History is also the result of the charisma’s action. The charisma have had and have important effects in the area of the civil and religious economy. The bearers of charisma have animated and still animate the economic life, giving life to works of charity, assistance, mercy and economic experience, whose importance in history and presently is absolutely undervalued.  

Consecrated life and the poles of human nature

All things that derive from a vision in which economy is an area separated from the civil area, and where the extra-economic factors, especially if they are of spiritual or “religious” nature (as the charisma are perceived in a reductive way),are considered as a detail, a contour, if not even the digester of the first dish, and that, as such, may also be missing without affecting the lunch. For some scholars, the presence of gratuity in the market is also harmful, «I have never seen anyone doing anything good for him who claimed to trade for the common good»,  according to Adam Smith, the founder of economic science (The richness of the nations, Utet, Turin 1945).

The encyclical letter Caritas in Veritate, strongly invites us to debunk this myth, when he underlines the importance of gratuity, therefore, of charity, within the economic life (CV 36), also as an answer to the present crisis. In another passage of the same Letter, the Pontiff points to the works of the religious, where it is possible to put together market and gratuity (CV 37).

In fact, when the charisma enter the civil dynamics, a dimension of love, of an extraordinary and rare power, the  agape, enters with them. History proves that when a charism is at work in any person and in the community, thanks to it, we can see “farther”. In fact the charism is the gift of new eyes able to see things that others cannot see, to discover “resources” there, where all others witness a “problem” to be managed. The action of charisma in history has always been, and continues to be, a work of shifting forward the little poles of human life.

Here are some challenges

In this particular moment of history, the consecrated life faces some challenges, linked to the decrease of vocations, the increase of the aged members, the reality of the works becoming more and more complex, and the increasing involvement of lay collaborators in the mission. The biggest challenge is that of managing the works well, to ensure a continuity. In front of this challenge we may run the risk of two fatal errors.

The first one is that of seeking efficiency and professional perfection at any cost (becoming subjects of techniques), with te risk of losing the charism on the way, and with it the excess of gratuity, the only thing that the world, even the economic one, forcefully  demands today. However, a charismatic work that loses its charism is destined to die. 

Today there is a very strong tendency, above all in Anglo-Saxon areas, (where they write text-books that are used all over the world, forming managers and consultants), to treat all the organising forms as substantially similar realities. The school and the hospital, the multi-national and the co-operative enterprise, the university and the religious order, all of them are organisations, for which to understand and cure them the methods are always the same.  

Obviously, many things are in common between the commercial enterprise, a co-operative and a religious community, but a good organising theory must concentrate, above all, on the differences. If we do not give importance to little differences, we are no longer able to see, in every organisation, the decisive elements called as culture, identity, value, mission.

The second error is to believe that the good-will is enough to re-vitalise the works, to ensure the continuity and vitality of the charism. The fear that minding this management is something like suffocating the charism is behind this vision. However, this vision could lead us to close the houses and the works progressively just because the forces decrease.

If the charisma that break up into history represent a process of spiritual, human, economic and civil  change, it should be noted that the mentioned process takes place through the realities that each charism emanates. Therefore, we desire to individuate some characteristics to be kept in mind whenever we speak of management, a theme that today is calling again the attention of many religious institutes, in order to answer the actual challenges.

Characteristics of the realities born from charisma

 The first characteristic of all the works born from the charisma is that their origin is not an economic motive, but a motive that we could call “ideal”. The work is born only as an expression of this ideal motive, sometimes also not intentionally (for instance, in the case of the Franciscan: the intention was that of helping the poor, of not allowing banks to be born from the «Mounts of piety»). Therefore, the fundamental expression of these experiences is the principle of gratuity: they are experiences that give space to the gratuitous human touch, when they are fully integrated in the markets, a gratuity that does not mean to do things “gratis”.

When there is the gratuity, a given action is performed because it is good, not because it bears good fruit (even if,  ex post, it actually bears fruit). All the experiences that are born from the charisma have the sweet scent, the fragrance of gratuity: and this is felt strongly and always.

The expressions of charismatic economy, moreover, are born to answer the needs of concrete persons, not from abstract designs, after the advice of experts and professional persons.  We do not “implement” projects, but remain in the attitude of an attentive listening to life, from where intuitions are born, and which always has its charity charge.

Therefore, the discordance between how much we live and how much we should live according to a good theory, can never be solved by simply advising to change the praxis, because the vital experience by itself embodies elements of indispensable elements of truth, which later reveal themselves as essential for the success and authenticity of the project itself in due time.   

The experiences of the works born from a charism –the third characteristic- are powerfully linked to the person of the Founder. Therefore, they are always experiences with strong identity. For this reason they are never anonymous or replicable by simply teaching techniques or know-how; they can be replicated and transmitted to others only by transmitting the same charism to other persons, arousing new “vocations”.

The forth characteristic: The foundation dimension of charismatic experiences is the reciprocity. We need to pay attention not to confuse reciprocity with altruism. In fact, sometimes we tend to associate the work that is born from the charisma with altruism or philanthropy. The rule of these experiences, instead, is the reciprocity: the involved subjects in this type of experiences donate, but receive also, according to the Trinitarian paradigm of reciprocal love.

Fifth characteristic - The experiences born from a charism and from gratuity, naturally attribute an important role to beauty: the beautiful also is of interest, not only the good (or the truth). In these experiences we are not satisfied to do things well, we want to make them also “beautiful”. For instance, sometimes, in the public hospitals (born from “non-charismatic” institutions), one could have the impression that beauty is not common. While, in the health centres born from charisma we soon notice that there is more beauty: in the way of behaving with persons, the area, in cleanliness, which is not just “hygiene”.

The charisma remind us that one can die also of ugliness. Sick persons recover with difficulty if, after their sickness, they do not feel to be beautiful again. The dimension of beauty, when it is present, says that a man has a value in himself, and he must be respected as a person, not only because of his being a client. This is why there is a strong link between beauty and gratuity, between beauty and charism.

The only way of knowing how to manage the works that are born from charisma is that of keeping in mind their characteristics. In fact, if the management is not a reflection of the peculiar values, culture and mission of the organisation, this may degenerate. In particular, gratuity is the essential characteristic, and it must be the pivot of a renewed management of these works. If it is not kept in the due consideration, in fact, above all in the mature and consolidated charismatic realities, it may gradually disappear without our awareness. We may go ahead for a long time without gratuity, feeling perfectly at home, for instance because of feeling efficient, but what is left over out of the charism in our works?

If gratuity becomes the pivot of our new management, where a person is truly at the centre, then the practices that will follow will, once again, be useful to shift forward the little poles of the human reality.

Alessandra Smerilli fma
Added lecturer in political economy
In the Auxilium
Piazza S. Maria Ausiliatrice 60
00181 Roma