1979
With Our Own Face
By looking at the expectation that is visible in ordinary people, one can realize that this is the first sign of the way God draws the single person out of nothingness. A Christian brings something that everyone needs, and, in fact, the university life of students of Communion and Liberation is not defined by graduation, university elections or other activities, but by something different and greater; it is defined by a Presence that responds to your own human needs. Our changed humanity brings about a “disturbance” in the way we experience everything—our work, politics, the situation we are in. The way we can continue to follow the event we have encountered is to be staying in the companionship, because Christ manifests Himself through the change of the people who give witness to Him. The human dimension of the diversity emerging with Christ is the recovery of rationality and gratuitousness.
A Movement within the Movement
In 1979, places of a new ferment were emerging in the communities of CL university students. There was the need for a real place to take shape in each community that would continuously generate the community. The main features of these movements within the movement were to be the passion for the event of Christ, that leads to the unity of the person, and recognizing that faith must be played out within the reality, the environment and history in which people found themselves. For the impact with reality prompts us to bring what we have encountered into our environment; only this way can we deepen the content of the encounter we have made.
A Presence Touching Our Lives
The subject of reassembling is our humanity, the whole of it, with all the discomfort it feels. Human discomfort is an everyday condition that we cannot solve on our own. Something else—an event—needs to happen. An event is such when it generates amazement—that is, when you realize it is not generated by the individual person—and when it touches your own person. For Christians, this event has the shape of a precise encounter that permeates their humanity. In this respect, the movement coincides with the individual person, because our own “I” is involved. When faced with such an event, our task is to follow it, and following implies a continuous comparison between our interests, our life and what we have encountered. This comparison generates a new judgment on everything, leads to conceive, that is, to create, to bring forth a different humanity. It is a new conception of life, which is characterized by charity, gratuitousness toward things and people. All this is sustained over time by the awareness of a Presence, by recognizing the One who is among us. Only this way is following the movement not something formal, but comes from a real affection, and joy is the result of this attitude. We must beg Christ that the memory of Him become habitual in our life, not as a distant memory, but as recognizing a Presence that embraces every moment of our day. Our whole life must become an entreaty, and for this to happen we need, on the one hand, to force ourselves to ask, and on the other hand to be aware of our own smallness and inability. By recognizing this Presence as the consistency of life, a new judgment on the world is born, that is, culture is born. Culture is not a principle reserved for intellectuals, but the content of a critical awareness that springs from the announcement that has been received. From the joy of this announcement, then, comes gratuitousness towards others and thus charity.
1980
The Rationality of Gratuitousness
The main focus for the companionship of the movement is not your ability to create or accomplish a certain project, but your own person. This is originally defined by its relationship with something Other, something external to it because it is unable to fulfill its desires and needs on its own. Human beings have not been abandoned in their helplessness, for the One who created the plan to which they belong came and revealed Himself. This acknowledgment gives rise to a friendship among Christians that brings forth a flood of generosity, an attitude of gratuitous commitment. If gratuitousness does not arise from judging our own “I” and destiny, it will remain a generous moralism destined to decay. Whereas a gesture is filled with rational gratuitousness when it is an expression of the truth of our person. Therefore, to understand the rationality of gratuitousness, we need to go more deeply into the essence of man. True rationality comes about when man becomes aware of his being a relationship with the infinite. The movement’s presence within the university is not about responding to some needs but it is about our self-awareness as being a relationship with Christ, which is our own destiny as well as the destiny of all. A true companionship can only come out of this, and a consequence of this self-awareness is a gratuitousness that is free from any outcome.
Moving to Experience
Moving “from experience to judgment”—this expression has often been used, but inappropriately, because it is precisely through judgment that experience is as such. It is about giving the dignity of experience to what we do because when our judgment is introduced, our actions change radically. To judge means to compare what we do with the acknowledged ideal; the fact is that we often feel it as an abstract mental operation. But instead, judgment is a new memory and taste we have inside wherever we go. Judgment is a measure by which the ideal determines the way a single person looks at and approaches things. This is the only certainty we have, because that “friendliness” that is often appealing in the companionship of the movement is not enough and may crumble over time. Whereas in the encounter we can perceive a value for our own life, and from this perception we begin to follow the companionship. To follow means to help what is proposed by the community become a reality; judgment is born and develops from here. This is not some mechanism, but the amazement and enthusiasm that arise at the discovery of a Presence. The verification of judgment gives rise to certainty, which brings with it a missionary impetus. Along this path a resistance of freedom frequently occurs, which is original sin. We should not be scandalized by this, but we need to ask the Supreme Being that the event we have encountered will permeate our entire life.
Personality and Cultural Impetus
Fr. Giussani recognized two key objectives in the work of CL university students. The first was the personalization of the life of the movement—it was necessary to deepen the new personality that arises from the encounter with Christ. The second aspect was culture. We belong to the Movement because of the impact with an exceptional event, in which we experienced a sort of “spark”; a spark that went right through our heart and revealed it in its truth. This is an all-embracing event, yet we often resist because of a lack of moral energy that leads us to be determined by our instincts and feelings. In order not to give in to this attitude a decision is required; this decision comes not from our own capacity but from recognizing we are attracted to Another. It is worthwhile to give in because the Other generates an irresistible attraction; therefore, our resistance is due to our incapacity of affection and adherence to beauty. The decision is also weakened by an uncertainty about the way forward, but this is the reason why Christ became man. He is the pathway in history, and He can reach the single person through a particular place such as the movement. That is why we need to follow the companionship, not passively, but continuously working so that we are able to judge everything from what we have encountered. The companionship must become experience, that is, a new judgment that permeates one’s entire life. Thus, a cultural position arises from the encounter with Christ, not as a fixation on a particular intellectual interest, but as a capacity for judgment that flows from the affirmation of His presence. The enthusiasm for truth is what generates a culturally alive position. Cultural activity, then, is the companionship expanding to the whole world; it is an embrace that encompasses all that we encounter.
1981
A Thread of Desire
We need to recognize that we are children of our own time. This fact cannot prevent good intentions from arising; however, it can make the transition from intention to morality difficult. Those who belong to the movement have been struck by an event that generated an attachment, and coming together is a sign that there is still a thread of desire, a thread of attachment to that initial ideal intention. This type of desire comes from the discovery that the consistency of one’s own self is something Other than one’s self. The problem is that this thread of desire is not experienced; there is a fragility of freedom that is not first and foremost inconsistency, but a lack of unity in looking at one’s own life. It is a problem of morality, which means a desire to increase and consolidate that authentic initial position of our humanity. The first way to develop morality is to recognize and own that thread of desire, that is, to let it “become ours.” We need to ask for this to happen; and this implies sacrifice, but it also leads over time to a change. The second way to develop morality is cultural and political research, because the essence of man develops in his impact with reality. The organic development of one’s personality is given by the activity of that desire which is provoked by what it encounters. Cultural research, then, is the use of one’s “I” in the function of something greater. The companionship is the instrument that can be of help in this work, and formalism is the greatest enemy we can have in living the life of the community. In formalism, change is not possible, whereas the opposite of formalism is freedom. True freedom always arises as judgment, as acknowledging our attraction to what is true, and it is fulfilled as adherence to it.
Being Certain of a Few Great Things
The commitment in the referendum against abortion raised the question about what is the Movement’s task in society. The importance of this issue was evident in the weeks leading up to the vote. The problem arose when, once the emergency was over, it was hard to give a reason for one’s own ordinary, daily commitment. This problem is serious because it suggests that we often move reactively and with little certainty. We need to become poorer, that is, to be certain of a few great things on which our whole life is based. These “few great things” coincide with faith, and faith would not be such if it were not put at risk in what happens, in all circumstances, in the environment we find ourselves in. Our poverty is not removed but our dignity and consistency lie in something that is beyond us. Faith is often perceived as an objection to who we are, while faith must challenge everything, must invest our relationship we have with study, with work, with our spouse. Only in this way does our certainty grow. But what is the content of faith, of those “few great things”? First of all, the fact that the Mystery is present in human form and nothing can ever uproot this Presence, not even our sin. The word “Christ” is often repeated in the Movement, but it is as if He did not exist; Christ, instead, is the form, the meaning of living in all its aspects. Before His presence we can feel our own misery, but His power overcomes this limitation and entrusts us with a task—to constitute the seed of a new people. That is why the other great thing we are certain of is the companionship of the Movement, and it is by belonging to it that our own “I” is defined.
Something that Changes Our Lives
We often live like people suffering from feebleness, afflicted with a chronic weakness that power seeks to nurture. This is the reason why we become reactive, and desire and instinct are the criteria for our actions. There are two reasons that drive us toward this attitude. The first is the fear of our own inconsistency, which actually indicates impatience—since the change in our person does not take place in the way and moment we would imagine, we question the truth of the event we have encountered. The second reason is our being apt to imagine the answer to the desires we have, eventually leading to the atrophy of these needs. What gives a face back to life, what personality is born again from, is belonging to something that is already there. But a true belonging is only referred to the One who creates and loves each single person, and thus to Christ. Belonging to Him means recognizing and following Him—this is the only true discipline of life. The problem, then, is not to follow the rules, but to be provoked by what the companionship proposes, because adherence is only implemented in embracing reality. This begins in the environment we find ourselves in, through the work to which we are called, and from there it extends to everything around us. Adhering to what the companionship proposes becomes the standard for dealing with all reality. Only then can we truly change and be a presence. To be a “presence” means to be inside this environment with the awareness of the One we belong to.
