01-07-2013 - Traces, n. 7

New World
University Students


A Path, Not an Oasis
At the recent CLU vacation, hikes, games, and rambunctious socializing were shot through with tenacious seriousness rarely seen on the American college scene. For the many young participants it was the occasion to discover the relationship with the One “who loves us more than we can imagine.”

by Vincent Petruccelli

“What does the vacation theme, ‘Another has become our measure,’ mean? It means everything is subject to Christ, to His coming toward us.” This was the simple provocation given by the CLU responsible, Giacomo, to the 130 college students and professors gathered in Estes Park, Colorado, for the CLU Summer Vacation. This theme challenged each person present–above all in the way we use our reason–and permeated everything that happened there, not because of the planning or effort of any of us, but because of Christ, Who did indeed introduce a new measure into everything.
On Saturday evening, a group of the science, engineering, computer science, and math students described this new outlook taking hold in their lives. In their presentation, “A True Scientist is a True Human Being,” they related how they had been gathering throughout the year (some virtually) to discuss their studies according to the approach to knowledge generated by their Schools of Community, in which they acknowledged each person’s individual call to Christ, and the wonder this opens up in them as they look upon the world. These meetings began as a result of a presentation that they gave at the CLU vacation last summer: “What Does Christ Have to Do with Mathematics?” A dialogue was born then about what it means to study the sciences and an exceptional openness and intelligence in front of their studies began to form. They began to ask: What is beautiful and what is human in studying science and mathematics? Matt, a computer science student from New York, related how they have grown in “the certainty that knowledge is not putting ideas forth, but asking a question of nature and awaiting a response. The dialogue with reality through hypotheses is, at the core, the dialogue with Him who makes it and this encompasses everything that is human.”
Camil, a PhD student in Logistics, clarified: “Dialogue in front of reality is not something only for students of science, but touches anyone interested in a human experience of college.” She insisted that we deepen our awareness of knowledge through the mediation of a witness, or else we will just accept everything we hear as the truth. The capacity to come to a judgment about the witness (the teacher, friend, newspaper) is essential for “being fully human” in the university setting, where most people are just swept along by the prevailing power. “Unless one discovers the connection between their heart and studying, all studies will remain, simply, information. What we learn from reality depends on our freedom and how deeply we are willing to pursue the questions that arise in our lives.” Camil’s challenge to us to be aware of our judgments about what we see and experience means to seek out the companionship that provokes us to look at reality in a more profound way and to “love the truth more than ourselves,” to affirm reality and the Mystery present there rather than affirming just ourselves.

A more reasonable reason. Dr. Giorgio Ambrosio joined us the following night for a continuation of this discussion, offering a personal witness. He described a choice we face: our reason can either become a measure, which limits us, or it can open us up. In the joy and simplicity of his relationship with Christ, the more “reasonable reason” is the one which is open, because it is the only one that allows a true humanity and, therefore, a true relationship with Christ.
The dialogue about open and closed reason continued in the book discussion of The End of the Affair by Graham Greene. Lele, a history professor at De Paul University, introduced the interchange by asking all of us to give the theme of the novel in one word. There was an almost unanimous response: “Love.” But Lele, pushing us to go beyond the surface of the work, proposed that we speak about it from the perspective of reason. We were then able to discern that the drama of this book is the struggle between a reason closed to the Mystery, where desire can only be fulfilled through a possession that suffocates, or a reason open to the Mystery, which has an infinite horizon and truly allows human desire to flourish. Our friend Nick from Washington, DC, put it simply: “This book cuts deep into the drama of my life.” This was the case for many of us: the story of Bendrix and Sarah–the protagonists of this novel–with the reality of God-made-man reflects our own daily battle for an open reason in front of the Event that has changed us. Lele concluded the discussion by pointing out what is at the heart of this drama, both of our life and of the book: “The One who has become my measure has come and has given everything.” It is this Love which truly changes us and it was clear in each of these gestures that this Love was present among us because of the burning of our hearts!
This year, Fr. Pietro surprised everyone with his lesson. Having asked all of us to write letters about our experience of this past year, he chose a few of them to make his main points. One described in an arresting way the difficulty that we all experience: “I guess I have a hard time attaching myself to the beauty I experience. My ‘yes’ is not strong...Why don’t I live more simply?” Fr. Pietro emphasized the dualism indicated here: our beautiful experience in the Movement is met with the constant struggle to truly follow, to let this beauty change our lives. So what overcomes our dualism? An event, something happening that makes us realize that “faith has its source in Another... I am not the source of my faith.” Only Christ coming toward us, only the Encounter, creates wonder–true wonder–that finds its fullness in prayer, in begging Christ to come into our lives even more. As another letter expressed, “In the wake of this greater begging, a Grace has filled me with greater attentiveness, and in this way I know that He is close to me, advocating for me, helping me now. So, the work of the School of Community this year has helped me to live with a greater awareness of my nature, of what I depend on, in many different circumstances. Truly, in these past five or six months, I have, for the first time, begun to feel like I am tasting the life proposed by the Movement–this absurd, penetrating, seemingly impossible freedom.”

He comes for me, continuously. The forum of personal witnesses demonstrated in further depth that it is possible to live this way in college by letting the encounter with Jesus dominate our lives. Annie, from St. Thomas in Minnesota–answering the question, “What is your experience of the CLU?”–said plainly that “CLU is the presence of One who loves me and comes for me.” She testified that this love comes alive through being with her friends in the community, not through words or concepts. Despite her infidelity, this Presence keeps coming and it is in this that her life changes: not by struggling to become a better person but by continuously experiencing the meaning of her life. Giacomo had a similar experience in the friendship with those in CLU at University of Maryland, where there is a love that is different from all other loves: “This love is Christ.” For him, CLU is “more and more being pointed down a path” guided by this relationship with Christ. And Costanza shared how the direction of her own path came through seeking the source of the love that she found in the people of the Movement. In the course of her search, things “became greater.” For example, she watched the relationship with her boyfriend become the “memory of Christ.” Costi spoke of a greater freedom and greater responsibility for herself and for her friendships. “This faithfulness is possible,” she told us, “because this Other loved us first.”
What was different about this vacation? One veteran of six CLU vacations pointed out, “Each community now seems very grounded where they are, in the life of the CLU at their own schools. This vacation is not an isolated oasis but a time where our experience is clarified and deepened in surprising and profound ways.”  Another agreed: “At its core, this vacation has been defined by Jesus deepening the relationship with me that He already started. What else explains the beauty, the novelty, the love that I see here!?”
At the conclusion of our days together, Fr. Pietro affirmed that what we have seen together is the beauty of Christ’s presence, the only event that opens our reason, overcomes our dualism, and gives an unforeseeable unity to life. In this fact is a possibility–a possibility that “life become relationship.” Following the exceptionality of Jesus, who came to meet us in the simplicity of our days, and in the desire provoked in us, our whole life can become a relationship with Him. Only this relationship creates the measure that allows us to breathe, to be fully human, and to live our life asking everything of the One who loves us more than we can imagine.