The traditional model for religious life worldwide will need to change if orders are to be viable for the long term, according to senior Religious.
“The current model of religious life is not sustainable,” Sr Bonnie MacLellan, General Superior of the Sisters of St Joseph of San Marie, has said as she outlined how the number of religious in Canada has dropped over 80 per cent since the 1960s.
Speaking to members of the Association of Leaders of Missionaries and Religious of Ireland about the current experience of consecrated life in Canada, she said it is a reality “shared with religious institutes in all of the developed world”.
In 1975 in Canada the number of Religious was 55,180. In 2022, the number was 9,293 and women Religious make up 83 per cent of the total.
“If I was the CEO of IBM, I would look at religious life in Canada and say plan for the windup of the corporation,” Sr MacLellan said but added, “Our ways are not God’s ways.”
In her talk, the canon lawyer explained that church law has limited options for reconfiguration of consecrated life and may focus primarily on mergers, unions, and suppressions.
She outlined the Vatican criteria for congregational viability and stressed that “a future full of hope is not possible if we continue on the same trajectory from whence we have come”.
While some congregations and institutes have looked at the reverse missionary model, inviting Religious from developing countries to relocate to Canada, this had been problematic.
“If there are fewer religious, those entering will be forced simply due to demographics to shift their focus from mission to congregational maintenance, taking on leadership roles prematurely without sufficient formation or support.”
Other canonical governance options which deserve consideration are collaborative and covenant models of leadership and the appointment of a commissary, a role she has fulfilled for the Sisters of Providence of St Mary’s of the Woods and the Victory Knoll Missionary Sisters.
“Do I think there is the potential to use a template from Canada in other areas in the world – I do,” she said.
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