Interview with Sr. Brigitte Mupenda Zawadi

Sister Brigitte Mupenda Zawadi

Sr. Brigitte is Congolese. She lives in Mali in the community of Kalabankura and at present she is the coordinator of a formation center for women.

Agnes Waweru: Recall a time when you felt most alive, most involved, spiritually touched, or most excited about your involvement. About memorable experience you have had with MSOLA.

Brigitte: It concerns my appointment to Chad, having done my apostolic experience in Mali and my first appointment as MSOLA in Mali, although I had to work in two different places, I felt at ease and the local language was the same everywhere. But once in Chad, I discovered another reality totally different from what I had experienced before.

The experience in Chad; through the apostolate, life in the community and in  their living environment, made me live moments where I felt both alive and participating, very spiritually touched and very enthusiastic by my engagement.

This was because, I tasted the reality of what our first sisters lived, at least that's how I felt; because no specific mission was entrusted to me and the majority of sisters from my community were working in our health center. Not knowing the local language, my first apostolate became that of going out to meet people, learn simple words in Ngambay (the local language), then I found plenty of kids who wanted to teach me the local language, so I invited them to come to the house; whenever they came, I helped them with extra-lessons of school courses and they helped me with the local language. We played different games among other things. Then the big girls started coming, with them and did some work in crochet and embroidery, after, the women themselves of the surrounding villages began to call on me for embroidery, crochet, sewing and knitting. I took the opportunity to chat with them on life education. The demand became greater and as I could not go everywhere, they chose four villages where they could meet for work. 

At the parish, I used to work with the altar boys and I collaborated with another sister to conduct  a short training for men and women catechists of the compound, I also worked with the youth of the parish for different activities.

In the community, I took care of the maintenance and stewardship (as community bursar) the other sisters who were working at the clinic used to leave early in the morning and came back a little later. This is my great experience.

Agnes: What made it an exciting experience is?

Brigitte: I was happy and made people with whom I worked and lived with happy, through ordinary life experiences. My initial anxiety was very fast turned into joy and full of confidence in myself and in others.

Agnes: Who was involved?

Brigitte: The Congregation which sent me there, God who called me into the Congregation of the MSOLA, myself, our sisters in community and the people to whom I was sent.

Agnes: Describe how you felt?

Brigitte: I went through several emotions, at the beginning when I received my appointment i.e. fear, worry and anger. After, it turned to abandonment, confidence, hope and joy.

Agnes: Describe what you did as a result of the experience?

Brigitte: Following this experience, I felt strong and confident to do studies in a field that was unknown to me. I made my final commitment in the Congregation of MSOLA, and I lived with sisters of a different Congregation.

Agnes: The things you value deeply about MSOLA? When you feel best about being a MSOLA, what about yourself do you value? The single most important thing that MSOLA has contributed to your life?

Brigitte: What I deeply appreciates of the MSOLA is the desire to care for the  well-being of each sister. Our spirituality which makes us responsible in our spiritual and apostolic life, dialogue and the developmental space given to each sister.

I feel best as MSOLA when I pray of course, but mainly when I live as a woman apostle reaching out to others and working for and with others without distinction.

About myself, I appreciate and value my sense of responsibility and the capacity to easily adapt to different people and environment.

The MSOLA have strengthened in me, the trust in God, in myself and in others

Agnes: The core value of MSOLA? What values give life to the Congregation? What is it that, if it did not exist, would make MSOLA totally different than it currently is?

Brigitte: In my view, the fundamental value of MSOLA is the fact of being a ‘woman - apostle’. Consecrated to be sent, the international and intercultural community life, open to the needs of the people to whom we are sent.

Interview with Sr. Catherine Booth

Catherine with pupils in Chinsapo, Malawi, 2014    

Catherine Booth was born in Manchester, in the North of England. First she met MSOLA in Malawi in 1972 when she was a young teacher. In 1975 she joined the Congregation. A teacher, a novice mistress, regional in the United Kingdom, a very warm person, always very well organized and ready to help.

Ania Wojcik: Catherine can you tell me about your best experience with the MSOLA Congregation? Recall a time when you felt most alive, most involved, spiritually touched, or most excited about your involvement. Tell me about this memorable experience that you have had with in MSOLA.

Catherine: It was at the beginning of 1990 when I was in Salima (Malawi). I was teaching already for 3 years. I was always enjoying teaching because it opens young people to so many possibilities. At that time I was asked to accompany 2 aspirants and a sister and because the school programme was very full, it was suggested to me that I will stop teaching and that I will look around to find something else. One of our parishioners said, that we are now in pandemic of AIDS and there are so many people in need and there is no one who can go and see them in a hospital. At that time church was not so much concerned about it. Already at school I had tried to promote awareness by getting medical people to talk with students about the problem. So I started to go to TB ward, trying to pray in Chichewa, to talk with the patients and their carers and then I invited some women from our parish to come too. It opened new world to me, the situation of the people, being with them. It is there, that I met people from other dominations and they were the ones who told me, that their pastors don’t come to see them. I went to the pastors and I told them that the sick are waiting for them. A few women from the Anglican parish joined our group of women who were visiting the hospital.  I went to the mosque as well. Through this the pastors became to know one another. It was beyond catholic world. It raised awareness. I was excited. I was encouraged even to apply for a pastoral training in Ireland but after the Tertianship my life changed direction- I became a formatter.

Ania: Were you not afraid to visit the sick?

Catherine: No. I wasn’t because of my previous personal experience with my elder sister who was very sick.

Ania: Did you talk with the patients about AIDS or was it rather a taboo?

Catherine: It was general sharing, how they were, sharing news, they were asking me: “Please pray for me”. I talked about AIDS with the SCC of the medical staff, who I knew very well, but not with patients; sometimes they said it was what they had, but not always.  I remember that I had a very good film “The life of Jesus”, someone translated it in Chichewa. At Easter I suggested that we could watch it, just to remind them what is Easter about.

Ania: How long did you live this experience?

Catherine: It was a bit more that 2 years.

Ania: What was the biggest lesson which you learned from the experience?

Catherine: That people are willing to work together. There is goodness in people; they have a desire to help one another.

Ania: Now, what are the things you value deeply about MSOLA? When you feel best about being a MSOLA, what about yourself do you value?

Catherine: The thing which I value deeply about MSOLA is what first attracted me to our Congregation when I was a lay missionary with my friend. It’s our whole way of living – and especially our internationality and simplicity. Being in an international community pushes us to try to understand one another and I think that’s a big thing in today’s world. Why do we have all the wars in the world? We fear one another, people don’t try to understand, they just fight to defend what they think. When I was a young sister once I asked: Why we don’t call ourselves just White Sisters Limited? We – like everyone else are limited. It is God who puts something good in us. It is a constant invitation to go beyond. To keep on going, trying, to go out, to understand. If we stop trying, what do we offer to our world?

I was also attracted by our sisters’ simple life style and easy relationships when in the Congregation which my friend joined they were calling each other ‘Sister’ and talked about ‘Mother General’. I also see that it’s this simplicity that enables our sisters to go out to other people.

Ania: What is the single most important thing that MSOLA has contributed to your life?

Catherine: The Congregation gave me a chance to reflect on what I have just shared with you and to try to live it very practically. We need to keep on adapting and not in staying in criticizing and judging.

Ania: What do you think is the core value of MSOLA? What values give life to the Congregation? What is it that, if it did not exist, would make MSOLA totally different than it currently is?

Catherine: Being initiators is one core value and I see it makes us different. Local Congregations have schools, hospitals - it is theirs. We have to trust people, to train them, to prepare. It is connected with simplicity. Our experiences say that sometimes things don’t go well but we still need to trust.

Ania: As a final professed sister, who have so many experiences which wisdom, advice can you share with me?

Catherine: Be sincere to what is going on inside you, to what is best in you, because that’s where God is.  As you went so far in joining us, becoming a sister to continue to listen to and to understand what is inside you, to live what God is inviting you to live. Then things can’t go wrong, because we know and we feel what is true to our deepest selves.

Ania: And at the end: How would you describe yourselves in few words as MSOLA?

Catherine: I would say I’m still a MSOLA who is enthused by God’s call to me and us in our Congregation and I’m still trying to live it and want to keep on trying because it gives me life.

Ania: Thank you very much Catherine for your sharing and the time which you have given to me.

Malawi community 2015, Catherine first on the left.

                                                                

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"I appreciate very much being able to listen to our younger sisters hopes and dreams for the future. It is always great to meet those who pass through the UK for studies and experience their enthusiasm and youth. Thank you for all you are doing."

Sr. Clare Honan, West Ealing- London

Préface de Peter Senge

Dans cet ouvrage novateur, Otto Scharmer nous invite à considérer le monde sous un jour nouveau, et à apprendre de l’avenir à mesure qu’il émerge. Einstein disait : « un problème crée ne peut être résolu en réfléchissant de la même manière qu’il a été crée ». En effet, la qualité de ce que nous créons dépend avant tout de la qualité de l’attention et du soin que nous y portons, tant au niveau individuel que collectif. Or, l’attention que nous portons à un problème est bien souvent limitée par ce que Otto Scharmer appelle notre « angle mort », ce lieu intérieur à partir duquel chacun de nous agit. Afin d’ouvrir la voie aux profonds changements systémiques que réclament urgemment le monde du travail et la société d’aujourd’hui, il est fondamental de prendre conscience de cet angle mort.

Dans le sillage de son précédent livre, Presence, retrace dix années de recherches et d’interventions apprenantes, Théorie U élabore et explore un nouveau territoire d’études scientifiques, d’évolution des institutions, et d’une pratique transformationnelle du leadership. Le processus en U nous propose un voyage nous permettant de nous relier à qui nous sommes véritablement par l’expérience du Presencing, un néologisme crée par Scharmer à partir des mots presence et sensing (ressenti).

Accéder à un champ de conscience qui permet d’innover

En partant de l’observation des étapes que traversent tous les grands créateurs et leaders, Otto Scharmer modélise, dans son livre Théorie U, les différents niveaux de conscience qui permettent aux individus et aux groupes de s’aligner sur une vision commune d’un futur à faire advenir et de le construire en l’expérimentant. Les liens qui se créent lorsque les acteurs d’un même système accèdent à la même source d’inspiration sont durables et deviennent l’infrastructure de nouveaux projets.

Une nouvelle forme d’apprentissage

À la différence des approches que nous pratiquons habituellement, comme l’application de connaissances et de modèles de comportement déjà formalisés, cette troisième voie repose sur la redécouverte des mécanismes sur le terrain, qui influent sur le comportement des acteurs, et sur l’apprentissage qui résulte de l’expérience dans l’action. La modélisation et la structuration des activités, reflet du futur en train d’émerger, n’interviennent qu’à partir du moment où les prémisses d’un nouveau système se sont avérés efficaces.

Le leadership du 21è siècle

Ce nouveau type de leadership se caractérise par la transformation profonde des individus et des groupes. Devant la complexité des situations où le changement s’impose, l’approche top-down ne fonctionne plus. Les changements doivent être générés parallèlement à tous les niveaux de l’organisation. Une nouvelle forme de leadership doit apparaître. Un noyau de personnes inspirées par la nécessite d’opérer un changement profond définissent alors un cadre de projet commun et convoquent un groupe d’acteurs représentatifs de l’ensemble du système considéré. L’ensemble de ces acteurs vont alors s’engager dans une expérience qui va transformer en profondeur les visions, les modalités d’écoute, et les rendre capables de concevoir les éléments clés du nouveau système en partageant un désir commun, une ouverture de cœur et d’esprit qui va faire d’eux les chevilles ouvrières du nouveau monde en devenir. Ces acteurs devenus les ambassadeurs d’une nouvelle façon d’aborder notre avenir commun, seront eux-mêmes profondément changés par cette aventure.

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