{"id":342544,"date":"2013-11-27T06:20:53","date_gmt":"2013-11-27T05:20:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/jesus-forsaken-a-light-for-theology\/"},"modified":"2024-06-06T12:11:04","modified_gmt":"2024-06-06T10:11:04","slug":"jesus-forsaken-a-light-for-theology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/jesus-forsaken-a-light-for-theology\/","title":{"rendered":"Jesus Forsaken: A Light for Theology"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>At the opening of the Academic Year of the \u201cSan Roberto Bellarmino\u201d<\/strong> Religious Science College on November 25 in Capua City, near Naples, Maria Voce<\/a> held a Lecture on one of the main points of the spirituality of unity<\/a>, \u201cJesus Forsaken<\/a>, A Light for Theology\u201d. There were Bishops of the different dioceses of the Campania region present. The president of the Focolare Movement outlined \u201cthe salient aspects\u201d, since \u2013 as she affirmed herself \u2013 \u201cwe cannot present briefly all the wealth of the doctrine of Jesus Forsaken in the spirituality of Chiara Lubich<\/a>.\u201d Here is an excerpt of her Lecture:<\/p>\n

\u00abI would like to begin with a quotation of a letter that Chiara wrote to a friend way back in 1946. An emblematic quote, which says:<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/em>Look \u2026, I am a soul passing through this world.<\/p>\n

I have seen many beautiful and good things and I have always been attracted only by them. One day (one indescribable day) I saw a light. It appeared to me as more beautiful than the other beautiful things, and I followed it. I realized it was the Truth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jesus on the cross. He came on earth to bring back people (who had distanced themselves from God because of sin) to a full communion with Him. He took upon himself every negative aspect of their life: sufferings, distress, desperation, pains, sins\u2026, making Himself, the Innocent One, similar to human sinners. \u201cIn order to bring the human person back to the Father’s face, Jesus not only had to take on the face of a human being, but he had to burden himself with the \u2018face\u2019 of sin\u201d[i]<\/a>, said Pope John Paul II.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Let\u2019s go back to the beginning of the Movement,<\/strong> in 1944, in the midst of the World War. On one particular circumstance a priest told Chiara that, for him, Jesus\u2019 greatest suffering was when he cried out on the cross: \u201cMy God, my God, why have you forsaken me?\u201d (Mt 27:46). Right away Chiara concluded: if that was the peak of his suffering, it was certainly also the apex of his love for us. Since then, together with her first companions, and later with all those who would have followed her Ideal, she felt called to become the \u201canswer of love\u201d to that cry.<\/p>\n

Jesus Forsaken was therefore revealed to her as \u201cthe living proof of God\u2019s love here on earth.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

This is well stressed in a famous \u201csong\u201d of praise and thanksgiving dedicated precisely to Jesus Forsaken and that spontaneously sprung forth from her heart:<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/em><\/strong>So that we might possess the light, you lost your sight.<\/p>\n

To acquire union for us, you experienced separation from the Father.<\/p>\n

So that we might have wisdom, you made yourself \u2018ignorance\u2019.<\/p>\n

To clothe us in innocence, you became sin.<\/p>\n

So that we might hope, you almost despaired…<\/p>\n

So that God might be present in us, you felt him far away from you.<\/p>\n

So that heaven might be ours, you felt hell.<\/p>\n

To make our time on earth happy, among hundreds of brothers and sisters and more, you were expelled from heaven and earth, from human beings and nature.<\/p>\n

You are God, you are my God, our<\/span> God of infinite love.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>This infinite love that Jesus crucified<\/strong> and forsaken had for every human being on earth transformed all sufferings, filled up every emptiness and redeemed every sin. Our separation from God was annulled in the re-established communion with Him and among us.<\/p>\n

Thus, Jesus Forsaken contains the key to penetrate and give an answer to the deepest mystery that envelops the life of the human being and the whole of humanity: the mystery of pain, of suffering.<\/p>\n

This is a great mystery that deeply touches Chiara\u2019s heart:<\/p>\n

\u201cJesus on earth\u2026 – she wrote with feelings – Jesus our brother\u2026 Jesus who dies between thieves for us: he, the Son of God, sharing a common life with others. \u2018\u2026 if you came among us, it was because our weakness attracted you, our wretchedness moved you to compassion.\u2019 Certainly, no earthly mother or father waiting for their lost children or doing everything to bring them back could equal our Father in heaven.\u201d<\/p>\n

From the mystery that Jesus lived on the cross, Chiara saw a light emanate, able to illuminate and to give meaning to every experience of pain and abandonment that a human person may live. She speaks of this with simplicity, confiding that, since Jesus Forsaken manifested himself to her, she seemed to discover him everywhere:<\/p>\n

\u201cHe himself, his face and his mysterious cry seemed to colour every painful moment of our life.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDarkness, the sense of failure and aridity disappeared \u2013 wrote Chiara. \u2013 And we started to understand how dynamically divine is Christian life that knows no boredom, cross, suffering, only those that pass, and makes one enjoy the fullness of life, which means resurrection, light and hope even in the midst of tribulations.\u201d\u00bb<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The challenging and innovative theme of the Lecture which Maria Voce gave to the Faculty of Religious Sciences, University of San Roberto Ballarimo (Capua, Southern Italy) at the opening of its academic year.<\/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":[893,894],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-342544","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-focolare-worldwide-2","category-senza-categoria-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342544","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=342544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342544\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=342544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=342544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=342544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}