Feb 20, 2019 | Non categorizzato
Full of good sense and good humor, Klaus Purkott knew better than most the value of listening to others. A man of few words, throughout his life Klaus Purkott forged relationships through his exceptional capacity to listen deeply. He helped and accompanied countless people, wherever he was, and lived to fulfilment his dedication to God as a Focolarino. For more than twenty years he worked as a legal practitioner around Berlin’s Civil Court, where he was well known for accepting the cases of people who could not afford legal fees. He was held in high esteem by clients and colleagues alike for his ability to resolve even the most problematic cases, often in surprising and unconventional ways! He was always particularly happy to get involved in those situations which seemed impossible to solve. Klaus attributed this preferential love for those people who found themselves in real trouble to his communist upbringing. He was born on 31 December 1936, in Upper Silesia, a largely German-speaking region which became part of Poland at the end of the Second World War. Undeterred by his congenital blindness (his eyes had only about 5 per cent vision), Klaus, after completing his high school education, went on to university to study Marxist philosophy. His father, a basket-maker, had been one of the founders of the Polish Communist Party, and like him, the young Klaus hoped to find the truth of life in Communism. But, as Klaus later explained, “Through my blindness, God soon made me understand how ineffective all my efforts were, and He prepared me to meet Him”. Klaus found a particular light in the figure of Jesus on the cross, who while experiencing the greatest interior darkness, entrusted himself to the Father. This discovery which he made in meeting the Focolare spirituality, transformed his life and led to a new and radical life choice: as a consecrated Focolarino, living his life for others. Apart from in his professional role, Klaus lived his vocation in many other environments: accompanying the many people who turned to him for help, support or advice; offering the benefit of his deep Biblical knowledge through talks and articles; personally sharing his experiences of life. He had that rare combination of a wide-ranging cultural knowledge together with a clarity of expression and a ready sense of humour which he employed so effectively to reduce tensions! In 1999, Klaus had retired from his legal work, and was called to Ottmaring, the ecumenical Focolare village in Germany. His moral authority was immediately recognized by the citizens there. “He was a real senior brother to us,” some of the Focolarini recalled. “He knew how to build relationships, and was someone you could trust.” Remembering Klaus, people say: he was so well-balanced, full of good common sense, so sincere. People sensed his deep relationship with God. In 2008 Klaus returned to Berlin. Then just over two years ago, he suffered a serious accident and the extent of his injuries meant he had to move to a nursing home. This was a new environment for him to witness to living the Word of God. And it was not long before a “Word of Life” group formed around him. Here, he is remembered for his exceptional way of living in the present moment. Not least on January 18, 2019, when he quietly and unexpectedly passed to the next life, during his afternoon nap.
Joachim Schwind
Feb 14, 2019 | Non categorizzato
Esther is Maori and Tom is of Irish and Scottish descent. Their story turns on its head the principle that there can be no real communication between very different cultures. Son of an Irish mother and a Scottish father, Tom was 26 years old when he arrived in New Zealand. While the Maori people were the first inhabitants of New Zealand, after numerous successive waves of migration it has become a multicultural country. Tom arrived with one of the low-cost flights that the British and New Zealand governments offered to young people willing to stay for at least two years overseas. Esther, on the other hand, is Maori and the oldest of 13 children. The two of them met at a disco and it was love at first sight. “I never noticed that we came from two different cultures,” Tom remembers. “And I didn’t really think about the fact that he was white,” Esther adds. “When I saw her I simply fell in love,” says Tom. The complications came later, when they announced to their families that they wanted to get married. His mother reminded him that he would not be able to take her to England because she isn’t white. Even Esther’s grandmother was not quite sure about Tom. She had already chosen another man for Esther, as she had done before for her own daughter, Esther’s mother. The traditions in the Maori community are strong and difficult to disregard. However, after the initial shock, Tom’s parents learnt to love their Maori daughter-in-law and Tom was welcomed into Esther’s large family. By mutual consent, the children were baptised and educated in the Catholic Church – where Esther belonged and where Tom felt the desire to belong. The first contact with the Focolare took place in 1982 through Father Durning, a Scottish priest who was Tom’s catechist and a missionary to the Maori community. Having been invited to spend a weekend with the women focolarine, Esther and Tom set off with their children. They felt a bit of trepidation… “I was trying to read the Bible – Tom recalls – but I got nothing out of it. Instead, I was struck by a phrase that one of them had said: “Try to see the presence of Jesus in whoever passes you by.” I said to her that if she knew my job at the railways, she would have agreed with me that it just wasn’t possible! I explained that it was such a difficult environment – but she insisted. So I did try it, and my faith became stronger. I had found what I was looking for – a way of living my faith in my daily life.” At their first Mariapolis Esther and Tom found themselves listening to people who shared personal experiences and events “interpreted” in the light of the Gospel – and these stories struck a chord with them. But theirs was not a simple story to tell because Tom had started drinking, a habit that had begun at work. Tom explains what happened next. “One evening, while I was about to have a beer, Esther asked me what I was doing. I understood that I could not continue to live like this; I had a wife and four children. Alcoholism was destroying our family, so I decided I had to stop.” But the life of a family like theirs is never boring and as soon as one challenge was over, another one immediately presented itself. And that’s what happened – after an accident, Tom was forced to leave his job and they decided to swap roles. “Esther went to work and I stayed home to look after the children,” says Tom. “I had to learn to do many things as well as the difficult ‘art’ of loving at home. To our friends, our choice seemed totally against the current. We can’t say that everything went smoothly, but even with our ups and downs, we always found ourselves united. Even when we have different points of view, or when I get fixed on an idea, I remember that Chiara Lubich taught us to always be the first to love, to apologize and never to lose the courage to keep on loving.” As Esther says, “For 46 years the spirituality of unity has become our daily lifestyle. I understand that God has given us a beautiful life. He has set us high goals and given us the faithfulness we need to reach them. So, for now, we keep going ahead.”
Gustavo E. Clariá
Feb 12, 2019 | Non categorizzato
‘We have to work together and have the courage to make things work.’ Loris Rossetto spoke with conviction at the recent ‘Co-Governance, Mutual Responsibility in Cities Today’ where he recounted the story of ‘Bella Calabria’ a hostel which is operating from a building confiscated from the Mafia. ‘Sometimes we mistakenly tell ourselves ‘nothing ever changes’ or, ‘it’s better not to take the risk’. However, when we roll up our sleeves and work as a team, you get results.’ This is the experience of Loris Rossetto and his wife, who, having left Calabria in the 1990’s to live in Venice and then Trent. On returning to their home region in 2005, they set up activities in buildings confiscated from the N’drangheta, as the Mafia is known there. Having experienced efficient ways of working up north, they wanted to combine the warmth, natural resources and culture of the south and develop, ‘A unique kind of tourism, characterised by the welcome and friendship that is typically Calabrian. Their goal was to promote the economic growth of the region, but above all to create friendships with people from other countries. They wanted to encourage the local population to work for the common good, without breaking the law, and to believe that the rejuvenation of the area was possible. The facts speak for themselves. In Calabria there are 35 local Councils that the state has taken out of the hands of the Mafia, including the regional capital. Half the drugs entering Italy pass through the region. But as the Rossetto’s experience showed, the scourge of the Mafia will not triumph for those who have the courage to promote a new way of relating to each other. ‘We started off by founding ‘Friends of the German Language,’ explained Loris, ‘wanting to promote exchanges between our town and German speaking countries. The first project was the creation of a meeting centre. Then we had the idea of opening the ’Bella Calabria’ hostel in a reclaimed building in Cutro, a village in Crotone province. On the 11thApril 2015 the building was opened. “We created a programme of classes,” continued Loris, “48 hours at the hostel with the motto ‘a happy person is one who respects the rules’. It was subtitled, ‘Do to others as you would have them do to you.’ They absorbed this idea and understood that to work as part of a team is good thing. The students learn foreign languages through simulation and dialogue in those languages.” But the first stages in this adventure were a steep learning curve. And it wasn’t because the couple didn’t understand what they had to do regarding finance or tourism. In the summer water is scarce. They have to store water in tanks, but it is never enough. However, luckily, the following year a Council was elected that really wanted to support and help them, and now they have better water distribution. The couple saw this as a sign from heaven to encourage them to keep going. And so bit by bit the project continued to grow. People came from the north of Italy as well as guests from Europe, a hockey team from Hamm, a class from Dresden and the German Red Cross. Everyone experienced the warmth of Calabrian hospitality and the local people, who were at first nonplussed, became interested in the project. “The people of Cutro have responded amazingly,” observed Loris, “Quite often a surprised tourist told us they had gone into a bar and were offered a coffee or a neighbour brought them fresh fruit. Our guests are so struck by all this that they fall in love with the place and the hostel, and those who come once, often return. We understand we’re on the right track. We are going to open a second hostel at Crotone, and have put forward a project which involves 3 parks: at Cropani Marina we want to teach driver’s education using mini-cars. We’ll offer a mountain biking course in Isola and a course in botany in Ciro. There are still problems with these projects, but it will work out in the end.” The common denominator is strong motivation and an invitation: ‘Never stop dreaming; stand with your feet on the ground and look up to heavens if you want to love and improve your own environment.’
Claudia Di Lorenzi
Feb 11, 2019 | Non categorizzato
“Together for a new Africa” is an innovative leadership course for young leaders from across Africa. Over 100 participants attended from 13 different nations. “Find your passion, whatever it may be. Become it, and let it become you and you will find great things happen FOR you, TO you and BECAUSE of you.” This famous Allan T. Armstrong quote sums up the spirit of the leadership course for over 100 young leaders from 12 nations of East Africa as well as the Democratic Republic of Congo which took place in January at the Focolare “Mariapoli Piero” centre near Nairobi. It is the first in a series of Summer Schools under the ambitious title of “Together for a new Africa”. One of the pioneers of this course is Burundian Melchior Nsavyimana, a lecturer in political studies and currently Coordinator at the Institute for Regional Integration at the Catholic University of East Africa. He described the aim of the first course as “to explore and experience an idea of leadership which is both rooted in the values of the African continent and also able to respond to today’s challenges; leadership which acts in a ‘communitarian’ way, which builds community, using the instruments and language of universal fraternity. If this is something which will affect our future, it deserves our commitment now. And we turn to the fundamentals of the culture of unity”. The effectiveness of this endeavor is facilitated by the close collaboration of a network of interested bodies: Sophia University Institute, The Politics for Unity Movement, the New Humanity NGO, with the cooperation of UNESCO and support from Caritas and Missio. The idea was first born as an initiative of an international group of African students attending the Sophia University Institute, in Loppiano, Italy. Together they decided to make a joint commitment to work for a new Africa, starting from the transformation and cultural renewal of its leadership. Twenty lecturers from East Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Sophia Institute delivered the first sessions in a three-year interdisciplinary and intercultural program covering themes such as responsible citizenship, leadership, a ‘culture of fraternity’, in order to tackle head-on the difficulties facing this continent. “The journey has just begun,” announces the program’s website [togetherforanewafrica.org]. “Africa (particularly Eastern Africa) is undergoing a very complex series of demographic, political, social and cultural changes. One of the effects of these changes is the increase of uncertainty they produce. Young people often lack the tools required to understand the changes in progress, and remain passive in the face of the conflicting demands of politicians, armed groups, multinationals etc. Having analyzed this context, we African graduates of Sophia University Institute, understood our responsibility as African young people to define actively with fellow youth the Africa we want in future as it is proposed by African Union Agenda 2063. The contribution of our initiative is to offer African young people an integral training on responsible leadership and create a network among them for acting together for the Africa they want.”
edited by Stefania Tanesini
Feb 11, 2019 | Non categorizzato
This year the Focolare Movement’s General Council has chosen a significant venue for its annual retreat: the Holy Land and the city of Jerusalem. The Ecumenical Institute at Tantur, located on the border between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, is an oasis of hospitality and fellowship. It welcomes anyone who wants to immerse themselves in the complex reality of Jerusalem, with its many cultures, peoples, religions and Christian traditions. That is why it is a suitable location for the annual retreat of the General Council of the Focolare Movement, being held there from 10-17th February. Friederike Koller and Angel Bartol, the central delegates of the Movement and organisers of the retreat, said this meeting embraces past, present and future. “A journey to the Holy Land is always a pilgrimage that calls on us to look to the past, to the historical foundations of the Christian faith and its roots in Judaism. Regarding the present, we will address one of the principle themes of the year 2019, which is the aspect of the ‘communion of goods, economy and work’. The intention is to reclaim within the Movement as a whole a radical Gospel lifestyle concerning the communion of goods, including material goods. Then, on the basis of an alternative lifestyle imbued with the charism of unity, we will seek answers to the economic challenges that present themselves today. We will also look to the future, considering two important subjects: work for and with the new generations, and preparations for the General Assembly in 2020.” Angel Bartol emphasised the importance of thoroughly applying the chosen working method, considering there are 62 participants at the meeting. “Whether we work in plenary or in small groups, we are always on pilgrimage. We feel we are continuously journeying with Jesus who wants to be present, living and active in our midst. This is possible when each one of us is ready to offer our point of view without being attached to it”. Friederike Koller added, “In this way we too can make a small contribution towards peace, which the Word of Life for this month encourages us to pursue and that the world, and especially this city, need so much.”
Joachim Schwind
Link: Focolare President Maria Voce’s greeting as the group left for Jerusalem
