Letters

EDITED BY PAOLA BERGAMINI
pberga@tracce.it

Buenos Aires
Your “Yes” Beyond the Ocean
Dear Fr Gius:
My name is Maria Sol, I am 15 years old, and I am from Argentina. I have wanted to write to you for some time, to thank you for being there. For without you, I would not be I. It is thanks to you that I can say I am I. Without you and without the Movement, my life would not be my life. So a thousand thanks. If I had not known you (for I do know you, even if not personally, and I love you very much), I would not have had the experience of Christ. I know that, in one way or another, I would have known Jesus, but I do not know if I would have adhered to Him in the way I do thanks to the Movement. I really don’t think so. It is you who have changed my life, made my life what it is. By now I cannot think of you without feeling deep gratitude, because you do not know me and yet you have given me and give me everything. Or rather, you have made it so that I see everything that has been given me by “Someone greater” with new eyes, and thus I live my everyday life in a different way, with different eyes. And this is just why it is impossible for me to imagine what would have come of my life without you. I take this opportunity also to tell you about something incredible that is happening, thanks to you. Some GS kids in Italy have heard about the difficult situation we are living here in Argentina, and are mobilizing and giving so that those of us who have financial problems can go on the Movement vacation! This is truly impressive, because it means that “Someone greater” is enabling them to do something like this. And once again the word “gratitude” comes to mind, which is what I feel toward you. And what I like about all this is that we have started writing to each other by e-mail. I have a good-sized group of friends, and I assure you that we have become real friends, in Christ and because of Christ. The fact that, even though they live on the other side of the ocean, they are more my friends than those who live two blocks from my house, fills me with wonder and makes me understand that all my relationships are given to me. All of them, all of them! Moreover, it makes me understand that I am absolutely incapable of keeping them up, of keeping up even one sole relationship. Rather, at times it seems that I even try to destroy them with my sin. Nonetheless, He gives them to me and He maintains them! Because a friendship without Christ is not friendship, it does not exist. As you said, “I am nothing, He is everything”! Truly amazing. One more time, my dear esteemed friend, thank you, thank you for everything, thank you for always saying “Yes” to Christ. Your “Yes,” your “Yeses” were and are necessary for me to have been able and to be able to say my own. Without your “Yes,” I would never have said mine.
Maria Sol

London
Recognizing Christ
Dear Fr Gius: In the middle of December, the CLU exercises were held in London for the students in northern Europe. This gesture–and when I say this I am referring to all of it (from the reading of your message to the lesson on “Recognizing Christ” given by Fr Agostino, to Chris’ testimony to the assembly…)–really was, first of all for me, and visibly for all the students who came from the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Scandinavia, an immense gift, or as Jolene wrote a few days after her return to Sweden, a “great beginning to the rest of my life.” Three facts especially moved me. First of all, your message of greeting was striking. We read it at the beginning of every gesture. “Christianity is the repetition of the message that the Mystery of God became man: it is an experience, it is the experience in which Christ becomes a presence and changes the face and flavor of things, because a presence can be defined only by a change. To know God, all of us need to experience His presence.” These days were truly the fact making itself evident that God made man is an experience. I say this also because of the numerous faces that I saw changed at the end of the three days. Oh yes, Jesus changes precisely “the face and flavor of things,” to the point of changing one’s face itself! Secondly, I was surprised by the unity that was recognized, lived, and visible among people who saw each other for the first or, at the most, for the second time, a unity made possible only by the purpose of our being together: the desire to live and go more deeply into the encounter we have had. The most remarkable sign of this unity for me was the beauty of the songs (especially the three very beautiful spirituals Saturday evening before the testimony), sung by the little group of students who, sharing the same passion and putting it at the service of others, led us into each gesture with heightened awareness. Finally, these three days once again made evident to me that what you indicate to us as the point of provocation on which to work captures and responds to the desire that is most pressing to us in that instant. You are always a (giant) step ahead! Really heartfelt thanks, because with your fatherhood we are beginning to discover the savor of a sonship that makes us ever more certain bearers of the only Presence, in whose warmth the cold heart of the north can and is beginning to melt.
Gianluca

Milan
The Cardinal at School of Community
Dearest friends: Last Tuesday, we had a special, unexpected visitor to our School of Community: our Cardinal Dionigi Tettamanzi. The day before, I had asked Msgr Franco Bignami (Fr Franco), who hosts us every week during our lunch break in a room in the Priests’ House, of which he is Rector, if he could confirm that the next day he would stop by to give us his Christmas blessing. He answered that, since the Cardinal was coming to lunch with him, he intended to ask the Cardinal himself to stop by. So on Tuesday, first Fr Franco came, bringing his blessing and saying that the Cardinal had called to say he was a bit late. Immediately afterwards, the Cardinal arrived; introduced by Fr Franco, he was greeted by thunderous applause. Fr Franco presented us, saying that we were a group of friends who meet every week, and that we were happy to meet our Archbishop. The Cardinal replied that he was pleased to meet a group of his faithful and that he would remember us that evening, entrusting us to the Lord, just as he does every evening for the people he meets during the day. We answered a question from him by telling him that we meet every week during our lunch break to do School of Community. We extended Fr Giussani’s greetings to him and gave him a copy of Traces. Two friends who were present later sent me this message: “First of all, thank you for giving us the chance to meet the Cardinal. On the way back to the office with Roberto, we said to each other that the word to define this meeting is ‘wonder.’ The wonder that was in our hearts (men of little faith) who did not believe that the Cardinal would really come, and that of the Cardinal who did not expect to find himself in front of a group of about fifty workers in the service sector who meet during their lunch break for School of Community. Am I remembering rightly that one of our sayings is, ‘Wonder alone knows’? We are grateful to Fr Franco for this sign from him of esteem and affection toward us, and grateful to the Cardinal for agreeing to stop by and see us, enabling us too ‘to see in his visit an echo and an extension of the visit that God Himself made in the history of mankind with the Incarnation of His Son Jesus,’ as the Cardinal wrote in his letter for the Blessing of the Families. And we are grateful to Fr Gius, without whom our meeting together could not even have been imagined, and we would have simply remained strangers to each other.”
Tiziana and the friends from downtown Milan

From Florence to Japan
I am studying Japanese at the University of Florence, and this summer I spent three months in Japan to do research for my thesis. I am writing to express my gratitude toward the friends who enabled me to pursue this passion of mine further and taught me a better and more interesting way of studying. When I started at the university, I had to take two Japanese courses, one in language and one in literature. However, I only went to the language class, because I liked it better. Then a friend of mine, Paolo, told me that studying a language is like getting to know a friend, and you want to embrace that friend fully, without leaving out anything that makes him up. So I started going to literature class, too, and it was clear that one doesn’t learn by making plans about things, but by observing, and that in this way, everything becomes a discovery. So I was able to learn not only more about Japan, but I also learned that loving means identifying with the other, wanting to feel what he feels. For me, this meant going to Japan and “living like a real Japanese.” There, I was able to observe and get to know more closely cultures and traditions so different from ours and to go more deeply into the subject of my thesis. And if it had not been for my friends, I would probably never have gone. In Japan, too, I experienced the same regard and attention to me that had struck me in Florence, this time through Fr Arnaldo, who phoned me every evening to hear how my day had gone, and through my friendship with Sako and Marcia…. The world is a big place, but there is one Nexus in everything I do, so that in these months I did not miss anything that was happening with my friends in Florence. Rather, my being there contained them, too. I think this is why we seek each other out wherever we are, so that this Nexus that has called us as companions may be ever clearer and more transparent.
Barbara, Florence

From University to Marriage
Dear Fr Giussani: The Catholic religion was for me a part of my country’s and my family’s culture; something natural. Despite this fact, when I met CL it was like an upheaval inside me. It seemed to me that what they were talking to me about was another religion, another Jesus, another Church, and my first reaction was rebellion. When I encountered CL for the first time, I was a university student. My objection to the invitation Daniele extended to me was that I was very young, and I had not yet determined to behave properly, to “be good.” I was not ready to become serious, and for this reason I was not going to be consistent. The only thing Daniele told me was, “You don’t have to change anything. Christ loves you deeply just as you are. He asks nothing from you but to say ‘Yes’ to Him.” I was certain this man didn’t know what he was talking about, because he did not know me. I was sure that one had to follow rules in order to be good and thus to aspire to Christ’s love. Nonetheless, a hope began stirring inside me. I started going to School of Community every week with Lupita, who had to travel an hour just to meet with me! Unquestionably, these people were unique. So I said to myself that I would never leave this group, but then I did leave. When I returned to Oaxaca after vacation, I saw that my mother had changed; she was happy and lots of guests came to the house, to dinner, to watch a movie, to read a book, or for dancing lessons. All this was because my mother had encountered the Movement. Skeptically, I could not manage to feel anything but an instinctive refusal, which deep down I know was nothing but envy. Out of a purely intellectual interest, I started going to School of Community meetings again, because they were studying a book by the author of The Religious Sense, an Italian philosopher whom I already knew from my ethics courses at the university. I was also eager to find some piece of evidence that would enable me to show my mother she was wrong. I compared my life constantly to the words I was reading, and this filled me with doubt and objections. As I was going through this process, I became good friends with René, who listened to me patiently and affectionately and cleared up my doubts. I could not stand for people I didn’t know to get close to my most intimate feelings and thoughts. I was frightened of knowing the truth about my life, of discovering that I could not say I was living my life with passion. During a retreat of our community, they showed the video of Fr Giussani’s meeting with the Pope. The commentary began by saying that if you do not belong to Christ, you belong to the world. At that moment, I realized I had to make a decision. I wanted to say “Yes” to Him. I talked about it with René, my mother, and Daniele, and each of them told me the same thing, that there is only one vocation: to follow Christ. I thought my boyfriend would be an obstacle, because he did not see it the way I did. Then I read an article in Huellas [the Spanish edition of Traces], where a boy prayed to St Riccardo Pampuri for his girlfriend, a Marxist, to be converted, and it was granted to him. I wanted the same thing. I asked for it, and I got it–not only his change, but also a change in the way I look at things and, as a result, in the truth of our relationship. The method was that of following, of being faithful to my friends and their advice, and, along this journey, I realized what marriage is. I discovered that God was calling me to form a family, and I got married full of joy, conscious that I was saying “Yes” to Christ. I continue to go to School of Community. I am part of a Fraternity group made up of young couples. Even if now I know that CL is a Catholic movement inside the same Church to which I have always belonged, I consider it something totally new. Christ reveals Himself to me as alive. Now I know that it is not a habit, that it does not mean simply enriching my life with goodness, but that He is the very reason itself of life.
Doriluz, Oaxaca, Mexico

My Indian Coworker
For work, I spent eight months in the Arab state of Dubai, on the Persian Gulf, on behalf of the Italian national electric company. In this country, where Arabs hold the economic and political power, besides the Westerners who are occupied with setting up the new technologies, the only ones who work are Indians, Pakistani, and Filipinos, who usually do the most menial jobs and live very precariously, because from one day to the next they could be sent home, even for minor reasons. None of them can obtain a certificate of residence, as opposed to the Westerners who are, nonetheless, listed and checked by the police. In order to get a phone card, for example, I had to present a photocopy of my passport and two pictures. Nothing escapes the police. And if someone tries to get away with something, he ends up in jail. If, in a rear-end collision, you get even just a dent, no auto body shop can repair the car without permission from the police. The entire life of the majority of people because of the excessive heat–is spent in closed places equipped with everything; these are shopping malls with stores, movie theaters, playgrounds, restaurants, etc. Many girls coming from the former Soviet republics and China work in the nightclubs to earn a nest egg and go back home. The days go by so mechanically and monotonously that many of my co-workers would seek some entertainment by going to these clubs. I saw people lose all their money this way. On the other hand, I happened to meet an Indian man who struck me because, as opposed to the others, he worked precisely, seriously, and competently; he never broke off whatever he was doing, and he was always on time. While the others did not even know how to hold and use a tool, he knew how to approach every matter knowledgeably. Curious about what I saw, one day I asked him why he was like this, and he said he was a Catholic. Since then, a great friendship grew up between us, which sustained and comforted me the entire time I was there.
Paolo, La Spezia, Italy

Working on Examples
Dearest Fr Ambrogio: I teach catechism and basic morality in a high school, and Traces is a great help to me, especially the first part with the testimonies. Here, a philosophical mentality for a theological presentation is still lacking and abstract concepts are still a puzzle, but working with examples helps the students to true awareness. I do not know who to thank for the Traces magazine that arrives here punctually every month. I would like my thanks to go all the way to the top, Msgr Giussani, but for me, the top people are always far away even when they are nearby. Please make sure my thanks reach the people who send me the magazine, as well as my Christmas greetings. And for you? GREETINGS in all capitals, and, remembering each other in our prayers, I send you my cordial best.
Fr Battista Personeni, SDB, Thailand