From the beginning it was clear to the founders of the residence, coming from the world of FUCI (Italian Catholic University Federation) that the Gregorianum was to be “neither a hotel, nor a hostel, but a place that proposed an idea: to put graduates together students with a method that would put them on a virtuous path from student to scholar “. A real educating community capable of promoting a space of freedom in which the vocation of young university students can develop in the best possible way.
The choice of creating a community that was not excessively large was fully responsive to the formative project: a group of about seventy people who can truly get to know each other and forge significant relationships with one another. Inside this “micro-society” open discussion takes place every day with people engaged in the study of different disciplines, from different parts of Italy and around the world, and from different social backgrounds and different ages, and this in itself provides a very effective tool with which the person can measure his skills, experiment, get involved, and be enriched.
Students are also required to participate in the management of the residence, which culminates in the co-participation of one of their representatives, elected through the democratic procedures that they have set themselves, on the “Board of Directors”. At the foundation, there is an articulated internal organization, to which everyone is called – in various capacities – to participate, with the aim of guaranteeing a series of self-managed services (newspaper library, internal bar/café, cultural and sporting activities, library, liturgical activities, promotion of new lifestyles, canteen/cafeteria and housekeeping feedback, …).
The residential aspect that characterizes university life within the Gregorianum is the premise for growth, in which to enhance those interdisciplinary skills of a relational type, whose importance is often overlooked. At the same time it is able to provide a mental attitude that is increasingly essential for effective adaptation to the world of work, to the complexity of reality, and to increasingly international contexts.
Thanks to the extensive network of alumni, in the residence it is possible to give small groups of particularly motivated students the business-oriented training that is complementary to the technical-scientific education provided by the university curriculum. It is also possible to give first-hand experience to students, supporting and encouraging collaborative projects with companies.
In order to bring daily life closer and the ideas and values acquired in the disciplines studied at the university to that wider vision of existence that is necessary for an authentic realization of the individual, renewed models and languages are required. By nature, young university students tend to experience this fracture in a particularly sensitive way and look to the Church in search of a synthesis that brings happiness.
Specifically, three-dimensional training proposals are carried out each year: investigation (seminar study groups, conferences, guest testimonials, cine-forums, guided tours); listening (celebration weekly community Eucharist, Liturgy of the Hours, occasions of prayer in conjunction with the most significant moments of the liturgical year, guided meditations starting from the Word of God, a spiritual retreat at Pentecost at the end of the academic year), action (in addition to the already mentioned service opportunities within the residence, volunteer experiences in diocesan or parish structures and works of solidarity are proposed).
These are the tools that are believed to be the most suitable to accompany students who live in the residence through their inner maturity, in the commitments that life puts forward and also in the experience of faith, trying to better interpret their needs.