For the first time ever the Presidents of the Catholic Bishops’ Conferences of Europe (CCEE) will meet at St. Petersburg in Russia from 4 to 8 October, at the invitation of Monsignor Joseph Werth, President of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of the Russian Federation. On this occasion the Presidents of the 34 Bishops’ Conferences of Europe that are members of the CCEE will proceed to the election of the new CCEE ruling council for the five-year period 2006-2011 and of the bishops to chair the Commissions for the media, for the pastoral ministry to migrants, for catechesis, schools and universities, and for vocations. The theme of the plenary assembly will be reflection on the service of the CCEE, which is celebrating its 35th anniversary this year. The bishops will try to identify guidelines for the future activities of the CCEE in the field of evangelization. In the first part of the meeting a representative of the Orthodox Patriarchate of Moscow and the Archbishop of Moscow Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz will speak of the situation of religion and of the Church in Russia. The second part of the meeting will concentrate on the vocational ministry in Europe and the role of the priest. Also on the agenda are marriage and the family, the Church in Europe and the international situation, the relation between the Churches and the European Union and the process of European unification. The archbishop of Belgrade Stanislav Hocevar will introduce the next European Ecumenical Assembly (EEA3) due to be held in Sibiu, Romania, next year (4-9 September 2007).
