Word of Life – December 2006

The poet who composed the Psalm from which this Word of Life comes had been on a pilgrimage to the temple of Jerusalem. He wanted to remain there, just as the sparrows who had built their nests there, but he had to return to his home (or: to his land). He remembered with nostalgia the “lovely … dwelling place” of the Lord where he experienced the presence of God. He then decided to go back again and so he set off on the journey to Jerusalem. It would be a “holy journey” that would once again put him “in front of God.” As in all cultures and faiths, the journey was a metaphor for life.
The “holy journey” is the symbol for the roads we need to take to reach God. We are in fact headed towards a final end that we should not call “death” but rather an “encounter” because it is not an ending but the beginning of a new Life with God. We are all called to this by him.
Why not then plan our whole lives with this goal in mind? Why not turn the only life we have into a journey, a holy journey, because the one who is waiting for us is the holy One?
Yes, we are all called to become holy: “This is the will of God, your holiness” (1 Thes 4:3). God loves each of us, individually, with an immense love. He has thought up and planned a specific itinerary for each of us to follow, with a precise finish line to reach.

«Happy are those who find refuge in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrim roads»

Certainly we are children of our time, a time with a predilection for activism – at times unbridled – and for efficiency, which values certain occupations and undervalues others, which quietly neglects some of the challenges of life out of fear and with the illusion that they will just go away.
Perhaps we too, influenced and blinded by similar tendencies, may uselessly waste our energies. Perhaps we too might consider taking days off to rest as unnecessary, setting aside moments for prayer as superfluous, and viewing our illnesses and various difficulties – which God permits in his plan of love for us – as merely obstacles along our path.
How can we begin or get back in step seriously with our own holy journey? It is not difficult to discover how: by not doing our own will, but doing the will of God. We can do this by following him in each present moment of our lives, knowing that – and this is a huge gift – we are accompanied by a special grace in everything that we do in this way, by the “actual grace” that enlightens our minds and helps us to direct our wills and sensitivities to what is good.
Even those who do not embrace any religious creed can make a masterpiece of their life by embarking with uprightness on a journey of sincere moral commitment.

«Happy are those who find refuge in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrim roads»

If life is a long “holy journey” traced out by the will of God, our itinerary demands that we progress every day. Love urges us to keep growing, to improve always. We cannot be content with how we lived yesterday, so we should regularly tell ourselves, “Today, better than yesterday.”
And what should we do when we stop, or when we go backwards by falling into our old ways or by just giving in to laziness? Should we remain discouraged by our mistakes and give up our goal? No, in these moments, our motto should be: “start out again,” first of all by entrusting our past, with all its mistakes and sins, to God’s mercy.
To start over again, by trusting completely in God’s grace, rather than counting on our own strength. Doesn’t the Word of Life tell us that we can find our refuge in him? We can start over each day as though it were the first day of our holy journey.
Above all, let us journey together, united in love, by helping one another. Then The Saint will be among us and he will become the “Way” for us. He will help us to understand the will of God better, and he will give us the desire and the ability to carry it out. If we are united everything will become easier and we will experience the beatitude promised to those who embark on the holy journey.

«Happy are those who find refuge in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrim roads»

These verses from the Psalms remind me of how a friend of mine lived. His name was Enzo Fondi.
In 1951, when he was twenty-two years old and living in Rome, Enzo decided to follow God completely within the recently formed Focolare Movement. After he received his medical degree as a surgeon, Enzo began his practice behind the “iron curtain” in a hospital in Leipzig, then East Germany. There he wished to bear witness to a love that is rooted in the Gospel. He was later ordained a priest. After a number of years he journeyed to the United States to continue to spread the same message.
During the latter part of his life his journeys did not let up. His work for the interreligious dialogue promoted by the Movement brought him to different places with various commitments, but the project was always the same: to follow God’s will. He concluded his long “holy journey” on New Year’s Eve 2001. That evening he was found in front of his computer as though still at work, with his head leaning on the table, his face serene and without a trace of suffering. More than having passed on, he seemed to have simply passed from one “room” to the next.
Fifteen days before his death, he had written, “My last will and testament: for me, the last will of God is the one he wants from me now. There is no other. To accomplish the last will of God perfectly, whatever it may be, this is my last will. I don’t know what the last will of God will really be for me, but one thing I do know is this: I will have the actual grace to do the will of God at the end of my life in so far as I have tried to take advantage of this grace by living each present moment well.”

Chiara Lubich