Rome (Italy). The 2nd CommTalkS, which took place in live streaming on 24 February 2024, with the questions of the young people from the Provinces of the world to the Mother Emerita of the Institute of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, Sister Yvonne Reungoat, participant in the ordinary assembly of the Synod in October 2023, is online.
The webinar was introduced by the Councilor for Social Communication, Sister Ausilia De Siena, who thanked the Provincial Communication Coordinators for having involved young people from all over the world in formulating the questions, which were then grouped by topic.
Mother Yvonne immediately expressed the joy of sharing this moment with the young people, many of whom were familiar faces during her visits as Mother General. “When I was participating in the Synod, I thought a lot about you, about all the young people of the world with whom we are in contact and I always said to myself, if only the young people were here! And you were present inside me.”
The Synod and synodality, the participation of lay people in the life of the Church, the role of the Episcopal Conferences, involvement and accompaniment, listening to young people far from the Church, are some of the questions that emerged. “If the Church is not synodal, it cannot transmit the Love of God; it cannot transmit the gospel; it cannot be a light in the heart of the world… I encourage you to discover this experience (of the Synod) and make it live in our educational environments. Presence, friendship, solidarity, and seeking together the paths that can be opened… I think that young people have this openness and the ability to invent, but they need to be supported,” are some of the words of the Mother emerita.
The digital environment, the internet, new languages, and digital missionaries to promote synodality, contact with other religions, sexuality, the acceptance of diversity, the role of women in the Church, are other questions, to which Mother Yvonne responded with joy and precision, expressing the importance of having firm convictions and the ability to engage in dialogue.
“The Church is all of us; it is not something outside of us. The Church is all those baptized in their vocations. We must become aware that the digital world is not a place, but a culture in which to bring the good news of the Gospel, which cannot remain outside of today’s culture. Young people are especially present. They have known the digital world since their birth; they have the ability to communicate with language that others can understand.
But it is important to first know what message we want to convey. It means having beliefs, values that we want to convey. We must create dialogue between contemporary culture and the Gospel that is enculturated. It is important to form ourselves and try to have initiatives to share with priests and educators to create these spaces of digital evangelization.”
Sister Ausilia concluded by thanking Mother Yvonne, whose “world vision, which touches the life and journey of the Church”, she admires, and expressing the certainty that she will bring these questions of young people to the next synod assembly which will be held from 2 to 27 October 2024. She then thanked the young people who studied the journey of the Church by asking interesting and profound questions; the FMA who acted as intermediaries, and the translators of the webinar. She recommended the use of this precious material for the animation of encounters:
“The recording of the webinar will remain on YouTube. I hope it can be useful for proposing it to groups of young people, perhaps for thematic groups. They can be re-proposed as video clips to further explore the topic and bring young people closer to the journey of the Church”.
