Homily by Fr Matteo Fabbri, Vicar of Opus Dei for Central-Southern Italy
Ez 34, 11-16, Ps 22; Jn 10, 11-16
"I myself will lead my sheep to pasture and I will make them rest. Oracle of the Lord God. I will go in search of the lost sheep and bring the lost one back to the fold, I will bandage up that wound and heal the sick one, I will take care of the fat and the strong; I will shepherd them justly." (I Lit.)
These words, which the Church applies to all saints and blessed "pastors", for many of us who knew him personally, appear as a perfect portrait of Blessed Álvaro, who was pastor and father.
It's nice to remember it like this, and we can say it with serenity, we need it. We need it because today's world lacks points of reference, fathers and true teachers. We need it here on the Campus, to carry on with the spirit of the beginnings this activity that was born from a suggestion from him.
Fathers are those who pass their lives to their children, who launch their children to face the challenges of existence, and they do so by paving the way, moving forward, preparing the way for those who will follow.
What happens to every father is also true for Don Álvaro: before being a father, he was a son. He was the "faithful son and successor" of St. Josemaría: he fully embodied his spirit and message, in so many years of living by his side he assimilated in depth the teachings of the Founder of Opus Dei, to the point of becoming its shadow, despite the obvious difference in character. He was a faithful man.
A fidelity built on the grace of God, above all. He, who was a person of truly uncommon talents, lived in profound abandonment in the hands of God, to the point of knowing how to spread peace and trust around him even in truly difficult moments.
Those of us who had the good fortune to meet him in his life remember that every time we were with him, even if for a few moments, we immediately noticed that he left us something: a greater supernatural optimism, a more lively sense of God's closeness, more in the future, more desire for holiness. It was understood that this "effect" of simply being with him was not produced by who knows what psychological technique: it was a simple infection of his way of living trust in God.
But this supernatural trust did not lead him away from reality at all. Not only because he was a profoundly engineer..., but because he never lost the effective perception of the situation he had to face, and he knew on the other hand that an inevitable content of anyone's life on this earth is made up of limits, errors, defects and from the sins of each.
Precisely for this reason he cultivated a lively sense of contrition, of pain for sin. I remember that in a Holy Mass which he presided over in the basilica of Sant'Eugenio I was very struck by the tone with which he pronounced the words "Lord, have mercy!" at the beginning of the celebration. On his lips it was not the mechanical repetition of a liturgical rubric, but it was a real invocation that sprang from the depths of his heart.
And so too in his exhortation to embrace great and demanding ideals, he did so taking into account the inevitable burden of each one's limits. Once I met him by chance in the central office of the Opera (in December 1990), I was able to spend a few minutes with him, and I asked him what I could tell on his part to the people I would meet upon my return. in Milan. And he replied: "we are proud" (he said in Latin: to indicate that we are growing, evolving) and specified: "we are sinners, but we want to be saints".
Personal limitations, errors and sins, thanks to the ability to rectify and ask forgiveness (first of all from God) were not for him, and are not even for us, an insurmountable obstacle on the path to holiness, they do not lead and must not lead to debunking of the ideal. I think this teaching is important for all of us, not only on a personal level, but also thinking about the commitment to continue to carry on the Campus. It is inevitable that ourselves and others collide with our limits, with our defects. There are no perfect people, and none of us claim to be perfect. Instead, there are - and how precious they are - people capable of starting over, of rectifying, of apologizing when necessary, of learning from their mistakes, of treasuring the corrections and observations received from others. And so, not only are ambitious projects completed, but above all one sanctifies oneself by realizing them. And we, aware that this initiative was born from don Álvaro, can certainly count on his intercession, to overcome our defects, also starting from the suggestions and "corrections" that we receive from our colleagues, whether they are of the same rank, lower or higher. One of the signs that work is truly sanctified is that it is lived not under the dominion of the logic of power or self-affirmation and one's success, but with true, cordial and affable collaboration, which is precisely the expression of a spirit of service.
Don Álvaro knew how to rectify, and for this very reason he always knew how to balance charity with truth: he said things with affection, with delicacy, but he said... the truth. And so he knew how to ensure that the momentum of the ideal did not fade into discouragement. And faced with personal limitations and sins, in a word, faced with true everyday life, he used a prayer that Pope Francis also repeated in his direct message to pilgrims who went to Madrid on the occasion of his beatification: gracias, forgive me, help me more. Thank you - trusting gratitude to God; forgiveness: ability to apologize and rectify; help me more, help me again: constant and trusting support on God's grace.
Thus don Álvaro did, and had done, great things all over the world.
We too, with his support and following in his footsteps, will be able, learning from our limitations and from our own mistakes, to accomplish great things for the benefit of our society.
Our Lady, to whom Don Álvaro was so devoted, assists us and today she does so in a special way, through the presence, for whom we thank, of Our Lady of Carmine de' Noantri. Our Lady accompanies us, with her maternal tenderness.
