AMERICA/PANAMA - “The Eucharist: Source and Summit of Our Mission,” theme of the 39th Eucharistic Congress, during which the Archdiocese will launch its Great Mission

Panama City (Agenzia Fides) – The Archdiocese of Panama will officially launch its Great Mission, this Sunday, June 21, at 9am, in the Roberto Mano Arena of Piedra Duran, on the occasion of its 39th Eucharistic Congress.
With the theme: “The Eucharist: Source and Summit of Our Mission,” 11,000 Catholics are expected to crowd the Roberto Mano Arena in Piedra Duran, to attend the Mass to be presided by Archbishop Jose Dimas Cedeño Delgado of Panama City and concelebrated by Auxiliary Bishops Pablo Varela and Jose Domingo Ulloa, and the priests from the Archdiocese's 95 parishes. An hour prior to the Mass, the priests will administrate the Sacrament of Confession.
The Mission is the beginning of the itinerary that will lead up to the 2013 celebration of the 500th Anniversary of the Evangelization of Panama, the First Church on Land on the American Continent. The Continental Mission proposed by the Bishops of Latin America was officially launched in Quito, Ecuador, in 2008, during the celebration of the Third American Missionary Congress. The Church in Panama made their official launching on March 1, 2009, in Atalaya, Veraguas.
According to the organizing committee for the Eucharistic Congress, led by Fr. Romulo Aguilar and Fr. David Cosca, the mission is an effort to place the Church in a permanent state of mission, without an official end, that can serve as a time of grace that leads to an encounter with the Living Christ, who calls us to a personal and pastoral conversion, and as a result, to ecclesial renewal and transformation in the society. (RG) (Agenzia Fides 15/6/2009)