In a world shifting under our feet, we need to stop and breathe together.
The GNRC Assembly 2025, to be held this August in Madrid, takes place at a moment that few of us could have foreseen. A change of Pope, waves of political instability across continents, rising tensions and new fears—but also new openings. It’s easy to lose sight of each other, and of the deeper thread that connects us.
That’s why we gather. Not to escape history, but to face it. To listen again, from the ground up, to the faith that brings us together. To hear each other’s stories. To pray, sing, eat, speak, and walk side by side—even if we come from vastly different places. Even if we carry wounds. Especially if we carry hope.
The Assembly’s theme is Walking Together: Rainbow Challenges After the Synod. It’s a question, a path, and a decision. After the Synod process that invited so many Catholics to speak from the margins, after Pope Francis repeatedly reminded us to go where people actually live, what now? What does it mean to be Catholic, LGBTQ+, and part of a Church in transition?
We’ll explore these questions in Madrid, not with easy answers but with real voices. Some of those voices are well known: theologians like Cristina Inogés and James Alison, Sister María Luisa Berzosa whose witness continues to shape conversations in Rome, and scholars like Renato Lings. Others will speak more quietly—from Africa, from the edges, or from inside long silences.
The heart of the Assembly is the people who show up. Volunteers. Parents. Youth. Elders. Pastoral workers. Artists. Migrants. People who have left the Church, and those who never could. Those who whisper their faith. Those who shout it. Those who carry it like a fragile glass, or a flame that won’t go out.
In times of political instability, gathering in faith is an act of trust. Not in institutions alone, but in each other. Not in quick solutions, but in shared presence. Our Assembly is not designed as a protest or a performance. It is a space of community, where our joys and contradictions, our prayers and our doubts, can coexist.
Being together is the beginning of change… because it reminds us that we are not alone.
You are invited.
August 21–25. Madrid.
Bring your story. Bring your shoes. Bring your faith.
Let’s walk.
Alessandro Ludovico Previti