Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Archbishop of Vienna will give a public address today on Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love) as part of the ‘Amoris: Let’s Talk Family! Let’s Be Family!’ conference in the Diocese of Limerick.
The Amoris conference, hosted by the Irish Institute for Pastoral Studies in association with the Irish Institute of Catholic Studies, takes place today in Mary Immaculate College, Limerick and will see a series of presentations and workshops on Amoris Laetitia and preparations for the World Meeting of Families in 2018.
Bishop Brendan Leahy, Bishop of Limerick will open today’s event with prayers and words of welcome at 2.00pm. Afterwards, at 2.30pm, Cardinal Schönborn will present on Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love), Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation on love in the family.
At 4.00pm, following the presentation, a number of workshops will be offered, including:
- an academic seminar on the theme of ‘Amoris Laetitia one year on: status quaestionis’ led by Cardinal Schönborn;
- an introduction of the catechetical programme for WMOF2018 by Petra Conroy, Pastoral Programme Manager for WMOF2018, Martin Kennedy, Pastoral Programme Coordinator for WMOF2018, and Jessie Rogers, lecturer in Sacred Scripture at Saint Patrick’s College, Maynooth; and
- ‘Millennial Youth, Generation X and the Regeneration of the Disconnected’ exploring the upcoming Synod on ‘Young People, the Faith and Vocational Discernment’ in light of WMOF2018, led by Gerard Gallagher, Pastoral Co-Ordinator with the Archdiocese of Dublin.
The day will close with a public lecture at 7.00pm from Cardinal Schönborn on the theme of ‘The Parish: Family of Families’.
Speaking ahead of the conference, Father Eamonn Fitzgibbon, Director of MIC’s Institute for Pastoral Studies, said, “the World Meeting of Families next year will be the biggest single event in the life of the Church on this island since the Pope’s visit in 1979. The build up to it is of huge importance also as it will effectively provide for an ongoing conversation about the family and how we see it and value it in Ireland. Our conference on July 13th will be one of the biggest platforms to date for that conversation, not least because of Cardinal Christoph Schönborn. He’s as close to Pope Francis as we can get when it comes to Amoris Laetitia, which is a very significant letter from Pope Francis on his understanding of family.”
For more information on the conference see www.limerickdiocese.org.
Cardinal Christoph Schönborn OP, Archbishop of Vienna, is a highly regarded author, teacher and theologian. He was a student of Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) and with him was co-editor of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Pope Francis chose Cardinal Schönborn to be the main presenter of his apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love).
The World Meeting of Families will take place in Dublin from 21-26 August 2018. Families and others from all over the world will gather in Dublin to celebrate their lives together, to share their experiences from different parts of the world, to reflect on the different challenges they face and to grow together in faith. The theme chosen by Pope Francis for WMOF2018 is ‘The Gospel of the Family: Joy for the World’. For more on WMOF2018 see www.worldmeeting2018.ie.
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