Riccardi

Interview with Chiara You've had several audiences with Pope Paul VI. What has been your strongest impression of these audi¬ences? The strongest impression that I had was certainly during the first audience. I felt I was in front of a person who loved in a very special way. The wisdom in the Pope's words was such that it overcame all the juridical obstacles still present; he understood; he received in his soul the whole content of the Movement that I was presenting to him. The Pope himself encouraged me to say everything, because there everything was possible. .I remember feeling a perfect harmony between what the Pope was say¬ing and what it seemed to me had come from God for the life of this Movement. My impression was so strong that I remember feeling almost as if the room where the Pope holds his audi¬ences was wide open and that heaven and earth touched right there. If they had led me in front of his person blindfolded and I had not

Commentary of the Word of Life: Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father. But whoever denies me before others I will deny before my heavenly Father (Mt 10,32-33). This word of life is a source of great joy and encouragement to all Christians.With this passage, Jesus calls us to be consistent in living out our faith in him, because our eternal destiny depends on the attitude we have assumed toward him during our lifetime. If we declare ourselves for him before others, he says, he will have reason to declare himself for us before his Father. If instead we have disowned him before others, he will disown us before his Father. Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father. But whoever denies me before others I will deny before my heavenly Father. Jesus reminds us of the reward or the punishment that awaits us after this life because he loves us. He knows, as one Father of the Church put

Today a lot is said about the role of the laity. And perhaps we would see more clearly who the lay person is and how the lay person is also 'Church', if a better and fuller explanation were given of certain aspects of the life of Mary. It seems to us that she is the model of the lay person, even though she is exceptional and unique.We Catholics do not make a God of Mary, as we are often accused of doing, but, since love and faith have led us to the discovery of all that makes her special, we often place her to one side, far away from us. We place her in a sphere which is hers, but it is not the only sphere in which she belongs. In her we praise the Mother of God, the Immaculate, the Assumed, the Queen, but not the perfect Christian, the fiancée, the bride, the mother, the widow, the virgin, the model of every Christian. She, like us lay people, cannot offer