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August 20, 2008
About 40 Sabans attended two sessions of pre-conference briefings on the
Diocese Jubilee project, a document entitled Diocesan Mission Plan 2008-2011. Sabans
have been on five different study groups to prepare a Reality Framework, which is
the basis of the Plan. This is the first time that the Diocese has had such a plan.
Anastasia Simmons opened up the first session Monday evening in one of the large
Med School lecture halls. Conference General Coordinator Erich van der Hoeven
explained that the desire for a Pastoral Plan had come from the fifth general
Episcopal Conference for Latin America and the Caribbean held in Aparecida,
Brazil, in 2007.
The Willemstad Diocese decided to use this energy plus the 2008
50th anniversary of the Diocese to create its first ever Pastoral or Mission Plan.
Van der Hoeven emphasized that the Jubilee slogan is: "Celebration and unity in
diversity." It was mandated that the Plan take into consideration input from the
Parish Level, and many meetings have been held to gather this information from the
roots and mould it into a document that will be the focus of a final conference in
Curacao later this year. Interviews and surveys were used to gather information on
the current situation to see what needed to be done.
The thrust of the Plan will be
to increase the sense of belonging to Church and community. To this end five topics
were explored by all Antillean Parish groups. These were Union/Communion, Planification and Structure, Education and Formation, Evangelization and Mission, and
Liturgy and Spirituality. Each of the five Saba groups gave the results of their
discussions during the pre-conference meetings.
Saba representatives will take any
edits to the conference document to the October meeting. The second session was held
on Tuesday evening.
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