Vitória de Carli: “The believer’s social commitment is incompatible with a passive and disconnected spirituality”

“The distancing from God through sin disfigures fraternal identity, transforming the other into an enemy, an object of fear, contempt and alienation,” he stated. Vitória Andreatta de Carli, the auditor of the Ecclesiastical Court of Porto Alegre in Brazil and one of the invited speakers at the Fraternity Theological Symposium to Heal the World that takes place in Quito from September 4 to 7.

Student of Christian spirituality and its secular nature In the light of the Second Vatican Council, he presented the intervention entitled “From brothers to enemies” a vision of Christian spirituality as a path of fraternity that is disfigured by human fragility and selfishness. In this situation, spirituality and the Eucharistic experience are presented as an opportunity to rebuild.

Thus, the Brazilian theologian assured that the starting point for delving into Eucharistic spirituality is the reality, that “disfigured fraternity”, that turns brothers into enemies and to which Jesus the Eucharist arrives to relieve, heal and sustain life while his presence is not only theoretical, but must occupy the center of life, thought, emotions and daily tasks.

“Christ wants to be the way, the truth and the life; wants to transform us; For this to happen we must allow ourselves to be transformed by him, this implies opening our hearts to May his will become tangible in our lives.”he stated.

Fraternity disfigured

Citing the Pope Paul VI and her phrase “we are mountaineers of the spirit” for the theologian, the layman is called to be ferment in the dough, salt in the earth; This means that he must bring the love of Christ to the world, transforming realities with his attitude, being a channel of that love and helping to transform the reality of enemies into the logic of brothers”, because as he comments “what the world needs now is for Christians to be authentically Christians who live an authentic spirituality”, applying the well-known phrase of Saint Catherine of Siena: “if they are what they should be, they will set fire to the world.”

In this line Vitória de Carli He insisted that “there is no Christian spirituality without daily life. Spirituality is a way of living, it is the spirit of God in Christ that passes through our entire life. First because of who we are, because of the family to which we belong, the work we do daily and the social environment, because spiritual life must materialize, it is an experience that must become concrete in our lives.

Valuable intentions that return the believer to the basics, But faced with the imminent risk of a Eucharistic spirituality that remains in a set of ritualistic forms or an interior and personal experience that has little or nothing to do with the experience of reality that many suffer, the Brazilian theologian refers to the need to live an “experience of incarnated spirituality, an ecclesial and social spirituality, because “spirituality is going to God, this means going to others, go to the brothers to that life that becomes concrete because there is no other way to God other than passing through the brother.”

Rethink the spiritual path

For the academic This theological symposium has been experienced as heaven on earthbecause “being with so many people from so many different places, all willing to follow God and rethink their spiritual path, becomes a moment of encounter with Him, with the Jesus who is present in each of them; the same one that accompanies us to transform us into people with a Eucharistic heart, living a spiritual experience in the middle of the world. The proposal is that we be the arms of our Lord who wants to count on us in the middle of the world.”

A secular woman, married and mother of two children who, based on his theology studies, warns that “the social commitment of brotherly love of a believer is incompatible with a passive Christian spirituality disconnected from the historical destiny of the human being.” In this way he affirms that the Eucharist is the “maximum expression of divine mercy that materializes and nourishes brotherhood and heals the wounds of the human heart.”

In a time characterized by crisis of fundamental models for society that are in question and the suffering of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean due to the effects of misery, poverty and inequality, becomes more forceful the call to work for fraternity.

Heal relationships

To this end, the theologian considers of vital importance any effort that serves the processes that allow heal relationships between people. However, the first step is to heal the wounds of the human heart that hinder peace and reconciliation because it is in the depths of the heart that the inclinations of the people of God emerge. For this reason it is timely to reflect on the reality of spirituality and assume it as a way of life.

“We are children of the same father and builders of fraternity which also extends to creation, much more so when the pandemic revealed the interdependence of human beings.

Quoting Pope Francis de Carli, he recalled that “No one can live alone for themselves, we are interconnected for good and bad” and the Church is striving at this moment to make a synodal discernment, then the horizon is in a search for all to achieve this journey together, to assume the mission of living in communion and participation with the certainty that In the banquet of the Eucharist we find ourselves before the maximum expression of synodalitythe place to heal the disfigured fraternity.

Intervention that Vitória de Carli concluded by remembering that Fraternity is emptying oneself to go to meet the other, It is loving others well and making them happy, trusting that they can meet God, living human relationships based on the love of God, without losing sight of the fact that each person has to work on their own wounds to achieve the development of their true nature.healthy relationships that can be an expression of that true brotherhood that we long for.

Photos: Communications Office of the International Theological Symposium

You may be interested in: Fr. Pedro Blanco: “The Eucharist should lead us to action, to be instruments of peace and love”

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