What is "cursillo"

Cursillos in Christianity (in Spanish: Cursillos de Cristiandad, short course of Christianity) is an apostolic movement of the Roman Catholic Church. It was founded in Majorca, Spain by a group of laymen in 1944, while they were refining a technique to train pilgrimage Christian leaders.

Cursillo is the original three-day movement, and has since been licensed for use by several mainline Christian denominations, some of which have retained the trademarked "Cursillo" name, while others have modified its talks/methods and given it a different name.

The Cursillo focuses on showing Christian lay people how to become effective Christian leaders over the course of a three-day weekend. The weekend includes fifteen talks, some given by priests and some by lay people. These talks are called "rollos". The major emphasis of the weekend is to ask participants to take what they have learned back into the world, on what is known as the "fourth day." The method stresses personal spiritual development, as accelerated by weekly group reunion (after the weekend).