St. Columba Catholic Church

CNA Staff, Apr 29, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).

A New England prelate is urging Catholics to both minister to transgender-identifying individuals in the Catholic Church while still continuously affirming “the goodness of human creation” as male and female.

Coadjutor Archbishop Christopher Coyne of Hartford, Connecticut, told CNA last week that he would make it a point not to challenge a transgender-identifying man or woman when they present as the opposite sex.

Coyne appeared on Connecticut Public Radio earlier this month arguing against the basic claim of gender ideology, which argues that men and women who “identify” as the opposite sex should be treated as such.

“Biology is biology. You’re either XX or XY. That’s a scientific fact. You can’t un-prove that fact,” the bishop told public radio. 

But, he argued, the LGBT debate has “pulled me more into a place of understanding and care,” including regarding transgender-identifying individuals. 

The prelate told CNA he would accept the identity of those men and women as they present themselves to him.

“It doesn’t cost me anything to accept them as they’re presenting themselves, as a brother or a sister, or whatever gender they’re asking me to refer to them as,” the archbishop said. “If they’d like to be referred to by this name or this pronoun, it doesn’t cost me anything to say, ‘Okay,’ and then begin a communication with this person.”

“If I start off just by beginning to define what the conversation will be, I could cut off an opportunity to bring that person more deeply into the Church,” the prelate said. 

“That doesn’t mean I accept what they’re bringing forward,” he pointed out. “It just means I accept what they’re presenting to me as brother or sister.”

Coyne was appointed to the Hartford Archdiocese last year and will succeed as archbishop once current Archbishop Leonard Blair retires. He has in the past offered candid opinions on Church matters, such as arguing that the Holy See should be moved out of Rome and expressing hope that the Church might in the future “ordain or name some deaconesses.”

He stressed to CNA this week that, when ministering to transgender-identified individuals, “the line obviously has to be clearly drawn” on matters such as ordination.

“The line has to be drawn clearly by way of biology,” he said. 

“We’re not intending to hurt this person or shut them off from the community,” he pointed out. “It would have to be clearly defined in terms of what we do. There are certain things that just can’t happen. Now, if that hurts the person and they decide they have to walk away, that’s unfortunate. But we haven’t changed any teachings on this matter.”

“Conversation is very important,” he said further. “When you’re dealing with these issues, especially [with] children — but at this point I’m talking about adults — we need conversation and clear understanding on what Church teaching in this matter is.”

Coyne stressed that, when dealing with children who suffer from gender dysphoria, “we have to be very careful.”

“When the child presents themselves with this issue, we have to first say, ‘We love you, we understand you’re going through these things, we have to be patient and walk with you.’” 

“We have to involve the parent, or parents,” he said. “We walk with the child, we love the child, and we work with the family.”

The Catholic Church in recent years has moved to address gender ideology. The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith this month released the declaration Dignitas Infinita, which stressed “the promotion of the dignity of every human person.”

The document states that “all attempts to obscure reference to the ineliminable sexual difference between man and woman are to be rejected” and that “only by acknowledging and accepting this difference in reciprocity can each person fully discover themselves, their dignity, and their identity.”

Asked how the Church might minister to transgender-identifying individuals while still affirming the truth about human bodies, Coyne said: “I think we continually talk about how we were made in the image of God, that God created us male and female biologically, and that that’s a good thing, and that’s something we should accept.” 

“How we live it out in terms of gender expression is another question,” he argued. 

But “we can continually affirm the goodness of human creation, and our bodies as male and female, and that it’s not something that needs to be in conflict with our gender, or seen as a mistake.” 

“It’s a given. It’s a beautiful thing,” he added. “It’s God’s graces already operating in that person by virtue of creation. Start with the theology.” 

CNA Staff, Apr 29, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

A national organization that organizes sidewalk counseling — the practice of giving women information outside abortion clinics about their other options — is celebrating more than 22,000 lives saved this month on its 10th anniversary. Sidewalk Advocates for Life (SAFL) president Lauren Muzyka said that even in a post-Roe America, their work is very much needed.

The latest numbers from Planned Parenthood reported more than 374,000 abortions, its highest-ever number, the year after Roe v. Wade was overturned. Abortion pill access is on the rise, with the pro-choice Guttmacher Institute reporting that this accounts for more than 60% of abortions in 2023. Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court is currently hearing arguments about the safety of the abortion drug mifepristone. 

But Muzyka is able to offer a perspective from “out on the sidewalk,” where Sidewalk Advocates encounter women seeking abortions every day.

“In some of our states where abortion is limited, like a six-week ban or a heartbeat ban, it’s really interesting because we’re actually still seeing a great amount of traffic,” she said. “I wish the country could see what we’re seeing in some of these more pro-life states.”

“Even in our pro-life states, we still know that there are women in crisis in our communities that, at the very least, are considering driving 300 or 600 miles away to the next nearest abortion facility,” she told CNA in a phone call. “A lot of people don’t realize, even in the pro-life states, that we still have Planned Parenthood Family Planning Centers on the ground that serve as abortion referral facilities.”

Muzyka gave the example of the state of Georgia. “It’s surrounded by pro-life states,” she explained. “A lot of women are going to Columbus, Georgia, or Atlanta to see if they made the six-week cutoff. If they didn’t, then they’re getting referred to the Carolinas or to Virginia or the Panhandle of Florida.”  

“Sometimes you have very distraught, angry women [who are] overwhelmed because they drove all through the night to see if they made this cutoff,” Muzyka further explained. “Some of them will turn around because they’re met by a sidewalk advocate there, but this is why our states really need to protect life at conception, because sometimes the six-week ban isn’t doing as much as I think the people of that state would desire to protect life and to protect women from this trauma.”

The sidewalk advocates do what Muzyka calls “crisis management.” They stand in strategic places outside an abortion clinic with pamphlets, information, and sometimes small gifts, and talk to women going in for an abortion.

“There’s always a reason or set of reasons that brings a woman to an abortion facility,” Muzyka said. “The idea is, if we can fill that crisis, then what we see is that that mom … often turns back to herself and reconsiders the life of her child. We let her know how we can help her, and then we give her a vision forward for how it’s possible for her to have her child and to have the life that she wants as well.”’

“A lot of women are there because they ironically feel like they have no choice,” she added.

Issues women struggle with vary from a challenging pregnancy diagnosis or severe morning sickness to fear that their parents will kick them out if they don’t have an abortion. 

“All we can do is invite, and it’s up to that other person to respond,” Muzyka said. “We do get a mix of rejection and then people who take us up on that offer of help.”

SAFL is celebrating more than 22,000 lives recorded to be saved from abortion through their sidewalk counseling service. In addition, more than 5,000 “hopeful saves” — women who leave the abortion facility to “think about it.” SAFL also reported 89 abortion workers leaving and 55 abortion facilities closing as a result of their work.

But their success isn’t their own, Muzyka said. 

“It’s the grace of God. It’s his hope, it’s his love, it’s his peace that’s really winning someone over,” she said. “… It’s even right there in our mission statement that we are the hands and feet of Jesus. And that’s really the heart of sidewalk advocacy, is Our Lord sent people out in twos to go spread the Gospel. And this is really the epitome of the gospel of life, is meeting someone there in their moment of crisis and speaking hope and peace into their circumstances.” 

The ministry sees “miracles out on the sidewalk” because it is a “beautiful little mix of practical and spiritual,” Muzyka said. 

SAFL’s top core value is being Christ-centered. Though the organization doesn’t subscribe to a particular denomination, the movement is “Catholic-heavy” but “comfortable” for anyone of another denomination, Muzyka said, and their formation materials incorporate Scripture. 

“And it’s beautiful, because we’re actually seeing this new springtime of collaboration throughout the body of Christ,” Muzyka said. 

“When you go to a Sidewalk Advocates for Life training, there is Scripture from beginning to end, reinforcing basically every major concept that we’re teaching,” she said. “Even the understanding that in every case, there’s a life-affirming solution — really anchoring ourselves and anchoring her into the hope that we have in Christ and giving her his joy and his peace and his love.”

“We really believe, of course, too, that we’re not the ones actually saving these babies,” she added.

The ministry doesn’t just help mothers and babies in crisis, but it offers community to pro-lifers across the country, Muzyka pointed out.

“It’s almost like Sidewalk Advocates for Life is here to say to the pro-life person serving on the front lines, ‘You are not alone, and we’re going to journey with you until you are called elsewhere or until your abortion facility shuts down,’” she said. 

We all use ideologies in one way or another to make sense of our world, and we need to find ways to discuss that world with people who possess different ideological reference points, writes Michael Sean Winters.

 NCR asked three Catholic theologians how they view the Vatican's new doctrinal document, which condemns gender-affirming surgery for transgender people. 

Paris Agreement pledges alone won't reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The Vatican can respond with an initiative based on the work of the Laudato Si' Action Platform and the competencies of Catholic universities. 

Rome, Italy, Apr 29, 2024 / 04:00 am (CNA).

While most people associate St. Catherine with the Italian hill town of Siena, the Dominican doctor of Church is one of the patron saints of Rome and spent her last years in the Eternal City, where one can visit her tomb and the room where she died.

Located around the corner from the Pantheon, the tomb of St. Catherine of Siena sits within the high altar of the Basilica of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva under the striking blue and gold vaulted ceiling of Rome’s only church with a Gothic interior.

Visitors can reach out and touch the marble tomb as they pray on kneelers behind the altar, and many leave small pieces of paper scribbled with prayer intentions atop her sarcophagus. 

Even lesser known than her tomb is the exact location where St. Catherine died. It can be found by walking two minutes from the basilica along the Via di Santa Chiara. The building where St. Catherine lived in Rome with some of her followers has been replaced with a theater, the Opera Lirica di Roma.

Hidden inside the theater building is a little gilded chapel dedicated to St. Catherine that marks the spot where she died in Rome. People who want to visit can simply stop by and tell the theater staff that they wish to pray in the chapel. 

Sister Catherine Joseph Droste, a Dominican Sister of St. Cecilia in Nashville, Tennessee, is a theology professor at the Angelicum in Rome. In an interview at St. Catherine’s tomb, Droste told CNA about St. Catherine’s importance to the city of Rome.

“Catherine is co-patroness of Rome with Peter and Paul because of her role in helping the papacy to return to Rome,” Droste said.

When Catherine was born in 1347, the pope was living in Avignon, France. Catherine was adamant that the pope needed to return to Rome, so much so that she went to Avignon and spoke with Pope Gregory XI encouraging him to fulfill a secret promise he had made that if he became pope, he would return the papacy to Rome.

Gregory eventually heeded her request and returned to Rome in 1370, but during the reign of his successor, Pope Urban VI, French cardinals unhappy with Urban’s reform efforts elected an antipope in Avignon.

“Urban asks Catherine to come to Rome, so she came to Rome at the end of 1378 to help Urban with the reform,” Droste explained.

“And Catherine, in the last months of her life, even though she was very sickly, would walk daily from here [her residence in Rome] to the Vatican. … She would go there daily and pray for the pope,” she said.

“You can see today right as you walk into the Vatican before you go into the main church in the narthex — if you turn around, above the entrance there is a mosaic of Christ and the boat with the apostles in it — that was from the original basilica. It was in a different spot, but it is reported that that is where Catherine prayed daily for [the successor of] Peter.”

After Catherine died in the spring of 1380, the walls of the room where she died were moved to a small chapel inside the Basilica of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva. (This chapel can also be visited by passing through the basilica’s sacristy, which is a historic location in itself for hosting two papal conclaves in the 15th century.)

Pope Pius IX named St. Catherine a co-patroness of Rome in April 1866. Pope Pius XII named Catherine a co-patron saint of Italy in 1939, along with St. Francis of Assisi.

“Catherine has influenced me a great deal in my love of the Church, in my love of the papacy,” reflected Droste, who received the name Catherine when she made her vows as a religious sister.

“One of the most important messages of Catherine she learned from Christ,” she added. 

“Christ asked her one day, ‘Do you know who you are and who I am?’ And he said to her, ‘You are she who is not. I am he who is.’ Now that is a challenging phrase because many people would think that means ‘I am nothing.’ Well, I am nothing before God because he created me and gave me everything. But in his eyes, I am everything because I am a human being that he loves.”

“And so, Catherine would say, Christ is crazy in love with you. He’s madly in love with you. He’s drunk in love with you. So Catherine’s first message is understanding what it means to be a human being, to be loved by God. And that’s important for every one of us.” 

Rome Newsroom, Apr 28, 2024 / 09:35 am (CNA).

Pope Francis had a full slate of events Sunday during his day trip to Venice, a trip that tied together a message of unity and fraternity with the artistic patrimony of a city that has been a privileged place of encounter across the centuries. 

“Faith in Jesus, the bond with him, does not imprison our freedom. On the contrary, it opens us to receive the sap of God’s love, which multiplies our joy, takes care of us like a skilled vintner, and brings forth shoots even when the soil of our life becomes arid,” the pope said to over 10,000 pilgrims gathered in St. Mark’s Square. 

Framing his homily during the Mass on the theme of unity, one of the central points articulated throughout several audiences spread across the morning, Pope Francis reminded Christians: “Remaining united to Christ, we can bring the fruits of the Gospel into the reality we inhabit.”  

“Fruits of justice and peace, fruits of solidarity and mutual care, carefully-made choices to preserve our environmental and human heritage,” the pope continued, seated center stage in a red velvet chair and vested in a white cope.

Pope Francis arrived in Venice early Sunday morning for a day trip to the prestigious Biennale art exhibition — which is celebrating its 60th anniversary — where the Holy See’s pavilion, titled “With My Eyes,” dovetails with this year’s broader theme: “Foreigners Everywhere.”

The pope’s visit also holds a deep meaning as Francis is the first pontiff to visit the Biennale — where the Vatican has held a pavilion since 2013. 

In his homily, Pope Francis pointed out that our relationship with Christ is not “static” but an invitation to “grow in relationship with him, to converse with him, to embrace his word, to follow him on the path of the kingdom of God.” 

Francis built upon this point to encourage “Christian communities, neighborhoods, and cities to become welcoming, inclusive, and hospitable places,” a point he linked to the image of the city of Venice as a “a place of encounter and cultural exchange.” 

Pope Francis observed that Venice “is called to be a sign of beauty available to all, starting with the last, a sign of fraternity and care for our common home,” the pope continued, highlighting the tenuous situation of Venice, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, which faces a myriad of problems ranging from excessive tourism to environmental challenges such as rising sea levels and erosion.

After the recitation of the Regina Caeli, the pope entered St. Mark’s Basilica to venerate the relics of the evangelist before leaving by helicopter to return to the Vatican as pilgrims and tourists bid farewell from land and sea.

Earlier in the morning the Holy Father met with female inmates, staff, and volunteers at Venice’s Women’s Prison on the Island of Giudecca, where he spoke on the topic of human dignity, suggesting that prison can “mark the beginning of something new, through the rediscovery of the unsuspected beauty in us and in others.“

The deeply symbolic visit was followed by a brief encounter with the artists responsible for the Holy See’s pavilion at the Biennale, where the pope encouraged artists to use their craft “to rid the world of the senseless and by now empty oppositions that seek to gain ground in racism, in xenophobia, in inequality, in ecological imbalance and aporophobia, that terrible neologism that means ‘fear of the poor.’”

The Holy Father traveled by a private vaporetto, or waterbus, bearing the two-tone flag of Vatican City, to the 16th-century baroque Basilica of Santa Maria della Salute, which sits on the Punta della Dogana, where he met with a large group of young people. 

Reflecting on the visit as a “beautiful moment of encounter,” the pope encouraged the youth to “rise from sadness to lift our gaze upward.” 

“Rise to stand in front of life, not to sit on the couch. Arise to say, ‘Here I am!’ to the Lord, who believes in us.” Building on this message of hope, which the pope emphasized is built upon perseverance, telling them “don’t isolate yourself” but “seek others, experience God together, find a group to walk with so you don’t grow tired.” 

The pope made his way to St. Mark’s Square in a white open-top golf cart bearing the papal seal, where he closed his visit with Mass. At the end of the Mass Archbishop Francesco Moraglia, the patriarch of Venice, thanked the pope for his visit. 

“Venice is a stupendous, fragile, unique city and has always been a bridge between East and West, a crossroads of peoples, cultures, and different faiths,” Moraglia noted. 

“For this reason, in Venice, the great themes of your encyclicals — Fratelli Tutti and Laudato Si’ — are promptly reflected in respect and care for creation and the person, starting with the good summit of life that must always be respected and loved, especially when it is fragile and asks to be welcomed.”

Rome Newsroom, Apr 28, 2024 / 08:00 am (CNA).

Pope Francis opened his one-day visit to Venice on Sunday morning with a meeting with female inmates where he reaffirmed the importance of fraternity and human dignity, noting that prison can be a place of new beginnings. 

“A stay in prison can mark the beginning of something new, through the rediscovery of the unsuspected beauty in us and in others, as symbolized by the artistic event you are hosting and the project to which you actively contribute,” the pope said to the female inmates gathered in the intimate courtyard of the Women’s Prison on the Island of Giudecca. 

Pope Francis left the Vatican by helicopter at approximately 6:30 in the morning, arriving in the Floating City by 8 a.m. The pope’s visit, albeit short, holds a deep meaning as Francis is the first pontiff to visit the prestigious Venice Biennale art exhibition, which is marking its 60th iteration. As part of the exhibition the Holy See has erected a pavilion at the women’s prison titled “With My Eyes.” The pope also spoke with artists while he visited the pavilion.

Taking a center seat in the intimate courtyard of the 16th-century former convent, the pope opened his address by saying that he wanted it to be thought not as an “official visit” but an “encounter” centered on “prayer, closeness, and fraternal affection.” 

“No one should take away people’s dignity,” Pope Francis said to the inmates, volunteers, and staff, joined by the patriarch of Venice, Archbishop Francesco Moraglia. 

Drawing attention to the “harsh reality” of prison, the pope highlighted some of the problems inmates are confronted with, “such as overcrowding, the lack of facilities and resources, and episodes of violence, [which] give rise to a great deal of suffering there.” 

But Francis, anchoring his message on hope and mercy, implored the women to “always look at the horizon, always look to the future, with hope.” 

The pope continued by noting that prison can also be a place of “moral and material rebirth where the dignity of women and men is not ‘placed in isolation’ but promoted through mutual respect and the nurturing of talents and abilities, perhaps dormant or imprisoned by the vicissitudes of life, but which can reemerge for the good of all and which deserve attention and trust.” 

Pope Francis stressed that it is “fundamental” that prisons offer inmates “the tools and room for human, spiritual, cultural and professional growth, creating the conditions for their healthy reintegration. Not to ‘isolate dignity’ but to give new possibilities.” 

“Let us not forget that we all have mistakes to be forgiven and wounds to heal and that we can all become the healed who bring healing, the forgiven who bring forgiveness, the reborn who bring rebirth,” the pope added. 

At the end of the encounter there was a lighthearted exchange when the pope, after asking the inmates — who responded, in unison, “Of course!” — to pray for him, quipped: “But in my favor, not against.”

At the end of the address, the pope presented an icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary as a gift to the inmates, saying: “Mary has tenderness with all of us, with all of us, she is the mother of tenderness.” In return the female inmates presented the pope with a basket of all-natural toiletries they make through a worker-training program. 

Following the encounter with the inmates, the pope made his way to the prison’s chapel, where he spoke to the artists, imploring them to use their craft to envision a world based on fraternity where “no human being is considered a stranger.” 

“Art has the status of a ‘city of refuge,’” the pope said to the artists, “a city that disobeys the regime of violence and discrimination in order to create forms of human belonging capable of recognizing, including protecting and embracing everyone.” 

ACI Africa, Apr 28, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).

Catholic bishops of the Ecclesiastical Province of Bukavu in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have denounced the insecurity and violence in their dioceses.

In their collective statement issued Sunday, April 14, the members of the Provincial Episcopal Assembly of Bukavu (ASSEPB) said: “Insecurity has become endemic, with its trail of killings even in the middle of the day, massacres and kidnappings of peaceful citizens in our towns and villages.”

ASSEPB members decried “the opening up of most of our territorial entities; the [rebel group] M23s surrounding of the town of Goma supported by Rwanda; and the strategy of paralyzing the economy by isolating and suffocating large and small towns.”

“Despite the holding of elections, the Congolese state remains weak and ineffective,” they further lamented. 

The Catholic Church leaders faulted the President Felix Tshisekedi-led government for leaving citizens to their own devices, saying: “The Congolese state is dead, and we, the governed, are abandoned to our sad fate; and we see no indication that today’s rulers are thinking about the well-being of the governed in the near future.”

“One wonders whether this behavior is not contributing to the plan for the [fragmentation] and dismemberment of the DRC, even though the people are already opposed to it,” they added.

The Congolese Catholic Church leaders attributed the challenges ordinary people in DRC face to “tribalism, electoral fraud, and the manipulation of almost all social strata” and added that the highlighted social ills “are increasing the suffering of the people.”

They challenged politicians to come to terms with the correct meaning of politics, prioritizing the people of God.

“Politics is the highest form of charity, because its purpose is not to serve oneself but to serve others and society — the people first,” they said.

The bishops cautioned their compatriots against despair, saying that the Congolese people should “refuse to die and remain hopeful, praying unceasingly for their conversion and that of their executioners both inside and outside the country, confident that help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”

They prayed that the “image of the Congolese, distorted by evil, be restored.”

In their statement, the bishops acknowledged with appreciation “the dynamism of the people of God” and the heroism of priests and women and men religious amid “endemic” insecurity.

“Almost everywhere, parishes are being created, church buildings are coming up, presbyteries are being improved, and many other services [are happening],” the bishops said, adding that the planned beatification of four martyrs — including three members of Xaverian missionaries and a priest — is scheduled to take place Aug. 18 in the Diocese of Uvira and is “a cause for joy.”

This story was first published by ACI Africa, CNA’s news partner in Africa, and has been adapted by CNA.

Rome, Italy, Apr 28, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

Across Italy there are houses of prayer run by the Ricostruttori (Reconstructors) community, a Catholic movement dedicated to people who are far from the Church but attracted to spirituality, particularly Eastern meditation and Buddhist practices. 

The Reconstructors was founded in 1978 by Jesuit Father Gian Vittorio Cappelletto.

“During the postconciliar period, the Church was faced with the need for new forms of evangelization and apostolate, to reach out to people who were drifting away,” Don Roberto Rondanina, priest and superior of the Ricostruttori, explained to CNA. “It was a time when Eastern meditation, Hinduism, Buddhism, the New Age ... were beginning to spread in Europe.” 

“Father Cappelletto, who lived in Turin, sought to understand the meaning of this ‘flight to the East’ and felt the need to find new forms of spirituality that were more experiential, closer to mysticism, open to mystery, allowing to touch one’s own interiority,” Rondanina said. 

To achieve this, Cappelletto drew some inspiration from Indian masters, recovering from their teachings forms of profound prayer with a Christian matrix, such as the famous “Jesus prayer” (“Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner”).

“His encounter with the East was an opportunity to rediscover this vein, which had previously been confined to monasticism, particularly in the Orthodox Church, but which was not widely practiced here at the time,” Rondanina said.

The East that leads to Christ

Cappelletto then designed a meditation course for the public with some characteristics similar to Eastern forms of meditation.

“It wasn’t a lectio divina type of meditation; there was posture, breathing, silence, and it had a big impact in the ’80s and ’90s because it was something new,” the superior said. 

According to Rondanina, who is the first successor to the founder, who died in 2009, Cappelletto’s “strong intuition” was to adopt technical disciplines from the East containing certain aspects of physical and psycho-physical attention and orient them “towards Christ and the Church.”

“Furthermore,” he told CNA, “Father Cappelletto has deepened an anthropological vision that is lacking in the East: the human person seen as a unique person who must be valued. Eastern schools tend to move towards an experience of the impersonal divine, where the divine in myself and in others is more essential than anything that defines the person. In the Western Christian matrix, on the other hand, each person makes his or her own choices, builds his or her own life and retains his or her uniqueness, expressed also in the dogma of the Resurrection.”

The Reconstructors today

The movement launched by Cappelletto spread by word of mouth throughout Italy, from Piedmont to Sicily. Today, it is recognized as a public association of the faithful, encompassing people from various backgrounds and vocations. 

The community is made up of about 30 priests, a few laymen, and about 40 laywomen. In all, there are just under 70 consecrated people. The priests are incardinated in their dioceses, while the laypeople work outside — as bank officials, doctors, religious teachers, or employees of charitable organizations.

More than 200 associates have also joined the movement. They are not consecrated but participate in the charism of the community in some way. “But it is much bigger than that,” Rondanina said. “Many people frequent our houses; it’s difficult to quantify.”

The landscape has changed a lot since the early days. 

“Before, there were hardly any non-baptized people. People knew the Church. Today, we find people who are far away but who haven’t moved away, simply because they’ve never been close.”

As in the past, the Reconstructors centers offer a methodical evangelization program, beginning with meditation, raising awareness of the sacred dimension, and then providing Catholic teaching.  

The reconstruction of man

The name of the community — “Ricostruttori” — has a few different meanings. 

“Our community is linked to the manual labor of reconstruction, as many of our out-of-town centers for retreats have been reconstructions,” Rondanina explained. “We began by restructuring an old building (cascinali) that had been used as housing for women working in the rice fields in the 1950s.”

This work of reconstruction also symbolizes the inner rebuilding of the person. For Rondanina, who teaches philosophy, personal reconstruction is an ongoing journey. Likewise, “to keep a youthful movement, and not close ourselves off in dogmatic forms, we must always be searching.”

Spiritual growth, the priest added, “happens when you move from the phase where you think you’ve found the magic wand to solve all your problems, the initial phase of youth where everything seems rosy, to a phase of crisis, where you take a step forward. The kingdom of God advances like this, with the ability to see our limits, to rebuild ourselves time after time, to understand where we went wrong, to remove the dross to get to the essential things.”