Dear Fr. Carrón: My son suffers from a serious form of psychosis that almost caused him to die of anorexia. Four years ago, I used to go to Mass every morning, always sitting on a pew in the right nave. I felt anguished, powerless, and lonely. I prayed for my son’s healing, and asked for help in my painful circumstance. I asked God to give me the strength I needed to carry that cross, and I asked Him to take me instead of my son. One fine day, I started sitting on a bench in the left nave, and I noticed that, every day, a small group of people attended Mass praying and singing with visible intensity. They all received Communion every morning, and lingered in church after Mass to say the Angelus and a special prayer. They were always smiling and happy. After the celebration, they would get together outside of the church to chat. There was something fascinating about them, in the way they looked at things. Day after day, one pew a day, I moved closer to them. I wondered, “How can they always be so cheerful? For sure, they don’t have all the problems I have.” I felt a growing desire to join them in prayer. One day, I took the initiative, and I sat with them for the Angelus. Three days later, I was at School of Community and, a few months after that, I joined the Fraternity. My life changed. My daily problems, my sufferings, and my son’s disease have not been taken away, but I look at reality with new eyes. His embrace makes me glad and free, and my life is simpler. I am in motion now. I speak to Jesus, and about Jesus with the people I meet. I know now that I can’t live without Him anymore. The people around me noticed my transformation, and my husband is living this experience through me. All the people I have met in the Movement up to now are friends who live their life with Jesus in their hearts, people for whom He comes first. In them, I see that fire that you often mention. People can attack the Movement right and left, but I only care about what I met and saw: friends who live in Jesus and for Jesus, bearing witness to His presence with their daily lives. My son’s illness has been a great trial. The very moment I stopped asking for his healing and I entrusted him into God’s hands (saying, “Your will be done”), Jesus gave me back my dying son. It was three years ago, on a sweltering summer afternoon, that my son, who had always refused treatment, decided to take the drug that would save his life, and that very night began eating again, changing his attitude completely. It was a miracle. The road to recovery from a psychiatric illness is long, but I am not anguished any more. My son is doing much better now. I ask Jesus and Mary to stay close to him, and to let him receive the grace of God and the gift of faith. Nothing else.

Laura