Dear friends,

dear applicants to the JECI-MIEC Colloquium 2014,

with this notification we would like to apologize for the fact that we had to withdraw the call for the Colloquium “Young Christians and Sexuality in the 21st Century’s Europe” – “The Choice of our lifestyle” for the fact that it contained a mistake done in the process of editing the call.

Unfortunately, this mistake concerned the financial regulations related to the participants’ reimbursements mentioned in the call.

Upon the decision of the European Team it was regarded necessary to update the call with the correct information and at the same time, as a means of transparency, to communicate to you the relevant changes:

Instead of a 100% reimbursement of travel costs, JECI-MIEC is only able to cover 90% of your travel costs to the Colloquium.

At this point we would also like to mention that we will still try to do everything within our measures to assure you a 100% reimbursement, but for budgeting reasons it could not be kept in the official call.

We hope for your understanding and that this change of criteria will not be a reason for you not to apply to our Colloquium.

Together with this notification you will receive an updated version of our call (with the changes marked in yellow) which is now legally binding.

Anyway we will ask any applicants after having received their application whether they were informed about the change and whether they consent to it.

Once more we would like to apologize for the unprofessional work and this personal mistake of the person responsible for editing the call.

With best regards,

Maximilian Niessen

on behalf of the European Team

To: All Organizations and Federations of the European Coordination JECI-MIEC

Dear friends from the national organizations,

the European Coordination JECI-MIEC has the great pleasure to invite all the national member organizations to nominate participants for the Colloquium “Young Christians and Sexuality in the 21st Century’s Europe” – “The Choice of our lifestyle”, which will be taking place in the Monastery of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, Obukhiv (Kyiv region), Ukraine from 23^rd – 30^th March 2014 (including arrival and departure day).

The Colloquium is targeted to both: Secondary and University Students.

This Colloquium is co-financed by the European Youth Foundation (EYF) regularly alternating with other typical activities of the European Coordination JECI-MIEC.

What is our Colloquium about?

Understanding of sexuality in 21st century’s Europe is diverse – as the debates and controversies are. Although Europe’s history and culture has been profoundly shaped by Christian values, European secular societies are nowadays facing the “challenge”, that to the tradition of living in a two-sexes-lifestyle there are many more options, which might even will have their role to play as it regards the demographic development of future Europe. Especially as secular positions towards sexuality meet faith-based (and particularly Christian) convictions and beliefs, debates and discussions tend to become inevitable: Some topics such as sexual orientation, marriage and divorce concern particular lifestyles, while others such as contraception and abortion even have controversial ethical implications. Most recently topics such as pedophilia and sexual abuse within Church have been subjected to strong criticism globally. What does this have to do with young people in Europe?

The European Coordination JECI-MIEC is a platform of secondary and university students in Europe who share their common identity as Catholic believers. Taking into account contemporary developments, it is clear that apart from morals and values concerning sexuality also Christianity in itself has further developed. Different world-views and debates on what is, can or should be allowed in one’s sexual life do not only come up between Church and secular society, but exist also within the community of Christian and especially Catholic believers in Europe and beyond. To give an example: “What is in the eyes of a Catholic student better? A committed homosexual partnership or a ‘proper’ marriage where there is disrespect and violence?” As recognizable from this question, decisions on (especially one’s own) sexuality need to be taken individually, consciously, respectful and responsibly – even if there for sure exist collective catalogues of values from several secular and religious instances.

Our colloquium therefore aims at raising awareness about the diversity existing among secular societies and Christians in Europe as it regards the topic sexuality and the reality of young people (SEE), to enable the participants of this colloquium to take their decisions on their sexuality more consciously and without prejudices or discrimination (JUDGE) and to make society aware of the results of these reflections (ACT).

Out of the variety of topics and issues existing, JECI-MIEC decided upon the following fields of interests to be addressed during the colloquium:

1)      sexual orientation: particularly topics such as heterosexuality, homosexuality, transgender and queer-theory;

2)      sexuality and responsibilities: particularly pregnancy, abortion, contraception;

3)      decisions and life-styles such as traditional family models and alternative concepts existing;

4)      sexual disorders such as pedophilia;

5)      sexual abuse within Church as a current global debate relevant to both believers and non-believers.

Please find forwarded with this notification the call for participants in PDF format as well as the participants’ application form in WORD format.

Deadline for completing the participants’ application form: 31^st December 2013.

We kindly ask you to disseminate this call among your membership!

(co-financed by the European Youth Foundation)

Colloquium2014 – Participants Call – UPDATED Colloquium2014 -Notification of Change and Letter of Excuse Colloquium2014 – Application Form