The Strength of the Excluded: World Meeting of Popular Movements at the Vatican
The importance and impact of a ground-breaking meeting:
The Strength of the Excluded: World Meeting of Popular Movements at the Vatican
The world meeting of grassroots movements ‘is a sign, a great sign’, Pope Francis declared when receiving their representatives in the Vatican on 28 October 2014. 
What do the expressions ‘popular or grassroots movements’ mean? Where did the idea of inviting them to the Vatican come from, and how did the meeting unfold? But most of all: what does this sign tell us about the direction that Pope Francis is proposing for the Church and the world?
An article on this meeting may be found here:
https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/strength-excluded-world-meeting-popular-movements-vatican
The only Canadian delegate, besides Michael Czerny,SJ, was labour educator, writer and global activist Judith Marshall, until recently working in the Department of Global Affairs and Workplace Issues of the Canadian Steelworkers Union. Back in Canada she wrote,
"After the three days in Rome with the popular movements, Pope Francis has continued to take the Church into the centre of the ideological battle grounds of neoliberalism, firm in his determination to make the contemporary Church walk with the poor and excluded and discarded. The popular movement participants have returned to their organisations and the day-to-day struggles for land, housing and work. The moments of dialogue in Rome have served to strengthen the convictions of both the Church and the popular movements that these are the right battles to be fighting…."
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