To every Sister and Brother in the Secular Franciscan Order
My dear Sisters and Brothers,
May the Lord give you his peace!
We still hear the announcement of Easter “He is not here, he is risen!” in our ears, and we have read in the Gospel, that Jesus said: “if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.” For already more than a whole year we have been waiting for the things to be changed. Yet, it looks if life were going on, day by day without changing anything. But if we do not see something, it does not mean that it doesn’t exist or doesn’t happen.
I see, I hear and I feel, my dear sisters and brothers, how many difficulties we have to face, how many times we have to struggle in our life, both in a spiritual sense, but also in its very concrete meaning on a daily base. Many of us had to experience the illness that this virus can cause, how dangerous, sometimes mortal it is. All of us have someone around us, in the family, in the fraternity, who suffered, had hardships, or even, passed away. During this pandemic many times we feel helpless and it fills us with tempers. But are we really helpless? Are these tempers really necessary? Aren’t we too much apathetic? Do not worry, we are not worse than the disciples who were going fishing, but did not catch anything. It seemed to be a total failure. Later, the disciples gathered behind the locked doors, because in spite of getting rid of the Romans, they had to experience the fear from the Jews.