On April 20-28, 2023, the 2023 Assisi Project Pilgrimage took place in Italy. The main theme of this formation event was the Franciscan Centenary and its 800th anniversary celebrations. The fifteen participants involved explored themes of peace, safeguarding creation and integral ecology.
The event was organized by the Franciscan Commission for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation (JPIC) of the Federatio Europae Mediae et Orientalis (FEMO) and the Ecological Movement of St. Francis of Assisi (REFA). It was conducted as part of the Integral Ecology Leadership School program. Three of the pilgrims were friars and the rest were REFA members and lay collaborators. Friar Stanisław JAROMI, the Director of the Pilgrimage Project, coordinated the event. The pilgrimage was divided into three parts: three days in Assisi, two days visiting Franciscan shrines and three days in Rome and the Vatican.
In Assisi, the pilgrims visited places connected with St. Francis and St. Clare. At the Franciscan Center for Dialogue (CEFID), they discussed projects for peace and reconciliation. At the Sacred Convent, they visited the treasures of the library, and discovered Franciscan history and art. At San Damiano and the Portiuncola, they explored the vocation stories of the saints of Assisi. On April 22, Earth Day, they prayed for our common home before the tomb of St. Francis.
Their pilgrimage continued to various Franciscan sites in the Region of Umbria, where they visited Lake Trasimeno, the Le Celle hermitage near Cortona, the Shrine of St. Margaret of Cortona, Mount La Verna and the town of Gubbio. They went on to visit sites connected with the Franciscan Centenary: Greccio, Poggio Bustone, Foresta, Fonte Colombo and Rieti. At each of these locations, the participants reflected on the Franciscan legacy and contemporary pastoral and ecological projects.
The participants entered Rome through the Appia Antica Regional Park and were hosted at the Friary of St. Maximilian M. Kolbe. From there, they made a pilgrimage on foot to the Vatican and a papal audience. Next, they took the subway to the Papal Basilica of St. John Lateran, where eight hundred years ago, St. Francis and his friars presented their rule of life. The pilgrims continued on to the General Curia where they learned some of the history and important events connected with the Friary and Basilica of the Twelve Holy Apostles. Finally, they attended a formation meeting at the JPIC office and heard a worthwhile lecture by Friar Michael LASKY.
Edited by Friar Stanisław JAROMI
