The theme of “creating a home” of the prayer Young people called to keep watch has often resonated in recent weeks and young people have become involved since the provocations on social media. What does “feeling at home” mean to you? And again: have you always felt at home in the Church?
These and other questions accompanied the preparation for the May 4th meeting in the cathedral, allowing everyone to express themselves anonymously. And the younger ones were not long in coming: authenticity, love, fullness, freedom, truth, safe haven, protection… These are just some of the responses received on the Instagram profile of Ora decima, the diocesan vocational house.
Similar words resonated in particular during the group exchange but also in other moments of the prayer in the cathedral which featured young people from the diocese who are following different paths: engaged couples on their way to marriage, AGESCI scouts leaving, new Action animators/educators Cattolica, young people from the public Profession of Faith of Catholic Action, young people from the SICHEM vocational path, young people from the Traditio stage of the Neocatechumenal Way, young people from Missio, young Vicenza, many of the latter leaving for a missionary experience and for this reason they received from bishop Giuliano the missionary cross.
Young protagonists, therefore, but not only young people. Representatives of all age groups and states of life were present, allowing us to truly create a home: just as in a family we take care of the youngest and/or the most fragile, so the cathedral had the faces of a true community ready to take care of these brothers and sisters involved in particular journeys of faith.
The testimony of a young married couple, Petra and Alberto, also posed a physical question regarding the theme of “creating a home”. They immediately shared the conviction that the couple’s journey is a “horizontal” trust, that is mutual, but also “vertical”, that is, it also involves God in everything. These young parents then told how the arrival of their son Giorgio made them understand that the basis of this process of change is making space in a plurality of dimensions: physicsto find space in the house for those who are arriving, stormso as not to fail in the pastoral commitments they try to maintain, within himself, which is not to be taken for granted in order to truly welcome the child who is about to be born. “It is a process of decentralization,” they concluded.
In the homily, Bishop Giuliano used three verbs: to build, to live (the house) and to travel. “Man builds, and in a certain way, continues the work of God that he created,” said Mgr. Brugnotto. “It is also said that many works are “man’s creations”. Below us there are the remains of some houses from the Roman era: buildings built to live in. This large church was built above, enriched with many “works of art”, expressions of human creativity. But what purpose does building have? Why do we build a house? The answer is quite simple: for inhabit“, continued the Bishop.
“We generally separate building from living. In reality, every time we build something – material or intellectual – we already live there, because we feel that thing is ours, it belongs to us and in a certain sense we recognize ourselves. The inspired text of Genesis urges us to keep the two realities, building and living, together. In fact, building as living unfolds in building that cultivates, that grows, that evolves. Therefore it could be concluded that living is not automatic, you need to know how to live, learn to live, to live somewhere. We might ask ourselves: how am I doing building my life? Where suit? Can I say that I have a “home” in which I really find myself?” underlined Bishop Giuliano. Moving on to the more relational dimension, in the family, among friends and in the Church, the Bishop asked a question that resonated almost like an appeal to everyone: Is there still room for young people in the Church?
In recent days Mgr. Brugnotto had already declared that “young people are a minority in our Italian society, which is increasingly older” and during the homily he recalled some words that had emerged and also the choices that some of the young people present are about to make, as in the case of Nicolò Luisettoseminarian of the diocese of Vicenza, who was admitted among the candidates for sacred orders during the vigil on May 4th.
The Bishop warmly invited the young people to adopt an attitude of the disciples of Emmaus: to listen to their anxieties, talking about them, comparing themselves, without fear. “We need to sit at that table made up of relationships in which we are not afraid to also share our anxieties,” said the Bishop.
It is no coincidence that for the occasion the Cathedral was made even more of a home with a table in the presbytery prepared as if for an important dinner, just as happened at Emmaus, one of the biblical passages that accompanied the vigil.
Naike Monique Borgo
