The Laity of the Chevalier Family in Preparation for the 2024 International Gathering
At the last International Gathering of the Laity of the Chevalier Family in Brazil 2017, it had been decided to hold the next International Gathering in 2023. The International Council together with the Tri-generalate agreed to hold that Gathering in the Philippines. A local Organizing Committee has been formed in the Philippines to prepare that Gathering. But we all know that since the beginning of the year 2020 we have been facing the Covid-19 pandemic and we don’t know when it will end; we are not sure when the ban on flights from different countries will be lifted. In the pandemic situation it is also difficult for people to raise funds and other activities. Therefore, the International Council together with the representatives of the Tri-generalate and the Philippine Organizing Committee at a Zoom meeting in June 2021 has decided to postpone the next International Gathering to January 2024. As a consequence of this decision, the local committee was asked to contact the Don Bosco retreat center where the Gathering will be held to move the booking to January, 2024.
Although the timing of the gathering is still relatively far in the future, the preparations are being continued by the International Council together with the local committee in the Philippines. At the zoom meeting of 24th July 2021, the Tri-generalate, the Philippines Organizing Committee, and the International Council through a communal wisdom discernment reflected on the Theme for the Gathering, which is now being finalized in a concrete proposal by the International Council and the Philippines Organizing Committee and it is hoped that by October or November 2021 the proposal will be sent to all the National Councils for ratification. We also talked about other things to be prepared like the funding, programs, graphics, logo, song for the Gathering and especially the technical things regarding the work of translation to assist all the Gathering participants together in one room, for example, by using Zoom as a means of translation.
For the follow-up and the progress of all these preparations, another joint meeting of the International Council, Tri-generalate and Philippines Organizing Committee has been scheduled for early next year 2022. All are invited to support the Philippines Organizing Committee together with the International Council in preparing this 2024 Gathering.