![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/110228-05-200x150.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
An intense week; a deep spiritual experience lived in full communion with the Focolare\u2019s local community present in the Holy Land. The members of the movement in that region felt a renewed commitment to building dialogue among everyone,<\/strong> in the spirit of universal brotherhood, the commitment of the Focolare Movement worldwide.<\/p>\n 26 and 27 February- Two days in Jerusalem.<\/strong> On Saturday morning the group met at the Western Wall, or Wailing Wall as it\u2019s also commonly known. Busy because of Shabbat<\/em>, it was the perfect place to further the acquaintance of various aspects of the Jewish faith and to find out more about Shabbat<\/em>. The group continued by foot towards the vicinity of the Roman steps that link the Valley of Cedron to the area where the Temple entrance once stood. According to tradition it is the place where Jesus prayed to the Father for unity among all men.<\/p>\n Sunday 27th <\/sup>\u2013 Final day of the pilgrimage with a mass celebrated in the Grotto of the Apostles by Cardinal Vlk <\/strong>and Mons. Antonio Franco, Apostolic Delegate to the Holy Land. The latter offered a meditation to those present on the significance of this visit of Maria Voce and the General Council to the Holy Land in the light of spirituality of Unity of Chiara Lubich.<\/p>\n After having visited the places of the passion and death of Christ, a reception in the Notre Dame Centre. 150 members of ecclesial movements, various church leaders present in Jerusalem as well as Jews and Muslims close to the Focolare gathered around the president, co-president and Council. Maria Voce introduced the Roman convoy and thanked everyone present for all that was done for them during the visit and for all of the activities that accompanied their pilgrimage. She assured them that the moments lived together and the people she met would remain in her heart; sure that she too would remain in the hearts of all those she met in the Holy Land.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Focolare Movement\u2019s General Council, with Maria Voce and Giancarlo Faletti, has returned to Italy. Their journey on the footsteps of Jesus, with a pilgrimage from Galilee to Jerusalem, has concluded and we publish the diary of the last days of their trip.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[893],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-292112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-focolare-worldwide-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=292112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292112\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=292112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=292112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=292112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/110228-03-200x150.jpg\")
25 February<\/strong>– After a visit to the Mountain of the Beatitudes and to Mount Tabor, the next stop was Nazareth. The General Council was met by a large delegation of the Focolare communities present in Haifa, Jerusalem and Bethlehem. In the Basilica, in front of the Grotto of the Annunciation, mass was celebrated in a solemn and yet simple atmosphere. Cardinal Miloslaw Vlk, Bishop Emeritus of Prague, and Mons. Giacinto Marcuzzo, auxiliary bishop of the Latin Patriarch in Galilee, concelebrated together with the 17 priests on the General Council, and two priests from the Latin Patriarch. Mons. Marcuzzo, in his homily, recalled the meaningful words written on the banner welcoming Pope Benedict XVI to Nazareth in 2009: \u201cWelcome to Nazareth, where it all began\u201d<\/em>. \u201cMary\u2019s yes\u201d, underlined the Monsignor, \u201cwas the first step in this new beginning of human history\u201d. At the end of the Mass, thanking the bishops and the Focolare community, Maria Voce renewed the whole movement\u2019s commitment to \u2018relive Mary\u2019 so as to be a presence of her in the world, as Chiara Lubich wrote in the movement\u2019s statutes.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/110228-04-200x150.jpg\")
In 1956 Chiara Lubich, during her only visit to the Holy Land<\/strong>, expressed the desire that one day there may be a focolare near those steps. The Movement\u2019s local directors in the Holy Land explained the developments over the last number of years that lead to the fulfilment of that dream: the purchase of a piece of land right beside the steps and measures being taken to obtain the necessary permits that allow for a transformation of this terrain into a garden park for gatherings and moments of reflection. After having read the passage of the Gospel of John often referred to in Christian tradition as \u2018Jesus\u2019 Priestly Prayer\u2019 along with Lubich\u2019s writings from the 1956 visit, a group photo captured this profound and deeply spiritual moment.<\/p>\n