“Fatherhood and motherhood – the two sides of the parenting mission”: with this title, today and tomorrow, April 22^nd and 23^rd, the Croatian city of Osijek will be hosting the second national meeting of family pastoral services, promoted by the National Pastoral Service for Family and Life of the Croatian Bishops Conference and its counterpart, the committee of the archdiocese of Dakovo-Osijek. Guest speakers will include 150 delegates working in family pastoral services – couples, families with children, priests, men of religion, family advisors – from Croatia’s sixteen dioceses as well as from the diocese of Kotor in Montenegro and the archdiocese of Sarajevo in Bosnia. Items on the agenda, as explained by the organisers, will include “the evolution of father’s and mother’s roles, their position in modern society and the impact of fatherhood and motherhood on families, society and the Church”. The meeting will try to combine theory with practice to respond to the families’ challenges and questions. “Nowadays, the family is threatened from many sides – said monsignor Duro Hranic, archbishop of Dakovo-Osijek – but the indissolubility of Christian marriage is not a goal to be achieved but a principle one starts from”. According to Peter Hodzic of the National Office for Family Life, “positive examples of the joy of parenthood are needed, to encourage as much married couples as young people not to put off marriage for too long”.