OFFICIAL NAME
Missionary Community of Villaregia
ACRONYM
CMV
ESTABLISHED
1981
HISTORY
CMV has its origins in February 1981, in Quartu S. Elena (Sardegna), where men and women choosing celibacy and married couples came together in a shared desire to know and live by the Word of God, serve the poor and foster a life of friendship and fraternal communion. A few months later, this small nucleus was welcomed in the Veneto region by Bishop Sennen Corrà of Chioggia, who erected a Pious Union for worship and religion, seeing God at work in this first group of young people called to follow the Gospel in a radical way. According to the newly promulgated Code of Canon Law, on March 25th 1984, Bishop Corrà erected CMV as a diocesan association of the faithful. On 26th May 2002, the Pontifical Council for the Laity erected the Missionary Community of Villaregia as an international association of the faithful.
IDENTITY
The CMV’s members seek to live a life of close communion for which the Holy Trinity is the source and model; to dedicate themselves totally to the mission ad gentes; to live in trusting abandonment to Divine Providence. The formative process for members takes place mainly in the Community and is directed towards assimilation of the charism. For the missionaries it involves theological studies that are completed through their apostolate. Each CMV centre offers an integrated itinerary of human and Christian development as well as experiences of prayer and encounter with the Word of God, evangelisation, service and missionary volunteer work, and community and Christian friendship. The task of evangelisation is undertaken both in countries where Christianity is long established and in the young Churches, where the CMV runs parishes and does apostolic work, according to its distinct vocation. In countries where the Gospel has long been preached, CMV cooperates with parishes and various missionary bodies to awaken and nurture an ecclesiology of communion and openness to the universal mission of the Church. Members organise community and missionary animation days and evangelisation weekends for young people, couples and adults. They work in schools and with groups of various kinds in order to cooperate in teaching global awareness and friendly coexistence. They also promote international voluntary work. In addition, in conjunction with other organisations involved in the same services, they work to welcome immigrants and help alleviate local poverty, including in countries where Christianity has long been present.
ORGANISATION
The Community has always allowed for different vocations: clergy and laity, single and married, men and women, united by a single charism, the same spirituality, and the aspiration to be a community for the mission ad gentes. The Community is structured in different nuclei in which members live the evangelical counsels according to their state of life.
With them, as part of the same family, are associate members. They share the aims and spirituality of the Community, without taking on juridical ties to the Community. Among htem are relatives, volunteers, friends and benefactors who actively collaborate in the Community’s activities find in it a path of Christian formation and a space for missionary service, as well as a place where they can live a Trinitarian missionary spirituality.
WORKS
CMV recognises that human advancement is a fundamental dimension of evangelisation, and so it has set up facilities to aid development in Africa and Latin America. These include shelters for at-risk children; cultural centres to offer young people with financial difficulties a place for training; literacy schools; medical centres to provide health care for people who have no access to hospitals and for instruction on dietary and sanitary standards; pharmacies and soup kitchens; projects to empower women and children; support for families by providing micro-credit for start-up businesses. As a result of the Community's commitment in these regions, churches have also been built with adjoining premises for the catechumenate and catechesis, and missionary centres for the instruction of lay people, especially young people and families.
PUBLICATIONS
Comunità Missionaria di Villaregia, published every four months.
WEBSITE
HEADQUARTERS
Comunità Missionaria di Villaregia
Fraz. Villaregia, 16 - 45014 Porto Viro (Rovigo), Italy
Tel. [+39]0426 325032
E-mail: info@villaregia.org
