{"id":341406,"date":"2012-09-23T08:00:10","date_gmt":"2012-09-23T06:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/light-from-chiara-luce-shines-in-the-rebibbia-prison\/"},"modified":"2024-06-06T12:07:38","modified_gmt":"2024-06-06T10:07:38","slug":"light-from-chiara-luce-shines-in-the-rebibbia-prison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/light-from-chiara-luce-shines-in-the-rebibbia-prison\/","title":{"rendered":"Light from Chiara Luce shines in the Rebibbia prison"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>\u201cFor several years I had become hard<\/strong>, closed up on myself, sad; today Chiara Luce has opened my doors\u201d one of the convicts tells Maria Teresa, mother of the blessed Chiara Luce Badano<\/a>, while he embraces her and holds her hands.<\/p>\n

The 20th<\/sup> September was certainly a special afternoon, in the theatre of the Rebibbia Roman prison: 250 inmates were dressed in their best clothes to greet the couple, Ruggero and Maria Teresa Badano, parents of the blessed Chiara Luce.<\/strong> \u201cIt will be a special evening,\u201d Anna Del Villano announces in her presentation. She is the director of one of the sectors of the prison.<\/p>\n

How did all this come about? Alfonso Di Nicola, of the Focolare Movement, who has for many years carried out voluntary work in the prisons of Rebibbia: \u201cI got to know that the Badanos visited the convicts in the Viterbo prison in 2011,\u201d he relates,\u201cand I thought that we could organise a similar evening also in Rebibbia.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the inmates find their seats, it is impressive to see how they greet each other warmly. They come from different sections of the prison, \u201caccording to the crime committed,\u201d they explain.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Four people sat on the stage:<\/strong>\u00a0 the Badanos, Chicca Coriasco – a close friend of Chiara Luce – and Franz, her brother. Maria Teresa breaks the ice and recalls how much her daughter loved the sick and those who suffer, and invites all to share this moment as in a family. Ruggero does not hide his emotions.<\/p>\n

What is Chiara Luce\u2019s message?<\/strong> She was a normal girl who played sport; she loved Sassello, her native city, especially when it was covered with snow. Together with Chicca, she got to know the Focolare spirituality when she was still very young. They took up Chiara Lubich\u2019s invitation to live the Gospel with youthful enthusiasm, in the diverse situations of everyday life, both joyful and sorrowful; and then they would share the fruits of their experiences in order to encourage each other.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs it is with older brothers,” Franz quips in, “I kept myself aloof from them.” She was a normal girl, and it was precisely this normality that drew him to her, especially when her illness would eventually be diagnosed as terminal cancer.\u00a0 Franz continues, \u201cChiara Luce was in love with Jesus crucified in the way Chiara Lubich presented him: abandoned, \u201ca loser\u201d, a \u201cconquered God\u201d who resembles each one of us\u2026 who at a certain point cries out on the cross\u201d.<\/p>\n

Love for God was the secret that helped her live her grave illness – an osteosarcoma, a very aggressive tumour. Through him her every suffering was transformed into love with contagious serenity and joy. Ruggero relates: \u201cI used to spy upon her from the keyhole of her room to see whether she was always like that, or whether her smile was only for us. But she smiled all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/strong>The silence in the theatre is not usual. Chiara Luce\u2019s story captures the attention of all and this young girl enters the heart of those present. While some images of Chiara Luce were projected on a big screen, an international Focolare choir sang \u201cGod Loves Me\u201d, the song written for the beatification of Chiara Luce, on 25th<\/sup> September 2010.<\/p>\n

\u201cSoon Chiara Luce will be a saint\u201d one of the inmates exclaims. Maria Teresa replies: \u201cThen you will no longer be here\u2026 we all pass through difficult periods\u201d. Her words fall like balm and are greeted with a warm applause!<\/p>\n

Official website of the postulation: www.chiaralucebadano.it<\/a><\/p>\n

Chiara Luce Website \u201cLife Love Light\u201d: www.chiaraluce.org<\/a><\/p>\n

Franz Coriasco, author of\u00a0 \u201cDai tetti in giu\u201d, Ed. Citta Nuova, Roma 2010<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An extraordinary evening in the Roman prison. Chiara Luce\u2019s parents relate the story of their young beatified daughter and illuminate the hearts of the 250 detainees.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"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":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-341406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-non-categorizzato"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341406","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\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341406\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}