Image courtesy The Clewer Initative
By Filipe Domingues
ROME — Our Easter newsletter offers a small sample of the many activities at The Lay Centre over the past few months. We have welcomed students and young professionals from 12 countries, mostly from the Global South.
Through the generosity of our benefactors, The Lay Centre has been able to provide a welcoming environment and additional formation opportunities for the members of our community. Today and in the future, they are the lay people scattered around the world, who carry out activities of profound impact wherever they are.
Among them we have a new group of students that we decided to call “Impact Fellows.”
They are students of the pontifical universities whose presence in Rome is marked not only by their academic journey, but also by a serious involvement in an impactful project outside The Lay Centre community, tied to the local Church or to other social action initiatives.
Currently, we have four Impact Fellows, originally from Croatia, Italy, Romania and Ukraine, who are working on projects linked to social action (raising awareness about modern slavery); service (supporting our local church with liturgical and musical assistance); dialogue (offering support through listening and self-help groups); spirituality (peacebuilding, Christian unity and pilgrimage).
As we continue our mission of hospitality and formation, we look forward to welcoming an Afghani refugee to our community in 2022-2023. This young man, who will study at a pontifical university, will help to promote dialogue between Christianity and Islam.
By engaging with projects outside the resident community, these fellows open up to new horizons and prepare to make a real impact now and in the future.
The Impact Fellows have become an essential dimension of our expanded “Lay Leadership” program, through which The Lay Centre aims to promote the lay vocation in the Church and in the world, by recognizing its different expressions.
You can help us sustain Impact Fellows studies and projects by making a donation to the “Friends of The Lay Centre” fund set up through National Catholic Community Foundation (NCCF)
Click here to make a donation. Select Friends of The Lay Centre Fund from the drop-down list "Designate this donation for a specific purpose."
Contact info@laycentre.org for further information.
Thank you.
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