Remembering, thanking, asking for forgiveness and looking to the future. 

Dear friends:

As we approach the end of this WUCWO period (2018-2023), I think it is appropriate to make memory and take stock. In Italian, the etymology of the verb remember [ricordare] is “to bring to heart”. We started in Africa, at the General Assembly in Dakar, with the joy and welcome of so many wonderful women from our organisations in that region.

Assisi 2023: a "Franciscan" General Assembly. 

Dear friends:

As I stand before the Lord praying for the upcoming General Assembly, the lives of St. Francis and St. Clare take on greater relevance within me, as models of what we will live at our meeting in Assisi 2023.

Francis and Clare are saints who changed the relationship between man and nature in the Middle Ages. If we contemplate the countryside of Assisi, we will better understand how the famous Canticle of the Creatures was born there. We can make great strides in our commitment to transform the planet into our Common Home. Francis is considered the precursor of integral ecology. He listened to God through the "book of nature", he established a dialogue with the birds and the fish. If we go deeper into his spirituality, we will be able to find the key to the Laudato si' interpretation and application.

Thanking Pope Francis for his 10 years of pontificate. 

Dear friends,

on behalf of the women of WUCWO I would like to thank Pope Francis whom, since March 13, 2013 and following his predecessors, leads us deepening the application of the Second Vatican Council. For this, I invite you to recall his facts, speeches and actions from the beginning of his pontificate to this day in order to try to understand at least something of his Magisterium.

The passion for evangelisation. 

Dear friends,

The passion for evangelisation, that means, apostolic zeal, is a vital dimension for the Church, tells us the Pope in one of his last Wednesday catechesis. It seems important to me, with the grace of the Holy Spirit and following the pontifical magisterium, to deepen this aspect of WUCWO’s purpose, which is to promote the co-responsibility of women in evangelisation.

Happy and fruitful Year 2023! 

St. John XXIII told the women of WUCWO: "Dear daughters: great are your responsibilities in today's world, which expects from you the light of your faith, the ardour of your hope and the zeal of your charity! May the extent of your influence be in proportion to the hopes it awakens!" (Audience of 3^rd May 1961).

Welcome, protect, promote and integrate walking towards Assisi 2023.

Dear friends:

Days ago I was at the presentation of the autobiographic book of a woman who spent 30 years risking her life to create a space in which the victims of war and conflicts were protected. There I heard again the four verbs that Pope Francis gave us to address the problem of migrants and refugees: welcome, protect, promote and integrate. In the prayer of this morning, spontaneously arose inside of me a prayer that sounded like this:

Towards the General Assembly 2023 with Francis and Clare. 

Dear friends:

We started on the 1^st of November 2022 the registration for the General Assembly. Our motto is: “Women of WUCWO: artisans of human fraternity for world peace”. Two great saints: Francis and Clare, lead us by the hand to Assisi 2023, from 14-20 May and to the private audience with Pope Francis, on Saturday 13^th May, in Rome.

The encounter with Francis as a moment of conversion. 

All WUCWO women are summoned to a private audience with Pope Francis on 13 May 2023; this event will be the threshold of our General Assembly in Assisi.

In this month of October, I entrust each one of you, women of our organisations, to Saint Therese of the Child Jesus (whom we celebrate on the 1st of this month) to guide our journey of conversion towards WUCWO with a synodal style that will be manifested in the audience with the Pope and in the Assembly 2023.

Dear friends,

This month I would like to invite you to join me in a thanksgiving to God for everything received at WUCWO. Three verbs come spontaneously to me: to listen, to share and to grow. Let me share with you just some of the good news I have recently collected and in some cases experienced, region by region.

Dear friends,

“The joy of the gospel fills the hearts and lives of all who encounter Jesus” (EG 1). This is how I imagine our meeting will be like at the next General Assembly in Assisi, from 14 to 20 May 2023, preceded on 13 May by an audience with Pope Francis in Rome, to which all the women of WUCWO are invited. We are very grateful to the Holy Father!

Dear friends,

“I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you”, this is how the story of the Last Supper begins and hence the title of the recent papal document, Desiderio desideravi, which Pope Francis has chosen to give us a new gift. It is a kind of meditation on the Liturgy, so that we may recover the “wonder” in the face of mystery and allow ourselves to be penetrated by the One who unites Truth and Beauty in Himself. “Beauty, just like truth, always engenders wonder, and when these are referred to the mystery of God, they lead to adoration” (DD 25).