Women Religious can arrest the “culture of death” in India, if they increase family visits and use their institutions to promote life, says president of the women’s section of Conference of Religious India (CRI).

Shrinking families adversely affect societies, cultures, religions and Religious life, says Sister Prasanna Thattil, 60, who was recently elected to head India’s more than 100,000 Catholic nuns.

“The growing modernism, individualism and profit-oriented life styles have affected families. Many now do not even want children. It is so sad. It is going to affect every section of society,” lamented the superior general of the Kerala-based Holy Family Congregation.

The women Religious in India can “positively intervene” to correct this situation if they increase home visits. “Women can understand families and women better,” Sister Thattil told UCA News.

Annually an average 11 million abortions take place in India and around 20,000 women die due to abortion related complications, according to the Consortium on National Consensus for Medical Abortion in India. Most abortion-related maternal deaths are attributable to illegal abortions.

India’s social orthodoxy demands extended structures of families, but studies show new generations tend to keep families nuclear, with maximum two children.

It has also become a trend among married couples not to have children and, studies show, the number of people opting to remain single has also increased. Demands to legalize same sex union and marriage have also increasing.

In the face of such anti-life tendencies, Catholic nuns “must share more their time and resources with families,” Sister Thattil said.

The CRI official also admitted one reason couples avoid having children is the increase cost of living.

“One way to help them may be to offer free education for third and fourth children in our institutions,” said the nun who heads the congregation started in 1914 to restore broken families.

“We can also financially help families by cutting down on our celebrations, decorations and even forgoing a meal or two at times as a community,” she suggested and added, many congregations have already undertaken such programs.

Sister Thattil said hundreds of educational institutions that the Church runs across India can be used to fight other negative tendencies such as conflict among religions, terrorism and fanatic movements.

“These challenges can be handled only with inter-connectedness of Religious across in India,” she said stressing a national action plan. “It is a call to come out of our cocoons and collaborate with each other,” she asserted.

Educational institutions can be used to counter terrorism and communal strife. “Catholic schools should become nurseries where hearts more than minds and brains are formed,” Sister Thattil said, who was principal of a higher secondary school for 18 years.

She wants Christian schools to stress that “education is to prepare students for life, to have healthy families and to enjoy civilization of life.” But some times “we fail to see the purpose education and looks only at grades in the answer sheet,” she regretted.

The current challenges also call for a change in Religious life and attitudes, asserted India’s top woman religious. The nun, who was also provincial superior earlier, said people look “holiness” in Religious.

“The Religious should therefore go for integrated growth of body, mind and soul,” she said and noted “a tendency” among them “to overlook one or more of these, leading to sickness and other unhealthy practices.”

Source: UCAN

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