{"id":367420,"date":"2024-11-27T00:05:00","date_gmt":"2024-11-26T23:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/?p=367420"},"modified":"2024-11-28T09:33:54","modified_gmt":"2024-11-28T08:33:54","slug":"gospel-lived-she-our-of-her-poverty-put-all-she-had-to-live-on-mt-1244","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/gospel-lived-she-our-of-her-poverty-put-all-she-had-to-live-on-mt-1244\/","title":{"rendered":"Gospel lived: \u2018she, out of her poverty, put all she had to live on\u2019 (Mt 12:44)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Kindness<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

This morning, while shopping at the supermarket, I passed by a large trolley where a shop assistant was piling up boxes. I noticed two of them were on the ground.<\/p>\n\n

Fearing that I had inadvertently dropped them, I apologised, picked up the boxes and placed them on the trolley.<\/p>\n\n

The shop assistant thanked me and said not to worry, then called after me: \u2018Kindness is rare!\u2019. Another person who was passing by just at that moment confirmed: \u201cThat’s very true!\u201d whereupon the shop assistant, by way of explanation, told her what had happened. <\/p>\n\n

As for me, I was happy, not least because this little episode reminded me of a phrase I had heard some time ago which had struck me. It spoke about \u201csowing kindness\u201d. It felt like a \u2018caress\u2019 from God. <\/p>\n\n

G.S. \u2013 Italy (*)<\/p>\n\n

Healing relationships<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

I have a brother, a Catholic Christian, who married a German woman from the Evangelical Church. When they settled in Italy, the relationship between my mother and sister-in-law was not easy, even though she was not against their children being educated in the Catholic Church. As for me, I tried to be a \u2018mediator\u2019 between her and my mother. My sister-in-law also suffered because of this misunderstanding, which was however healed shortly before our mother died. For some time now, I have been sharing the \u2018Thought for the Day\u2019 with her via Whatsapp which helps us to live Gospel-based love on a daily basis. One day the thought invited us to \u2018be merciful\u2019, with this short commentary sentence: \u201cMercy is a love that knows how to welcome every neighbour, especially the poorest and neediest. A love that does not measure, is abundant, universal, concrete\u201d. Her response was immediate: \u2018If I have made you feel bad in certain circumstances over the past years, please forgive me\u201d. Astonished, I replied in turn: \u201cI too apologise\u201d. And she: \u201cI don’t remember any incident for which need to apologise…\u2019. <\/p>\n\n

C. \u2013 Italy (*)<\/p>\n\n

Called and sent<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

Someone very dear to me asked me to write something about my experience as a teacher for an acquaintance of hers from another country who was doing a project on values education.<\/p>\n\n

I realised that it was an opportunity to transform into a testimony and \u2018proclamation\u2019 what, in some ways, has been my personal response to the \u2018call\u2019 to live according to the teachings of the Gospel as a teacher and as a mother.<\/p>\n\n

The piece took many hours of writing, deleting, correcting, rewriting, remembering aspects that I could add, deleting others that seemed irrelevant and, above all, filtering each word with love. I tried to put myself in the place of the person I was writing for, because even though I did not know her, I could love Jesus in her. <\/p>\n\n

I sent it to my friend, aware that it might not be exactly what she needed, and so was ready to change everything.<\/p>\n\n

To my surprise, she replied: \u201cI have already sent your letter. I really liked it\u201d. No doubt it was not the writing itself that was liked, but the work that God had done in me which could be a little light for others by being shared. <\/p>\n\n

And, of course, the other things I had to do in those days were easily taken care of, as there had been some changes in the rota that left me with more free time.<\/p>\n\n

C.M. \u2013 Argentina<\/p>\n\n

Edited by Carlos ManaPhoto \u00a9 StockSnap-Pixabay<\/em><\/p>\n\n

(*) From ‘The Gospel of the Day’ November-December, Citt\u00e0 Nuova, Rome 2024.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Gospel, if we want to live it, asks us to use everything we have – our intelligence, our skills, our heart and our hands – go towards to our brothers and sisters. Small gestures that can often help rebuild relationships or even just enrich our days with kindness. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":367414,"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":[2844,3286],"tags":[3349,3196,3301],"class_list":["post-367420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sociale-3","category-testimonianze-di-vita-en","tag-notifiche-en","tag-ppg-en","tag-testimonianze-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367420","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=367420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367420\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/367414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=367420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=367420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=367420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}