Tertianship in Bikfaya – School of the Heart

I have always liked the term “schola affectus”, the school of the heart. It has less of a hard edge to it than an academic year with assignments and exams. But the heart, as well as being the place of tender emotions, is also the place of anger and hurts.  So tertianship, under God’s grace, is a place of healing and reconciliation in an international group of companions. This year in Bikfaya we were a community of ten made up of nine nationalities.

The eight months offered space and time to integrate our personal histories and become reconciled with all we are through the writing of one’s autobiography, sharing from the heart of a significant moment and of course the long retreat: a time for our relationship with the Lord to be rekindled and to be reconciled with all who were part of our history.

As well as inputs from Dany on the Institute, there were speakers, both in person and on zoom, on the history of the Society, Safeguarding and Consent as well as the Synodal Process of Pope Francis and other topics.

Tertianship brings its own challenges: willingness to engage with the different inputs, the flexibility to engage with the programme and the experiments, as well as adapting to local food, which though plentiful and varied, was different to what people were used to.

Affective growth is not as linear. We have to patiently and responsibly deal with our feelings, both positive and negative with the help of spiritual direction.  The goal is to grow in freedom to serve, to discern where the good spirit is leading and recognise where we get trapped.

Many people contributed to making our stay possible and taking care of our needs. I am most grateful to them and to Nawras and especially to Dany with whom I was happy to work so closely.

This is only the second  year of the Bikfaya tertianship and the tertians will evaluate its strengths and weaknesses with Franck Janin, the President of the European Conference of Provincials.

We also got some sense of the endurance of the Lebanese people who have had to live through one crisis after another, a falling standard of living with constant price rises as the value of currency fell. Lebanon has strong religious practice compared to Europe. It was a new ecclesial experience for me to grow in awareness of the role of Patriarchs and the many Catholic and Orthodox rites as well as different Moslem groupings. It was impressive to see the activities of the scouts and girl guides at weekends in Bikfaya.

I found it isolating not knowing the language and am keen to learn some rudimentary spoken Arabic and be able to use some of the rich variety of blessings.  Even if the year was challenging at times, I feel privileged to have been asked to serve in this school of the heart in which I too am a student!

Fr. Charlies Davy, s.j.