On the feast day of St Claire of Assisi, we publish a spiritual thought by Chiara Lubich which encourages every Christian to put God in the first place of the their life.
When we were young, we were always greatly struck by a phrase that Saint Claire told St Francis when the latter inspired her to follow his way. He asked her: “My child, what do you want?” One could expect all kinds of answers, like: “I want to follow you in the way of poverty, I want to choose religious life, I want to enter a convent,” and so on. Instead, in response to the question, “My child, what do you want?”, she answered unhesitatingly: “God”.
It’s the same choice that we made at the beginning of the Movement, we made only one choice: God! Beyond the bombings and the destruction of war surrounding us, God emerged. We believed in God and we chose Him as the ideal of our life. This choice of God is constantly renewed because it makes us put aside all those riches that we can accumulate in our life without even realizing it. Perhaps we are rich of our spirituality, rich with material things, rich in intelligence and the pursuit of our studies; we could be rich of our family bonds, our priesthood, our aims in life.
Our ideal, who is Jesus Forsaken, who made Himself nothing, makes us put all of these things aside so as to have God first (…). This is what Saint Claire reminds us of today. She did it by choosing the way of poverty; we can do it by choosing the way of unity, by trying to keep the presence of Jesus in our midst, the Risen One, and by embracing suffering through our love for Jesus Forsaken.
Chiara Lubich
Mollens (Switzerland), 11 August 1987
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