“It’s essential that the young be enabled to discover that Christian life is possible today, and is also reasonable and realizable. But if they are to do so, it is necessary they find people, whether in their own age group or older persons, who live the Christian faith in a joyful and coherent way”. The point was made by the Bishop of Gerona, Carles Soler, on inaugurating the new pastoral year in recent days. “The youth mission is the primary objective for the Church of Gerona in the months ahead”, said the bishop. Following the path pursued in recent years, the diocese will continue its policy of amalgamating parishes and promoting, coordinating and forming the apostolate of the laity. If on the one hand “the progressive lack of priests” is manifest, on the other, there is, Bishop Soler underlined, a need to invest “with determination in an integrated pastoral ministry, in which the participation of laymen and laywomen, and of male and female religious, is indispensable”.
