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[Woodstock Report, October 1997, No. 51]
This issue of the Woodstock Report features people first and their projects second--just the reverse of our usual Report. And what a great pleasure it is to introduce these outstanding people! They comprise two categories: the three current fellows in our new International Visiting Fellows program; and a number of very talented people who have come forward all around the same time, quite independently of one another, to take active roles in the development and direction of Woodstock programs and projects.
I honestly believe that there is something providential going on here. It can't be accidental. If we had planned five years in advance--back, say, in 1992--to have on board at Woodstock the people to whom this issue of the Report introduces you, we couldn't have pulled it off! First of all, it took a thoroughly unexpected and unsolicited gift of about $225,000 a year for each of the next 25 years to initiate our International Visiting Fellows Program. Woodstock fellow Tom Reese literally got a phone call one Saturday afternoon right out of the blue. The rest is history. Tell me God's not here!
The second completely unplanned and unexpected development was the way I and other members of the Woodstock team got phone calls or visits from people who came forward on their own initiative to volunteer their services to develop new programs or to lend their expertise and experience to the expansion of programs already underway. All of them are lay people, not religious or clergy, let alone Jesuits. What a gift! In Latin the word is gratia or "grace."
I can't help but suspect that by this grace God is actively leading us at Woodstock to fulfill a goal set for the whole Jesuit Order at its last "General Congregation," whose elected members meet every 20 or 30 years to evaluate the life and mission of Jesuits and set priorities and goals for the future. I was one of the 220 members of this last Congregation in 1995. One of the top priorities we set was to work in companionship with non-Jesuits, especially with lay people. And working "with" could equally mean working "under." There should be no presumption that a Jesuit is boss. We need to work as peers, each of us being members of the full Body of Christ, bringing our special gifts, experience, spirituality, and insight to one and the same mission we all share: helping our human family and our world to become, by God's grace, the Kingdom of God.
This exciting new development of new companions playing key roles in Woodstock's projects is described in these pages. What is also needed, in addition to people, of course, is the financial wherewithal to support their work. So, it is more than coincidence, it is providential that the other main feature in this issue is the list of our donors and benefactors--all of you to whom we are so deeply grateful. We list you to thank you. Like the people working on projects, you too share in Woodstock's mission and in the ever growing influence of its publications, educational events, and conferences. All of us at Woodstock keep all of you in our prayers daily.
Yours gratefully,
James L. Connor, S.J.