{"id":328800,"date":"2016-12-21T04:13:08","date_gmt":"2016-12-21T03:13:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/the-simplicity-of-aletta-2\/"},"modified":"2024-05-16T15:05:57","modified_gmt":"2024-05-16T13:05:57","slug":"the-simplicity-of-aletta-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/the-simplicity-of-aletta-2\/","title":{"rendered":"The simplicity of Aletta"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Aletta\"<\/a>Born in Martignano<\/strong> (Trent) on 27 November 1924, Vittoria Salizzoni<\/strong>, who moved temporarily to France with her family, felt God\u2019s call at the age of 13: an intuition which she tried momentarily to put aside. At the age of<\/strong> 21 she met<\/strong> Chiara Lubich <\/a>and was attracted by the novelty of the life she lived. Her doubts dissolved immediately<\/strong>: the path through which she could respond to that \u201ccalling\u201d she had felt ever since childhood, was the focolare<\/a>. Aletta<\/strong> (\u201clittle wing,\u201d the name that Chiara gave her to remind her of the winged<\/em> flight <\/em>she had to take without looking back) stood by Chiara for 20 years in the discovery and implementation of the features of the Charism the Holy Spirit was slowly revealing to them. Among these, besides the specific spirituality of unity<\/a> which is its particular characterstic, were the main concrete aspects<\/a> of Christian life. What specifically suited the figure of Aletta, was the concern for health and protection of the environment<\/a>. Chiara herself had explained this aspect to her as: \u00abthe entire humanity of Jesus; the life of Jesus in each person. Jesus was born of a woman like us, suffered the cold and hunger, cried, and experienced human affection. He fed the hungry, multiplied the bread and fishes, and healed many sick people. But above all he was full of love for mankind, and his suffering\u2026 Suffering, death and the resurrection are also expressions of this aspect.\u00bb <\/em> In the 1960s and 1970s Chiara asked her to open the focolare house in <\/strong>Istanbul<\/a>, where Aletta would have many and profound contacts with Patriarch Athenagoras I<\/strong><\/strong>. So on many occasions, she had the chance to accompany Chiara in her visits to the Patriarch.\u00a0 During her stay in those lands, Aletta discovered the beauty of the Orthodox Church and the Churches of the Orient, in which she saw the importance of translating truth in life, exalting love. The contacts she established were the precursor of a fertile dialogue that has continued up to today, with the current Ecumenical Patriarch, Bartholomew I. \"Aletta\"<\/a>After the death of Athenagoras,<\/strong> Aletta moved to Lebano<\/a>n. Those were years of civil war, which with the continuous air raids, repeated the lesson of the movement\u2019s early years in Trent: \u201ceverything collapses, only God remains!\u201d She shared with the local people the insecurity and risks of those long years of war, supporting, consoling, and imbuing hope. Difficulties and dangers did not hinder the spread of the charism of unity, not only in Lebanon but across the Middle East, which Aletta visited periodically. In 1990 she returned to Rome for good. \u00abDuring those first years in Piazza Cappuccini<\/em> \u2013 recounts Palmira<\/strong>,<\/strong> who is also from that first group of focolarine women of Trent \u2013 I would go with Aletta to the valleys to meet the first communities that were sprouting. She was like an angel, and it explains clearly why Chiara immediately called her so. And she was like the batter of an angel\u2019s wing, for Chiara and for all of us throughout these 70 years of her life in the focolare. She didn\u2019t talk much, but what she said put us all in the essential facts of life. What characterized her most was simplicity, an inborn serenity and enviable psycho-physical balance.\u00bb<\/em> Ten days before her death, Aletta recorded a video message to the youths of the Movement, <\/strong>the gen<\/a>, gathered for their congress: \u00abI want to greet all the gen of the world on their 50th<\/sup> anniversary<\/em>. May they all make progress; they are young, still strong, and can do all they wish!\u00bb<\/em> Upon announcing the death of Aletta to the Movement worldwide, Maria Voce<\/a>, the Focolare President wrote: \u00abWith joy and immense gratitude we are accompanying <\/em>Aletta <\/em><\/a>to the house of the Father. We could not have had a better model than her, who gave her life without measure.<\/em>\u00bb By Anna Friso<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A month after her passing, we commemorate one of the first young women who joined Chiara Lubich in the adventure of the first focolare house. Gifted with an inborn serenity, and a builder of peace, she has left us her simplicity as our heritage, and the testimony of giving without measure.<\/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":"","_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-328800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-non-categorizzato"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328800","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=328800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328800\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}