Overview - the Aspects of Life animated by Love

Introduction: Like a Rainbow

Through the charism of unity, the Lord wished to bring about in the Church not only a spirituality but also a so­ciety, which later was given the name Focolare Movement or Work of Mary.

Undoubtedly, this "Work" needs to have a soul (pre­cisely what our communitarian spirituality is), but it also needs to have an order, a structure. And the Lord looked after this too.

If I remember correctly, it was in 1954. The spirituality appeared to be more or less complete. And one thing had become clear to us: we had to become another Jesus.

As early as 1946 we wrote in some notes: "Each of us must aim at being another Jesus as soon as possible. We must act as Jesus here on earth. We must put our human nature at God's disposal so that he can use it to make his beloved Son live again in us."'

But how could we do this? Baptism and the other sac­raments had certainly already brought this about. But our adherence was necessary as well, and this could be sum-

1. Chiara Lubich, Writing, "Unity, " 2 December 1946, quoted in A Call to Love (Hyde Park, NY: New City Press, 1989), p. 29.

marized in one word: love. Love sums up the Christian law. If we love, we are another Jesus. And we are Jesus in all that we do. Our life, therefore, had to be love. If we had wanted to describe what we should be, we would have had to say, "We are love," just as God is love. And if love was our life, love had to be our rule as well.

And here is an idea we had, perhaps an illumination.

Love is light, it is like a ray of light that passes through a drop of water and opens out to display a rainbow, whose seven colors we admire; they are all colors of light, which in turn display an infinite number of shades.

And just as the rainbow is red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet, love, the life of Jesus in us, is mani­fested in different colors; it is expressed in various ways, each one different from the others.

Love, for example, leads to communion, it is commun­ion. Jesus in us, because he is Love, brings about com­munion.

Love is not closed within itself but by its nature it spreads. Jesus in us, Love, reaches out to others in love.

Love elevates the soul. Jesus in us raises our souls to God. This is union with God, this is prayer.

Love heals. Jesus, Love in our hearts, is the health of our souls.

Love gathers people together in assembly. Jesus in us, because he is Love, joins our hearts.

Love is the source of wisdom. Jesus in us, Love, en­lightens us.

Love gathers many into one, this is unity. Jesus in us fuses us into one.

These are the seven main expressions of love we had to live, and they represent an infinite number of expressions.

These seven expressions of love immediately appeared to us as the standard for our personal life, and they would also constitute the Rule of the Work of Mary as a whole, and later on of its various branches.

Because love is the principle of each of the above ex­pressions, of each aspect (since it is always Jesus who lives in us in every aspect of life), our life would be marked by a wonderful unity.

Everything was to flow from love, be rooted in love;

everything was to be an expression of the life of Jesus in us. And this would make human life attractive, fascinat­ing. Consequently, our lives would not be dull and flat since they would not be made up of bits juxtaposed and disconnected (with the time for lunch, for example, hav­ing nothing to do with the moment for prayer, and with mission set aside only for a specific hour, and so on).

No. Now it would always be Jesus who prayed, Jesus who engaged in mission, Jesus who worked, Jesus who ate, Jesus who rested, and so on. Everything would be an expression of him.

The General Statutes of the Work of Mary and the Guidelines of its different branches² refer to these various expressions of love, that is, of the life of Jesus in us as our Rule, and as such they have been approved by the Church.

We would now like to begin re-examining the aspects of our life (its seven "colors," if we can say this) in order

2. The Focolare Movement or Work of Mary is composed of eighteen branches of which there are:

— two sections of the Focolarini (men and women), which are the

"supporting structure" of the Work of Mary.

— ten branches (men and women Volunteers; Focolarini and Volun­teer priests; Gens; men and women Religious; Gen boys and girls;

Bishops friends of the Focolare).

— six "movements" on a wider scale: New Families, New Humanity, Parish Movement, Diocesan Movement, Youth for a United World, Young for Unity.

The General Statutes of the Work of Mary, approved on 29 June 1990 bv a decree of the Pontifical Council of the Laity, established norms common for all the members. What characterizes each par­ticular branch, on the other hand, is defined by the respective Guide­lines, which are approved by the Movement's own General Assembly.

to see, among other things, if they too contain the "some­thing more" that we discovered in the points of our spiri­tuality, that is, if they are the expression of a life of communion.

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1. Red - Love is Communion

Love is Communion

Since our Statutes apply to the entire Work of Mary with all its religious and lay vocations, the aspect of the communion of goods also includes our concept of economy, work, and poverty.

Communion of Goods

We know, of course, that others in the Church have lived and continue to live this communion, but for the most part they were, and still are, selected groups of per­sons, those with a special calling, such as monks and nuns in monasteries and convents.

In the Movement it is the whole of society that lives the communion of goods, including lay people, as it was among the first Christians. To reach this goal, we seek to mirror the communion of saints and we live according to the model of the Trinity, where it is true to say Omnia mea tua sunt, "all that is mine is yours" (cf. Jn 17:10).

There are those in the Focolare Movement who live out the communion of goods in a complete way. These are the celibate men and women Focolarini,' who give to the Movement their entire salary and, by making a will, con­sign all their future capital and real estate to the poor, especially through the Focolare's formative, apostolic, and charitable activities.

1. "The focolare is, in the image of the family of Nazareth, a living together in the midst of the world of persons celibate and married, all totally committed, although in different ways, to God" (Chiara Lubich, La dottrina spirituale, p. 88).

Then there are others who give their surplus.

Saint Jerome says: "If you have more clothes and food than you need, you owe these to others." And before this Paul had said: "Not that others should have relief while you are burdened, but . . . that there may be equality" (2 Cor 8:13).

We have always lived the communion of goods in the Focolare, even from the very early days. I remember it started with a letter I wrote on the subject, which was read by the whole community, and which referred to the example of the first Christians.

The response was immediate and concrete. Month af­ter month, we put into common everything we could: what was available and what we would need, and a record was kept of everything. We continued to do this throughout all of the Movement.

Later, when distinct sections, branches, and wide-rang­ing movements came about, each part practiced it within its own ranks. It is still like this.

The "something more" in this aspect lies in the way we deal with our goods and money. Usually, we do not give away our possessions or surplus as separate individuals, but we decide together what to give, and we put it in com­mon beginning with the needy of our own branch.

Work

I would like to begin by saying that the prime source of income of our Movement is not work but the Providence of God that comes to us. It is always abundant and has covered as much as half of our financial needs.

In the Movement our constant experience is that if we seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness, all the rest comes as well (cf. Mt 6:33).

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The second source of income is our work. We give proper value to work in the Focolare, giving it

great importance. This becomes evident also because most

of our members are workers as, in the house of Nazareth,

were Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.

Because loving makes us "another Jesus," we look at

work the way he did. We consider our work:

— as an opportunity to do God's will, thus always be­ing "turned toward the Father";

— as a very important occasion for finding fulfillment;

— as the possibility of being co-creators;

— as having the purpose of serving Jesus in the com­munity;

— and, finally, as a chance to share what we earn with those in need.

Considering work in this way gives a higher meaning to life, and it is a constant source of joy.

Some religious orders, as we know, also underline the importance of work. Saint Benedict, for instance, had the motto: "Ora et lahora (pray and work)."

What is the difference for us?

Many religious families do not always give to work all the above-mentioned meanings. At times work might seem to be a counterbalance to prayer, or simply something nec­essary to support oneself.

In his private life, however, Jesus was not so much a person who was consecrated to God, who withdrew to a monastery, as he was a worker. Therefore, the Focolare spirituality has a similar, if not identical, concept of work to the one Jesus had.

Given that at work we can be apprentices or experts, we have to specialize; we have to be familiar with the vari­ous rules of the workplace; we must endure the effort and fatigue our jobs demand; we need to be punctual; we have to take care of our earnings, administer our income, and so on.

To be a true worker, a member of the Focolare must look after all this and more. Love one's work, therefore.

detachment

At the same time, however, we must be detached from our work, because Christ requires detachment also from one's "fields." But here one of Jesus' promises comes true. Everyone who has left father, mother, wife, children or fields . . . will receive a hundred times more and will in­herit eternal life (cf. Mt 19:29).

And because we strive to live like this, we receive the hundredfold, a capital that does not fall short.

This capital, the effect of God's Providence for our hav­ing put aside and given up everything for him, is what we have called the capital of God. In its regard, we found that we need to have three attitudes: to revitalize a spirit of poverty; not to live off interest; to determine that the Work of Mary cannot possess anything more than the goods it is actually putting to use.

Poverty

Closely connected to the aspects of the communion of goods, economy, and work, is poverty. We all strive to live it, and the consecrated members of our Movement even make a vow or promise of poverty.

The Guidelines of our different branches specify the various ways we practice poverty, which should be lived in the image of the poverty of Jesus, and which requires that goods be administered with openness and conform to spe­cific rules.

Poverty within the Focolare is not an end in itself but an effect of love. Since we love, we give, and this makes us

poor, having only what we need. But in the same way, poverty is also a support for love, an aid to love.

The Economy of Communion

The latest endeavor in this field is the Economy a/Com­munion,² whose use of profits is intended to work together with the communion of goods. It aims at setting up busi­nesses run by competent persons, who make them effi­cient and profitable. The profits are then put into com­mon: one part to help the poor and give them what they need to live while they are unable to find work; another part to develop structures to educate persons animated by love; and a final part to develop the businesses them­selves.

We found what God told Catherine of Siena, in her Dialogue, concerning clerics who did not pay much atten­tion to such matters: "with regard to temporal goods, I told you that they should be distributed in three portions:

one for their own needs [this makes us think of the profits that are used for the businesses]; one for the poor; and one for the use of the Church [which could indicate the structures of a Movement that has the nature of Church]."³

This perhaps serves as a confirmation for us.

2. The idea of the Economy of Communion as a new way of doing business was proposed bv Chiara Lubich in 1991 in Brazil, in re­sponse to the great poverty she saw in thefavelas, the slums that circle the city of San Paolo, and which Cardinal Arns, its archbishop, called a "crown of thorns."

3. Catherine of Siena, The Dialogue (New York: Paulist Press, 1980), n. 121,p.232.

2. Orange - Love Radiates

Love Radiates

Let's talk now about outreach or, as it is more com­monly called in some circles, apostolic activities.

The subject is vast. We will limit ourselves to gathering early ideas here and there from the writings of the early years. Reading through just a few pages on this aspect is enough to make us understand that what John Paul II said of our spirituality holds true also for our apostolic activities: "The first inspiring spark was love."'

Yes, it was love; a spark was enkindled; it spread light all around and burst into flames.

Love reaches out; love itself bears witness.

I know that in other environments it is said that, "Love is the soul of the apostolate." But it is much more. Love is the first form of apostolate, love of our neighbor as an expression of our love for God.

Each member of the Work of Mary is not called only to evangelize along the lines of "Go therefore and make dis­ciples of all nations . . ." (Mt 28:19). When the word enters into our actions, it should not be only an exposi­tion of the Catholic faith. It has to be undergirded by witness (the witness of love) and its meaning filled out by experience. This is the way it was with the first Chris­tians, and this is the way it is now.

Love, not Proselytism

A letter from 1948 helps us to see two things: how love is the driving force of outreach and how outreach is essen-

1. Insegnamenti di Giovanni Paolo II VII/2, pp. 223-225.

tial to the Christian life.

I wrote to some young people:

"May the whole city fall into the furnace of the Love of the Heart of Jesus.

"My sisters, Jesus rejoices to know that other sisters have joined you, but at the same time, he weeps because you have conquered few people to his Heart.

"Forgive me for saying this to you! I should first re­proach myself, but let me tell you what I think.

"Don't tell me that they (your fellow citizens) are hard to convince, etc., etc.

"It's not true. Love conquers all!

"It is love that is lacking in our hearts! Too often we believe that loving God means (only) going to religious meetings, praying a long time, doing hours of adoration.

"Religion is not only this! . . .

"It is (also) looking for the lost sheep, making ourselves all things to all people! It is loving in a practical, gentle, and strong way all the persons around us as we love our­selves, and wishing for them what we wish for our­selves. . . .

"The Lord urgently needs souls like this: souls on fire. . . .

"And how few he finds . . .

"Let's love. . . . Let's widen the circle of unity to in­clude the greatest number of souls possible.

"This is love of God!"²

In 1954, after having concentrated for a while on set­ting down the essential structure of the Focolare (with­drawing in the meantime a little from apostolic activities), this is what I wrote:

2. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Letter, Trent, 4 November 1948.

"The hour is coming in which we must rekindle our Ideal in the world . . . like a fire.

"For this to happen, however, we must return to the fruitful life we had in the early days when we won over very many people to God simply because we wanted to express our love to the Lord.

"This lack of self-interest was like a magnet that at­tracted many, and the community grew up around us.

"Do you remember?"³

In 1956 we were already in correspondence with people in other nations where the Focolare was taking its first steps.

This letter is addressed to a group in France:

"Dearest friends in France, I read your letters and shared your happiness for the day-meeting that was held in Grenoble.

"[Our people] returned full of joy. . . . They told me that it was like re-living the early days of our Ideal when the first Focolarine lived in Piazza Cappuccini.

"This made me immensely happy. I thought, if ten years ago there was hardly anything in Italy, only a great 'fire' burning in Trent, and now Italy is (here and there) sowed with the Ideal ... in a few years (the same thing will happen) in ... France. . . .

"I'm sure of this, because the strength of our Move­ment is not you but Jesus among you, and he does great things.

"But Jesus, of course, uses you.

"And so I beg you with all my heart, love him madly! . . .

"France must fall into the net of Jesus. God wants it:

may his kingdom come, come, come!

3. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Letter, Rome, 3 November 1954.

"You are small, poor, beset with problems. But for this very reason God will work. This is what he did with us;

this is what he will do with you."⁴

Love Anchored in Suffering

To spread our Ideal more effectively, we counted very much on suffering.

"Dear friend, I was very happy with your letter. It re­flected the soul of someone whom Jesus has called to fol­low him in his forsakenness.

"Take advantage of the solitude he has left you in, so that you can be alone with him alone. But then go at once to carry out his will, which is to bring fire into the world. . . .

"If you are on the cross, you will draw everyone to you ... to Jesus. . . ."⁵

We recommended prayer and mortification as means for reaching our goal (which proves that ours is both a collective and personal spirituality).

"Dear people responsible for zones,⁶ at the Center of the Movement we have decided that you should visit your entire zone personally, bringing to each soul the fire of God's love. . . .

"While you do this work, be ardent in prayer and union with God, so that this very delicate task may be carried out in depth and with excellent results, and so that people

4. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Letter, Rome, 13 December 1956.

5. Cf. Chiara Luhich, Unpublished Letter, Rome, 22 April 1 955.

6. "People responsible for zones" are persons who coordinate the life of the Focolare Movement in its various territories throughout the world, which are called "zones."

will give their best for the glory of God.

"Keep yourselves mortified and far from the world around you. We will never know so well what is happen­ing, and we have to know it, as when we are united to God alone and completely lost in our Ideal."⁷

The fire that Jesus brought is love, and love conquers. The following passage is from 1955:

" 'I came to bring fire to the earth . . .' (Lk 12:49). Why fire? Because he is fire; because Christ is God and God is love!

"[But] fire burns when it consumes something, when it conquers. A love that does not conquer, dies out! There­fore, we cannot fool ourselves thinking that we have Christ within us if this fire doesn't burn, if this fire doesn't con­quer."⁸

Apostolate Carried Out in Unity

The typical way for the Focolare to do its apostolic ac­tivity is above all to do it in unity: "May they all be one, so that the world may believe" (cf. Jn 17:21).

And the "something more" of our outreach, or, if you like, our apostolic activity, lies in this unity, which is nec­essary and obligatory for those who live this spirituality. We can say that it is "something more," because this is not generally required of those who want to do apostolic work.

Another writing says, "Identifying with Jesus, being another Jesus. . . . We must be so for all those around

7. Cf. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Letter, Rome, 16 June 1955.

8. Cf. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Talk, "The Seven Colors, " Vigo di Fassa (Italy), 19 August 1955.

us, with no exceptions. . . . Then, as soon as this spirit of ours touches someone's soul, we should remain linked spiritually to him or her so that Jesus may live among us, and that in him we may find the strength to conquer other souls to the perfect love of God."⁹

The following episode has always remained fixed in the depth of our hearts. In it lies the secret of our outreach, its necessary departure point. It is in a talk from 1962:

'As I was walking along the streets of Einsiedein, in Switzerland, I saw many people of various religious or­ders passing by. The different habits of the sisters and priests were very beautiful against the background of such a splendid natural setting. I understood there that the founders were really inspired in dressing their followers in that particular way.

" [Among these], I was particularly impressed by Charles de Foucauld's Little Sisters of Jesus. They rode by on their bicycles, with very lively faces and peasant scarves on their heads. Their expressive faces reminded me of their founder, de Foucauld, who, they say, cried out the Gospel with the whole style of his life.

"In fact, those sisters seemed to say: 'Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are they who mourn, blessed . . .'

"These are not the beatitudes that the world would like to have but the scandal of the Gospel.

"Then, I too felt a great desire to be able to give my witness, also in an external way.

"[But] ... no solution came to me.

"At a certain point I said to one of my companions:

'You know ... I saw how those sisters had an effect on me not through their words but by the way they dressed . . .' and I said I wished we could do the same. But how

9. Cf. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Letter, Ostia (Italy), 18 April 1950.

could we tell people about God? 'Ah,' I said, 'By this ev­eryone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another' ()n 13:35).

"Mutual love, therefore, was to be our distinctive sign. Dying to ourselves in mutual love is our (typical) apos­tolic activity."¹⁰

Then if we use the spoken word as well (and "woe to me if I do not proclaim the Gospel!" 1 Cor 9:16), if throughout the years we have felt the urgency and, I would say, the calling to proclaim it even from the housetops, if we give talks and repeat them for the good of many, using modern means of communication, all this should come afterwards.

"Structures" Evangelize Too

However, witness and outreach are the duty not only ofpersons who are united but also of structures, beginning with the focolare. From this outreach, then, the focolare itself acquires new meaning.

In a writing from 1950, we read, "The focolare is made up of people who live a life in common solely in order to realize among themselves and around them the testament of Jesus, 'Father, may they all be one.'

"Through their mutual love . . . they are transformed into Jesus, into love, and their focolare truly becomes Fire, all Fire."

"Thus if someone visits the focolare . . . and is not

10. Cf. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Tall: to the Focolarine, "The First Two Aspects of Our Spirituality," Grottaferrata (Rome), 25 December 1962.

11. There is an underlying wordplay in the Italian. The word "Focolare" means hearth or fireplace and comes from the same root as the "fuoco" which means fire. For a focolare to be on fire is to say that the fire place is ablaze.

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inflamed to the point that he or she goes away lit up, ablaze and in peace just as the Focolarini are, then the fire in that focolare has gone out.

"[And] a cold focolare does harm, it's not that it does nothing, it actually does harm. Whereas a focolare that is ablaze does what it should: it does good."¹²

Therefore, the focolare is a powerful means ofout-reach. And this holds true today for all our forms of commu­nity: from the nuclei of the Volunteers to Gen units, from our headquarters to our little towns, from clergy houses to convents to environmental cells, and so on.¹³

In 1956 another part of our structure, a temporary one, was taking place: one of our Mariapolises in the Dolomite mountains of the Alps. It was a jewel, a divine diamond, a heavenly means of outreach. But it was also a place to strengthen oneself spiritually, so as to continue one's ap­ostolic witness to others.

As we read in something written at that time, we can already foresee a Mariapolis¹⁴ that was to be permanent:

"Many have spoken of the Mariapolis and they've spo­ken well of it. It's logical, because the City of Mary . . . could not help but have a special fascination and, at times, extraordinary effects.

"Catherine of Siena, however, says that you know some­thing well by studying it, but even better by studying its opposite."¹⁵

This is what I wrote, "When most of the citizens of the Mariapolis had left . . . everything up there seemed to have ended. There was still that blue sky, those green mead-

12. Cf. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Writing, "The Focolare," 1950.

13. The reference is to different types of groupings within the various branches of the Work of Mary.

14. See note 16, p. 125

15. Cf. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Letter, 22 September 1956.

ows, those majestic Saint Martin mountain slopes, those pathways, that church: everything was still beautiful, yes, but Mary was missing; her city, her family was missing. A family made up of all kinds of children ... of people who were very united to God — some who had always lived an innocent life, others who had just returned be­neath the gaze of the Mother, long-awaited, now happy like all the others.

"I assure you that ever since I came to know our Ideal, I tried never to look back in life, but those empty roads, that sun-filled valley, now had the appearance of a corpse and made me think again of those two enchanting months filled with the presence of Mary. Perhaps more than look­ing back I was looking up and, without realizing it, I was asking Mary to perpetuate this city of hers here on earth.

"Certainly, we must make every city another Mariapolis, yet (it may be that the Lord wants) a place to give con­tinual glory to Mary through an ever- enkindled life of the Ideal. It would be a place where one can take refuge and be renewed like a soldier returning home from the barracks, a foretaste of heaven while still on earth in the Church militant, a place to acquire new strength and re­turn to battle so that the kingdom of God and his Church may advance in the world: a permanent Mariapolis.

"May Our Lady grant us this gift."¹⁶

A foretaste of heaven. . . . Perhaps it is true; the per­manent Mariapolis of Loppiano has been described as a "videoclip" of paradise.

Now Mary has already built, or is in the process of building, about twenty of these videoclips of paradise.¹⁷

16. Cf. Chiara Lubich, Unpublished Letter, 22 September 1956.

17. Loppiano, the first of the Focolare's model towns, located near Flo­rence, Italy. Founded in 1965, today it has more than 800 inhabit­ants. See note 16, p. 125.

3. Yellow - Love Uplifts

Love Uplifts

The third aspect of the spirituality of unity is the one that concerns our spiritual life.

Love within us, which makes us another Jesus, not only creates "communion," not only "reaches out," but it also "uplifts." It is the principle and source of our inner life, of our union with God, of our true prayer. In this talk we will focus upon prayer, meditation, and union with God.

Prayer

With regard to prayer, this time too we will refer to writings and talks that we have preserved from past years, in order to look more closely at how the Holy Spirit, through the charism of unity, taught us to pray.

We will not go beyond this to look at the communitarian prayer offered by the liturgy, nor will we speak of prayer in the lives of people with particular vocations, such as priests and religious. We will, rather, examine prayer as required of everyone in general.

Prayer, as we know, is our relationship with God. It is a building block of our very being, of our being human. In­deed, since we are created in the image and likeness of God, we are capable of a direct, personal relationship with God; we are persons who can address God as "you."

That humans have a natural disposition to pray be­comes clear when we come to know our brothers and sis­ters of other religions. We find they have prayer texts which are amazingly beautiful. They bear witness to the secret, but effective, action of God who always urges people to pray

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human beings are truly human IF they pray

And the same applies to us Christians. We are brothers and sisters of Jesus, through grace; and in him we find the model of how to relate to the Father. Jesus, in fact, did not only preach, work miracles, and call the disciples to fol­low him; he also immersed himself in prayer. Indeed, just as Jesus was always in communion with his Father, always in his presence, so it should be with his followers.

We all know that Christians pray in different ways. It is possible, therefore, to highlight the main and typical ways of praying among those who have been given the charism of unity.

These characteristics clearly emerge if we compare our prayer life with that of Christians, even the ones who knew their Christianity best, at least those in our countries, at the time when the Focolare began.

I remember that in speaking of prayer we said that "one needs to put to work the mind, the will and the heart. Our mind helps us reflect on the words we hear; our will leads us to formulate resolutions on the basis of our re­flections; our heart draws us to love what we have prom­ised to do."'

These were certainly excellent suggestions.

continuous prayer

Nonetheless, within the Focolare Movement, prayer immediately became something else. From the early months we emphasized, for instance, the duty to "pray always," as Jesus requested. But how could we pray al­ways? We knew that we couldn't do this by multiplying

1. From an unpublished letter of Silvia Lubich, Bozzana (Italy), 22 July 1939. (Silvia, the author's baptismal name, was changed to Chiara during her time in the Franciscan Third Order.)

the prayers we said.

We could pray always bv being Jesus. Jesus, in fact, prays always. If in performing any action it was not we who lived but Christ living in us, through love, our day would become a continuous praver. And this would be possible if we based our life on love, being a living expression of the word "love," which sums up all the Law and the Proph­ets.

Another way to "pray always" — which we practiced a little later — was to offer to God during the day one ac­tion after the other by saying short expressions of love, such as: "For you Jesus."

Thus all our actions were transformed into sacred ac­tions. We were convinced then, as we are now, that by offering our daily work to God in this way, and per-forming it well, we cooperate with him in the creation of the world;

we are co-creators with him.

And this wav of praving is very much in tune with our times. Today we see the world and the whole universe in evolution, and human beings are reminded of their duty to "subdue the earth" (cf. Gn 1:28).

In addition, when we work for a Work of God and, therefore, for the Church, we participate with Christ in the redemption of the world.

The extensive activity that has always characterized the Focolare could have compromised prayer, making it im­perfect and unworthy of being offered to God. This is why we always stressed that we needed to give prayer a privi­leged place in our lives.

Already during the early times, we wrote, "What im­portance does it have to be so committed to bringing many people to God when our own souls remain small and im­perfect because we do not find a really peaceful time for our own nourishment in prayer?

"What importance does all this have, when the very prayers we have sacred duty to say are said in the midst of

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countless distractions and recited only superficially, hur­riedly, or are shortened in length?"²

obstacles to prayer

With regard to the failings we could have in our prayer life, I wrote:

"We have the possibility of living in communion with the All-Powerful God and yet we do it so seldom, in such a hurry, and often reluctantly. At the end of our lives we will regret having given so little time to prayer."³

Another obstacle to prayer could be a state of spiritual aridity. In those who are committed to living the spiritual­ity of unity, however, we note a certain facility in over­coming aridity in prayer. This too is nothing other than an aspect of Jesus Forsaken, one of his faces, and just as we know how to pass from the cross to the resurrection in other circumstances, we ought to do so here.

It seems to us to be very providential that we can, gen­erally, overcome aridity. Since most of us live in the midst of the world, it is important that certain spiritual trials are not drawn out. We have other temptations to con­quer.

We feel that one's physical condition is important for prayer, too. In fact, we try not to overtire ourselves prior to these moments so as not to come before God without any strength or with little ability to concentrate, and be forced to give God the least productive moments of our day.

2. Chiara Lubich, On the Holy Journey (Hvde Park, NY: New City Press, 1988), p. 35.

3. Chiara Lubich, Fragments of Wisdom (Mumbai, India: St. Paul Press, 1991), p. 77.

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preparation for prayer

We are also convinced that we should prepare for prayer. The experts say that prayer needs a remote and an imme­diate preparation.

The remote preparation is to keep our hearts free of any attachment. It seems to me that all the members of the Movement are actively committed to this kind of preparation. In fact, our entire life is constantly focused on loving Jesus crucified and forsaken; and that we lose, we put everything else to one side.

Often we speak of "cutting," of "pruning," and above all of the detachment required in being outside ourselves in an attitude of loving others, in living the "other" and not ourselves. Yes, we hope that this preparation is present in our lives. At least it is what we strive for every day.

The immediate preparation, instead, consists in always starting with a moment of recollection.

We became aware, and are still aware, of the absolute necessity and value of prayer.

"In heaven," I wrote in 1989, "where we hope to go, life will not consist of carrying out apostolic endeavors. It will consist of praising, thanking, and adoring God, the Most Holy Trinity. We must learn now to live as we will then."⁴

how jesus prayed

But there is a prayer in the Focolare Movement that, with the infinite and divine riches it contains, is all en­closed in one word, just one word, which Jesus said and taught us, and which the Spirit puts on our lips.

Jesus prayed, he prayed to his Father. For him the Pa-

4, Chiara Lubich, On the Holy Journey, pp. 83-84.

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ther was "Abba," which means dad or papa, the one he turned to with infinite trust and boundless love. He prayed to him from within the heart of the Trinity, where he is the Second Divine Person.

Since he came on earth out of love for us, however, it was not enough for him to be the only one in this privi­leged position of prayer. By dying for us, redeeming us, he made us children of God, as he is, his own brothers and sisters. And through the Holy Spirit he gave us too the possibility of being introduced into the heart of the Trin­ity, in him, together with him, by means of him, so that we too have the possibility of repeating the same divine invocation: "Abba, Father!'" (Mk 14:36; Rm 8:15). "Dad, my Dad, our Dad," with all that this means: total surren­der to his love, certainty in his protection, security, divine consolation, strength, ardor born in the hearts of those who are certain of being loved. . . .

This is Christian prayer, an extraordinary type of prayer. One does not find it anywhere else, nor in other religions. The most someone who believes in a Divine Being does is to implore, venerate and adore, while remaining, so to speak, "outside" of the Divine Being. Here we enter into the very heart of God.

Naturally, we can say "Abba, Father!" with all that this word implies only if the Spirit speaks it in us.

And again, for this to happen, we need — as required by the charism of unity — to be Jesus, nothing but Jesus.

Meditation

The prayer life of a member of the Movement also in­cludes meditation.

It is logical that, if we are called to a spirituality that is both personal and collective, we need to build up along

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with the "exterior castle" (that is, the Focolare Movement, the Church), the "interior castle," that is, the union of our soul with God within us. And this is achieved espe­cially through meditation.

A preparation is necessary for this too. If we do not make even the slightest effort to recollect ourselves and "close the shutters," so to speak, or, in other words "turn off our senses" (close our eyes, for example), so as to seek him, then God cannot let himself be found (the mystics say that God is at the center of our soul) and he cannot spend time with us, flooding us with his presence, giving us all the beautiful things he brings.

We found this writing from 1972:

The Trinity inside of me!

The abyss inside of me!

The vastness inside of me!

The boundless love inside of me!

The Father

Jesus proclaimed to us

inside of me! The Word! The Holy Spirit, who I want to have always to serve the Work of Mary, inside of me! I ask nothing more. I want to dwell in this abyss,

to lose myself in this sun, to live together with Everlasting Life. What then?

Prune away the life outside and live what is inside:

The more I cut off communication

with the outside

(words that are often unnecessary, etc.),

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the more I converse with the Trinity inside of me."⁵

what should we use for meditation?

We have always been convinced that we should medi­tate for the most part on Holy Scripture and on writings to do with our spirituality. This is the suggestion given to those who belong to an ecclesial Movement. It is very helpful when we wake up to start the day by meditating, for example, on the passages chosen for the scripture read­ings of the day. Afterwards, we share more deeply in the Liturgy, and it becomes a much more satisfying and beau­tiful experience.

If we want to read spiritual texts, biographies and writ­ings of saints or something else, we can do so, and it is an excellent idea, but as spiritual reading.

and how should we meditate?

To meditate we begin by sitting calmly and reading a book, after having put ourselves in the presence of God. If, at some point, we have the impression that he takes the soul and uplifts it, then we must close the book, stay with him, listen to him, answer him, love him, adore him, ask him for graces.

After a while, we may feel that the conversation can be considered complete. Then we open the book again and continue reading. In practice, meditation should become a true conversation with God. We feel listened to, we speak to him, and our whole soul is taken up by him. It is like opening a bottle of perfume whose fragrance permeates the whole day.

5. Chiara Lubich, Diary, 22 May 1972, mLa dottrina spirituals, pp. 192-193.

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Our experience shows that it is not good to meditate with an "ulterior motive," that is, taking notes that may be useful to other people. This can be done later. During meditation it is best to be alone with God. Nor should we go on and on reading, giving in to spiritual greed. This would not be love.

the effects of meditation

If meditation is done well, it often has the following effect. It makes us lose interest in the things of this world, even beautiful things, because it takes us to another real­ity experienced in the depths of our hearts: God, his love, union with him. We then go back among the people and the things of this world with our intentions all permeated with the supernatural.

Union with God

First of all, we have always been convinced that the charism of unity must bring people to a great union with God, precisely because of the "charism of unity."

This is how something I wrote speaks of our union with God:

"Unity is the word that summarizes our entire spiritu­ality: unity with God, unity with our neighbors. And more specifically, our typical way is unity with our neighbor in order to attain union with God.

"In fact, the Holy Spirit revealed to us a way that is distinctly ours and fully evangelical, a way to unite us to God. Generally speaking we do not seek God first of all in the depths of our hearts where he dwells, or in nature. We look for him and we find him by going through our neigh­bor, loving our neighbor.

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"Only in this way — by loving our brothers and sisters — are we guaranteed unity with him as well, for then we find him alive and beating in our hearts. In turn, unity with God leads us to go out to our fellow human beings; it helps us to make our love for them something that is not false, nor insufficient, nor superficial, but rather true, full, complete, verified by sacrifice; it includes the readiness to give one's life, and is capable of achieving unity."⁶

This is a common experience ever since the Focolare was born. After having loved our neighbors during the course of the day, when evening comes we find in our hearts union with God. This union was blessed and greatly blessed especially bv those members of our Movement who live in the midst of the world. This "experiencing" God, his kingdom in us, is the most important antidote to the materialism that reigns everywhere and influences so many.

The following writing is a prayer from many years ago that underscores the truth that we find God by loving our brothers and sisters.

"When unity with our brothers and sisters is complete, when it has flowered anew and more fully from difficul­ties, then, as night fades into day and tears into light, often, I find you. Lord. Going back into the temple of my soul, I meet you; or as soon as circumstances leave me alone, you invite me, you draw me, gently but firmly, into your divine presence.

"Then you alone rule within me and outside me. . . . The soul is immersed as if in some delicious nectar and the heart seems to have become the chalice that contains it. The soul is all a silent song known only to you: a melody that reaches you because it comes from you and is made of you....

6. Chiara Lubich, Cercando Ie cose di lassu (Rome: Citta Nuova, 1992), p. 156.

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"And . . . strangely — strange to the human way of thinking — we have gone out to our brothers and sisters all day long and, in the evening, we have found the Lord, who has dissolved every trace, every memory of creatures."⁷

We feel that this way is particularly pleasing to the Lord. We can observe, moreover, that for those who go to God following a way that is more individual in nature, the lov­ing and spontaneous dialogue with him requires a struggle, at times painful one, that takes time; it is a conquest and not always successful.

Instead, for those who journey along a more collective way, like ours, we can affirm that this dialogue is perceived, at least in certain moments, from the beginning. And even children can experience it.

Moreover, it has been our experience that this union with God can reach the point, in time, of being the under­pinning of our every action, the foundation of our being.

What happens after we have experienced union with God?

"Union with God," we affirmed on another occasion, "is developed by means of many graces God gives to our souls. Paul, listing the graces given to him, speaks even of revelations. For us, there might have been certain move­ments, divine impulses to our wills, urging us to renew our conversion over and over again. It can happen at our meetings, through a strong presence of Jesus in our midst. Or there might be certain consolations or illuminations or other gifts."⁸

Very many of us, certainly, have made an effort to love our neighbor and have overcome trials and received graces. The little plant of our union with God should be present

7. Chiara Lubich, Meditations, pp. 109-110; cf. also Christian Living To­day, p. 147.

8. Chiara Lubich, Journey to Heaven, p. 46.

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and have grown in our souls, and each could tell us its story. We could also list its fruits.

All this is a very important and delicate spiritual heri­tage, which we can perceive only with the senses of our souls. For those living in the midst of the world, this heri­tage is something out of the ordinary, something miracu­lous. It is the kingdom of God within us.

What we need to do is to not waste it but guard and look after it, reminding ourselves that it is part of the life we will experience when we will leave this world. . . .

And we can guard and look after it, helping this spiri­tual heritage to grow by working on four fronts: striving always to be in an attitude of love for our brothers and sisters; overcoming every trial, great or small, through love for Jesus forsaken; reminding ourselves, with gratitude, of the graces God has generously given to us in life; and, finally, since we are talking about our inner life, our rela­tionship with God, we should add fuel to the fire by tak­ing care of our prayer life in a special way: morning and evening prayers, meditation, participation in the eucharist, and so forth.

We should be convinced, as experts in the spiritual life affirm, that God calls everyone to this union.

Furthermore, so as to give the proper place to prayer, in the Work of Mary we always have before us Mary, the Mother of Jesus. How do we imagine Mary, how is she described to us in the scriptures? How has she been de­picted in paintings, songs, and statues by artists through­out the ages?

Surely not as an unrecollected person, as someone who is restless, who is impetuous, always rushing, mindful only of external things. No, we think of her as a person who, filled with mystical beauty, discloses an immense treasure hidden in her heart: God.

And so it should be for us, too.

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