Contemplating the Faces of Christ

23. The path which consecrated life is called to take up at the beginning of the new millennium is guided by the contemplation of Christ with a gaze fixed, more than ever, on the face of the Lord.⁷⁰ But where does one concretely contemplate the face of Christ? There are a multiplicity of presences to be discovered in ways that are ever new.

Christ is truly present in his Word and in the Sacraments, especially in the Eucharist. Christ lives in the Church, he makes himself present in the community of those who are gathered in his name. He is before us in every person, identifying himself in a special way with the small, the poor, those who suffer and those most in need. He meets us in every event happy or sad, in trials and in joys, in pain and in sickness.

Holiness is the fruit of the encounter with him in the many presences in which we can discover his face as the Son of God, a suffering face and at the same time the face of the Risen One. As he once made himself present in daily life he is still present in daily life today where he continues to show his face. Recognizing him requires a gaze of faith which is acquired through the habitual reading of the Word of God, through prayer and above all through the exercise of charity because the Mystery can only be fully known through love.

We can recall some privileged places in which the face of Christ can be contemplated, for a renewed commitment in the life of the Spirit. These are walking the paths of a lived spirituality, a priority commitment in this time, taking the opportunity to re-read in life and in daily experiences the spiritual riches of one's own charism, through of a renewed contact with the same sources which, inspired by the founders' and foundress' experience of the Spirit, gave rise to the spark of new life and new works, the specific re-reading of the Gospel found in every Charism.