Ariccia (AsiaNews) – The 13th general assembly of the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME) opened today in Ariccia, near Rome, on the theme of “Communion and Mission 'ad extra' in the 3rd millennium.” The assembly, which meets every six years, has the task of reviewing the work of PIME missionaries, looking at new possibilities for evangelisation, and electing its new superior general and governing board.
The assembly officially opened last Sunday with a prayer vigil led by current Superior General Fr Gian Battista Zanchi. Several priests, women religious, relatives and PIME friends took part in the ceremony.
Yesterday, after settling procedural issues, work got underway with the presentations and discussions of various reports from the institute’s various regions.
Over the next month 44 PIME members will work in Ariccia; they represent about 600 priests and lay people who are part of the PIME family.
The institute has missionaries in Oceania (Papua New Guinea), Africa (Guinea Bissau, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Algeria), the Americas (Brazil, Mexico, US), Italy, and especially Asia (India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Cambodia, Thailand, Hong Kong–China, Philippines, and Japan).
Participants will discuss issues like refocusing PIME’s identity, above all from a spiritual point of view and then looking at it as an institution totally committed to missionary work (where members make a commitment for life, "ad gentes", to the nations, to non Christians) as a specific proposal, different from others wich imply commitments that are limited in time or focused on one’s own culture and country.
At the same time, participants will look at how PIME can study new ways of evangelisation (bearing witness among Muslims, getting involved in charitable and social work in countries where the mission is banned, providing education and training to priests and lay people from different cultural backgrounds and nations).
The role of media like our own AsiaNews agency is also included in these new ways that will come under consideration.
