Sesto volume della serie “Quasi Tischreden”, che riunisce conversazioni dell’Autore con un gruppo di Memores Domini.

Le Tischreden, “dialoghi a tavola”, propongono oltre duecento incontri svoltisi con ritmo all’incirca settimanale a partire dal 1990 e raccolti per tematiche.
Nel presente volume, introdotto dalla Nota per la lettura (pp. 1-2) che approfondisce motivo e metodo di pubblicazione, sono raccolte alcune delle conversazioni tenutesi fra il 28 marzo 1991 e il 6 novembre 1996.

L’introduzione dal titolo “Dentro quello sguardo” è il resoconto di una conversazione con i giovani dei Memores Domini (Milano il 20 novembre 1994; inedito).

I testi di riferimento utilizzati come spunto di riflessione per i dialoghi di questo volume sono “Moralità memoria e desiderio” e “Decisione per l’esistenza” in Alla ricerca del volto umano (Rizzoli, 1995; T21, T32, T37-38), “1981. La fine di un mondo” in Un avvenimento di vita, cioè una storia: Interviste, conversazioni, interventi di monsignor Luigi Giussani a partire da registrazioni, non rivisti dall’autore (EDIT: Il Sabato, 1993; T96), L’alleanza: Volume uno dagli Esercizi spirituali (Jaca Book, 1979; T101), Perché la Chiesa: Il segno efficace del divino nella storia (Tomo 2, Jaca Book, 1992; nuova edizione Rizzoli, 2003; T109, T154), Il tempo e il tempio: Dio e l’uomo (BUR, 1995; T160-161, T177), Il senso religioso (Rizzoli, 1997; nuova edizione: BUR Rizzoli, 2023; T198), oltre ad alcuni pro manuscripto e scritti inediti (trascrizioni di appunti) relativi a eventi legati alla vita dei Memores Domini.

La Tischrede “Contro lo spiritualismo” (pp. 215-227; T58) ha origine dal messaggio di Giovanni Paolo II Io sono la vita (15 agosto 1992, messaggio per la proclamazione della VIII Giornata mondiale della gioventù di Denver, Stati Uniti agosto 1993).

Il volume si chiude con la “Legenda” (pp. 387-389), l’“Elenco analitico” in ordine cronologico di tutte le Tischreden pubblicate (pp. 391-397) e gli indici (“Indice dei riferimenti biblici”, pp. 401-403, “Indice dei nomi e delle cose notevoli”, pp. 404-411, “Indice tematico”, pp. 412-424). [P. M.]

Introduction. Within that gaze. The way the event of Christ reaches an individual determines his or her personality, defining them forever. The method by which the event gets into relation with the individual “I” is called “charism.” It always reaches the person through the encounter with a human companionship. Therefore, the individual becomes himself if he obeys, if he empathizes with the aspects of the companionship he has encountered.

1. An All-Embracing Way
Charism and verification.  The charism is the way we have of perceiving Christ, and so the charism is an all-embracing perspective as it is the way Christ gives Himself. Christ Himself is all-embracing. The gift of the charism aims at verifying, that is, at discovering the glory of Christ. The charism makes you experience your relationship with a person in a way that is so full of care and so rich in factors—and in a manner which is normally impossible to conceive—that it thus demonstrates its truth. The easiest educational tool aimed at this all-embracing gaze is to ask in the form that Christ taught us and the Church teaches us—the sacraments and the liturgy, respectively.

All that is said.  All that is said in the Movement can be said in a few words—the personality of Christ is present because the people who have met Him are “one.” Each one is a member of Christ and therefore each one is a part of the other, a member of the other. The Author sums up, “Yet, if you are a member of mine, I am no longer myself without you!” One’s self is assimilated to this presence, and so all that seems “very complex and very long” to say happens. The only matter is to ask for this awareness, and the most important thing is the sense of the Mystery. The Mystery, for those who have met Christ, is a reality. As a matter of fact, with Christ we move from the Mystery sensed by reason and instantly vanishing—because reason cannot hold it fast—to the Mystery made human presence. The most truthful attitude, then, is in “looking and asking”—asking makes you look, and looking makes asking proliferate.

Nothing is profane. God’s relationship with man takes place only through historical facts—it is the covenant between God and man. The whole human world is a temple—everything is inside this temple and there is nothing profane, that is, outside the temple. If the Lord became a man, this man is the master of the framework of the new and eternal covenant; with this man everything serves as an expression of the relationship with Him. The relationship with the other, therefore, defines the relationship with Christ as the mode by which Christ attests Himself in time. The most beautiful thing in the world is to experience this covenant with God in the closest reality.

2. Through Temperament
Simon’s impetus. Simon was chosen to lead all the others because he responded with an emphasis, dedication, awareness, and enthusiasm that the others, by temperament, could not provide. Christ identified him as temperament, “You are a rock.” What Jesus does is by taking his cue and pretext from temperament. In creating man, God creates the cue to take to exalt him. Therefore, the nature by which God makes man has plea as its inevitable and irreplaceable expression. Salvation, in fact, lies in asking the Mystery for its power to accomplish in your own person what you would not even be able to think of. Therefore, the method revealed by Christ is the message of a most simple liberation.

Being responsible for your temperament.  Being responsible for your temperament means that your temperament, by translating or mediating to others something it has heard, must aim at affirming not itself, but what it has heard. You are responsible for your temperament in everything you do, as temperament gets everywhere. Temperament is a “condition” that God accepts and transforms into an “instrument” of His plan of salvation. For grace cannot act without conditioning your freedom and, before that, your temperament.

Temperaments and pages. There are passages in God’s word where some aspects are exalted. Some temperaments are exalted in certain pages of the Scriptures so that people can find a correspondence with what they are themselves. It is very important to find out the page that suits you best in God’s word—meditating on that page is like a prevailing aspect of your daily life. There are in fact pages in the Bible that focus on the mode of one’s journey to destiny. That page has the effect of a charism that can bring a change, that can make the temperament created by God in each one of us grow. Peace is the consequence of facing the page that suits best.

3. Following a Presence
From something implicit. On your path of vocation, you usually walk not according to what was implicit in the reason that made you start: the richness of the first moment is so implicit—and so subtly persuasive—that it will never happen again. Therefore, if the implicit does not unfold, the instinctive prevails, the natural predominates. The historical, existential starting point of your path is the purest and truest moment in your life. The time of each person’s life is meaningless if not a single moment of time provided the meaning of all time. This moment in time is the beginning of vocation. It looks as the poorest and the least aware of all, but in fact it is the most aware and the most concrete of all. That is why what opposes the initial moment is the real enemy.

Objection, objection! Following, humanly speaking, implies intelligence and affection; following those whom Christ brings together as companionship enhances this intelligence and affection. No renunciation of your own nature is involved, but rather a strengthening of it. Only a presence can give value to the “channel through which” and the “destination to which you are going,” thus giving value to God Himself and the circumstances through which He speaks. Only the concept of “presence” entails both something sensitive and tangible and Something else. You cannot understand a presence by analyzing, observing, interpreting or searching through it bit by bit, but only by its revealing itself.

“There is an old man in your life.” “There is an old man in your life.” According to the Author, this statement said to one of the participants is true for two reasons. In the first place, because that old man is God. There is someone who comes before you and whom you follow. From here comes that strong feeling of confidence that others do not have. In the second place, the statement is also true humanly speaking, in the sense that a sincere relationship between a young person and an older person is extremely more positive than the relationship between two young people, because relating to an older person means relating to a greater experience, therefore with a more proven wisdom. A stable serenity, the documentation of a balanced affectivity, cannot be found in another person, unless the latter is the transparency of Another.

4. A New Mentality
“Do not conform.”  Christians stand before the world with a new mentality. This mentality is not asserted through hegemony, but through a new culture, as was the case with the early Christians. Their new culture featured an ecumenical character, that is, the ability to go through everything starting from what is valuable. Their true ideal was Christ. He is the only one who can radically change the way you think, conceive, imagine and perform your work. It is about a change of being.

Against spiritualism. Spiritualism is an error because the living God is a God who was made flesh, and it is in the flesh that we find Him. In fact, in its totality, the Church can be identified in a people, therefore in a very concrete term. Moreover, the Church touches each person’s life according to a certain companionship in which the subject comes across. More generally, to err as spiritualists means to abstract from concreteness, that is, to abstract from the circumstances of time and space that define a problem. For although a problem has a conformity of principles, it always arises through circumstances of time and space. By disregarding these, we fall into spiritualism.

Instructions for use (?!). The event of Christ performs the miracle—through the Church He enters the world and begins to outline moments of clarity and true goodness. It is the life of the Church that testifies to holiness. Therefore, if we do not follow Christ, we shall make miracles impossible (though not in the original and total sense of the term). Following may either derive from a sense of duty, and so this means following some “instructions for use,” or it can be supported by the awareness that sooner or later obedience will make our soul flourish. In this sense following is already a miracle.

5. In Action
The real difficult position. Our reaction in the face of reality is inevitable and can be of any nature. That is where the problem begins because the two greatest types of fatigue emerge—taking action without pretense and accepting. To take action without pretense means to ask without presumption, “Lord, may I take action to correct?” If correcting is not possible, we need to accept the purpose for which God allowed the circumstance to happen, that is, to accept God’s design. This means getting in motion in the face of what is happening. Getting in motion takes shape through the two ways that seem the most abstract and the farthest from touching the issue it has caused—in the first place, prayer (“Thy kingdom come!”), and secondly, witnessing. However, the root of the whole matter remains the word “offering,” that is, giving as the purpose of one’s action “for the love of Christ.”

Destiny and task (1). Welcoming the word destiny is a form of love, while welcoming a task is a form of self-interest. The word “destiny” makes you undergo Something else. Recognizing and accepting this is a greater love than even accepting a task. The word “task” becomes something new when a particular emphasis is added—in order to reach destiny, each one has a specific path. The word “task” then is secondary to the word “destiny” even if it is more understandable or more measurable. Appearance is the task, and destiny is salvation. The word task becomes dense, intense and serious when it enters the horizon of the word destiny—that is when it becomes a responsibility.

Destiny and task (2).  “Mentioning things according to their destiny also implies mentioning things according to the task for which they serve, because mentioning things according to their destiny comes through their use for God’s plan, that is, for the task.” Only the word destiny suggests the true task and defines the true purpose. Therefore, while the task and purpose are served, destiny is loved and depended upon. As a matter of fact, you belong to destiny but you do not belong to the task. It is only the discovery of destiny that allows you to accept that the norm of your actions is a certain purpose. For the discovery of destiny is the mortification of autonomy. Such mortification does not exhaust life because the transition to destiny (Christ) is a love, that is, it is forgiveness. It is then in looking to Christ that everything develops, that you learn to feel your errors, perceive the false directions and choose the true ones.

Only by redeeming. During our journey within time and space, the glory of Christ is an ongoing reassembling, resuming, rebuilding what is constantly being destroyed. To be part of the action by which Christ redeems the world is always to participate in the victory Christ achieves over evil through the cross. It is that “through the cross” that qualifies the collaboration to save from evil. In fact, doing good, as such, does not imply this—doing good is doing good. Working, instead, is meant to rebuild; this is the cross. Therefore, to take part in the redemption is to take part in that love to the world that is performed through the cross. In fact, love as impetus is not worthwhile compared to love as self-sacrifice. Thus, reality as it is can be built only by redeeming, that is, by taking part in the mystery of the cross.

6. Inside the Life of a People
Urgency for change.  The School of Community is first and foremost a thought—meaning by thought the completeness of the expression of reason—it is reason doing its work with completeness. The completeness of the work of reason is a consciousness of reality according to the totality of its factors. The totality of these factors implies a point where reason cannot explain everything, but only blame the presence of a factor beyond its possibilities. “Beyond” means that this factor can indeed turn what you are talking about or thinking about into a sign. In light of this Mystery, which reason discovers in the reality that has become a sign, our actions are challenged in various ways. The outcome of the work done with School of Community, then, rather than being dominated by curiosity and reduced to a dialectic, must demand an urgency for change in our lives. The first symptom of our being “already” changed is begging. And then, from this change, another change will constantly be developed. This is the deep meaning of “He is, if He is at work.”

A reality on the move.  The Movement, insofar as it is a friendship to destiny, represents a reality on the move, towards a greater maturity. Being scandalized by our own shortcomings is the best way to go against the Movement, that is, to block the dynamism of friendship. In fact, the nature of friendship is to help us walk towards destiny. The proposal to help us walk towards destiny is a proposal towards the human reality and thus towards a response to a need. We can experience the Movement by participating positively in the things that the Movement proposes. Positivity deepens and is determined as sensitivity and faithfulness if it pursues the purpose for which it was born. Any shortcoming or mistake should not remove as its first consequence a greater urgency of our personal commitment.

Doing School of Community. School of Community is Christian truth learned in its “applicability and in its resourcefulness, within human commitment,” that is, “within the way human beings seek to translate their basic needs.” In this respect, School of Community brings out the way the Christian message meets these needs and helps in their fulfillment. All the questions one may ask about how to experience School of Community are not authentic if the answer that follows does not respond to a passion you have—your passion for knowing the Lord. The nature of School of Community is a companionship of people who live in the same place seeking the Lord.

To offer yourself is to live. Only if the Word becomes flesh does hope become happiness. Christianity is the ultimate Mystery turned into a fact that can be experienced. And so, the way you can be in relationship with others is different. That is why you cannot offer ideas—you can only offer yourself, that is, your own gaze on reality. If you do not offer yourself, you offer a lie. To offer yourself is, above all, to live, exist.