In a letter from 1944, addressed to a girl who shared her ideals, Chiara wrote: “Little sister in God’s Immense Love! Listen please to the voice of this little heart! You have been dazzled along with me by the flaming brightness of an ideal that surpasses and summarizes everything: By God’s Infinite Love! […] Love joins us as sisters! Love has called us to Love! Love has spoken in the depths of our hearts, saying: “Look around you. Everything in the world passes away. Each day comes to an end and evening drops so quickly. Each life has its sunset and soon the sunset of your life will be upon you! But never despair: Yes, yes, everything passes away, for nothing of what you see and love is destined to last forever! Everything passes away, leaving you with nothing but hopes and regrets!” But don’t despair: Your constant hope tells you: “Yes, there is what you are looking for: There is that infinite and immortal longing, a hope that never ends, a faith that breaks through the darkness of death and is a light to those who believe; your hope is not in vain, your believing is not in vain. It’s not in vain! You hope, you believe — because of Love. This is your future, your present and your past: It’s all summarized in the word Love!”[2].

Feeling and knowing oneself to be loved personally by God becomes the first spur to love others. In fact, how could we love others if we did not know that we are deeply loved? From this assumption, we can grasp the impact of this aspect of the spirituality, also in the ecumenical and interreligious spheres and with those who are motivated by universal and not specifically religious values. Very many people, united in following Christ, base their life on the living certainty that God loves them. In today’s world, they too can “repeat, with full conviction and in truth, the words of John the evangelist: “We have known and believe in the love that God has for us” [3]. Furthermore, it is not difficult to find consonance between this cornerstone of Chiara Lubich’s spirituality and other religious experiences, as in the case of Islam. Addressing those present in the Harlem Mosque in 1997, Chiara stated: “What immediately made us feel especially close to our Muslim brothers and sisters was the fact that we share with you a profound faith in the love of God. As the Qur’an puts it so well, ‘He is closer to us than our jugular vein’.”[4]
Furthermore, the Hindu understanding that recognizes God as love by nature and that in love is God’s supreme reality, manifests itself for example in the words of the philosopher Thayumanavar: “God is the first to love us, since it was he who gave us love and increases it in us when we seek him”[5].