In these days in which the Covid-19 pandemic is worsening with all its burden of pain and fear, there are some comments that reappear here and there and invoke the Divine Will, describing all its "punitive" power against humanity now out of control. Men are so far removed from God that they expect nothing but lashes, scourges and destruction from Him. The Church also is in the eye of the divine storm with its corruption and infidelity. In support of this thesis some passages are extrapolated from the writings of the Servant of God Luisa Piccarreta confirming this inexorable destiny for the men and women of our time.
Frankly, those who have been reading Luisa's writings for years trying to make them a nourishment for their faith in the life and teaching of the Church, deeply disagree with this kind of instrumentalization for at least three reasons.
The first is that life in Jesus' Divine Will is an experience of light, meaning that it transfers into the soul the same "passionate love" with which God loves us immensely in Jesus. We are called to take root in this Love, without ever "missing the flight". We grow in this Love in the conviction that there is not a single moment when God does not love us and does not want to accomplish his "game" of love on each one of us and that, above all, He wants to play it with us.
The second is that sin and infidelities of men with their sad effects - and not only in this time of the pandemic - are always present to God. He never closes His eyes on our injustices and corruptions. God's gaze sees reality even more harshly than any of us can. In the Divine Will, this gaze is also communicated to us. The Lord makes us understand, without disguise and justification, the profound evil that germinates from infidelity to God's plan, to His Will that is manifested in creation and redemption. But how does God look at the sin of men? He looks at it from the cross of Jesus. There we can see His eye, there we can see His judgment. That is why when Jesus speaks to Luisa about the evils of her time - and He does not prophesy the evils of who knows what future ages - He invites her to fully understand how He gave Himself to the Father out of Love to do what men did not want to do: His Divine Will. Luisa never invoked punishment or was never pleased with the evils or "scourges" of her time. On the contrary, her visions always led her to a more intense, involving and holy prayer. This was also the purpose - which was confessed several times by Jesus Himself - for which she was shown what was happening even thousands of miles away and that no newspaper could make known to her in real time.
The third reason is as follows. The knowledge of the Servant of God, Luisa Piccarreta even if it is about facts of the history of her time -we repeat, never about a distant future- - is to be considered "mystical" knowledge. Mystics have a knowledge of reality which, at the moment it is translated into writing, needs an interpretation in order to be accepted. Many times Luisa says that she cannot even find the words to say what she saw. Luisa tried to write what she knew and it is not by chance that she invoked the continuous divine assistance to write what God showed her. Some readings that pretend to see in Luisa's words what she could not even say, are more imprudent than wise. The temptation to instrumentalize some words of Luisa hurt us very much and cast a shadow in our hearts because in front of the infinite Sun of the merciful Love of God, once again our pride as an inflated balloon appears. But the Light of the Divine Will is not dark!
Enza Arbore, president of the Association
Don Sergio Pellegrini, ecclesiastical assistant