“It was a wonderful meeting. All the participants had the opportunity to share their experience”, declared to SIR Don Eugen Blaj, director of the Pontifical Missionary Societies (PMS) in Romania, guest in Bucharest of the meeting of the Conference of Missionary Childhood of Europe (Cime ). Starting on April 7, at the monastery of the Discalced Carmelite Fathers of Snagov, the event brought together forty-three participants from 25 European countries, accompanied by sr. Roberta Tremarelli, general secretary of the Opera della Santa Infazione in Rome. The next day, during mass, Don Blaj received from Msgr. Georges Colomb, the relic of Blessed Pauline Jaricot, sent by the bishop of Lyon. “It is a small piece of fabric from Blessed Pauline’s dress. She will be exhibited in the Pom chapel in Bucharest,” explained the Romanian priest. On the evening of April 9, the archbishop of Bucharest Msgr. Aurel Perca celebrated the mass animated by around twenty Romanian missionary children and the following morning was dedicated to reflection on cooperation, led by the Jesuit Marius Taloș. In the afternoon, the participants visited the three cathedrals of Bucharest – Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic and Orthodox – and the apostolic nunciature, and in the following days, some of them were able to see different cultural and religious realities of the country. On Saturday morning they will meet a group of Romanian missionary children of the Roma ethnic group in Blaj. The next Cime meeting will be in 2026 in Slovakia.
