On November 6, the second year of the online synodal style training course sponsored by “Evangelii Gaudium” (CEG), the theological-pastoral training center linked to the University Institute of Loppiano, Florence, in collaboration with the General Secretariat of the Synod. Course focus: becoming “missionary-disciples” in the service of universal brotherhood
A new stage for the synodality training course that began in 2022 at the Evangelii Gaudium Center (CEG), located at the Sophia University Institute, together with the General Secretariat of the Synod. The theme of the year 2023/2024 is: training for the synodality to become “disciples-missionaries” in the service of universal brotherhood. Registration for the course remains open and has no geographical limits: each lesson, which lasts three hours, takes place online every Monday from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm from November 2023 to May 2024 The main language of the lessons is Italian, with translations in English, Portuguese and Spanish. At the end, there will be a face-to-face meeting, also in workshop format, in Loppiano, the Citadel of the Focolare Movement, headquarters of the Center that promotes the initiative.
A rich and fascinating experience
Two hundred and forty-eight people enrolled in the course last year: they came from the English-speaking world (UK, Ireland, USA, Canada), from many Latin American countries, from Asia (Singapore, Malaysia , Philippines, Korea, India ), Africa (Cameroon, South Africa, Nigeria, Congo, Kenya, Burundi) and almost all of Europe. Many representatives of diocesan or national Churches participated in the synodal process, including priests, religious men and women, but also many lay men and women. Mostly Catholics, but also members of other Churches. “It was a strong, rich and I can say compelling experience,” said Vincenzo Di Pilato, professor of basic theology at the Faculty of Theology of Apulia and coordinator of the CEG academy, whose words can be found on the Focolare website . “The course is intended to represent an attempt to respond, with the rest of the world, to the call that the Holy Spirit makes us ‘go out’, as Pope Francis repeated. The going out where the Holy Spirit pushes us, explains- well Di Pilato, this does not mean dispersing or dividing us, but expanding our individual contents to accept everyone.
In accordance with the work of the October Synod Assembly
Di Pilato quoted a letter from a diocesan leader on a synodal trip to Malaysia, among many received from participants, at the end of the course: “I am truly grateful for the opportunity to learn a lot about of the beginnings of the synodal Church and the synodality. I truly “It opened my eyes to the promptings of the Holy Spirit that guides the Church.” Regarding the topics that will be discussed in this new course, the coordinator of the Center affirmed that, first of all, they will be consistent with what emerged from the Ordinary General Assembly of the October Synod. collecting the fruits of community identification, we realized that some issues seem more urgent than others. For example, the ministeriality, the places and ways of participation, the formation to be ‘missionary disciples’ in the service of universal brotherhood”. With our initiative we want to continue, concluded the coordinator of Evangelii Gaudium Center in Loppiano, “to be builders of the unity of the Church and the world, according to the synodal style in which Jesus lived his human-divine existence with the apostles and with all his disciples.”
