30 Aug 2018 | Focolare Worldwide
Focolare president Maria Voce wrote to the local Focolare community in the Democratic Republic of Congo: “Let us ask the Father to welcome into His Kingdom of peace all those persons who lost their lives in this serious accident, while entrusting to His love the wounded and everyone involved.” The accident occurred on the morning of August 28th in the city of Limate, north of Kinshasa. A silo containing tons of wheat, owned by flour producer FAB Congo, collapsed on part of the Moyi mwa Ntongo Hospital and an adjacent company. Under the weight of the rubble some people lost their lives, including Valentine, a member of the Focolare who was in charge of the laundry services, while other victims were in nearby buildings. “There has been an outpouring of help and support, searching for her body,” writes Aga Kahambu on behalf of the local Focolare community, with police, Red Cross and volunteers working tirelessly. Some of the victims are FAB employees, but the number is still uncertain. It is a very sorrowful time for all of us, but the unity and solidarity among so many has helped to strengthen us.” 
According to the local newspaper, “Actualite.cd,” the count is provisional, because the incident occurred at rush hour” and it reports “significant damage to the facilities, with the destruction of radiology, diagnostics and other departments.” Constructed in 2006 and directed by the Focolare Movement, the medical centre Moyi Mwa Ntongo is considered an excellent facility with 55 beds. Built for the care of child blindness, the centre then took on other projects, such as HIV and AIDS. Moreover, it is a model international humanitarian project: it makes use of specialists and local staff, trained both in the DRC and in Europe. In 2016, ten years after its founding, it finished a modern maternity and neonatology unit, which are essential in a country with one of the highest infantile death rates in the world. Fortunately that unit was preserved from the collapse. The ward was completed thanks to the contribution of people and agencies connected to the Focolare Movement, such as the Giancarlo Pallavicini Foundation and the gentlemen Albina Gianotti and Vittorino Giussani, financers of the Medical Centre since the day it began, and by AMU Luxemburg and AECOM Congo, as well as other supporters.
28 Aug 2018 | Focolare Worldwide
27 Aug 2018 | Focolare Worldwide
“According to reliable sources, on the 11th of August alone 5,100 Venezuelans crossed the border between Ecuador and Peru, a record that exceeds last May when in 3,700 new arrivals arrived in one day. This is why Ecuador has declared a state of migratory emergency.” Roggero, born in Venezuela of Italian parents, knows Latin America where he lived for almost 40 years before moving to the Peruvian capital in 2015. Not only are Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru grappling with an epochal exodus, but also more distant countries like Chile, Argentina and even Uruguay and, according to many observers, it threatens to provoke one of the greatest humanitarian crises in recent decades. The new rules of entry into Ecuador and Peru a few days ago imposed on Venezuelan citizens to show a passport, which is impossible to obtain these days. “This is something hard to understand if you aren’t experiencing it for yourself. The Venezuelans who have fled to Peru may have already reached the quota of 400 thousand people. They fled from a country in the grip of a very serious crisis where everything is lacking, and I’m here to find a job and keep together the rest of the family that’s been left in Venezuela at the cost of great sacrifice. They are willing to do anything, they often go hungry; they spend even 3-4 hours a day on the bus to earn just a few dollars. Many sleep on the floor and suffer from cold because they do not even have a blanket and shower with cold water. But at least they know that the family members who went to stay in Venezuela (wife, children, brothers, grandparents …) have a roof over their heads and can somehow survive with the few dollars that come from abroad. Meanwhile, the Focolare community has been trying to welcome people, relatives or friends, who keep arriving. “What is important for us,” says Silvano, is that they find a family atmosphere. Then, if we can share some food, jackets, medicines, a blanket or some help in obtaining a temporary residence permit, even better. On August 12th we met for the third time in the Lima focolare with the Fiore Center one of our operations offices. We were 23 people, two thirds of whom were Venezuelan. First, those who wanted could attend Mass. Then we offered lunch on two large tables. Before leaving, we saw a video presentation of Chiara Lubich, because most of the people did not know the Movement. An always moving moment is when we distribute clothes that the local community collects for us. We also laughed a lot when one of the people was wearing his coat, which he picked up by accident. This unusual happiness concealed some very harsh realities and all kinds of painful stories of the journey from Venezuela. Talking and listening to them has been a liberation for them. To somebody in emergency we could offer, in the meantime, some washing machine tours. To some others we were able to offer a few turns of our washing machines for their laundry. Two rocker friends of one of the guests showed up by chance and left deeply moved by the relationship they had seen among all of us. They called us “quality people”. It seems that this definition, in the rocket world, at least in Venezuela, is the highest possible compliment. And it was not over yet: from the one you would least expect came an invitation to say a final prayer. All of us in a circle joined hands and offered a prayer that was very meaningful! That same evening we learned that the UN estimates that 2.3 million Venezuelans have already fled the country since the beginning of the crisis. So we still have a lot of work to do – and for quite a while. “
26 Aug 2018 | Focolare Worldwide
Married for 31 years, with five children and a granddaughter on the way, Gianni and Maria Salerno would have many stories to tell, along with practical advice on raising children. But for their panel on “Joy and the challenges of parents raising children in today’s world,” which is the main topic of the meeting in Dublin, they bring to the table the patrimony of the life and experience that has matured for many years in the Focolare’s New Families Movement. Some of the topics that will be discussed are: the role of technology in the family, the relationship with the faith, the multiple connections with work, the economy and environment. It is a “family of families,” which draws on the spirituality of unity of Chiara Lubich as a compass that marks north on the sometimes wearisome journey of life. “We’d like to emphasize several “key terms” that seem useful for the relationship with our children and are liveable anywhere in every the country of the world, regardless of culture. The first is detachment. Our children are not ours, they’re God’s children. This attitude allows us to seek what is best for them, to respect their freedom and to discover God’s plan for their happiness. Another important word is accompany, to them feel our nearness so that they can face difficulties without feeling all alone. Thus they can learn commitment, through an ongoing training of the will. Then, there is a phrase that has always been fundamental in our experience and in the experience of many other families from around the world with whom we are in contact: start again. When you make a mistake, when there’s a problem, or love is lacking, we can always put a period and begin again, asking forgiveness if we’ve overdone it when correcting one of our children, which for parents is often an opportunity to unload rather than educate.” 
“We should always try to immerse ourselves in what our children are going through. We use a popular phrase to express our desire to listen deeply and be open: walk in their shoes for a while before giving any quick answers. Example, sharing and dialogue are indispensable in a family. You have to be able to talk about anything in a family and parents are the ones who must prove it, using their antennas to catch the non-verbal messages that children send – especially teenagers – which are often provocations. Then we need to give our time to them. How much effort this involves, perhaps at night after a long day’s work, especially when our thoughts don’t coincide. We have to allow ourselves to challenge them without any fear of them or their ‘world,’ even when worries of all kinds arise within us: about their health, the friends they choose, school and the future. When this happens we try to hold on to a valuable piece of advice: be occupied, not preoccupied so as to avoid letting our anxiety make them even more insecure or less free. In the end, what we can always do is to pray for them, entrusting them to God’s love. There are cases in which children become rebellious and reject the relationship with the parents, taking on violent behaviours, making questionable choices that are sometimes grave and serious. This causes suffering and destabilizes the family. The wound of having failed at educating our children really burns and makes us wonder: where did we go wrong? Also in these cases we have to remember that we are parents forever and that the door of our hearts is always open. It’s not easy, but we can follow the example of Jesus crucified and abandoned who offered his pain and transformed it into Love. Like him, we can also consume our pain by continuing to love our children concretely, along with all the other neighbours who come our way, in the awareness that, in the end, Love will triumph.”
23 Aug 2018 | Focolare Worldwide
The flood in Kerala, southern State of India, has wrought more than 400 victims and about 750,000 displaced. The rescue and assistance operations are brought ahead amid great difficulties due to the inaccessibility of some areas struck. In some cases, they were forced to throw food and water from the helicopters because the streets and bridges were destroyed by the devastating floods. The local Focolare communities writes: “We have returned from Trichy (about 300 km from Kerala), where the Mariapolis was held with the members of the Word of Life groups, spread out within a range of 120 km. But our hearts are with the people of Kerala struck by strong rains. We are still in the monsoon period, with hot winds that cause these tropical typhoons. For all we know, the members of the Movement are fine. A retreat had been programmed for the priests in Trivandrum (south Kerala), but we had to cancel it because it is not safe to travel and many of the priests who booked are involved in the tragedy. During the weekend, our local communities were busy collecting foodstuffs and prime commodities to be sent to the struck areas. We are counting on your prayers.” Also Pope Francis prayed for the victims so that “our brothers there may have our solidarity and the concrete support of the community.”
23 Aug 2018 | Focolare Worldwide
“We are following closely the events surrounding the Coast Guard Ship ‘Ubaldi Diciotti‘, which arrived in Catania and is in two-days stand-off with 177 people on board who are not being allowed to disembark. The umpteenth case, unfortunately, that over the past few months has put a strain on the culture of hospitality that has always been the mark of the Italian people, “says the press release of 22 August signed by Rosalba Poli and Andrea Goller who are leaders of the Focolare Movement in Italy. They support “the need for shared paths at a European level in the search for non-improvised solutions”. But they highlight “the great concern for human events such as people fleeing from hunger, war and death”. And they ask “that the human dignity of those who are in the same condition recognized either in their countries of origin, and in the countries through which they are travelling, including ours where they have now landed.” The communiqué concludes with an appeal to politicians “from all backgrounds; that they put aside disputes between sides and particular interests, and collaborate in the name of our common humanity, which comes before any other distinction or separateness”. See also: “A-mare (o amare) il prossimo” (in Italian)
