February 25, 1976
Città Nuova
OPEN DIALOGUE
by Chiara Lubich
You have chosen God as the Ideal of your life, and hundreds of thousands of people the world over have discovered and chosen Him with you, in contrast to the current deep spiritual crisis. What makes this ideal of God so fascinating?
Il The fact is that not I, not we, haven chosen God, but God has chosen us. And He made Himself known with His beauty, His attraction, His personal love and His truth. He revealed Himself above all through the Gospel which we discovered to be true.
In the thirty-two years that we have been living this life, He never let us down: His promises have always come through.He said: “Give and it shall be given to you,” and it has always been so.
He said: “”Ask and you will receive,” ask united in my name and you will receive, and it has always been so.
He promised the conversion of those around us if we are united in His name: “May they be one so that the world will believe,” and it has occurred in Italy, in Europe, in the whole world, millions of times.
The beatitudes, which are a revolution from the world’s way of thinking, especially today’s world, proved to be true: the poor experience the Kingdom of God which they possess….
He told us that He is the way, the truth and the life and we experienced it. In following Him, people feel that they are pursuing the goal. In following Him, every why finds an answer, even suffering and death. In living Him, we feel the life of God beating within us, that spiritual life so real and concrete that has its origins, its growth, its different stages, its experiences, all foretold in the Gospel.
How can we not fall in love with Him who has filled our lives, who has made it dynamic, divine and fruitful? He who nourished us with a food that makes us live on beyond death, to one day find life in eternity?
If we have experienced that all of what He said is true, then it’s easy to leave every other Teacher for Him.
We are living in an era where many live experiences. The Gospel is within everyone’s reach so that we can experience it.
It is through it that your faith in the Church is also strengthened: “He who hears you hears me.” And you see that it is true. This is what makes you recognize a particular charism in the Bishops, especially in the Pope.
This is what speaks of the fire that Jesus enkindled in your heart which needs to love, a fire that is becoming a blaze.
How can we not love such a man? If people today say that He is not God, since the world with all its progress has regressed to this point, let them live a Gospel-based experience, but as children, without any preconceptions, and they will discover that this man can only be God.
This is what fascinates in this life: divinity.
It exits, it silently penetrates hearts, and while the world covers itself with an atheistic mask, it accomplishes the revolution which one day, together with all the other forces in the Church, will be more than ever visible. Yes, because also this phrase is true: “Have faith, I have conquered the world.”
