Riflessione:		FR. ALBERIONE AND THE PAULINE FAMILY Fr. Giuliano Saredi, ssp
Audio e Testo:		Don Giacomo Alberione ALLE PIE DISCEPOLE DEL DIVIN MAESTRO, 1963 LA FAMIGLIA PAOLINA n. 162  - n. 163 - n. 168 Per sentire l'audio fai click sull'icona del microfono. Per sentire i brani seguenti usa le frecce arancioni. Per salvare l'audio sul tuo pc usa il pulsante destro del mouse: "salva oggetto con nome"
Video:		27 Aprile 2003: La beatificazione in Piazza S. Pietro Omelia del Santo Padre Giovanni Paolo II Dal DVD: A. Monge, "Giacomo fa' luce!" Versione .mov  | Versione .wmv
Testo:		Don Giacomo Alberione Il corpo mistico della Congregazione UT PERFECTUS SIT HOMO DEI, I, n. 281 ITA - ESP - ENG Don Giacomo Alberione Ritratto morale del Paolino UT PERFECTUS SIT HOMO DEI, III, n. 58 ITA - ESP - ENG Don Giacomo Alberione, ANIMA E CORPO PER IL VANGELO, pag. 61ss Mentalità paolina ITA - ESP Don Giacomo Alberione “Vita mutatur, non tollitur” SAN PAOLO, Febbraio 1947

FR.  ALBERIONE  AND  THE  PAULINE  FAMILY
FR. Giuliano Saredi, ssp

The phrase of the title is taken from a meditation given by Fr. Alberione to the Pious Disciples of the Divine Master on Ascension Day of 1963 (23 May). The thought of Paradise serves as introduction to the meditation that in fact veers to the Pauline Family. The invitation is to understand it in its totality, because “the whole Pauline Family is not yet understood, its individual parts and the mission that it has in the world”. From here start the brief considerations that follow.   

“Union of spirit. This is the substantial part”

Fr. Alberione never tired of repeating to his spiritual sons and daughters that union of spirit is the substantial part of the Pauline Family and consists of a single spirituality: “To live the Gospel in its globality; to live in the Divine Master inasmuch as He is Truth, Way and Life; to live him as his disciple Saint Paul understood him”. This is the spirit that identifies and unites everybody,  although the Pauline institutions are multiple and their activitieas are different.

Is this spirit alive in us today? Should we not perhaps take possession again of Jesus, as he himself defined his person: Way, Truth and Life (Jn 14, 6), that is, the complete Christ, not dissected; the soul of our spiritual/community life (Christ thinks, lives and acts in me/in us), the content of our apostolate (dogma, morals, cult), the answer to the entirety of man (mind, will, heart)?

The question has its own meaning, if we think that already in the seminar “At the center is Jesus Christ Way and Truth and Life” (September 1984) there was talk of “removal” of the idea of Way, Truth and Life and of the “danger” of such removal for the Alberionian charism, confirming afterwards – in the Meeting of the General Governments of the Pauline Family that followed in April 1985  – that “the expression Jesus Christ Way and Truth and Life should be read in priority form with respect to the titles of  Master/Pastor”.

To one who has some familiarity with the texts of the Founder, it is not hard to pick their constant orientation on the matter: a single spirituality: “the spirit of the Pauline Family consists in devotion to Jesus Christ Way, Truth and Life”; varying apostolates: “the various institutes have their own apostolate and the title that is added is a title that indicates their apostolate”.   

“Members of a mystical body, conformed to the mystical body that is the Church”

In his meditation to the Pious Disciples, mentioned above, Fr. Alberione said that “the Pauline Family mirrors the Church in its members, in its activities, in its apostolate, in its mission”. On another occasion, he adds that it is made up of several institutes, each one with its own apostolate, because “the apostolates in the thought and inspiration of God must be the most urgent apostolates during our times”.  

Wanting to enter a little into the sense of these affirmations, seemingly enlightening is the text of another meditation that the Primo Maestro gave to the Paulines in April 1960 and that can be read in Ut perfectus sit homo Dei (III, 58-61). Although addressed to the Society of St. Paul members, this inspired page – in which the inspiration of Saint Paul is palpable, – is good as bottom line and orientation for all the Pauline institutes. From the text, that cannot be summed up in a few words due to its conceptual density, shines out “the tireless Apostle who, “having been made all for all”, was always, everywhere, with all, and with all means… to renew the world in a new light: Jesus Christ”, to whom the Pauline Family is called to give continuity, actuality, presence; Saint Paul living in a social body,  characterized by dynamism, adaptability and versatility for the Gospel. Men and women of the frontier, above all in moments that are difficult for the Church, and capable of staying in the shadows at the right moment to attend to prayer and study. Men and women with apostolic imagination, who have no other goal than the greatest good of all, heedless of discomforts, sufferings, humiliations; who do not ask for themselves honors and recognitions, believing in eternal reward. 

The individual institutions (one represents all before the Tabernacle, one spreads the doctrine of Jesus, another approaches souls), moved by a single spirit (to live Jesus Christ and to serve the Church), give form to that mosaic that is the mystical body of the Pauline Family, “a well interconnected and connected body, through nthe collaboration of each ligament, according to the energy proper of each member”, that from Christ “receives power to grow in a way that builds itself up in charity” (Eph 4,16). In that manner the Pauline Family understands and builds itself up, serves and builds the Church with the variety of its gifts.  

“The love of Christ has gathered us in one” 

Without love, all the charisms lose their meaning and value; thanks to love, on the other hand, all concur in building up the myatical Body of Christ. Love, that will never end, is the vital and creating force of the communion of saints, because God is love and is the cause of the exchange of spiritual goods that is establised between the Church of heaven and that of earth. Therefore, the Pauline Family in pilgrimage here below nurtures the certainty of being supported by the Pauline Family in heaven purified of every sinful imperfection and rich with the power of God. “The soul continues in the beyond its life, affection, prayer, apostolate with much greater perfection than down here”, writes Fr. Alberione.

The same love of Christ that has gathered us in unity does not disappear with death. Although we live in different conditions, we remain as brothers and sisters unified by the end: the glory of God and the peace of men. With the passage to the “Pauline life in heaven”, the Family recomposes in the communion of love and in the original beauty as God wanted it. The one who is called to it turns his love, transfigured in God, on his Family still making its journey, and on his work in the “various mansions”, making himself with her and for her, intercessor, apostle, and invisible presence.