OFFICIAL NAME
Comunità Cenacolo
FOUNDATION
1983
HISTORY
The Cenacolo Community was born on July 16, 1983, on the feast of Our Lady of Carmine. Rita Petrozzi (Mother Elvira), after years of waiting, during which she felt a strong inner urge to dedicate herself to the young people she saw lost in the false illusions of the world, received the keys to an abandoned house in the hills of Saluzzo (Cuneo - Italy) where she began to welcome sad and lost young people, who were looking for a way of salvation and of meaning for their lives. Thus began an "adventure" without material security, but sustained by the certainty of God's faithfulness and a profound sense that what those young people were seeking was not just something, but Someone: the face of the Father. Over the years, the number of people in need of help who turned to the budding community increased and it became necessary to open other houses, first in Italy and then in other countries around the world. This opened the way to an unexpected and unplanned missionary horizon. The first diocesan canonical approval dates back to Pentecost 1998. On July 16, 2009, the Pontifical Council for the Laity decreed the recognition of the Comunità Cenacolo as an international association of the faithful.
IDENTITY
The Cenacolo Community wishes to be a living sign of God's merciful love for young people, families and people wounded by life, sometimes far from the faith, proposing the Christian life as an authentic response to the anxieties of the human soul. The Community is not only a place of recovery and social assistance, but a family that educates people in freedom and hope through a clear proposal of the Christian experience, in the certainty that the rediscovery of faith in God restores dignity and beauty to the human person.
The members of the Community pursue their own personal sanctification by living a strongly Eucharistic and Marian spirituality, in trusting and total abandonment to Divine Providence. They are committed to the free acceptance of and service towards those who, especially because of drugs and other addictions, live a situation of existential loss, sharing with them the path called "School of Life", which involves fraternal life, friendship, prayer, work and sharing. Witness and mission are lived by all members, who understand this as an essential part of the need to announce with their lives that the encounter with the Risen One sets people free and makes of them a “new creation”.
STRUCTURE
The Cenacolo Community is composed of dedicated members, ordinary members and members belonging to the Public Association of the Faithful "Missionary Sisters of the Resurrection", who have the rights of dedicated members. Dedicated members have a residential community life, committing themselves full time to the activities of the Community, and are the core of the Community. Ordinary members participate in the life of the association, drawing nourishment and support from it to live out their Christian witness in the ordinary conditions of their family, professional and social lives. The governing bodies of the Association are the General Assembly and the Council, consisting of the President, the Vice-President and the elected councillors. Numerous volunteers, friends and collaborators also participate in the life and activities of the Community, even if they are not members.
WORKS
The Cenacolo Community carries out its activities throughout the world by means of a number of works, known as "Fraternities": houses for the recovery of people who face serious misadventure and addiction; houses for street children, houses of prayer and spirituality and social cooperatives. There are also listening centres for disadvantaged people, family groups to support parents marked by the serious difficulties of their children, and prayer groups. The Community lives out the proclamation of the Gospel wherever it is present through its works of charity, which are a sign of resurrection and a source of faith and hope. Not infrequently, young people received by the Community will give testimony (in schools, parishes, public squares, and even through musicals and recitals) of their encounter with the Risen Lord who has drawn them from "darkness to light". The Community organises periodic meetings and retreats to accompany in faith young people, married couples, families and people in need. Every year, in the month of July, there is an international meeting called "Festival of Life", which involves four days of prayer, meetings, testimonies, catechesis and musicals to praise and bless the God of Life.
PUBLICATIONS
Risurrezione, quarterly.
WEBSITE
http://www.comunitacenacolo.it
HEADQUARTERS
Comunità Cenacolo
Via San Lorenzo, 35
12037 Saluzzo (CN)
Italia
Tel. [+39] 0175.46122 - Fax [+39] 0175.476369
E-mail: ass.fedeli@comunitacenacolo.it; info@comunitacenacolo.it
