Fatima (Portugal). From 26 to 29 September 2024, the annual VIDES International Members’ Assembly was held in Fatima, at Our Lady of Carmel Retreat House, on the theme: “Young protagonists of socio-cultural change”.
The meeting place, in front of the Sanctuary where the apparitions of Our Lady to the little shepherds took place, was a suggestive and spiritually charged place, particularly suitable for reflecting on the progress of the Association and for strengthening the sharing of the values on which its work is based.
The work, coordinated by the VIDES International President, Mr. Guido Barbera, and the Director General, Sister Annecie Audate, FMA, with the presence of the Vicar General of the Institute of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, Sister María del Rosario García Ribas, and the Provincial of O. L. of Fatima Province (POR), Sister Maria Deolinda Dos Santos Teixeira, began on 26 September with the meetings of the Presidency Council and the Administrative Council to evaluate the work carried out and reflect on the future commitments of the Association.
“To imagine a better future is to give a direction and actively commit to building a different world. In a dark time, which kills imagination, trust and hope, we want to imagine, dream, desire, and promote the alternative to war, to every conflict and injustice. A fraternal society: a world where people live happily together, in peace. This is the wish I bring to all of you for the work of our annual assembly,” were the words of Guido Barbera, in his welcome discourse.
On the 27th, there was a meeting of the Formation Commission, during which some 70 participants, divided by language into 8 working groups, were confronted with the objective of strengthening unity between delegates and young people through mutual knowledge and sharing operational criteria for the formation of volunteers, identifying future perspectives.
In particular, during the work of the Commission, participants were able to reflect and exchange opinions and points of view on the identity of the Vides groups, their inspirational principles, the role of young people within the groups themselves, and, consequently on the type of voluntary service proposed and the methods and objectives of youth formation.
Finally, on the last day of work, the Annual Assembly was held, an ‘institutional’ appointment, and also extremely concrete, during which were approved fundamental documents for the life of the Association – like the budget – explaining the objectives and projects implemented in the current year and outlining the development guidelines for the following year.
These were alternated with more informal moments, characterized by the joy of being together, to meet each other or in some cases to meet each other again, united by the sharing of the fundamental values of the Association: solidarity, attention to young people, the promotion of the weakest and most vulnerable, which allows participants to “close the gap” and make them feel like members of a large family.
The joy of being together was even more evident when the work was completed, when the group of participants moved to Lisbon for a trip “to the end of Europe”.
One of the participants, Maurizio Cei, VIDES Adviser, sums up the experience: “An old slogan of the Vides was recited, ‘equal in diversity’. It is precisely what we breathe every time during these days. A Babel of languages, yet an incredible ability, in the end, to understand each other. A difference of places and situations lived, yet the capacity to find out, precisely in those differences, the common points that serve to elaborate common strategies of work. Equal in diversity, therefore, discovering the value of differences and knowing how to bring them back within the large family that makes us somehow equal.”
