Posts From Sarah Numico
EN | IT | FR | DE – CCEE Congress on university pastoral work. How is it possible to help university students to discover and live the fullness of Gospel life, to be and become responsible in life? These were the issues discussed by more than fifty delegates responsible for university pastoral work for the European Bishops’ Conferences along with groups of students from all over Poland, meeting in Lødż (Poland) to reflect on and exchange views about the theme “Being and becoming responsible in life”. The four-day meeting (16-19 April) was organised by the ‘University’ section of CCEE’s ‘Catechesis, school, and university’ Commission.
EN | IT – “We reaffirm our communion with the Eastern Christian communities and minorities persecuted anywhere in the world”: these words can be read in the message signed by Archbishop Georges Pontier of Marseilles, who is also President of the French bishops. From France also comes the demand that “courageous initiatives” are taken to “ensure peace in these regions and to grant everyone an equal citizenship”, while the Catholic community continues to “support efforts made in their favour”.
EN | IT – “A clear sign of the strong interest of the EU Commission to continue the dialogue with the churches”: this is the meaning, in the words of Card. Reinhard Marx, President of the Commission of the Bishops Conferences of the European Community (COMECE), of the meeting that the bishops of the 28 EU countries had with President Jean-Claude Juncker and his deputy Frans Timmermans, during the plenary session that took place in Brussels from 18th to 20th March.
EN | IT – “A true master” who has traced the road for the present and future of our academic community. This is the definition given by Cardinal Angelo Scola, Archbishop of Milan and Grand Chancellor of the University of Northern Italy’s School of Theology, to describe Johannis Zizioulas, Metropolitan of Pergamum, when the Orthodox scholar was awarded an honorary degree by the same university on January 24.
EN | IT – No. 2 of the Moscow Patriarchate, Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeev, President of the Department of External Relations since 2009, recently took part in the works of the Synod on the family, meeting Pope emeritus Benedict XVI, the president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and Pope Francis.
EN | IT – We are now at the final stages; on 22th May the first ballots will open. The campaign is getting livelier, even though the debates are played more often at the national than at the European level. Well centered on Europe are the numerous messages, appeals, statements that have been published in recent weeks and days by individual bishops or conferences of bishops in relation to the upcoming elections. Here are the statements of the bishops Lithuanians, Latvians and those of the French bishops’ conference.
EN | IT – Also the churches in different European countries are showing their engagement in the debate. Thus, for example, the Church of Finland has invited eight major candidates in a debate on the Finns’ ‘Manifesto for the European elections’. On the other hand, the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) has produced a sort of “manual” on the forthcoming elections.
EN | IT – There are demanding words in the concluding paragraph of the document that the bishops of the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (Secam) presented to the Eu on the occasion of the fourth Africa-Eu Summit last 2-3 April. The bishops had already expressed these reflections and proposals in a pastoral letter issued in February 2013, perhaps with little echo here in Europe.
