Generosity, Trust and Courage. Religious Life in time of Pandemic

I was walking back home from Saint Rachel, a pastoral center for migrant and asylum seeker children which I direct for about two years. My mind was crowded with negative thoughts and emotions… I was in fact recalling with sadness and a good lot of disappointment the latest negative reply from a person whose help I had asked for. I recollected my memories of this year of pandemic, in which we have faced several waves of bigger and bigger difficulties: two months of lockdown closed in the center with our kids, a whole summer of activities with no support of foreign volunteers, a second lockdown in Autumn, a Christmas with little joy and no parties, and then another lockdown in January… all this with our poor resources, getting several times close to burnout.

As I was reflecting on these things the words of the Lord came to my mind: “Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses it will save it.” We priests, religious men and women have made an important decision: we put our life in God’s hands, at His disposal and at the service of others. In moments of need, emergency or necessity we should be the first ones going out, looking for those who may need our help, because our life is not an absolute good, more important than the poor, to be protected by any mean.

When I reached home I found an envelope from Italy under my door. My old-time friend Anna sent me a Christmas present (3 months ago!) that just today arrived, right today! When I opened it, I could not believe my eyes: a calendar with pictures and thoughts of a common friend, Imma, who died of cancer in 2018. Imma had a passionate love for the Holy land, and with me she shared her love for Lourdes and for mission.

In the calendar, with pictures of her in Africa, her parents inserted some sentences from her writings, and the first thing I read was this: “A missionary who does not love, who does not give his life out, is worthless, useless, he is nothing”. These words pierced my heart, because they expressed with fervor the same feelings that accompanied me on my way home, but that in me had more a bitter and disappointed taste. What struck me even more was the letter written by Anna, who said: “If you are down, tired, lonely, remember that evening in Imma’s garden… May her thoughts, her writings and the prayers she left to us enlighten your moments of darkness and discomfort.

God’s timing is incredible indeed, and the mystery of the communion of the Saints will never be fully grasped. What from now on I will know for sure is that we are never really alone, and that despite the disappointment that as humans we can receive from and give to others, we enjoy, and always will, Heaven by our side.