Annual Report. PATRIARCHAL CURIA UGCC 2019

47 National Family Day Congress Families need a special place to share their faith and to be encouraged in their ministry. The UGCC Commission on Family organized the sixth annual Family Day Congress, which took place on May 18, 2019 on the premises of the Lviv Holy Spirit Seminary. The main theme of the Congress was: "You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit" (John 15,16). The main goal of the Congress was to help the UGCC family parish movements to grow and provide a networking opportunity to share the best pastoral practices in family ministry. There are 5 large parish family movements in the UGCC: "Movement of Christian families", "Married couples encounters", "Light of life: Domestic Church", "Movement of Nazareth Families", "Cana Movement". We hope that the num- ber of people involved in these ministers will increase. "This year we hosted 300 families who represented active members of the UGCC Family movements as well as the members of the smaller parish family movements", stated Fr. Vasyl Nester, head of the UGCC Commission on Family. The main speakers of the Congress were an Italian couple active in family min- istry Giancarlo Corsi and Maria Christina Rossi. The couple has dedicated over 40 years to the family ministry in Italy. They shared the best practices of how to expand family movements in Italy and how the Church could become a welcoming place for families. The Church is, in a real way, a family among families, and senses the need to support families in their efforts to respond faithfully and joyfully to their God-given vocation in society Pope Francis