An Exciting Challenge

The presentation of Luigi Giussani’s book, L’io, il potere, le opere [The Self, Power, Works], promoted by the Rome Cultural Center and the Companionship of Works. The Great Hall of the Pontificia Università Urbaniana was packed with ecclesiastics, politicians, and business people

BY ANGELO PICARIELLO

Only a book that contains “contributions from an experience” can make a book presentation discussion exciting, even thrilling. This book (L’io, il potere, le opere [The Self, Power, Works] by Luigi Giussani, published by Marietti) is one of those that throws everyone off-balance, forcing them to rethink everything. Hence, philosopher Dario Antiseri cites the author when he says that “philosophy does not save;” Diarmuid Martin (Secretary of the Justice and Peace Pontifical Council) says that “Father Giussani’s reflections could bring the entire social doctrine up to date;” while the politicians present in the Great Hall of the Pontificia Università Urbaniana tried too to break out of their molds. Strikingly, they all listened quietly. The only politician to speak at the event (promoted by the newly created Rome Cultural Center and the Companionship of Works of Rome and Lazio) was Giulio Andreotti. He immediately offered “instructions for use” of the book, along with “purchasing advice.” Since what is offered in the book is an experience, not ecclesiastical theory, his advice is to read the words, “imagining that Father Luigi is saying them.” “You will see that, after an initial moment of difficulty, the connecting thread linking his reflections will be clearly apparent.”

New anthropology
Martin also had advice to offer: “Place your reason and freedom on the line, because this is what Father Giussani asks us to do.” Monsignor Martin would have had to have been Giussani as a teacher but now he at least tries to be his reader. An attentive one, it seems. “And,” he stated, “since as it happens we are working on the new compendium of social doctrine, it seems to me I can see it already written in these pages,” which are the work of a “master teacher” capable of tracing out a “new anthropology.”
This is a strong statement, but not a “generic” one. Martin listed, one-by-one, the points that struck him. The concept of the right to form associations was first of all. “Works are much more important than simple associations–for everyone, even for the pagans.” But “for Christians, the prime characteristic of ‘works’ is charity.” The Church’s task is not only to educate people to common values, “because even the pagans do the same.” Martin asserts that “it is mainly the chapters of the social doctrine on the State and politics that have to be rewritten,” because “new men are needed who are able to serve society,” and the new factor Father Giussani inserts into this aspect–to Martin’s mind one that is still underestimated– “is the value of pluralism.” “I too have been struck,” Martin went on, “ by his great skepticism with regard to the modern State, but we should not underestimate the role that the State can play in nations like my own Ireland.”
These statements opened the debate, with Andreotti recalling the role of the European Community, and Martin confirming, “You mean that we have put the European Community’s contributions to good use with intelligent decisions,” and Andreotti’s reply, “Yes, certainly, but the best decision Ireland made was to join the Community.”

A “friendly” state
A question was posited, however: What is a “friendly” State, as opposed to an oppressive one? Dario Antiseri tried to describe it, using Giussani’s words, recalling that “man can submit only to Christ, otherwise he is a slave,” and reiterating the crucial role of intermediate agencies for a correct conception of subsidiarity, otherwise confused (as often happens) with the idea of federalism or–even worse–of bureaucratic decentralization. Antiseri spoke also of freedom, of pluralism. For example, regarding the schools, he asked, “Do you really think we would have such good bread if there were only a State bakery?” And he concluded, “It falls to us to refute a widespread conviction that Catholics are the dogmatic ones and the others are those open toward criticism and questioning,” while history teaches the opposite: “Pascal, Locke, Newton, Kant, were Catholics, or at least believers.” Speaking in the discussion, moderated by journalist Roberto Fontolan, was also Companionship of Works (known as CdO in Italy) President Giorgio Vittadini. He recalled Father Giussani’s address to the representatives of the Christian Democratic Party in Assago in 1987. Giussani’s words returned the discussion to its central position, “man’s elementary experience, his desire, above and beyond too much thinking–even in a Catholic way –about politics.”

Building forms of new life
Central, for Father Giussani, is “the encounter with a presence that arouses attraction,” capable of edifying the man who encounters it. Here lies the conflict with a power “that conceives of itself without God and without man,” said Vittadini, drawing from the book.
“No modern ideology–in fact–embraces, as its goal, the growth of the ‘individual.’” Too often the opposite temptation arises, “of a capillary administration of man’s needs,” as Pasolini put it, “who, every one knows, was not Catholic.” What can be done? Father Giussani’s answer is the same as the Pope’s, who in Rimini in 1982 issued the invitation to “build forms of new life for man.” When Father Giussani speaks of a “religious sense of work,” says Vittadini, he effects a revolution against Marx, “who spoke of work as alienation.” “What is proposed,” the CdO President concluded, “is certainly not to abolish the State, but a State that ‘recognizes’ more than ‘authorizes.’ And a State that defends this desire of man is, in the end, also stronger and more effective.”

Father Luigi’s wish
Andreotti agreed, seeing in Giussani’s words a relaunching of the spirit of “his” Catholic Action, the “groups of prayer, action, and sacrifice” invoked by Paul VI. “Today,” he added, “the movements are a great wealth, and a kind of ‘competition’ should not be seen as a threat, because there was competition even among the apostles.” Andreotti sees the teaching on subsidiarity as central, “inverting the common conception, which is a reductive one, that would entrust to the creativity of individuals only what the State does not succeed in doing by itself.” And too, “Father Giussani’s wish ‘never to be comfortable’ is striking,” as is “his insistence on wonder, which the new generations seem so little able to feel.”
There was still time for another “round,” so Antiseri went on to speak of freedom, saying that the one who used his freedom most courageously in the Gospels was the repentant thief, “who saw Christ not triumphant, but on the cross, and believed.” “Freedom is something different from tolerance,” said Andreotti, refuting a common credence, “an idea that behind its facade smacks of arrogance.”
The fact that this is a matter that involves everyone–including business people, men of the Church, and politicians–was confirmed by the audience, a large and attentive one, but above all, varied. Here is a proposal for man from which everyone can draw something of value.