The Annual Meeting of the Portuguese Province of the Society of Jesus took place in Portimão, in a year that also marks the 50th anniversary of the Society’s return to the Algarve.

From August 27 to 29, around 75 Jesuits from across the Province gathered at the Ferragudo Social and Pastoral Center for their annual meeting, organized by the Jesuit community of Nossa Senhora da Estrada (Portimão). The central theme this year was community life.

This gathering of prayer and reflection, which traditionally opens the new pastoral year, sought to deepen the link between community life and apostolic mission. It was an opportunity to give thanks for the gift of living together—sharing both life and mission—while exploring new ways of growing in this dimension, attentive to the challenges that today’s world presents to religious life.

Inspired by the tradition of the “villa houses” in Jesuit formation—days marked by simplicity, fraternity, and outings in a spirit of poverty—the organizers recreated an atmosphere that fostered friendship, contemplation, and shared experience.

On the second day, the Jesuits divided into three groups to learn more about the Society’s presence in the Algarve, particularly in Portimão, Mexilhoeira Grande, and Odiáxere. One group visited the village of São José de Alcalar and the parish of Odiáxere, another went up to Monchique, and a third explored the city of Silves. In each place, they met with diocesan priests and committed laypeople, listening and dialoguing about the realities and challenges of the Diocese of the Algarve, before visiting sites of cultural interest.

The day concluded with a boat trip along the Algarve coast, departing from the riverside area of Portimão and sailing between the mouth of the Arade River and the open sea. All participants came together again in this symbolic gesture of communion and celebration, which fittingly crowned a meeting centered on fraternity and the rediscovery of community life as both a source and a place of mission.