July 2023
Dear members of District 113,
You have done me the great honor of electing me as Governor to represent our district for the year 2023/2024. It is therefore in this gubernatorial capacity that I shall be travelling to the United States to attend, with the Luxembourg delegation, the 105th International Convention, to be held this year in Boston from July 7 to 11.
As I take up my duties, I'd like first of all to recall the importance of our membership, as Luxembourg Lions, of the European family.
On May 9, thanks to the combined efforts of many Lions, including Immediate Past Governor Vito Cassone and our International Relations Officer Nico Bley, the Governors of Districts 103 (Eastern France), 112D (Belgium) and 113 signed a trijumelage charter at Robert Schuman's birthplace in Clausen, with the aim of bringing the many Lions in these three districts closer together and facilitating their joint work.
In the same European spirit, on June 10, 2023, we celebrated in Schengen the 60th anniversary of the Interclub Quatuor, whose visionary action over the decades has brought together Lions from Germany, Belgium, France and Luxembourg in their service missions, across borders.
It is this spirit that, thanks to each and every one of you, we will continue to embody and that we will strive to amplify, in order to further improve the daily action of our clubs.
Secondly, as I had the opportunity to point out on June 17 at our Annual General Meeting and during the handover of power, I wish to place District 113's action under the banner of our global Sight First cause. As we all know, this is Lionism's primary raison d'être, and many of its achievements, from corneal donation to the electronic white cane, will enable us to demonstrate our support for the blind and visually impaired in concrete terms.
Finally, I believe it is important for Lions in general, and those in Luxembourg in particular, to be able to illustrate our presence in the community with simplicity and determination, which means being identified as Lions, being "on the map" of charitable organizations. Our service actions deserve it, as do the people who make them possible, and it's the very example we set that will inspire potential new members to join us.
To conclude, I'd like to thank you all warmly for your confidence in us, and to let you know that our first and second vice-governors, Monique Isebaert-Leemans and Christiane Weidenhaupt, our zone presidents, Georges Weyer, Roland Wirth, François Zuidberg and Aurelia Mari, our secretary, Jean-Paul Hoffmann, and I will be at your side to support you in your daily work as Lions!
We're off to work.
We serve and we shall serve!
Jean-Philippe CHRISTIENNE
District Governor
2023-2024