The beginning of CLU in Moscow

A Group of Friends at the University of Humanities
Agata, Maia, Liuba, Roman, and the others. The first meeting of School of Community and the vacation

by Elena Mazzola

Elena works at the University of Humanities, one of the biggest universities in Moscow; she has been teaching Italian there for some years now. Oksana is looking for a job, and would like to teach French in university. They offer her a place at the University of Humanities. Then, I arrive there, too. They need teachers for English, and they recruit me. Lastly, Fr Paolo arrives; it would be nice to propose a course on The Religious Sense.
We start off. There are now four of us working at the university.
Moscow is not just a big city, it’s huge! The official statistics give the population as eleven million, but on the underground railway there seem to be more! Everything seems so far away and out of reach.
Everyone is in a rush. It takes forever to reach people and the rhythm of life at the university is frenetic. We meet each other hurriedly and briefly at the university, between one lesson and the next, and in those few minutes we would like to share everything. But we can’t meet only in these short moments or at the vacation, an SMS is not enough, and the School of Community cannot be just a sliver of time carved out of the chaos. Our friendship is for everything and about everything; it involves the whole of life. Some truly sense this. Agata tells us, “When I am alone doing something, especially when it is something difficult, the words of the songs we have heard come to mind and keep me company.” Maia says, “I am learning to look at things from another point of view: that of destiny and of God.” And Liuba tells us, “In the university, they asked us to do research on cloning and, in the end, unexpectedly, the professor asked us to write our opinion. I began to write, and I don’t know what gave me the courage; only a short time ago, I would not have done it. I had to speak of myself and I started off by saying, ‘I am a Christian…’” These are some of our CLU friends.
But let’s go back in time.
September 2002 In the Moscow community, there is already a small group of university students, Elena’s students and friends of their friends. Some of them come to our meetings now and again, and some came to the vacation.
One evening, we called them to our center and suggested clearly and simply that they begin to live a Christian friendship at the university. We spoke of man’s desire for happiness, of how everyone neglects it, and of how for us it is something great and dignified. We said that we live for an ideal, Christ, and that this corresponds to the cry in our hearts. We saw the faces of Liuba, Iulia and Vera light up. To be honest, I never expected it.
So we started off. At the first meeting, we watched the film The Gospel According to Matthew. Then we wrote a leaflet inviting our companions to the School of Community. In the meantime, reinforcements from Milan arrived: four students from the Catholic University. They would always study together in the university and their friendship was catching from the start. We began to hold School of Community on At the Origin of the Christian Claim and The Religious Sense.
August 2003 A group went to Italy to work at the Rimini Meeting, and in September we took part in the CLU Èquipe at La Thuile. Then we had the surprise of meeting Fr Giussani, a moment of greeting during which he wanted to hear all about us and told us again how he loves Russia. I thought back to what he had told me the previous year: “In a way, I envy you, because I would like to do what you are doing, but there again, I don’t envy you, because the most important thing that anyone can do is to give glory to God” and all that came from it. We came back even more certain.
In Moscow, we found Alex already waiting for us. More reinforcements had arrived in the meantime, this time from Bari, in Southern Italy.
September 2003 We decide to begin the year by spending three days together. We are rather doubtful at first, then we are surprised by the hospitality shown us by some Orthodox friends who offer us a marvelous house in Pereslavl Zalessky, one of the oldest and richest cities of Russian history, surrounded by wonderful countryside. There were 25 of us: the group from Moscow, Natasha and Katya from St Petersburg, another five from Vladimir, and Alex; Chiara from Trieste, who is a good singer and with Katya teaches us many songs.
The theme of the vacation is “Living Reality.” For many of us, it’s not easy. Masha is working his way through the university and lives almost two hours away form Moscow, and so has little free time. “I would like to come on vacation with you, but how can I? I would like to come for School of Community every time, but how can I?” All the same, he manages to organize it, and in those days we take our cue from his questions: what are we looking for in what we do every day? What do we expect from our studies, from our work, from our friends? They were days full of provocation and friendship. A new seed.
Back at the university, we dive back into the frenetic life as before. We meet for School of Community every Friday evening at the center. Our friends from Vladimir, Roman and Tanja, come to see us at least once a month. At the end of October, Fr Paolo arrives in Moscow. We take up again the study of The Religious Sense and we invite our new students. Why not start a course? We have already got the teacher! In this way, we met Lev, who has so many questions; he is the first to react to the provocations, and the first to book a place for the winter vacation!
February 2004 For some, the February vacation was already a tradition. This year, we have ours separately from the adults–just ourselves, a “student vacation,” or better, the CLU vacation. For students, February is a time of vacation, and we allowed ourselves 4 days together. At this stage, we are already a good group of friends: Liuba, Roman, Tanja, Oksana, Katja, Natasha and Vera. At the concluding assembly, Yura, who was with us for the first time, spoke, “I am amazed, I am happy to have met people who believe in what I believe; I didn’t expect it.” Then Lev, on the way home, said, “It’s reasonable to keep on staying with you, after these holidays, although I don’t understand all you say. It’s reasonable because it corresponds to my heart.”
March 2004 Elisa has recently arrived from Milan, and will stay until the end of April. She found us in the middle of this beginning, and gets involved with Liuba, Sasha, Lev and Vera in the first attempt at charitable work: cleaning the center every three weeks.
We truly want to be educated in the truth, we want to learn, we want to live the Movement. We are interested in everything. If we hear there is an exhibition of Chagall, we go to see it. Anna arrives, and we come to know that she has heard Fr Giussani explain The Announcement to Mary so we ask her to read it to us.
Liuba introduces the meeting, “Fr Giussani has always recommended this book to read… since the beginning of the Movement…”