Chiara Lubich, founder of the Focolare Movement, received an honorary degree in 2000 from The Catholic University of America in Washington. CNS

An article from the March 28 edition of Today’s Catholic regarding Chiara Lubich: Chiara Lubich taught the world how to love as Christ does

SAN ANTONIO • Several hundred people attended a Memorial Mass April 26 in Oblate School of Theology’s Immaculate Conception Chapel for Chiara Lubich, with Archbishop José H. Gomez the principal celebrant.

Concelebrants included retired Amarillo Bishop John W. Yanta, Oblate School of Theology president Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI, and eight other priests of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate and the Archdiocese of San Antonio.

Chiara Lubich, who died March 14 in Rocca di Papa, Italy, was the foundress of the Focolare Movement — officially titled “The Work of Mary” — in Trent, Italy, in 1943. She was among the most influential women in the Catholic Church worldwide.
Her followers and friends — including Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI — have always referred to her simply as Chiara — Italian for “Clare.”

During his homily, Archbishop Gomez said Chiara’s life reflected her love for Mary, our Blessed Mother. He noted that she received an intuition at the Marian shrine at Loreto that her vocation would be to found a movement that would be a reproduction of the Holy Family of Nazareth.

It was significant, said the archbishop, that she died on the day known in Mexico as “Viernes de Dolores” — the Friday of Sorrows — because of the Focolare Movement’s emphasis on the Virgin Mary’s relationship with suffering: “Our Lady of Sorrows, as she is popularly called.”

He said Chiara was called to start “The Work of Mary” to make present the life of the Blessed Virgin more clearly in the church. She interpreted various moments in Mary’s life presented in the Gospel to be successive steps in which the faithful could look to for light and encouragement.

“I dare say that Chiara and the Focolare family follow in the footsteps of St. Paul to bring the good news of the Gospel to the “Gentiles” of our time. God has called all of you ‘to proclaim the good news to them,” he said. Those modern Gentiles, he said, are members of other Christian ecclesial communities and non-Christians.

Archbishop Gomez said the time after the death of a spiritual community’s founder is a special time of grace and growth for that community, adding, “Chiara will continue to guide all of you from heaven, and over there, she’s more powerful,” he declared. “This is a time of thanksgiving to God for the blessing of Chiara and a time of renewing commitment to unity, communion and love of God,” he concluded.

The Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, founded in 1816 by St. Eugene De Mazenod, a French bishop, have had a long and warm relationship with the Focolare Movement, said Father Fabio Ciardi, an Oblate priest who lives in the Focolare’s international center for men Religious in Rome.

Ciardi recalled as a seminarian giving Chiara Lubich a small homemade booklet on fraternal life, taken from the writings of St. Eugene de Mazenod, the Oblates’ founder.
“Chiara had put in our hearts a passion for the church and a great love for our founders,” Ciardi said. “A few days later, she asked if she could send a copy of the booklet to all the focolares around the world.”

The priest said Lubich was “enchanted” with De Mazenod. “Chiara understood St. Eugene in his most profound spiritual personality,” Ciardi said. “But what touched me the most were these words of Chiara, addressed to us Oblates: ‘If you, because of the charism of unity, feel part of the Work of Mary (the official name of the Focolare Movement), because of your founder, I am an Oblate of Mary Immaculate.’”
Ciardi said she also identified herself with other religious orders and the various charisms they brought to the church.

Rose Marden, associate academic dean of Oblate School of Theology, said she learned about the Focolare’s spirituality of unity last year while helping local Focolare leaders plan an event celebrating the publication of Lubich’s Essential Writings.
“What inspires me about it is that it’s such a contemporary spirituality — living in the world but not being of the world,” Marden said.

“It takes into account the challenges of contemporary life. Lubich’s focus on being one was so powerful in an era when we face such religious and cultural diversity. That shows a very mature approach.”

J. Michael Parker, director of communication of Oblate School of Theology, can be contacted at (210) 341-1366, ext. 203. He also serves as a freelance writer.