An Invitation and a Challenge
One of the core messages of the pontificate of Pope Francis is human fraternity. His encyclical
“Fratelli Tutti” is a programmatic lay-out and articulation of his vision on fraternal sharing and
economy. The Holy Father, after all, took the name of a great saint who embraced and lived a
life of poverty and simplicity and chose to be brother – fratello – to everyone.
One of those tackled by the said encyclical is fraternal economy. It is the stewardship of God-
given resources oriented towards the growth of the human person and his harmonious
existence in the fraternity of humanity. This reorients the entire actual economic process where
the person serves the economy – production, distribution, consumption – and either enjoys or
suffers from it. Economy, rather, is for human flourishing where there is solidarity and
subsidiarity.
In response to this, the Diocese of Assisi instituted the International Award “Francis of Assisi
and Carlo Acutis for an Economy of Fraternity” on 10 October 2020. The Bishop of Assisi, Most
Rev. Domenico Sorrentino, in his letter to the Superiors of Male Religious Institutes dated 29
June 2022, describes the award as an initiative to support “a specific project, initiated at the
grassroots level, by persons, entities or societies, who come together and design a project to
care for the most disadvantaged in their communities, especially in the poorest regions of the
world.” The award bestows a maximum price of 50,000.00€ to a chosen project.
Two projects have already benefited from the award. The first is a project by a parish in the
Diocese of Pasig, Philippines where individuals with disabilities, normally unemployed and
destitute, were bonded in solidarity and mutual support in producing a technology of making
charcoal briquettes from scraps and water lilies. The second project benefitted by the award is
the Agriculture & Justice Village of the “Economy of Francesco” (Agriculture & Justice Village) in
Nigeria where young innovative people train and form communities of farmers to cultivate the
land without making it sterile.
We encourage the brothers who are engaged in forming communities, guiding their growth
with sustainable means and programs to forward their application before 31 December 2022
to:
The site also provides guidelines, details for the process of application and the criteria for the
presentation of projects.
