Teaching and Learning to Love
Human Affectivity and Christian Chastity
Rome, 5-9 February 2018
On several occasions, Pope Francis has spoken of the need for a ‘revolution in tenderness’, for Christians and for humanity as a whole. He is convinced that the power of faith can reach the peripheries of the world ‘by attraction’, the attraction of love lived in a sacrificed, universal, transparent and joyful way. Hence the importance, especially among future priests in the Church, to learn how to love, in a mature way, and to teach others how to love. A prelude for this is to live the virtue of chastity, «sign of the transparency of relationships and the gift of self», as the recent Ratio on priestly formation says (n. 21).
The organizers of the meeting are aware that purity is not the most important of Christian virtues, still less that it can be lived in isolation from other virtues. Thus, the Study Week has been structured in terms of virtues and attitudes that make living chastity more joyful, integrating, meaningful, paternal and evangelically efficacious in the life of the candidate to the priesthood and the future priest.
The Fifth Study Week is addressed to the formators of candidates for the priesthood who have matured sufficient “on the ground” experience to be able to rise a common reflection and an enriching exchange between the various protagonists of the direction of the seminaries.
In addition to the morning presentations by rapporteurs with proven competence, the meeting foresees that all participants can actively participate in the afternoon workshops, which seek to elicit reflection on the specific practical problems that are found in daily reality. The various situations experienced by the participants, coming from diverse cultural and ecclesial contexts, will undoubtedly be an opportunity to share ideas and ways of working to help others in their task of serving the seminarians.
The activity will be developed in Italian language, and during the morning sessions simultaneous translation into English and Spanish is planned.
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