The Europe@Heart 2025 weekend happening in Namur (Sept 19-21) brought together policy experts, spiritual leaders, civil society, and both young and established professionals interested in the green transition. Europe@Heart is an initiative from the Jesuit European Social Center focused on offering a moment of reflection on key issues for today's Europe. This initiative is led by the team of JESC under the direction of Filipe Martins SJ.

The event opened with a climate wine tasting, featuring wines from unusual and upcoming wine regions across Europe. Its aim was to shed light on the changing landscape of viticulture, a crucial industry of our continent. We did have a lively debate around which taste appealed to whom and some of us have definitely discovered that charcoal taste in wine is not for us.  

Plenary sessions combined with smaller group deliberations including the speakers is the format we follow each year, allowing space for the participants to actively engage with our guests and each other. The panels were revolving around the following questions: Why aren’t we all equally worried about the climate crisis? Could it be forced? And how can spirituality help us address the problem? 

In the current global turmoil, decision makers constantly find themselves pushed to prioritize among competing crises; the climate, economy, social issues etc. In Saturday morning’s panel, speaker Chiara Martinelli (Director of CAN Europe) pertinently pointed out that the crisis we are facing is actually one crisis. The crisis of our model of production and consumption. Of the painstaking realisation that there is a limit to bending reality to our wishes. Of the harsh consequences of abandoning the concept of unity with nature and others. The dangerous change in our political direction derives from the instrumentalized distrust of those who have been betrayed by the system. Those who have been deprived of their ability to take care about what they care about, by those whose guiding principles are profit above all else. 

Continuously, Saturday afternoon’s panel looked at the role of businesses and how the narrative shaping the debate can be reclaimed and put in service of the people. Participatory democracy can similarly help us leverage the ability, creativity and power of the many. And while forcing the change seems tempting given the urgency, long lasting transformations can only be done with everyone on board.

We invited Mark Montegriffo to perform a short music concert on Saturday evening, and the beautifully crafted lyrics set the scene for the Sunday morning’s panel addressing spirituality. We were looking for the answers to how spirituality can help us become greener. By adjusting our relationship to others, to our community and other communities, by asking more profound questions about one’s place in the collective are all ways to allow spirituality work in us. Furthermore, while technology has a crucial place in the mix of solutions, it cannot be the sole solution in itself. It would risk benefitting mostly those who thrive in the current unequal system. 

We are grateful to all our participants for trusting us with their time and sharing the various perspectives to enrich mind and soul.