Promoting a Pastoral Care of Human Life at the Local Level

Between May and December 2025, 15 online meetings were held by the Dicastery’s Family and Life Area with 60 heads of the Offices for the Pastoral Care of Life from the Conferences of Bishops of every part of the world. Participants also included 31 directors of Family Institutes of Catholic Universities linked to the Dicastery and members of REDIUF, along with 18 leaders of international ecclesial movements and associations working in the field of the defence of life.

This was demanding, yet extraordinarily fruitful work, aimed at accompanying those involved in the formation of the laity on issues concerning the culture of life and the defence of the dignity of the human person. It is not easy to structure a systematic and ongoing pastoral commitment within local contexts to form a Leadership for Life in the local Churches, as advocated by the document “Life Is Always a Good”, published last March by the Dicastery. Nevertheless, the initiative sparked great interest among all the Offices involved, which felt accompanied and supported when facing cultural contexts that are now strongly secularized, where it is necessary to go back to the start – rediscovering our need for fundamental human values that make human coexistence possible, with respect for everyone and for each individual, from conception to the natural death of every person.

Listening. Welcoming insights and opportunities from all over the world

Those responsible for local pastoral care had a chance to share doubts, questions, experiences already undertaken, and the hope of launching new formative pathways, especially through collaboration among the Offices dedicated to the Pastoral Care of Life of Conferences of Bishops from different countries. This is a new opportunity, for which everyone made themselves available with enthusiasm and a spirit of service. Walking together, in fact, does not only mean being accompanied by the Holy See, but also collaborating among Churches from different countries and with similar cultural backgrounds.

Reflection. The educational challenge

In the area of formation, there was a shared sense of urgency to recover the centrality of a bioethics that places the human person at the centre, with his or her intrinsic and inalienable dignity in every stage and state of life. Today, widespread educational and relational poverty makes this formation complex. Yet the educational challenge is actually an opportunity not to take anything for granted and to start again from the foundations of Christian moral life, in order to rediscover the beauty of the truth engraved in human conscience.

To this end, the many participating universities made themselves available to collaborate with the Life Offices of the Conferences of Bishops and with movements’ leaders, in order to promote solid formation at the local level.

Restitution. Defining clear and shared language and effective communication

The Pastoral Care of Life requires to clearly define concepts and language concerning life and the dignity of the human person. Therefore, the importance of reaffirming the meaning of words and concepts starting from the Church’s Magisterium and from a clear Christian anthropology was shared, so that messages about the value and gift of life may be unequivocal. Communication itself, in this sense, must feel called to place itself at the service of truth and to become a means to spread the beauty of life in families, parishes, and educational contexts, where today confusion and uncertainty often prevail when important educational choices must be made.