GERMANY, by Fr Hans-Martin Samietz, Munich, Spiritual Leader of the Schoenstatt Young Men • If you ask the Schoenstatt Young Men in Germany, “What is mercy?” their answer will be, “Decisions guided by your heart”. This could easily give rise to a misunderstanding. The heart isn’t something sweet, charming, red, flashing, for example, but something full, strong, sensitive, courageous. In this sense the heart complements both what is purely intellectual, and what is instinctive in human beings, because it contains both. The heart is the expression of the inner core
Read More GERMANY, from Maria Fischer • “That’s him!” The article that appeared in the Rheinische Post newspaper was as zestful and mischievous as Fr Theo Hoffacker, a member of the Schoenstatt Priests’ Federation, on his 90th birthday. “Heart and soul a priest”, Heinz Kühnen wrote, and that is what Fr Hoffacker is. “The man keeps himself fit: cycling and swimming are simply part of life. In the past he went with his twin brother to sail in the Adriatic, and until a few years ago he regularly went skiing in Switzerland.
Read More Editorial Staff Schoenstatt.org – Buenos Aires, Cape Town, Schoenstatt, Madrid, Cologne, Vienna – Christmas 2015 • ” Only God the Father and his merciful love are important to us. Ultimately he loves us not so much – as we taught at the beginning of our Family’s history – because we have been good, but simply because he is our Father, or because he is able to pour out his merciful love most richly when we joyfully affirm our limitations, our weaknesses and miseries, and become aware that they are the
Read More Belmonte, BRAZIL, Interviewing Fr. Marcelo Cervi, superior of the Diocesan Priests Institute of the Southern American Region, on the Schoenstatt Shrine in Belmonte • Fr. Marcelo Cervi – well known by all the pilgrims who were in Belmonte during the Jubilee Week in October of 2014 – was interviewed by reporters of the Schoenstatt Movement in Brazil on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the symbolic blessing of the cornerstone for Belmonte by Father Kentenich on December 8, 1965. Fr. Cervi offers this interview by means of Schoenstatt.org for
Read More By Agustín José Lombardi, an argentinean living in Guarapuava, Brazil • When we speak about originality within the movement, we normally refer to specific characteristics of Schoenstatt’s charism and pedagogy. Almost immediately, we connect this originality to the invitation our father and founder made to Mary, that she establish her abode in the Shrine and from there pour out her graces as intercessor. After a hundred years of history, we realize that Schoenstatt’s originality manifests itself through the characteristics that the Movement has developed in the countries where the culture
Read More From María Fischer • This December 24, 2015, it is 50 years since Father Kentenich returned to his and our Original Shrine, after 14 long years of exile in Milwaukee. Father Kentenich arrived at Schoenstatt from Rome on the afternoon of the 24th of December of 1965. He arrived at Schoenstatt, on Christmas Eve, where the Family and the Original Shrine waited to welcome him. It was a long time of waiting that ended that 24th of December, after several weeks in Rome until the decree finally arrived on the
Read More ARGENTINA/URUGUAY, by Ernestina Strata • Saturday, 28 November a group of forty enthusiastic pilgrims departed from Buenos Aires to Nueva Helvecia, the first Schoenstatt Daughter Shrine, for an encounter with the Father and Founder’s person and footsteps. Those in the group were from different places around Argentina: Tucumán, Tandil (BA.Arg.), San Pedro (BA. Arg.), Córdoba, Mendoza, Corrientes, Greater Buenos Aires, and Buenos Aires City. A family from Benito Juárez (Province of Buenos Aires), a woman from Montevideo and another person, who lives at Punta del Este, joined the group at
Read More From Maria Fischer • “The door is a symbol of Advent: The Lord is coming to us; we want to open the door to him and welcome him.” These were the words of Fr Juan Pablo Catoggio, Chairman of Schoenstatt’s General Presidium, in his sermon on the Third Sunday of Advent. “This year the door is a particularly telling symbol. Our Holy Father, Pope Francis, has proclaimed an extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy. Last Tuesday, 8 December, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, our Holy Father opened the Holy Door
Read More AUSTRIA, Viena, by Tita Andras • It was exactly a week ago that I was on the return trip from Memhölz to Vienna having just participated in the first international gathering at Schoenstatt’s auf’m Berg Schoenstatt Center about Belmonte with a Schoenstatt group. What did this group have in common? Simply those present had hearts on fire for Belmonte, for the Center and for the Shrine of all of us. I had met some of the participants, Norbert and Gertrud Jehle, Albert and Alisia Bush and also Carmen and Jürgen
Read More MESSAGE OF THE GENERAL PRESIDIUM OF SCHOENSTATT – FR JUAN PABLO CATOGGIO • The General Presidium gathered for its annual week-long meeting. The place and time were special: They met in Rome, at Belmonte, exactly fifty years after Fr Kentenich’s return from exile and his stay in Rome. During the meeting, the General Presidium drafted a message to the Schoenstatt Family to mark the 50th anniversary of the fourth milestone in the history of Schoenstatt, and the opening of the Year of Mercy. At the request of the President of
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