At the beginning of the year the Jesuits created the so-called Future Lab in the Jesuit College Innsbruck, a place where young adults find time to put their own lives in order, are allowed to ask important questions about the future, are invited to spiritual exercises and times of silence and find space in the company of us Jesuits to learn to read their own lives.

The Future Lab has been open and running for a few months now. The first residents have moved in and we started the programme with a mountain weekend, spiritual exercises and vacation stays. The rooms and halls are brought to life!

On 19 September 2020, Innsbruck’s bishop Hermann Glettler celebrated mass with us to inaugurate the Future Lab and provincial Fr. Bernhard Bürgler SJ blessed the premises. Afterwards, there was opportunity to visit the rooms. „To me, the Future Lab is above all a place and space for listening: listening to myself, listening to my longing and listening to the needs of our time and to the Word of God. This threefold listening, this triad slowly enables me to hear God’s calling to me, lets me recognize my life‘s trace and gives me courage and strength to live my life,“ said Fr. Bürgler SJ.

"We look back gratefully on these first experiences. Despite the exceptional circumstances of the Corona pandemic, many young people have been happy to participate in the programme of the Future Lab from the very beginning. Some came to us with specific questions about life and found room for important questions, thoughts and conversations in the beautiful new rooms and the hospitality of the community in the Jesuit College. There was great interest in the introduction to Ignatian Spirituality and the sense of community, good spirits and openness in our house were especially appreciated. We don’t convey a finished image of God. Everyone is invited to come as they are, we offer an atmosphere for personal searching and thinking, all questions allowed", says Fr. Helmut Schumacher SJ, director of the Future Lab. 

Young people from Austria, Germany, Switzerland, South Tyrol and even Poland found great value in their time at the Future Lab and many are planning to come back soon.

You can find the programme of the Future Lab via www.zukunftswerkstatt-innsbruck.org