8/9). We ought always to keep that type of “poverty” in mind which was so like Jesus himself and we should become like it. To be able to bear witness to it we ought to try and have that life style while at the same time rejecting all forms of misery and “get rid of anything that looks like luxury, gain or accumulation of goods” (Rule of Life 51).

My role as General Bursar is enclosed in that “mission”. Consequently I regard myself as an animator, somebody trying to remember and to remind his brethren of the choice we made in Betharramite religious life.

Is it easy to describe the mission of the Congregation and the management of our goods?

The mission of the Congregation is the end towards which all our efforts should be focussed. For it is in the mission and through it that the Betharramite way of witnessing, announcing and helping others to experience that special way of meeting the Risen Lord.

Of course, the mission of the Congregation is a vast area! Our mission pays attention to facts that are more concerned with poverty and the most marginalised in society. St Michael likes to say “that the Betharramites should shoulder missions where others fear to go”. That is our raison d’etre, our mission. Our resources should be invested in that direction, and the first resources of the Congregation are the religious themselves, who have been prepared and formed for years to reply to such calls as are expressed by the Church. But that is not possible without investing financially. Consequently the goods of the Congregation must be well administered otherwise we run the risk of not being able to support the mission entrusted to us.

In keeping with the spirit of the Betharramite mission the Congregation doesn’t own special works. That means that the works which are particularly connected with education are very important because they were and still are the reply to the needs and difficulties of certain milieu and social contexts. They must not however get in the way of our vocation which is to be a “flying camp” ready “to go where obedience is calling us.” If the works are not an image of this ideal they are in danger of becoming obstacles to the freedom necessary to obedience and availability.

Is there a “Betharramite” way of being the “bursar?”

I don’t know. Actually our Rule of Life shows a path for us in that direction. It is to be read passionately, without ever getting weary; look at it with fresh eyesight accepting to be surprised.

I would say that every Betharramite treasurer, whether community, vicariate, regional or general treasurer must be constantly aware of the aim of our Congregation. The mission of our Congregation as expressed in the Rule of Life is the topic for discernment when it comes to investing our resources.

A good “Betharramite Treasurer” ought therefore to be an animator rather than an administrator. His vision should be both on the spirituality (the scale of values) and on the “accounts” (the reality) so as to avoid all abuse of goods (whether such abuse is the result of “community” or “personal” aims. It is also a way of looking at the reality serenely.

While seeing to it that the community is short of nothing, he must be able to correct and change attitudes in the management of goods (I’m not talking about big expenses for which authorisation is required from the Major Superiors, but also for the sums of money at the disposition of each one”.

To help the communities and each religious to be faithful to their vow of poverty, a “Betharramite Treasurer” has two methods at his disposition:

• At community level: help in the preparation of the budget which notes “income” and “expenses”. To prepare a budget is a priceless tool and a necessary duty, for it helps the community to fix its priorities and make choices.
• At personal level: train all the religious to render an account personally of the use of money and goods put at their disposition. It is not an operation of the type “tax control” but a real means for helping each one to be faithful. In line with the fidelity of rendering accounts there must be a similar fidelity on the part of the treasurer himself in rendering account regularly of the management of goods belonging to the community, the Vicariate, the Region and the Congregation into the hands of his lawful superior and, in the case of the top levels, into the hands of the Councils concerned.

But the Betharramite Treasurer must never forget that he is to be a servant. And nothing but a servant.

Graziano Sala scj
General Bursar

We are grateful to Fr. Jean-Dominique Delgue scj for giving us the permission to publish this interview that he made to the General Bursar for “En avant”, the magazine of the Vicariate of France-Spain.