Letter from Coordinator 07 2012

Dear Confreres,
Letter from the Coordinator, No 7 (2012)
Dear Lay Missionaries of the Most Holy Redeemer,
Dear Partners in Mission,
Greetings to all, and to the members of your Units. I hope that the vacation time gave you the possibility of receiving new strength, hope and vision for our pastoral work.
We shall celebrate two very important meetings of our Conference this autumn. The Mid- Sexennial Meeting will be held from 28th of October to 3rd of November in Kraków, Poland and immediately after this meeting we will take part in the “Fifth Assembly of the Conference of the Redemptorists of Europe (CRE)” (5-6 November) also in Kraków. The preparatory commissions for these meetings are finishing their work.
At this midpoint of the Sexennium we will deal in a special way with the issues concerning the manner in which the theme “To preach the Gospel ever anew (St. Clement.) Renewed Hope, Renewed Hearts, Renewed Structures for Mission” was received. We will share our experiences and expectations about new visions, new structures and new initiatives concerning our mission, formation and so on.
It is obvious for all ,that at this present time in Europe we should think about new ways of evangelization and/or re-evangelization, and also about new structures for some of our Units. Eight Units in Europe have undertaken serious steps towards their restructuring together with other Units, and other two have changed their legal status in recent months (the Regions of Belgium South and of the Vietnamese Confreres in Europe ceased to exist and became parts of other structures).
During the “Fifth Assembly” of the CRE we will discuss and try to approve some proposals concerning new missionary initiatives and common formation in our Conference.
A few months ago the new Secretariats, Commissions and Working Groups of the Conference began their activities. All of them held at least one meeting, and all of them sent some proposals for the Assembly in Kraków.
I would like to thank each of these groups and to present to you the general outlines of some of their proposals.
The meeting of the Secretariat for Evangelisation was held in Madrid (Spain; 3-5.05). The chair-persons of every working group in this Secretariat received the tasks for their commissions. We have since received from them some proposals:
Working group for “New Missionary Initiatives” (Kraków/Poland: 28-29.08.2012)
1) The group proposed to establish, in the spirit of new evangelization, the European Mission Movement of CRE. This movement will involve the fusion of various evangelisation and mission groups from our European Units. One of the goals will be to create some common evangelisation projects in various places in Europe. Well prepared mission teams from various Units, composed of Redemptorists and Lay-missionaries, could offer special “short-term”
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or“long-term” evangelisation projects in places where there is no possibility to do this at present. These projects could address various linguistic groups, migrants, and various age groups. They could also address specific themes, provide schools of prayer of evangelisation courses. It would be helpful if some of our communities open their doors to these volunteers who may wish to be part of some of these projects for learning and for an experience of community life, common prayer and also for some formation.
2) The group suggested organising the first “International Evangelisation Camp” in 2014 for Europe. It will be the opportunity for a common formation of different groups and for movements of evangelisation (Redemptorists and Lay-collaborators) from various Units, to promote our common mission in the spirit of the new evangelisation.
3) The group proposed making use of the evangelisation programme “ChristLife”. This programme consists of three steps of formation. The first step is: the proclamation of the kerygma and the invitation to join the community of the Church. The second step consists of the formation of disciples, and the third one, formation for mission.
4) The group proposed also the prayer for our Conference, for evangelisation in Europe and for the renewal of our missionary involvement in it.
Partnership in Mission (Bratislava/Slovakia 8.09.2012)
1) The group proposes to make use of the positive examples of collaborative ministry that are currently happening in the CRE. It was suggested that a forum for sharing experiences/ideas could be a positive step in this process. The possibility of sharing Lay and Redemptorist personnel among the Units was also discussed. Some examples of this kind are currently happening in the Conference, e.g. a Lay missionary from Bratislava is beginning her second year working with the Scala Youth Ministry team in the Dublin Province.
2) The Redemptorist Youth Congress is taking place in San Sperate, Sardinia in August 2013 and it was suggested that this meeting could be used to promote Redemptorist Lay Vocations. There will be an opportunity to give workshops on lay vocation/lay missionaries during the meeting. It could also be a forum for sharing ideas, materials, multi-media about evangelization. It was also suggested that Units in the CRE could reflect on possibilities for young people to be engaged in lay ministries. Some specific possibilities could be promoted at the meeting in San Sperate.
3) The possibility of organizing a “Partnership in Mission Conference” was discussed. The Collaborative Ministry Conferences organized in the past were acknowledged. These conferences brought people together and gave them an opportunity to share their experiences. It was suggested that the El Espino meeting (Spain) could offer an invitation to people from other Units to attend.
4) The topic of formation of Lay people in the Redemptorist tradition was also discussed and material placed on the page www.redemptoristspirituality.net was examined by the meeting. It was noted that there are many good relevant resources available. One of the challenges is to ensure that they are easily available to those who wish to access them.
5) The group suggests also using the “ChristLife” programme, as a very positive and useful tool for evangelisation. Information on the programme is available at www.christlife.org.
Social Ministry (Köln/Germany; 22-23.05.2012)
1) The group suggests developing a database of contact persons from every Unit. A network of mutual support, based on the contact persons we have, could be established. This experience should be made available to others, though workshops/symposia/colloquia.
2) The process of establishing of Interprovincial Communities should promote concrete action in the area of social ministry. Concrete suggestions should be offered to the CRE.
3) Social ministry should be a part of the Initial or Ongoing Formation (e.g. “Pastoral Year” – or shorter practical courses in an Interprovincial Community with social ministry).
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Youth Ministry (Sevilla/Spain: 3.05.2012; San Sperate/Italy: 5.07.2012)
1) The 10th European Redemptorist Youth Meeting will be held from 7th to 12th of August 2013 (you can find all necessary information at: www.redemptoristmeeting2013.eu).
2) The group wants to collect various youth pastoral experiences, materials, projects, and initiatives, and to put them on the web-page of the Conference. In the process of the preparation of youth projects for all Europe, the group will ask for some suggestions and for reports from the work of youth ministries in various Units.
3) With the cooperation with the Redemptorists from Spain the group wants to open to all our youth groups the possibility of having an experience connected with “El Camino de Santiago” in Spain (7-10 days). Our Community in Astorga is ready to welcome the pilgrims. In this house the young people will also find the possibility of praying in the Redemptorist tradition, reflecting, finding spiritual accompaniment, the sacrament of reconciliation and sharing experiences of various cultures.
4) Volunteering: There are some proposals about volunteering: work with migrants, mission ad gentes, Caritas, pastoral work abroad, etc. The group suggests making use of some already existing projects and to start some new ones. Ireland and St. Clemens Province are able to share their own concrete experiences in this area.
All working groups of this Secretariat gave also their suggestions for their possible participation in the process of development of Interprovincial Communities in the CRE (the requirement of Statute 00012), especially in the area of preparation of pastoral plans and the plans of community life in this new type of community in Europe.
Secretariat for Formation (Roma/Italy; 30-31.08.2012)
The Secretariat proposes:
1) That there will be a common preparation for final vows for the whole Conference in one place. Only the retreat before the perpetual vows may be organized in the individual Unit.
2) Meeting of formators will take place in Kraków from 12th to 16th of July 2013. This will be the first meeting of all formators of the Conference, as the previous meetings were held only on the sub-regional level. The meeting will consist of two parts. The first part will be the comprehensive sharing of realities, difficulties and challenges from each individual Unit. The second part will provide input for our new vision for the common missionary endeavor in Europe. This part will serve as well as a moment of formation of formators.
3) “Pastoral Year”. Many Units have a “Pastoral Year” in one form or another, while some of them do not. The group insists that at least part of this particular time of initial formation should be lived by the students in a different Unit. For those who do not have a pastoral year this could be a new initiative in the Unit, both for receiving students from other Units and sending the students for experience in other part of the Congregation. This would involve a careful selection of place, supervision, accompaniment, support and evaluation. This would open our students to the diversity of cultures, ecclesiologies, rites and social conditions.
4) Language schools. Summer schools specializing in the teaching of language skills should be organized. For cooperation within formation in Europe, a greater facility in other languages is required for our students. Language Schools in the two official languages of the Conference, namely English and Italian should be offered each year (together with other languages where appropriate, in view of possible pastoral placements). It is possible to receive the assistance of teachers of foreign languages from among the confreres or our Lay partners.
The Secretariat for Formation gave also some suggestions about common houses for novitiates and theologates, and for common ongoing formation in the Conference. All these suggestions will be presented during the Assembly in Kraków.
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Secretariat for the Brothers, (München/Germany: 13-15.06.2012).
The main point of the first meeting of this Secretariat was a reflection about their tasks in this quadriennium.
1. The members of the secretariat decided to write a letter to all Brothers in Europe in order to introduce the Secretariat and its members.
2. Furthermore they propose an Assembly of all Brothers in 2013.
3. The next meeting of the Secretariat will take place in Elbląg/Poland from 24th to 27th of January 2013.
Communication Group (Roma/Italy; 20-22.03.2012).
The group continues its work on the web-page of the Conference. The first preliminary layout is almost done. The web-page could be:
1. a simple and easily accessible medium of communication in the Conference, the place where we could share our ideas, thoughts, and evangelisation concepts,
2. it will be presented in the three official languages of the Congregation: English, Spanish and Italian (with the possibility of translation to another languages through “Google translator”),
3. in future – it should be accessible through other platforms, e.g. ipod, ipad, iphone, tablets, etc.
4. some parts of this web-page will be available only to Redemptorists,
5. there will be links to the official web-pages of every Redemptorist Unit in the CRE and to other Redemptorists web-pages.
6. the Secretary of the CRE will regularly insert information about various workshops, courses, sessions for Redemptorists or led by Redemptorists.
N.B. The web-page will be open soon but it was already attacked by Internet hacker from Indonesia and it was blocked for a few days (so it has already some interest!).
Financial Commission (Bonn/Germany; 2-3.08.2012).
The commission performed the audit of the budget of the Conference and it offered some proposals for the future. The members of the commission are planning some projects of economic solidarity and economic collaboration in the Conference. They propose also:
1. organising the meeting of all vice/provincial bursars from the Conference,
2. helping with some economic aspects of the new projects for Interprovincial Communities,
3. initiating the research on new possibilities of fundraising for common projects.
These are only some of the proposals, which will be presented during the Assembly of our Conference. We need God’s help for our work in Secretariats and Commissions, so please pray for blessings for all the new pastoral plans in our Conference.
Yours, in the Redeemer,
Jacek Zdrzałek CSsR Coordinator of the CRE
Rome, October 6, 2012