Automatic translation from Italian, under review.
A simple lunch, with the air of celebration still lingering, for it is the “day after” the profession of a novice, the first Asian sister. With us are Giovanni and Rosetta, who have come from the Veneto almost as representatives of the love of a mother, Diva’s, who yesterday helped us understand how the heart can cover a distance of more than 11,000 kilometers in a nanosecond, and of a father who, even better from Heaven, explains to us that, in God’s today, we are already one, Heaven and earth, the abyssal distance bridged in Christ the Redeemer. At table, the place of sharing par excellence, there is also a young woman spending a few days with us in the community; Sr. Carmela arrives from the curia a little after lunch has begun, it is nice to arrive after a morning of work, and then Sr. Marianna also arrives from the hospital where she works, a little later still, we are almost at the end, but with her smile she almost says: “I made it, you are still here!” Unfortunately, the little virus that has kept us company for two years still demands our attention, and so, since we are a few more than usual, our dining room for today is in the garden. It did not turn out badly for us; in these times one also understands how much we must thank God even for a small open-air space.
We talk. We remember that today is 30 August. It has been fifty years since that yes which took its first steps with determination! A young woman from Messina, just graduated in philosophy, with a dream placed in her heart from Above, shatters the human dreams of a mother and a father: a career, a family, a promising “normal” life seem not to be enough for her. How can Nunziella explain it to her father? A friend said to her that day: “Miss, you are taking a step with which your parents will be pleased in a few years.” At that moment, perhaps, it was not easy, but her father Pasqualino knew that Nunziella would not turn back; he probably already imagined what she would answer to the one who left the University of Messina for Rome to bring her back to that world which had so passionately engaged her and to which she could have made a contribution. Her father was right: 30 August bore the seal of that Gospel word “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the Kingdom of God...”; with joy and firm determination the twenty-three-year-old Nunziella decided: “God alone.”
To tell the truth, Sr. Nunziella said few words to us today; one of us, with liveliness, brought up an anecdote, and she smiled and answered Rosetta’s questions.
When you find a pearl of great value, you can only sell all you have to buy it... How many beautiful things Nunziella left behind... well, at least we imagine it, because in reality, to many of us who knew her, she always spoke of the “Pearl,” her beloved Spouse.
And what of us, who have left everything and followed him? Jesus has already reassured us!
