MISSIONARIES CALL FOR PEACE
MISSIONARIES CALL FOR PEACE By: SEDOS members 2025 From June 16th to 20th missionaries from all continents, members of Congregational Leadership Teams, missiology students, some preparing for their final perpetual commitment in the Religious Missionary Life, came together at the Centro Ad Gentes, Nemi, in the Roman hills, to reflect on the specific missionary call emerging from the Church’s current path of renewal and reform: synodality. Three days reflecting on the theme: “Missionary Institutes and Synodality: Charism, Prophesy, and Witness” renewed the sense of commitment to furthering synodality within and among different missionary Institutes. Internal renewal of processes and structures goes hand in hand with the missionary commitment to be a witnessing presence, bringing God’s love to the peripheries of our world, not just the geographical but to the existential peripheries: the mystery of sin, of pain, of injustice, of ignorance and indifference to religion, of intellectual currents, and of all misery.] [1] Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, 2013. At the end of the seminar, the group issued the following Statement re-echoing Pope Leo’s calls for peace in the world. Statement from the SEDOS Residential Seminar 2025 We, seventy missionaries from thirty Missionary Institutes, representing thirty-two nationalities across all continents, lay men and women, religious brothers, sisters and priests, gathered in the serene and spiritually resonant setting of Centro Ad Gentes in Nemi, outside Rome, for the 2025 SEDOS Residential Seminar. Our shared time together was a profound witness to the Church’s intercultural, international and intergenerational richness and to the possibility of [...]
