There is one important word in the Gospel: the word “as” … We find this word “as” quite often — in the New Commandment, where Jesus says, “Love one another as I have loved you.” We find it in Jesus’ last will, when he prays, “As you, Father, are in me and I in you, may they also be one…” So as … “may they too be one in us.” We find it very often in Focolare founder Chiara Lubich’s writings.

So what does it mean? Certainly this “as” characterizes us first of all as Christians… But when was it that we in the Focolare particularly understood what this word “as” means? It was when we understood, when Chiara understood the importance of Jesus Forsaken, because she saw the “as” there, in the cry of Jesus on the cross: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46). This was the measure of his love.

So in “as I have loved you,” how did he love us? It was by ending up on the cross forsaken, out of love.

“It was the measure of his love and of the mutual love required of us — a measure without measure, to give everything, not to keep anything for ourselves, to be ready to lay down our life and our spiritual or material possessions as well,” said Chiara Lubich in 2003, when she received an honorary doctorate in theology from the University of Trnava in Slovakia.

So this is the “as,” and you can see that it is not simply benevolence or human friendship, even though these are important. Nor does it mean just agreeing with each other; but it is something very strong and radical that asks of us material and spiritual detachment, so as “to make ourselves one with one another.” This is the only and best way to be prepared to receive the grace of unity. So the measure of unity lies in Jesus crucified and forsaken.

Chiara described this well in her book The Cry … She explains that Jesus Forsaken became “infinite disunity … to give us perfect unity.” In this way, he “brought about the reunification of humanity with the Father and of human beings with one another … He, Jesus crucified and forsaken, is the cause and the key to unity, which he will bring about today, too.” And we have the responsibility to live like him, because we made a discovery that the world still needs to make: that Jesus Forsaken is the key to enter into unity.

In 2001 Chiara met with some priests from the Schönstatt Movement in Switzerland who asked what was new about the discovery of Jesus Forsaken in the history of Christian spirituality.

Chiara emphasized that the most important new thing is precisely that through knowing Jesus Forsaken we start living a collective spirituality with new light and greater fullness — that “spirituality of communion” as Pope John Paul II called it.

It is a spirituality that characterized the first Christian communities, of whom it was said, “They were one heart and one soul” (cf. Act 4:32), “no one considered their goods their own; they put everything in common” (cf. Act 2:44). This practice was very much alive among the first communities.

Then, during 2,000 years of Christianity, individual spiritualities developed. Perhaps God wanted this so as to highlight one by one all of his words, which indeed have the power to change people’s lives. Now what returns with new vigor is the need for a communitarian, collective spirituality, a spirituality of communion.

Therefore, since this need has become evident, we need the key to achieve it, the way to make it happen, which is the knowledge of Jesus Forsaken. Knowing Jesus Forsaken helped us take a leap forward … into seeing that a spirituality of communion is possible precisely because of Jesus Forsaken.

“In his forsakenness, Jesus is the teacher of unity, of divine unity,” wrote Chiara. Therefore, to learn how to make unity we must graft ourselves onto Him.

Chiara wrote this in one of her pages during a special period of light: “Before going to our brothers and sisters we have to be in unity with God… We must not do anything, not even raise an arm, not even smile, if Jesus is not in us. And we should do everything to the extent that Jesus wants us to do it, neither more nor less.

May it be only him, all of him, always him who lives in us … “Every moment of our life should have a vast horizon: as vast as God, because we have to put all our strength into doing it. May everything always be consumed.

“The soul who is in perfect unity with Jesus within itself is ‘another Christ.’ They are aware of being Jesus, because at that point his presence has imbued their whole person. And they are aware of being another Jesus, with Jesus in them, because they find him, any time they wish, in themselves. It is possible to reach this point by generously corresponding to the grace.”

And in another part, she writes: “This morning I understood in a new way the words in Jesus’ last prayer: ‘As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me’ (Jn 17:21).

“To bear witness to Jesus we need to be in him and in the Father, as the Father is in him. Essentially, we need to be one with Jesus, to be Jesus. When Jesus lives in us, we bear witness to him.” In the Focolare spirituality, however, we know that “being one” with Jesus and “being one” with our brothers and sisters go together; we can’t be one with Jesus without being one with our brothers and sisters, nor the other way round.

They are two inseparable aspects; each requires the other. In her talk on “Paradise and unity,” Chiara says: “For him to be present among us … it is necessary to be one with him beforehand. But it is a ‘before’ that is also an ‘after’. In fact, we are not perfectly him until he is present among us” … Sharing her experience, Chiara once said: “With his grace, notwithstanding our limitations, we too tried to live like this. And as we did so, we began to realize that Jesus had truly brought on earth the lifestyle of heaven.”

Maria Voce

From a talk given in Montet, Switzerland, on August 16 to mainly Catholic members of the Focolare.