Jesuit Novitiate
Novitiate of the Euro-Mediterranean Province of the Society of Jesus
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Lent at Number 3, Via Domenico Chiodo

06 Mar 2018

On the 16th of February, the Novitiate experienced the departure of six people. The six novices of the second year left, going to different Jesuit communities (Milan, Naples, Palermo, Albania), for the so-called Lent experiment. And we of the first year remained as missionaries in Genoa. The house is entrusted to us. We live here together with the permanent community, Fr Agostino, Fr. Ray, Br. Paride and Fr. Ignazio.

The first week, just back from the Month of Spiritual Exercises, we skipped our regular courses in Greek and various foreign languages. We needed some time to – with calm and in a new way – take the first steps in the daily life of the novitiate. Coming back was not easy. In the space of a few hours, we went from the rhythms of the Month to the everyday ones of work, prayer and community at Number 3, Via Domenico Chiodo.

But after a few days Lent began and we asked ourselves whether we should choose a sign for this particular time. Putting together six heads with different perspectives required more meetings. Everyone put forward one or more proposals. We identified three of them, and we presented them to the Novice Master. He then  gave us his reflections. And at the end of a long process in community, a shared sign emerged: community evaluation. It is a form of fraternal correction, but positive. The objective of the exercise – which is weekly – does not consist in identifying a weak point or a fragility or a defect – call it what you want, but you get the gist – of the other so he can mature in this aspect. The goal is another: to appreciate and value, that is to identify in each a reflection of beauty, a luminous trace to underline. Every novice is committed to looking at what is beautiful about the other and tell him so. It is a mark of conversion that demands openness and availability. We try!

After all, Lent is a time of change. It is an opportunity to change the direction of one’s gaze. We do not deny the difficulties, but we note both the wheat and the darnel, and lean in favour of the growth of the former rather than the latter. It is a time to give voice and oxygen to the gifts that God has given us and to the gifts he is making of us.

 

A time of penance and reconciliation

by Gianluca Severin

“Do you do penance?” a lady from the parish asked me as we left Mass. The question calls forth hair shirts, fasting and scourges, the shadow of a religious life imbued with mortification.As novices we become aware of our life, even of our sins, and we also live as penitents. But penance does not arise from and is not aimed at pain.

There is a penance related to sin itself: it is the situation created around and within us by our sins: anxieties, bitterness, rigidity, damaged relationships, renunciations, lost opportunities, offended dignity or health.If I have failed in a friend’s reliance on me, I will have to endure his hesitation to trust me again and that flash, however brief and hidden, of doubt in his eyes at my words. God does not add anything to punish us, he does not add a wrong from Him to the wrong we have done. Here we can experience the truth of our choices.

There is a penance linked to contrition: it does not matter how much and how many times we part ourselves from Him, when we choose the way home, God run towards us to embrace us again and renew our relationship; however, the wounds and fractures we have caused to ourselves and to our brothers and sisters and of which we are now aware remain. Repentance is industrious, it calls us to take care, to repair, to apologize, to return what we have stolen “four times as much”, even if the brothen is not willing to believe in our repentance and to forgive us. Here we can experience our responsibility.

There is a penance in order to walk in the opposite direction from what distances us from ourselves, from our brethren and from God; this commitment is called ascesis or, ignatianly, agere contra. It takes patience and perseverance to heal those habits that pollute our time and our relationships. The distinctive trait of this penance is not the pride in what we are able to impose on ourselves but the joy of living more fully. Here at the novitiate, the alarm goes off early so that we can pray before diving into the flow of the day. If I cannot get up, I do not have to give up fruit for lunch: I have to get up, every day, at the sound of the alarm clock. Here we can experience our freedom.

There is suffering for the evil of the world that those who set out on the path of the Lord experience more acutely.It is the suffering of the mother for the child who is losing their life, of the friend for a withering friend, of God, our Father and Brother, for us when we refuse His gifts: life, love, reason, freedom… In the face of evil our heart does not remain indifferent, sometimes it calls to action, even to sacrifice, sometimes it calls to closeness, patience, witness. Here we can experience the Cross and compassion.

We are always called to conversion and renewal; love, not pain, saves.

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