The simplicity of Aletta

Dec 21, 2016 | Non categorizzato

Born in Martignano (Trent) on 27 November 1924, Vittoria Salizzoni, who moved temporarily to France with her family, felt God’s call at the age of 13: an intuition which she tried momentarily to put aside. At the age of 21 she met Chiara Lubich and was attracted by the novelty of the life she lived. Her doubts dissolved immediately: the path through which she could respond to that “calling” she had felt ever since childhood, was the focolare. Aletta (“little wing,” the name that Chiara gave her to remind her of the winged flight she had to take without looking back) stood by Chiara for 20 years in the discovery and implementation of the features of the Charism the Holy Spirit was slowly revealing to them. Among these, besides the specific spirituality of unity which is its particular characterstic, were the main concrete aspects of Christian life. What specifically suited the figure of Aletta, was the concern for health and protection of the environment. Chiara herself had explained this aspect to her as: «the entire humanity of Jesus; the life of Jesus in each person. Jesus was born of a woman like us, suffered the cold and hunger, cried, and experienced human affection. He fed the hungry, multiplied the bread and fishes, and healed many sick people. But above all he was full of love for mankind, and his suffering… Suffering, death and the resurrection are also expressions of this aspect.» In the 1960s and 1970s Chiara asked her to open the focolare house in Istanbul, where Aletta would have many and profound contacts with Patriarch Athenagoras I. So on many occasions, she had the chance to accompany Chiara in her visits to the Patriarch.  During her stay in those lands, Aletta discovered the beauty of the Orthodox Church and the Churches of the Orient, in which she saw the importance of translating truth in life, exalting love. The contacts she established were the precursor of a fertile dialogue that has continued up to today, with the current Ecumenical Patriarch, Bartholomew I. After the death of Athenagoras, Aletta moved to Lebanon. Those were years of civil war, which with the continuous air raids, repeated the lesson of the movement’s early years in Trent: “everything collapses, only God remains!” She shared with the local people the insecurity and risks of those long years of war, supporting, consoling, and imbuing hope. Difficulties and dangers did not hinder the spread of the charism of unity, not only in Lebanon but across the Middle East, which Aletta visited periodically. In 1990 she returned to Rome for good. «During those first years in Piazza Cappuccini – recounts Palmira, who is also from that first group of focolarine women of Trent – I would go with Aletta to the valleys to meet the first communities that were sprouting. She was like an angel, and it explains clearly why Chiara immediately called her so. And she was like the batter of an angel’s wing, for Chiara and for all of us throughout these 70 years of her life in the focolare. She didn’t talk much, but what she said put us all in the essential facts of life. What characterized her most was simplicity, an inborn serenity and enviable psycho-physical balance.» Ten days before her death, Aletta recorded a video message to the youths of the Movement, the gen, gathered for their congress: «I want to greet all the gen of the world on their 50^th anniversary. May they all make progress; they are young, still strong, and can do all they wish!» Upon announcing the death of Aletta to the Movement worldwide, Maria Voce, the Focolare President wrote: «With joy and immense gratitude we are accompanying Aletta to the house of the Father. We could not have had a better model than her, who gave her life without measure.» By Anna Friso

The beginnings of a “Centre for Unity and Peace”

Mar 7, 2019 | Non categorizzato

Located on the border between the Jewish and Arab sections of Jerusalem, it will be a place of spirituality, study, dialogue and formation for the Holy City and for the whole world. A French historian once wrote that Jerusalem does not belong to Jerusalem, because it is a city of the world, a city where people of the whole world meet, again and again, face to face, to confront each other and to challenge each other. It is a place where some seek to practise peaceful cohabitation – while others seek war, where some strive to spread a sense of common belonging – while others try to spread hatred. In fact, it is easy to give in to the temptation to see only what the almost daily news reports tell us about the Holy City – about the violence between the Jews and the Palestinians and the unending struggle of the Christians… But is this all there is to Jerusalem? Is there still room for hope and for the prophetic role this city has for the entire world? Chiara Lubich was always convinced that there is room for hope. She went to the Holy Land for the first time in 1956 and among the holy places she visited, there was one in particular that moved her. It’s called the “Scaletta,” and it refers to the ancient Roman white stone steps, just outside the walls of the old city, next to the church of Saint Peter in Gallicantu. According to tradition, Jesus walked along those steps in the evening after the Last Supper, on his way to the garden of Gethsemane. Also according to tradition, it was on those very stones that he uttered his prayer for unity: “Father that all may be one…” Here is how Chiara Lubich described the strong impression this place had on her. In her diary she wrote: “It was here that their Teacher, whose hour of death was drawing near, prayed to the Father. His heart was full of tenderness for his disciples, who had, yes, been chosen by Heaven, but who were still weak and without understanding. Jesus prayed to the Father in his own name and in the name of all those for whom he had come and for whom he was ready to die: “Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one” (Jn 17:11 NRSV). There he called upon the Father to make us his children, even though we were far from him through our own fault, and to make us brothers and sisters, in the strongest unity, that which is divine.”[1] From that moment, it was Chiara’s desire that a centre for dialogue and unity could one day be born on this tiny piece of land. In the 1980’s there came an important turn of events. A plot of land adjacent to the Roman steps became available. Slowly the project advanced and approval was granted in 2016. Recently the excavations for the building works have been carried out. The future “Centre for Unity and Peace” received a precise mandate from Chiara: it is to be a place of spirituality, study, dialogue and formation. It is to be a place open to people of different ages, cultures, beliefs and backgrounds. It must foster encounters and opportunities to learn about others and so promote authentic relationships. Another decisive moment came in February 2019, when Maria Voce, president of the Focolare Movement, placed a small medal of Our Lady into the soil as an important initial sign for the construction of this centre. The project is to be a multi-purpose structure, suitable for hosting events and initiatives of various kinds at both local and international levels. It is now possible to contribute in various ways to support the construction of the centre. Click here for all the necessary information.

Stefania Tanesini

[1] Chiara Lubich, Scritti Spirituali/1: L’attrattiva del tempo moderno, Citta Nuova Editrice, p.172-179

Not just best friends

Apr 13, 2018 | Non categorizzato

“We’ll never be able to quantify the help that we receive from our brothers and sisters. How much courage their faith inspires in us, how much warmth their love, how much their example draws us!” Chiara Lubich (1920-2008), who wrote these words, was known as someone who drew after her hundreds and thousands of people and constructed relationships with Buddhists, Muslims. She is still being followed by people with no religious affiliation and breatheing new life into politics and economy. The friendship with the first companions of Silvia Lubich whom they knew simply as “Chiara” or Clare, played no small role. It all began with a choice of God and her consecration to Him in 1943, Trent, Italy. However, quite soon it was no longer a single “I”, but a collective subject that began to move, to act, to pray and to love: Chiara and her first companions could have ended becoming anyone, but they became beacons of light on all five continents. This story has many incredible elements, but yet it’s simple. You understand it if you open and read in chapter 13 of John’s Gospel: “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. As I have loved you, so must you love one another” (13:34). This is a commandment that can only be lived out in the company of others. When Chiara and her companions read this Gospel passage in a bomb shelter, they looked at one another very intensely as they thought about the commitment it would be. They didn’t hesitate, but said to each other: “I’m ready to love you to the point of giving my life for you.” Chiara would later consider this the cornerstone on which the entire Focolare Movement would rest. It’s certainly not something unheard of in the history of the Church, but there might be one thing new about it. Chiara immediately conveyed to her companions whatever she was living and all that the Holy Spirit was inspiring in her. The bond among them was stronger than cement, and I would like to illustrate the qulaity of their relationship that valued and freed potentials, edifying a work that was of God. Ten years went by and it was 1954. Chiara was living with Giosi, Graziella, Natalia, Aletta, Marilen, Bruna and Eli. One day, as Chiara paused to look at them, she recalled the sentence from the book of Proverbs: “Wisdom has built her a house and set up her seven columns” (Proverbs 9:1). She was looking at the seven young women in front of her, each with her own talent, all of them united and rooted in God. These were Wisdom’s seven columns, the seven colours of the spectrum that emerge from the one light of Love. Seven interdependent aspects of love, each flowing from and into the other. Chiara entrusted Giosi with the communion of goods and the paychecks, not only the care of the poor: the red of love. To Graziella she entrusted “witness and spreading,” the orange. Natalia had been her first companion: she personified the heart of this ideal, the cry of Jesus Forsaken of love. She would carry thi secret beyond the Iron Curtain. She was the spirituality and prayer life, the yellow of the spectrum. Aletta would be remembered as the one who encouraged the members to be mindful of their health, and to form a community united in love. Chiara entrusted her with the green, Creation and physical life. To Marilen, who lived for fifteen years in the midst of a Cameroon forest, Chiara entrusted the blue: harmony and the home. Bruna was a bit of an intellectual and Chiara saw her as the one who could develop the aspect of studies: the indigo. Eli was always at Chiara’s side and helped to make sure that all the members around the world were living as one. She was entrusted with the aspect of unity and the means of communication, the violet. Some other of her first companions would also have special tasks: Dori, Ginettta, Gis, Valeria, Lia, Silvana and Palmira.

1959: Lia, Marilen, Bruna