The Catholic Church wants to welcome and give hope to unemployed youth or those who work in precarious conditions, even if they do not have the financial resources to help them, stresses the new head of the National Youth Ministry Department (DNPJ).
“We may not have anything to give in economic and material terms, but we have an embrace of welcome, hope and confidence to give,” Father Eduardo Novo, 32, who in December began a three-year term told the ECCLESIA Agency.
The priest of the Congregation of the Marianos da Imaculada Conceição has as priorities the commitment to training and the media, in addition to the accentuation of the spirituality linked to the Virgin Mary, in connection with the centenary of the apparitions of Fatima, which takes place in 2017.
The DNPJ will "clearly invest in social communication" through the website and social networks on the internet, and commit to "continuous training in various aspects", said the religious from Trás-os-Montes.
"More than providing intellectual training, it is intended to be an experiential journey, in which each person has a personal encounter with Christ", stressed the official, who considers the possibility of launching a "national publication that is an itinerary for young people" .
The religious intends to create an intensive course for those responsible for the diocesan youth secretariats and intends to see the discipline of Youth Ministry in the formation of seminarians.
Father Pablo Lima's successor has as medium-term goals to invest in “Fátima Jovem”, an annual meeting at the sanctuary of Cova da Iria, and prepare the next WYD, scheduled for 2013 in Rio de Janeiro.
“I didn't want to drop a possible candidacy for Portugal to host a World Youth Day. We have the conditions for that”, said the priest who lives in the convent of Balsamão, Macedo de Cavaleiros, 500 km northeast of Lisbon.
The new person in charge intends to continue working with the team members of the DNPJ and expand it to new elements, at the same time that it will meet with the diocesan bishops and directors of the Youth Ministry secretariats, with whom he wants to maintain “a very close relationship”.
Father Eduardo Novo wants his mandate to be marked by "greater involvement", "co-responsibility" and "social sensitivity" on the part of youth who have "difficulties in dialoguing with the Church hierarchy, due to lack of knowledge".
In the first message he addresses to young Catholics as director of Youth Ministry, the priest asks them to be “firm in faith”, “joyful in hope” and “generous in charity”, assuming the “commitment to transforming reality”.
The appointment, received with surprise, forced the priest to suspend his doctorate in Educational Sciences: “I felt small, with a mixture of enthusiasm and fear. I asked myself how it was possible that the bishops remembered an individual who is in Trás-os-Montes”.
The religious coordinates the Youth and Vocation Ministry of his congregation and in September the new bishop of Bragança-Miranda, Dom José Cordeiro, gave him the same responsibility for the diocese: “In Bragança everything was at zero. There was nothing,” he explained.
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