Also in the news

On Saturday, March 25, 2023, the Ordinary General Assembly of the Association of Catholic Communicators of Paraguay (ACCP-SIGNIS Paraguay) was held virtually.  The Directive 2021-2023 presented the Report and Balance of everything acted on during its two years of management.  Among the activities carried out, the outgoing president, Omar Bogado, highlighted the participation of eight young Paraguayans in the RadioLío-La Chispa de la Palabra training program, organized by SIGNIS ALC. He also spoke about the participation of the association in the Listening Process of the Ecclesial Assembly of Latin America and the Caribbean through a meeting in which he reflected on the type of Church "that we want and dream, taking into account the new challenges in the light of the Fifth General Conference of Aparecida, the signs of the times and the Magisterium of Pope Francis". He also mentioned the participation in the VI Latin American and Caribbean Communication Congress (VI COMLAC), which took place in Panama in July 2022.  During that Congress, members Alejandra Sosa, Luis Núñez Chera and Sofía Ferreira attended RadioLío’s face-to-face training, along with other young people from 11 Latin American and Caribbean countries. In total, there were five days of training in different workspaces, such as community radio stations and Catholic television stations. The biggest challenge was to implement everything learned in the coverage of COMLAC VI through rotating teams. Subsequently, Bogado mentioned ACCP-SIGNIS Paraguay’s commitment to its partners' professional training and the incorporation of new members who wish to strengthen their communication knowledge and serve in that field.  Finally, a vote took place to elect the new Steering Committee for the period 2023-2025, which was formed as follows:  Chairwoman: Lourdes Aquino Vice-Chairman: Marcos Cabaña Lead Directors: Karina Benítez, Sofía Ferreira and Aníbal Casco Alternate Director: Beatriz Pompa Lead Trustee: Jorge García Riart Alternate Trustee: Luis Núñez Chera The partners of the new Directive committed to continue with the projects carried on by ACCP-SIGNIS Paraguay and promote transformative, different, and open communication. Source: ACCP-SIGNIS Paraguay.

Last September SIGNIS held its Assembly of Delegates in Brussels, Belgium, for the first time since the beginning of the covid-19 pandemic. Here, the institutional and financial reports were presented, the new Delegates were introduced and the Board of Directors for the 2022-2026 period was approved.  During the second day of the Assembly, Dr. Nataša Govekar, director of the Department of Pastoral Theology in the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication and the Dicastery’s representative for SIGNIS, addressed the participants with an inspiring speech about community building within the Church.  In her speech, Dr. Govekar takes into consideration the difficulties the Church is facing at all levels, underlining a certain struggle in rediscovering and better understanding its mission in a time of epochal changes and fast advancement. She stressed how, in this period of uncertainty, many initiatives and entities connected to the Church ended up being concerned only with themselves and many ecclesiastical establishments seemed to be, as Pope Francis wrote in the Message to the Pontifical Mission Societies in 2020, “swallowed up by the obsession of promoting themselves and their own initiatives, as if that were the objective and goal of their mission”. Dr. Govekar opposed these types of behavior to the silent work of the Holy Spirit, and how it is extremely important nowadays to have faith in the idea that chaos and confusion are fundamental steps into achieving harmony, exactly how it happened during Pentecost. “The Holy Spirit is sowing something new, even if we don’t see it yet”, she affirmed. According to her, the Holy Spirit is moving SIGNIS through the potential creation of strong networks and communities, therefore becoming more than a steady establishment, but rather a “translator of the Gospel message into the world of multimedia”. In order to do so, Nataša Govekar underlined the importance of “servant leaders”, meaning people who can facilitate community building and do not care about “occupying a position”, but rather on spending time at the service of the Church.  “The Church desperately needs people who are able to forget themselves and recognize the gifts and talents of others and are willing to put all the talents in common”, Dr. Govekar claimed, as she urged the members of the Assembly to become facilitators of God’s work in others, in all members of SIGNIS for the benefit of all who SIGNIS wants to serve.  As the Church, along with the entire world, is facing new challenges and re-learning how to communicate and discover others, Dr. Govekar incited everyone to see SIGNIS not only as an organization, but as part of the communitarian journey which needs the contribution of all of its members not only as professionals but as brothers and sisters.  SIGNIS’ representative of the Dicastery for Communication then proceeded to conclude her speech with words of hope and affirmation: “Let us not be afraid to give space and trust to a younger generation, who desires to share not only the execution of the projects, but also the spirit from which the projects are born. Let us remember that only trust can generate trust and can make us all grow in responsibility for a common mission”.