Covenant solidarity Category

PARAGUAY, CIEES, Maria Fischer • “It was great. Many doors are opening for us,” says Juan Vicente Ramírez, just after the launch of the ¡Reinvéntate! Ciudad del Este, this Friday, July 24, 2020. ¡Reinvéntate! CdE is a social program for regional entrepreneurs, created and articulated from the support center of CIEES of Ciudad del Este, a non-profit organization that seeks economic reactivation after the crisis caused by the mandatory quarantine due to COVID-19. —   “Actually, the project called ¡Reinvéntate! CdE was born in CIEES”, affirms Juan Vicente Ramirez, aRead More
MEXICO, Eduardo A. Shelley • It has been 15 Sundays, 105 days, since the last Mass was celebrated in the “María, Camino al Cielo” Shrine in Monterrey, Mexico. In the meantime, technology has been very helpful, since we have been in contact with the priests and the community through video calls and the transmission of the Masses and rosaries from the Schoenstatt house, but nothing substitutes receiving the graces of the Shrine in person, especially the grace of home. That is why the Mass on Sunday, June 21, 2020 wasRead More
PARAGUAY, CMT educators: Lourdes, Victor, Magdalena, Rosi Minerva, Alicia and Ricardo Acosta • The coronavirus pandemic turned the life style of people around the world upside down and the House Mother of Tuparenda (CMT) was no exception, since it also had to stop its activities, with the great challenges that this implied in the process that we had been working with each participant. —     The life in confinement of the participants and their families, as for any person, needed a reinvention to face the consequences of the pandemic.Read More
ARGENTINA, Editorial Tribuna • Even during times of pandemic, the solidarity activity that the more than one hundred missionaries of the Schoenstatt Apostolic Movement carry out in Rio Tercero does not stop. The group, mostly made up of older women, is working these days on making warm clothing for adults and children. Furthermore, some weeks ago they gave to the Municipality coats and caps that will be used by the health personnel. — “We are currently making quilts for cribs, baby bags, coats and booties for grandparents in day careRead More
CHILE,Fr. Francisco Pereira, Jorge Gómez Alemparte / María Fischer • The Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM) joins the efforts and actions against all forms of violence against children. This is message was expressed on June 4th, the International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression. “Our children need tenderness and protection at all times, for they are the hope of society, the Church and humanity”.  What does Schoenstatt do to protect children? The answer is not only education for children or schools and all kinds of strengthening of families, butRead More
COSTA RICA, Tatiana López •  March arrived, a month of great significance for Costa Rica. The 19th was awaited with great illusion, because the anniversary of the blessing of our Family of Hope Shrine would be celebrated. Everything was going relatively normally and the preparations for this great day continued. News arrived from the old world that Milan was suffering from the contagion of a virus that came from China, and at the same time they informed us that Madrid had its first victims.  These events seemed so far away.—Read More
PARAGUAY, María Fischer in conversation with Juan Vicente Ramírez • “We are already getting to the last few supplies of food”, commented Juan Vicente Ramírez, Vice President of the Chamber of Commerce of Ciudad del Este, a member of the International Community of Schoenstatt Businesses and Executives (CIEES). “We have 4,500 food kits left for this month, and we’re done.” They end up not because he and the others have lost the desire to act in solidarity, but because they have already fulfilled their mission. “Now government assistance programs forRead More
SPAIN, Pilar de Beas • For me, the confinement began on March 10 due to a pneumonia that to this day I do not know if it was COVID-19.  Already medicated and with the antibiotic in place, I began to have an urgent need to “do something”. I even contacted a hospital to help (innocent of me) make calls to the relatives of sick people, since what worried me most from the beginning was the loneliness of people who were dying without any hands on theirs. — Here I learnedRead More
INITIATIVES IN TIMES OF PANDEMIA, initiated by the Community of Sant’Egidio – Thousands of people from different European countries have shared the appeal promoted by the Community of Sant’Egidio. The first signatory is Andrea Riccardi, together with a group of personalities who express, in a different way, European culture. An appeal that quite obviously finds strong resonance among those who are worried about the situation of elderly citizens in these times of pademic.— This appeal comes from a concern of the Community of Sant’Egidio for the future of our societiesRead More
CHILE, Paulina Johnson V. and Rafael Mascayano M. • A few days have already passed and we are still thankful for the result of the workshop “Introduction to the Social Thought” of Fr. Kentenich. As he would say, we are in the re-living.  A workshop-course which was originally designed to be held in person and, because of the coronavirus, we were faced with the dilemma of not holding it or of trying to hold it in a virtual format, a modality which presented us with great challenges. — The concreteRead More