National Team and Regional Chairs gather in California

Twenty-seven members of the National Team of Accompaniment for the the V Encuentro and fourteen Chairs of Episcopal Regions gathered at Mount Carmelo Retreat House in Redlands, CA along with a few invited guests from Region XI and sponsoring organizations. Participants were welcomed by Alejandro Aguilera-Titus from the USCCB Subcommittee on Hispanic Affairs who introduced Laureen Aguayo as the new National Coordinator for the V Encuentro. Alejandro reminded participants that we are in the final stage of preparation for the V Encuentro and that the goal for 2016 is the forming of diocesan and parish teams. Bishop Gerald Barnes, outgoing chair for the Subcommittee for Hispanic Affairs gave a brief message to ENAVE and ERAVE noting that the majority of Latinos living in the United States were born in the United Stated yet the majority that we serve or are involved in the Church are immigrants. He raised the question,

"How will we reach them? It is critical that we reach out to the 3rd and 4

th

 generations. The 1

st

 generation does not know the story of Hispanic Ministry of this country. "

Bishop Barnes urged us to come at the V Encuentro from numerous directions. Bishop Nelson Perez, the new chair of the Subcommittee for Hispanic Affairs noted that the processes and materials that are prepared must reach those who do not live the "Church" day in and day out.

"We are called to Evangelize and Pope Francis is inviting us to an "encounter" at the periphery, outside our comfort zone. The V Encuentro will set the stage but we will have to figure out how to do it. Each of the previous Encuentros left its mark and its gift. It is a struggle, the voices of advocates give us the future, but it doesn’t happen right away. Whatever will happen, will not happen right away. What we are doing is planting the seed, it is sown. And the seed will grow and we may not see the result, or at least not right away. This is what we are doing together in 

conjunto

. It is messy. We are building on the shoulders of the giants of Hispanic Ministry who have worked and built and now we take it to the next level."

Participants were introduced to a new PowerPoint to be used with the Fact Sheet found on Teamwork and on the V Encuentro website. This Fact Sheet and an introductory letter was sent out to all the Bishops of the United States. Dr. Patty Jiménez then presented the current status of the logo. Fifteen submissions were voted on by the ENAVE members and ERAVE Chairs. The selected logo did not receive a warm reception and there was a great diversity of responses on how to improve it. The Communications Team took into account all that was shared and a new plan was developed for the design of the V Encuentro Logo. Read here to learn about the new official logo design. Alejandro Aguilera-Titus then presented the role and responsibilities of ENAVE member organizations with new categories (Partners and Collaborators) of relationship and commitment to the V Encuentro. Other Catholic national organizations or Institutions (NCCL, NCEA, Priests Councils, Leadership Conference of Women Religious

, Conference of Major Superiors

, etc.), need to be engaged and invited to participate in the V Encuentro Process and marketing materials need to be developed in order to invite them. A Partnership brochure has already been developed and can be found on our website. Dr. Patty Jiménez reviewed how to use the Teamwork platform, an online project management software, to access the V encuentro documents and Fr. Hector Madrigal presented the 2015 Expense Report as well as the 2016 Budget for ENAVE. The Episcopal Regional Chairs were then invited to report about their experience of the past year by sharing highlights and challenges that they are experiencing in their regional work. A highlight repeated by various chairs was the successful participation in their regional meetings and a positive response from the participants. They are successfully reaching out to the many dioceses in their regions and several dioceses that had not previously participated in regional gatherings have responded. The greatest challenge is connecting to dioceses where there is no diocesan director of Hispanic Ministry. Sr. Anna Marie Reha then presented the Manual for Diocesan V Encuentro Teams which provides the information needed to offer the Encuentro Experience training to diocesan teams. The manual can be found on Teamwork and on the V Encuentro website and is available in both Spanish and English. Alejandro Aguilera gave an overview of the Spirituality of the V Encuentro using the Emmaus Story and Olga Villar, from the Archdiocese of Mobile, AL shared a powerful personal reflection of "Encuentro" from a Latina perspective. Concluding, Dr. Hosffman Ospino gave an update on the development of the Process Guide. Participants then had an opportunity to provide feedback to Dr. Ospino who is working with a team of writers to complete the guide in the coming months. ENAVE and ERAVE will gather again on Monday, July 18 in St. Louis, MO in conjunction with NCADDHM’a annual conference. 2016 © ENAVE. All Rights Reserved.

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