Tenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
The Lord listens the desires of the heart
Since, then, we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, “I believed, therefore I spoke,” we too believe and therefore speak, knowing that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and place us with you in his presence…. Therefore, we are not discouraged; rather, although our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to what is seen but to what is unseen; for what is seen is transitory, but what is unseen is eternal. For we know that if our earthly dwelling, a tent, should be destroyed, we have a building from God, a dwelling not made with hands, eternal in heaven. 2Cor 4,13-5,1
A Sunday afternoon of the April 1972, being recently married and yet with no sons, we were going around driving our car in the Legnano streets, talking about various not important things, as we like to do when our commitments leave us some available time to stay together. By a certain time I raised this question: “Anna Maria, what do we want to do in our couple life?” “ I would like to spend my life for the others, together with you. In particular, I would like to be the mother for sons without a family. And you, Pierluigi, what would you like to do?” “I would like to be called by the Lord to talk to the men.” That evening we thought to be alone, but it was not in this way. The Lord had listened to us and he allowed to us what we freely asked in that moment. One after the other, nine sons were born, meanwhile we adopted other five in Calabria, in Peru and in Brazil. In the meantime, in addition to the family and professional commitments, the Lord has sent us, often together, in Italy, in Europe, in Africa, in Asia and in the Latin America and, wherever we went, we have been his witnesses.
Few days ago, after about forty years from that talk in the Legnano streets, we were sitting in the dining room, being alone because the sons, because of professional reasons or because being married are out of the house the all of them, we had the same conversation: “You, Pierluigi, what would like to do in the years which we have still ahead?” “ I would like to continue to talk about the Lord wherever he sends me. And you, Anna Maria, what would like to do?” “I would like to continue to talk about the culture and the art, in Italy and abroad, as I am presently doing. I feel that it is my call, because it allows me to always talk about the human manifestation of the Beauty of God.” Also this time we think to have been listened and the Lord will send us where he wants, better if together.
Entering in the today passage of the letter of Paolo to the Corinthians, we too can honestly state: “I have believed, hence I have talked”. It has been an enrapturing life and now we can live in a serene joy, because we are “convinced that the one who resurrected Jesus the Lord, will resurrect also us…. Due to this, we are not discouraged, but, if our external human nature is going to be disrupted, the interior nature is going to be renewed by each day, … We know in fact that, when our earthly dwelling will be destroyed, which is as a tent, we will receive another dwelling ….eternal in the sky.” As far as the future is concerned, I think that we can use as ours the words of Paolo in the Letter to the Philippians: “It is not that I have already taken hold of it or have already attained perfect maturity, but I continue my pursuit in hope that I may possess it, since I have indeed been taken possession of by Christ (Jesus).“ (Phil 3,12).