Next Friday, July 21st, approximately 300 children, teenagers, and advisors from across the state will gather at the Sanctuary of Health and Peace in Belo Horizonte for the opening of the 7th State Congress of IAM – Missionary Childhood and Adolescence. The meeting will continue until Sunday with a full program.

The opening Mass will be on Friday at 7 pm, presided over by Dom Nivaldo dos Santos, auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Belo Horizonte and representative of the IAM (Infant Missionary Association). The ceremony will be broadcast live on the Padre Eustáquio Channel on YouTube.

On Saturday, activities begin early in the morning at the Padre Eustáquio Theater auditorium, attached to the church in the northwest region of Belo Horizonte. With the theme: The Joy of Communion in Mission, participants aged 8 to 15 will experience lectures, workshops, cultural presentations, moments of prayer, and sharing experiences. At 6 PM, in the church square, there will be a meditation on the Holy Rosary, done in a unique way, with the children themselves assembling a giant rosary while praying.

On Sunday morning, the children will gather at Father Eustáquio Church for the closing of the Congress and Holy Mass at 11:30 am, which will also be broadcast live.

The welcoming and support for the Congress will be provided by the State Coordinator for Missionary Childhood and Adolescence in Minas Gerais, Sandra Bonine, by the Rector of the Archdiocesan Sanctuary of Health and Peace, Father Vinícius Maciel, SS.CC., and by the Archdiocesan Coordinator Margarete Julião. In addition, six other advisors from the Archdiocese of Belo Horizonte, who organized the program and structure of the Congress, will be available to the press during the event.

Missionary Childhood and Adolescence

The Pontifical Society of the Holy Childhood (IAM) was founded on May 19, 1843, when a bishop in France was moved by the reality described by the missionaries who evangelized in China, with whom he had a close connection since adolescence.

To fulfill the missionaries' request, the bishop called upon the children of France to help other children. Thus, they pledged to pray a Hail Mary every day for the children of China and to help them with a coin each month, an expression of Christian charity and universal solidarity.

In 1922, Pope Pius XI declared the Society of the Holy Childhood as "Pontifical," approving and assuming its organization and witness as an evangelizing work at the service of the Church throughout the world.