La Thuile

Living for the Work of an Other
In testimonies about offering hospitality to minors in Como and welcoming AIDS victims in Kampala, Innocente Figini and Rose Busingye helped listeners to have a new gaze on everyday life

by Paola Bergamini

“As Carrón emphasized yesterday, work is an expression of the ‘I;’ it is born of a person who sees a need and tries to respond. But there are ways and there are ways. We can stop at a particular or, as in our experience in responding to the need that we encounter, we can help each other to place ourselves before Him, He who responds to the true need of man: Christ. You understand, don’t you, that the horizon is totally different?” With these words, Vittadini introduced the Tuesday evening testimonies of Innocente Figini of La Cometa in Como, Italy, and Rose Busingye of the Meeting Point in Kampala. Two works, one offering hospitality to minors and the other helping AIDS victims, “that are two examples for learning to have a new gaze on reality, for responding to the circumstances that we encounter every day.”

Innocente Figini
They have fourteen children born to them, twenty-four foster children living with them, a technical school, and a sports association, but “we didn’t want to found anything. This life just materialized in our hands,” begins Innocente, an ophthalmologist who, together with his siblings Erasmo and Maria Grazia, was at the origin of this charitable association called La Cometa. “We’re called to serve something that an Other indicates to us through the solicitations of reality.” The first call came in the form of their father’s words shortly before his death: “I leave you my faith. Just one word of guidance: live in communion.” At the time, nobody understood what it meant. Then Erasmo was asked to host an HIV-positive child. He asked for help from his physician brother, and their closeness grew. Then they had an encounter with Fr. Giussani, who told them, “Do a work of communion.” “This whole story was born of the encounter with that man, who leaned down to our needs. In that encounter, I experienced the correspondence between what moves our heart and our reason. For me, the truth was a precise fact, a man, and, following him, I understood that the journey to truth is an experience, not a definition. Up to that time, I had used my reason to manipulate reality. I wandered around after my images, my thoughts. I didn’t let myself be provoked by reality. Giussani revived the glimmering of desire I had in my heart.” This encounter continued in the work of School of Community because “the need for meaning has to be educated, otherwise it runs the risk of falling into the trap of the common mentality, which tries in every possible way to uproot the desires for truth, beauty, and justice in our hearts. This is even more the case for our children.” In time, reality has presented many needs that required responses, and that led to the flowering of a series of encounters and initiatives, like presenting the exhibit on their work at the Meeting in Rimini–which they organized so beautifully, in their surprise and enthusiasm at being asked to do so. “We never laid out plans on the drawing board. We have always felt free from the outcome, free to ask anyone for help, because everything works together for His glory. We never wanted to understand theoretically the meaning of the word communion. We experienced it in offering hospitality. Communion is a judgment, truth. It is born of the union of hearts, not similar temperaments.”

Rose Busingye
In Kampala, with the assistance of two doctors, two nurses, and fifty volunteers and social assistants, Rose helps 2,000 AIDS victims and 2,050 orphans through AVSI distance adoptions. “I began truly working when someone said to me, ‘You are mine.’ This was when I discovered who I belong to, not just who I am. I’ve always worked for Jesus, but there came a time in my life when I was running after something I couldn’t catch. As long as things went well, I would say, ‘How wonderful, Jesus!’ Then the difficulties came–the sick people who complained all the time, the friends who weren’t there... I wanted to leave. I began working again when I answered the question,  “To whom do I belong?” The answer was incarnated in specific faces, with first and last names. It was no longer an imaginary Christ. I responded to my vocation.” A new creativity blossomed, in the form of the International Meeting Point charitable center. Its origins were in acute observation of reality and the need of the other seen in its totality. “Once, some Italian friends brought me to see the beauty of a sunset. I thought, ‘This is important for my Meeting Point women too.’ So now we organize outings to go see the sunset! Lately, we’ve also organized soccer games for our women.” When the way of working changes, others take note. “First, they saw me as a person who ‘had’ to do things, but now they see me attentive to what I do. And when I am not there, they do the same things.” For example, when Hurricane Katrina struck Louisiana two years ago (see the Volume 7, No. 11 [December] 2005 issue of Traces), Rose asked the women–whose work is breaking big rocks into smaller rocks and selling them to road and housing construction firms–to pray for those left homeless and deprived of their families. A woman came up to her and said, “When you met me, you didn’t just pray. I want to die having loved someone. In the future, I don’t want people to meet my children, and just pray!” Rose continues, “I returned after four weeks. They had collected $1,200. An American journalist who heard about it was scandalized. He told us, ‘Those who give charity give of their excess. You’ve given everything you have. It’s not right! America should be giving to you.’ One of my women answered him, ‘Man’s heart is international; it is moved to compassion.’ He left, shocked.”