Nov 9, 2016 | Focolare Worldwide, Senza categoria
The city of Como has risen to the headlines because of the notable influx of refugees that have been forced by barbed wire walls to divert their routes across Switzerland, as they travel to the countries of northern Europe in search of fortune, or reunion with their family members that arrived before them. The distance is very short, but the many border controls are rigorously imposed. There is a growing number of men, women, children and unaccompanied minors who are camped out waiting for an opportunity to evade border inspections. Bishop Coletti asked everyone to accept the challenge of welcoming, directing his appeal especially to the Church community that it might put into practice the Acts of Mercy during the Jubilee of Mercy which is an occasion for sharing and growth. “We took it as an appeal to us,” say the members of the local Focolare community, “and we immediately got to work, offering our services to the Diocesan Caritas that is on the front lines in organizing the assistance effort. There was a huge response from our community network that also includes people who are close to us: relatives, friends and acquaintances. We collected food, blankets and other basic necessities. We took turns covering the work schedule, providing showers and meals, distributing food, cooking and cleaning. In the evenings we serve up to five hundred meals. The faces we meet are disoriented, frightened, grateful and, at times, suspiscious. It’s hard to communicate with people who speak a foreign language. But just being there, tired and sweaty, offering a plate of food with a smile, trying to understand from their gesturing whether our guests are happy with the meal – makes us feel like we’re part of one big family.” One person from the meal service writes: “I was struck by the faith, the intensity of the Coptic Christians as they prayed before and after the meal.” And then: “In the eyes of our refugee brothers who we accompany to the showers and serve at table, we see Jesus who responds to us: ‘It’s Me!” Then; “After an evening of serving, when we meet with the other volunteers to share our experiences, your heart is bursting with emotions and positive resolutions.” On the patronal feast of the city of Como it was a special afternoon in the crowded basilica, with the bishop and civil authorities, with the full participation of Eritrean, Ethiopian and Somali Christian refugees, along with a representation of 500 volunteers. “The Gospel reading about the Final Judgement, in Italian, English and Tigrinya was very moving,” they reported. “Colomban Missionary Father Claudio, who belongs to our community and spent more than 30 years in those countries and knows their languages, has been working for weeks in the camps. The bishop entrusted their spiritual wellbeing to him, placing his very basilica at the complete disposal of the refugees. Jesus came to visit us today in these refugee brothers and sisters. And we want not only to accept Him, but to respond into the future in concrete ways.” Source: Movimento dei Focolari Italia
Nov 8, 2016 | Focolare Worldwide, Senza categoria
Photo credit: Ursel Haaf
Nov 6, 2016 | Focolare Worldwide, Senza categoria
The preamble to the Constitution of UNESCO declares: “Since wars begin in the minds of human beings, it is in the minds of human beings that defenses of peace must be built.” This November 15th, Chiara Lubich and the Focolare Movement’s efforts in favour of peace, will be remembered at the headquarters of UNESCO in Paris, France. We offer some thoughts of Igino Giordani about peace. He had first-hand experience of two world wars. “Social wounds are called wars and disagreements. They tear at the social fabric leaving wounds that are unable to be healed. Ancient souls yearned for peace: “if you want peace, prepare war,” said the Romans. But in the spirit of the Gospel, true peace is never obtained by war, but by the sprouting of a peaceful disposition and by a harmony of minds. You don’t commit evil to obtain good. “If you want peace, prepare peace.” Here again, you bring about renewal by building peace, not with weapons, but with love that revives life. When love is on the move it generates brotherhood, equality, unity. It vanquishes envy, arrogance and discord. It gathers people together into one family and one mind. Human life is sacred. Do not kill! Do not take revenge! Love your enemy! No retaliating. The portion of humanity that followed Christ understood the angelic message of the Gospel that was sung on the night of his birth: ‘Peace on Earth’. One lover of peace is all that is needed. Jesus opposed the generals and bloody heroes with peaceful ones, victorious over themselves, inspirers of peace within themselves, among citizens and foreigners…. He created a new and more difficult heroism: that of avoiding war in all of its forms, forever breaking the dialectic between pardon and remission. This peace is the fruit of love which requires us to love even our enemies, even those that bear false witness against us. It prevents fractures, or it heals them. In the regimes of love, discord is an absurdity, a negation, and those that provoke discord certainly place themselves outside the spirit of Christ: and outside they remain until harmony has been restored.” Source: Igino Giordani, Il messaggio sociale del cristianesimo, (Rome: Città Nuova, 1935 and 1966) p 360-368.
Nov 5, 2016 | Focolare Worldwide, Senza categoria
Hungary had been invaded by Soviet troops following the 1956 uprising. In response to the appeal of Pope Pius XII, Chiara Lubich wrote a letter that became the Magna Carta of a new calling in the Focolare Movement: the Volunteers of God, men and women who live the spirituality of unity and are especially committed to bringing the presence of God into society. Last October, a total of 1,840 participants from the wale of Italy, came together in Castel Gandolfo, Rome. “There’s a lot of desire to step up for our country, to overcome the fragmentation and to create a network of best practices that can provide mutual support. Now, it’s more necessary than ever before to give an intergenerational concrete response to the challenges of those that suffer in society.” This was the comment of one of the young participants that summarizes the three days of intense work. Focolare Movement president, Maria Voce, sent a message at the opening of the meeting in which she encouraged them to bear witness to the charism of unity in its more concrete expressions, keeping their gaze fixed on Jesus’s prayer “that all may be one” (Jn 17:21). The meeting continued with a series of reflections and testimonies on the central theme for the entire Movement this year: “Jesus Forsaken: 
God’s aperture on the world, and the world’s aperture on God.” The testimonies were very moving. The voices of Pina and Tanina trembled as they told about their daily acts of heroism welcoming the thousands of refugees that have disembarked at the small island of Lampedusa in recent years: “We feel that these African brothers and sisters are our own until the time comes when we have to let them go. When they leave and disperse to many parts of the world we’re filled with emotions and concern for what still awaits them.” Journalist Riccardo Balaarm told how the painful experience of his disabled son led to a commitment among the National Paralympic Swimmers to promote the testimony of free swimmer and silver medallist Arjola Trimi from Rio, Brazil. In the afternoons 150 groups discussed 35 topics: formation, social and political involvement; economy, health and ecology; art etc. These are all things that the Volunteers are called to deal with in their daily lives, through which they strive to fulfil their vocation as “first Christians of the twentieth century” as Chiara Lubich liked to call them: lay men and women that live the Gospel with the same fervour of the first Christians, committed to spending their lives for the building of a united world (Jn 17:21). A solemn moment was the signing of the act of initialization of the promotion of the Canonization Process for Volunteer Domenico Mangano from Viterbo, in the presence of Fr Andrea De Matteis, Vicar and Chancellor of the Diocese of Albano. https://youtu.be/EDCfdVUGa6s
Oct 31, 2016 | Focolare Worldwide, Senza categoria
Chantal Grevin
![Opening the 500th Anniversary Year of the Reformation]()
Oct 30, 2016 | Focolare Worldwide, Senza categoria
For the first time in 500 years Pope Francis, Bishop Munib Younana and General Secretary of the Lutheran World Federation, Rev Dr Martin Junge, will sign their names to the invitation for the 500th Anniversary of the Lutheran Reform in a highly significant gesture. Equally significant is the title that was chosen for the event: “From Conflict to Communion – Unity in Hope”. The event will be held on October 31st with an ecumenical service at the Cathedral of Lund, followed by a public ceremony at Malmö Stadium in Sweden. The Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification (1999) was already a milestone for Catholic-Lutheran ecumenical dialogue, an important historical document that this year will serve as the theological basis the search of unity in the one Church of Christ. There has been a long history of friendship between the Focolare Movement and Lutherans. It was precisely the encounter with them that made Chiara Lubich realize that the spirituality that God had entrusted to her was not meant only for Roman Catholics. 
The history: On January 14, 1961, Chiara Lubich had been invited to speak about the spirituality of unity to the Lutheran Sisterhood of Mary. Among the listeners were several Lutheran pastors, including Klaus Hess and his wife Amalie, founders of the Brotherhood of the Common Life in Germany. A few months later the Hess couple visited Rome to know more about the Focolare Movement and the Catholic Church. On May 24, 1961, Chiara founded “Centro Uno” for the unity of Christians and, in June 1968 she inaugurated the Ecumenical Centre at the permanent Mariapolis in Ottmaring, Germany. Meanwhile the Focolare spirituality was being welcomed by bishops, Catholics, Evangelicals and Lutherans in East and West Germany. The spirituality of unity was also spreading in Sweden, and more than half the people at the Mariapolis were Lutherans. In 1982 bishops from different Churches began to attend the Movement’s annual gatherings for Catholic Bishops Friends of the Focolare. In 2015 there were 6 Lutheran bishops from three countries at the Focolare meeting for bishops in Constantinople. In 1988, Chiara was awarded the Augsburg Peace Prize. In 1999, she was an invited guest at the historic signing of the Joint Declaration on Justification in Augsburg. She was invited to compose a prayer that she recited at that solemn celebration. In 2003, the then Lutheran bishop of Munich, Johannes Friedrich, visited the Internationals Centre of the Focolare Movement with a delegation. Chiara spoke to them about Jesus Forsaken: “He presented himself (…) as the model to be imitated in every trial and especially in the pains of disunity; (…) [Jesus] Forsaken is also [the] light for recomposing full visible unity”[1]. In 2009, Focolare president Maria Voce was invited to the celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Joint Declaration. Since she will not be able to attend the 500th Anniversary of the Lutheran Reform, she will be represented by Friederike Koller and Ángel Bartol who are the Central Delegates of the Work of Mary.
See: Statement issued from the 35th Ecumenical Meeting of Bishops friends of the Focolare Movement.
[1] Città Nuova 2003, 10, p 35
