Dilexit ecclesiam Category

COSTA RICA, Michelle Ramírez • Can you imagine 19 Movements and 18 pastors, together, talking among themselves?  Seated at tables for four, with a digital clock in the center of the auditorium, visible…. very visible, keeping time…. each round of 18 minutes, counting in reverse…. and change!  And again in 18 minutes, change!  And thus, consecutively until completing nine times the change!  No, it is not a game…. It is the Movements vs. the Church.  It is the presentation and the offer of their apostolates and mission.  It is theRead More
SPAIN, Juan Zaforas • In this congress, we have had the opportunity to live a unique experience, even to the moment in which we have learned and received from others.  We hope to have contributed something of our own and we wish that to this experience others come in the future who can show us the way to continue on the way together.— Surely as many  already know that the passed weekend in Madrid, Spain, the celebration of the Congress for the Laity 2020 took place.  More than 2,000 representativesRead More
ROME, via www.sac.info • On January 19, 2020, the first day of the triduum was celebrated in preparation for the feast of St. Vincent Pallotti with adoration and Vespers, led by Fr. Stanisław Stawicki in the church of SS. Salvatore in Onda. The Holy Mass was presided over by Fr. Alexandre Awi Mello, the Secretary to the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life and also a member of the Institute of the Schoenstatt Fathers. Many members of the Union of Catholic Apostolate and friends of St. Vincent participated inRead More
COSTA RICA, schoenstatt.org in conversation with “los tempranitos or early birds of the Universal Apostolic Confederation,” Elizabeth Fields and Alejandro Robles • “Everyone said this was impossible. Then one came that didn’t know, and just did.” As we talked via WhatsApp between Barcelona and Cologne until we ran out of cellphone batteries, my gaze stumbled upon a postcard that had been “residing” on my desk for years that said: “Everyone said this was impossible. Then one came that didn’t know, and just did.” In this case, a married couple came,Read More
SOUTH AFRICA, Tapiwanashe Manhombo • When my dear sister Evadne told me to save the date for the celebration of the feast of the Assumption in Lansdowne, I hadn’t put much thought into it. In my mind, this was going to be another one of those great days where we get to gush about Mother Mary – it would be beautiful but ultimately another one of those routine celebrations. Or so I thought… — I arrived almost an hour before the ceremony began. This gave me time to take inRead More
Catedral de La Plata
ARGENTINA, Fr. Jorge González / María Fischer • We are sitting in a well-lit corner, in front of the living quarters of the new parish priest at the Cathedral of La Plata, Fr. Jorge González, of the Priests’ Federation in Argentina. He took up his position a few weeks ago and is already working at full steam to “enshrine the cathedral,” as he described it, referring to a famous expression by Cardinal Bergoglio, today Pope Francis. Without having planned it, María Teresa and Daniel Martino and I witnessed one ofRead More
CHILE, Bárbara Brain • So much excitement! Everything was so beautiful! What an impressive testimony! What joy! Thank you, thank you! … These are some of the comments from the people who gathered for the Pentecost vigil on 8 June at Paseo Bulnes, in downtown Santiago.— Perhaps it was not a crowd in the literal sense of the word, but there is no doubt that the fire of the Holy Spirit touched each of the more than 3,000 souls that gathered in the streets to express their hope in theRead More
CHRISTUS VIVIT, Maria Fischer This time from St. Peter’s in Rome with Fr. Alexandre Awi. On 22 June, the day of the audience with Pope Francis, the crowning jewel of the International Youth Forum, the Schoenstatt participants sent their third and final video message to the International Schoenstatt Family in four languages and only one message: Christ is alive. Christ is alive, the Pope’s message, the message of the Youth synod, the message of this post-synodal journey, is a message for the whole of Schoenstatt, for this apostolic movement foundedRead More
CHRIST IS ALIVE – INTERNATIONAL YOUTH FORUM, Maria Fischer with Lucas Galhardo and Hemma Struntz • Good afternoon, good evening, good day…it’s once again 2:30 in the morning in Rome, when Hemma Struntz from Austria and Lucas Galhardo from Brazil, the two Schoenstatt representatives at the International Youth Forum, recorded the second video to greet the International Schoenstatt Family, this time in Spanish and English. They had already finished the talks, the working groups, the discussions and the Mass at the forum. All that was left was the crowning jewelRead More
CHILE, Gonzalo Díaz and Barbara Brain • “We invite you with great hope to unite with us in mobilizing yourselves this Pentecost. At such crucial moments in the life of the Church, we want to ask the Holy Spirit to renew us with his light, warmth, and strength and to make of us credible witnesses to the gospel.” – This simple and direct call, from a small group of Schoenstatt members in Chile, grew from a trickle of enthusiasm among various groups of our downcast Chilean church. Wounded by casesRead More