4.3 The polar centrality of the cross

The decisive element, in a formation plan based on the integration model, is obviously formed by the central pole, by that value, idea, experience, conviction that the subject has internalized and is making more and more his own, and which at the same time inspires his conduct and aspirations, as though it were pillar and hub of his life.  On the one hand it is what sustains and strengthens him, but on the other it is also what provokes him as a constant point of reference, an ongoing criteria of discernment, a common denominator which somehow contains and expresses the various dimensions of living as presbyter or consecrated person, but who also needs every aspect of human living.

Concretely, it is the person of the Son, his death and resurrection mystery, his Passover, his sentiments, his heart of Servant and Good Shepherd.

This theological-spiritual reference is also the nerve center which serves as  integrating element, and which ought to be the very heart of priestly and consecrated life, its vital center, that which animates it and forms its identity and which is indispensable not only to rediscover and propose clearly during initial formation, but also to articulate pedagogically as pole of attraction and psychic traction.  In other words, the process of psychic integration can be realized only around what has already been placed, at least theoretically, at the center of the Christian life and the identity of consecrated and priestly life. Which is precisely the Christ, because thus it pleased our Father-God, to make of Christ “the heart of the world, the center not only of the cosmos, but of the life of every living being, because in him he chose us, blessed, predestined, redeemed us, recapitulating (reuniting) in him all things, reconciling all reality through the blood of his cross”. (cf Eph 1:3-10; Col 1:15-20) Because the Word  (“Verbo”) became incarnate not “to abolish, but to complete…”, so that “all might be accomplished”. (Mt 5:17-18)

This theological centrality of Christ must increasingly find a corresponding psychological and psycho-pedagogical centrality, so to speak, which, then, is none other than that process of reunification and reconciliation (“ricapitolazione” e “rappacificazione”) of which Paul speaks, a complex operation, which starts off from afar and cannot but last all one’s life, but which can and must necessarily begin during initial formation.

So it will be a question of really placing the cross at the center of the young person’s life, almost as though to plant it in his heart, so that he will progressively discover how only the Son’s cross, as a sign of the greatest love ,raised up from the earth, can give meaning to everything, really to everything, the past, the present, to personal limitations and weakness, to powerlessness and to sin, to life and death, to suffering and love, to his vocational choice and every other life choice: because only the Paschal Mystery of the Lord can transform evil into good, the absurd into the meaningful, the offense received into radical purification, illness into responsible sharing in salvation, death into life…; only love expressed by the cross can judge one’s personal story and orient love, form the conscience and enlighten the eyes of the mind,  surface what is unconscious and unconfessed, wound and heal, discover the genuine mystery of sexuality and give it order, tell its nature and richness, reveal illusion and deception, defenses and secrets of human selfishness, show that love has the stigmata and if it does not, it is not real love… The cross is the truth of life. ⁴

For that reason it attracts (“I, when I will be lifted up from the earth, will draw all to myself”, Jn 12:32, all and everything); through this he recomposes and rejoins what was divided, arid and scattered, every fragment of life and humanity; (cf Ez 37:1-15) “nothing escapes its warmth” (Ps 18). Therefore, the cross is that living warm center around which the young person must progressively learn to make his whole being turn…life, impulses, limitations, sentiments, instincts, desires, projects, passions, dreams, relationships, etc… It is the icon upon which the young person must continually fix his gaze along the formation journey (cf Jn 19:37), like the Hebrews in the desert.

Reproduction in a summary picture of the preceding.

Tab. I: Objective of formation: contents and synchronous perspective.

This graphic outline offers us in synthesis the perspective of the objective of formation from the point of view of contents. It is the synchronous perspective.

Attempt to summarize and offer in graphic outline the evolution of formation models in recent decades.

Tab. II: Formation models: historical-diachronic evolution

The outline is to be read from top toward bottom, along a route whose stages are not always so strictly differentiated.