Lines for common action in the today of the Church and the world

            It is necessary to develop together a theology of com-passion, of collaboration, of respect and expectation in the work of God, even by means of gratuitous love and disinterested service. Faith and reason is not the whole of  theological method; there is also experience and love. Orthodoxy does not suffice; we also need ortho-praxis, as John Paul II says in NMI nn 49 and 50, speaking of charity with reference to Mt 25:35-36: “By these words, no less than by the orthodoxy of her doctrine, the Church measures her fidelity as the Bride of Christ.” “Now is the time for a new ‘creativity’ in charity.. The charity of works ensures an unmistakable efficacy to the charity of words.”

Commit ourselves to working together for the good of humanity. From comparison or exclusion, it is necessary to move toward integration.  With an ever increasing love for humanity, and for the peoples and cultures obviously excluded from a lived experience of brotherhood: the poor, sick, elderly, youth, children, exploited women, persons relegated to the edges of society…

            An anthropocentric shift in spirituality, and not only in theology, in order to live in a human dimension of universality. Here, too, from the contrast of spiritual values and human-social values, with a pluri-secular experience of our charisms—life, equilibrium, friendship, charity, work—going toward the integration which is characteristic of the Gospel.  Even though today we speak less about liberation theology, we feel a greater opening to all suffering and every need, in the name of the Gospel.

            Rendering alive and operative the charisms of apostolic and missionary charisms, with all their potential becomes an urgent need today with some concrete consequences for the Church, and in the Church for consecrated life.

            Here are some concrete examples of that.

            The call to universal fraternity: and the concern for every human being (NMI n. 49-51) is translated into the ortho-praxis of apostolic life, in creativity of charity, in a logical relationship between Gospel words and works, according to the example of Jesus: proclaiming the Gospel and doing works for the Reign; acting and teaching. Jesus is at the same time model and teacher.

            The call to a Church who is a friend of humanity, who does not condemn but encourages, who does not exclude but includes, who does not “excommunicate” but helps people to enter into the truth and life of communion; who does not impose herself, but proposes herself, who wants to make visible the face of the Triune God, source of everything and of all.

            Opening consecrated life as its mission to the effective engagement of the Church in dialogs, according to the teaching of Paul VI’s Ecclesiam suam in the third part, the GS n. 92, VC 51 and all the third part, the NMI (chap 4), Starting Afresh from Christ, nn 40-44… Everything is directed toward a strong call to commitment with the Church for the world.

            To be witnesses also of a pardon continually asked and offered, for the purification of the memory, to recuperate the past in a positive light, to draw good from evils. To do penance for past mistakes means a  consistent and firm resolution not to repeat them in the future.  And that, also for what is related to our history and the histories of our religious families.

Attention on the part of consecrated life to all that is human, because nothing of what is human is alien to the heart of a disciple of Christ (GS n.1), even at the risk of being misunderstood, as though its mission were no longer supernatural because it is concerned about the human. But in this, it follows, imitates, and lives the sentiments of its Teacher and Lord. (Phil 2:5-11; Heb 2:17-18; 4:15)        

It is necessary to develop and concretize a consciousness of being light for all, yeast for all, almost asking more of ourselves in terms of the quality of yeast and salt, of the power of the light and love that we must offer as the mass of dough to be raised becomes more abundant …

That involves translating into works and apostolic collaboration for today’s Church, the principle of the true spirituality of revelation:  God seeking for human beings, when we no longer see humanity seeking God…