We know the phrase. We chant it at assemblies and inscribe it in our mission statements. “Unity in diversity.” It rolls off the tongue with comfortable familiarity. But as an international congregation, we must pause and ask ourselves a piercing question: Has our understanding truly been translated into concrete action?
Sometimes words are easier to speak than to put into practice. The gap between a catchy concept and a lived reality is the very ground where the Holy Spirit meets us. We are not called merely to co-exist; we are called to live interculturality with interdependence and co-responsibility for our common mission. This is the arduous, beautiful path of our vocation. Let us walk it together, guided by four pillars that transform our differences into a divine symphony.
Pillar 1: Mutual Learning – The Path of Ongoing Conversion
Congregavit nos in unum Christi amor. “The love of Christ has gathered us into one.”
Let that sink in. If it were not for this radical, initiating love, we would never have found ourselves in the same room. We are not related by blood, we do not come from the same family, nor do we share the same culture or language. This gathering is not a comfortable coincidence; it is a divine disruption.
This echoes the spirit of Deuteronomy 6:5 and Matthew 22:39—we are to love God with our whole being, and our neighbor as ourselves. Yet, loving a neighbor who speaks a different tongue or interprets time and space through a completely different cultural lens requires a continuous conversion. We must strip away the illusion that our way is the only way. Mutual learning means accepting that the “other” is not a challenge to my identity, but a necessary, sanctifying part of my own spiritual growth. It is the lifelong path of allowing Christ’s love to rewire our hearts so that we can truly see the face of God in the sister who is different from us.
Pillar 2: Hospitality of the Heart – Welcoming the Spirit of the Other
When a guest steps over our threshold, we never say, “May you feel at house.” Instinctively, we say, “May you feel at home.” This linguistic nuance is our theological compass.
A house is a physical structure—walls, a roof, a defined space. A home, however, speaks of belonging, acceptance, warmth, and the profound feeling of being loved. Have we truly become a home for one another? Have we helped others feel at home within our communities?
This is the essence of hospitality of the heart. It is not about managing different cultures through tolerance; it is about creating a safe and welcoming space where every sister, regardless of the country she hails from, feels accepted, respected, and loved as she is. We are invited to welcome not just the person, but the Holy Spirit dwelling within them. The Spirit does not erase our cultural identities or our personal uniqueness; rather, the Spirit sanctifies them so that they may enrich and complement one another. To welcome the spirit of the other is to believe that their culture carries a gift that I desperately need.
Pillar 3: Shared Responsibility – Stewarding Our Common Mission and Home
A home, however, is not a hotel. It requires active care. Our religious life is lived according to rules, constitutions, and regulations—not as rigid prisons, but as the scaffolding of our mutual care and shared responsibility.
Our founder, St. Arnold Janssen, envisioned the SSpS family not as a melting pot, but as a vibrant garden. He knew that differences are not managed by making everyone the same. Rather, they are embraced through open communication, mutual listening, and sincere dialogue.
Stewarding our common mission and home demands that we set aside personal preferences and group interests for the sake of our collective call to participate in God’s mission. When we do this, cultural differences cease to be obstacles. They are transformed into the very building blocks of our common home. We are interdependent—we cannot build this home alone, and we cannot steward it without the unique contribution of every sister. This is co-responsibility in action: tending to our unity so that the mission can flourish, not in spite of our diversity, but because of it.
Pillar 4: Prophetic Witness – Our Communion as the Message to the World
Wherever people live together, differences will inevitably clash—different ideas, personalities, customs, and expectations. This is normal. But for us, these moments of friction are not the end of the story. Whenever these challenges arise, we are invited to return to the foundation of our vocation: the love of Christ that has gathered us together.
If we achieve this—not perfectly, but persistently—our communion itself becomes the message. Our diversity, harmonized by the Spirit, is not just an internal affair; it is a prophetic witness to a fractured, polarized world.
Like a beautiful symphony, where the flute does not envy the drum, our varied voices create a beauty that transcends words. When we celebrate our differences around the same table of sisterhood, forgiving one another when misunderstandings arise, and continuing to walk together as one family in Christ, we become the living Gospel. We radiate the Father’s love outward. In a world desperate for signs of peace, our very existence as a united, intercultural community is the loudest sermon we will ever preach.
Let us stop simply uttering unity in diversity. Let us become it. For it is from this home—this sacred space of interdependence and co-responsibility—that the love of Christ flows inexhaustibly to the ends of the earth.
Sr. Herdiana Randut, SSpS – Province of Japan
