We come from so many well-known and faraway places, but like the first Christians, we are one heart and one soul. All of us have lived the experiences of a momentous meeting with Christ in a Cursillo de Cristiandad and from that moment the living Christ of the Gospel, He who presents us to the Church, has been our reference point, our constant motivation and our guide. This is the objective of our Movement: to make possible for people to meet Christ who grows and develops in the Christian by grace in a conscious, intense and infectious manner.
Today I feel thrilled and grateful, because that idea which was put into our souls when we were twenty years old, was not an illusion, nor a youthful fancy, nor an excitement proper to one’s age, but a plan from the Spirit of God.
The fact of being united here invites us to reflect on the root of the Foundational Charism of our Movement and to remember that the disposition of men or women facing the personal and vital world, which is the area of influence of the Cursillo, is always the same whatever the latitude, place and culture. Disposition does not take up time or space. It is an attitude facing the fact of living.
The Cursillos is a movement, which in its own way, has established itself in the Church in such a way that Christian realities might become life in the individuality, originality and creativity of each person, because each one, discovering his/her potential and accepting his/her limitations, lives his/her freedom with conviction, strengthens his/her will with decision and constantly fosters friendship, in his/her personal and community daily living.
The Cursillos are the wonderful news, that God loves us, communicated by the most human means, that is friendship, so as to lead each one to what is best for him/her.
For this we ask and continue to ask that the laity, who constitute the majority of men and women of today, may meet one another in the place where they live and in the simplest way, with the living Christ of the Gospel and that in feeling themselves united to Him by grace, they change the rhythm of their own life and learn to relish it and accept it, without having to move away from where they live, because places in the highways of human existence, may be the yeast which, in some way leavens, the Christian milieu and the condition in which they live their lives is changed.
All this is done while they continue to be lay men and women, since we think that the most simple lay element of the laity, namely that it constitutes the most natural essence of its lay state, is the fact of being able to live in the midst of the world’s excesses where the most authentic values are unknown, belittled or not valued. In this more or less general situation, the Cursillo offers simple and concrete means so that each may live and grow in his/her faith.
We ask that those who are passing through the world, may meet with people who believe in the truth, and are convinced of their own faith, living, enthusiastic and capable witnesses, through their attitude in facing life and attracting others through the joy of living with God and man.
This is our aim, for this we are striving. Once again we are gathered together here in Rome so to strengthen our common faith and be able to achieve this end, as well as to thank our Holy Father for the wonderful attention that He has always given to our Movement. We are also concerned about the concerns of the Holy Father and we desire to commit ourselves to collaborate with Him.
We think with gratitude of all those who have died so that Christ may reach as many people as possible. Many in fact are those who have experienced the grace of faith and the gift of inspiring it with joy.
We also remember those, who more than us deserve the gift of being here today and who for reasons of work, family, possibility, or economy, have not been able to join us here.
With renewed spirit, united to all of them in prayer and united to Christ, we return anew to the world to continue our usual pilgrimage, with which we are well acquainted because we bear it deep within our soul: to journey with Christ towards the Father, with the help of the Holy Spirit and of Mary and all the saints, bringing all our brothers and sister with us.
DE COLORES!
Eduardo Bonnin
St. Peter’s Square, Rome
July 29, 2000