13 Feb 2019 | Non categorizzato
At times the closest relationships turn out to be the most difficult ones. Such was the experience of Miso Kuleif and her father. “I have always had a difficult relationship with my father. Neither I nor the rest of the family have ever managed to get along well with him, and because of this we suffered a lot. Yet, there was a precise moment in my life when I discovered that my father really loves me and that I love him too”. Miso Kuleif, a 24 year old young girl, introduced her experience with these words. She was born in Jordan, but has been living in Italy with her family for more than twenty years. Miso’s father suffered from health problems for quite a long time, but the situation was at its worst about three years ago when he ugently needed liver transplant surgery. He chose to have the operation done in Jordan, as there, unlike Italy, the donor can be alive. “The problem was to find a donor”, Miso continued, “and therefore to find someone willing to undergo compatibility checks. When I got to know this, it did not take much to decide. I left with my father to undergo the necessary tests”. “From where did I get this strength? I have been living the spirituality of unity for some years and this helped” – she explained. “I met the Focolari in my hometown through the Diocesan Movement that promotes the spirituality of unity in many dioceses and parishes. During our meetings, we have often spoken about loving others as the Gospel teaches and about being ready to give our life to others. Now I couldn’t back out. If we have the chance to save a life, we cannot refrain from doing it”. Miso left Italy; she interrupted her university studies without knowing when she would be back. Her experience in Jordan was quite tough. “I was there alone, surrounded by a family to whom I did not seem to belong. If I had to undergo surgery, I could not have the comfort of the ones I wanted to be near”. But she moved on. Tests proved that Miso’s organ was not compatible with her father’s. After a short while a donor was found; it was her father’s brother, the only one who accepted to do the necessary checks. “It took me quite a while to metabolize this experience. Thanks also to members of the Movement who were quite close to me, I realized that I love my father, even though it is difficult for me to admit it. It is easier to hate someone, but it is much more harmful. The real problem was not the situation itself, but the way I dealt with it. I learned that we can always be happy, and this depends on us. The Gospel says: “Freely you have received, freely give”. Now I know how important these words are. If my life were different, maybe it would have been simpler, but I would not be the one I am today”.
12 Feb 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
11 Feb 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
11 Feb 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
10 Feb 2019 | Non categorizzato
On the 2019 World Day of the Sick we share a short reflection by Chiara Lubich on illness and the Focolare Movement’s communities where sick people are living. You know that the whole of our Christian life is revolutionary. It completely changes our way of thinking and goes against the flow. Now, looking at how sick people are considered in the world, we see that in some ways they are considered differently from healthy people, as if they were a separate category, especially if their illness is long term or incurable. Today’s society does not understand the value of suffering. It wants to forget about both suffering and death and so it marginalises the sick. This is something seriously anti-Christian because, of all marginalised people, Jesus Christ on the cross would really be number one. So these particular communities where sick people are living are of course like the others, but they are also special because of the fruit they bear and the witness they give to the world of what suffering means to a Christian. Suffering is a gift God gives to a person. These are not only words said to console ourselves or console the sick. All those who are not well are truly loved by God in a special way, because they are more like his Son. (Chiara Lubich, Perchè mi hai abbandonato?, 1997, pp.108-109)
8 Feb 2019 | Non categorizzato
A mild-mannered yet decisive man, profoundly convinced that the Gospel is one of the most revolutionary books ever written containing the power to change the world, Marco Aquini lived all his life for this. He left us a month ago, on 4 January. Meeting Marco left its mark. He was one of those rare people whose gaze reached right inside you and touched your heart. A man of few words, he would approach any problem you had with a gentle, practical approach. Any advice he gave was never imposed on you, rather it served to help you draw out solutions from within yourself. Marco was born in 1958 in Udine, Italy. He was one of the first young people to get to know the Focolare Movement in the Friuli region, where the people are known for being serious, industrious and self-disciplined. From a young age he experienced the hard blows that life can bring when his father was killed in a serious accident. But his encounter with the spirituality of the Focolare Movement proved to be a turning point in his life. In 1978, during a summer program with the Gen (the young people of the Focolare Movement), Marco discerned the calling to give himself to God as a Focolarino. At the same time, together with others, he responded to Chiara Lubich’s invitation to sign a pledge to remain faithful to God to the end of his life, which has become known in the Focolare Movement as the “Pact to be faithful right to the end”. On that occasion, Marco wrote to Chiara, “Before I got to know the ‘Ideal’ (the Focolare spirituality), I was closed within my own gilded world. Living the Ideal, I’m now coming out of myself. I go back home conscious of having the powerful potential to change the world in which I live”. From his early years as a Focolarino, his contribution was always whole-hearted and passionate, firstly in Germany, then back in Italy at the Movement’s Centre, where he was involved in establishing two organizations to assist those most in need and to promote peace: AMU (‘Associazione Mondo Unito’/ ‘United World Association’), and ‘New Humanity’ the Focolare’s NGO accredited to the United Nations. For many years he served as counsellor for the aspect of “Communion of Goods, Economy and Work” at the Focolare’s international centre, and was for some years co-responsible for the Youth for a United World movement. From 2000 he sat beside Chiara and Eli to read news stories in the regular “Link Up” video conference calls with the whole family of the Focolare Movement worldwide. Another personal tragedy was to profoundly affect Marco’s life: the unexplained disappearance of his sister, Chiara, who had long endured fragile health. Together with his mother, he suffered greatly as the search continued until, sadly, her body was found. Even in this situation, Marco managed to hold on to his belief in the love of God, which gave him the strength to support his family. Later, together with his mother, Franca, Marco helped to set up a day centre, named after his sister, to provide support and social integration for people with physical and psychological disabilities, as part of the “Associazione Insieme Si Può” / “Together We Can Association”, which Marco never ceased to accompany, even at a distance. In Rome, at the Pontifical University of St Thomas Aquinus in Urbe, he was Visiting Lecturer on courses in International Cooperation for Development and Sociology of Development. Most recently, he joined the team of Città Nuova, bringing his economic expertise to the administration of the Focolare magazine. Throughout his life, he never failed to find ways to love the weakest and suffering neighbours, including regularly offering the benefit of his skills and experience to a Caritas outreach group near Rome. In November 2018, he communicated to his friends the discovery of a life-threatening illness. He faced this new step on the journey with a renewed choice of God, and despite being in great pain, he also expressed finding great joy. Maria Voce in her telegram to the worldwide Focolare community, chose to emphasize his vocation as a Focolarino, as well as his sober, honest and straight forward nature which was expressed so well in the Gospel phrase Chiara offered for him to live: Let your word be ‘Yes, Yes’ or ‘No, No’ (Mt 5:37), and how he lived his illness in such an extraordinary manner. The last phase of Marco’s life left those around him speechless as they witnessed the rapid unstoppable deterioration of his health over two months, until he reached the heavenly goal on the morning of 4 January. His funeral was attended by people of all kinds, all linked to him in different ways and all somehow “roped together” with him to climb, no longer his beloved high mountains, but the highs and lows of this life, accompanied by his luminous and authentic example.
Patrizia Mazzola
