Dear Fr. Carrón:

A few weeks ago, we got together with some friends of the Fraternity after a break of a few months caused by too many commitments. Many things had changed during this time: some of us had changed jobs, some had been transferred elsewhere. So my husband organized this get-together with the desire to see where we stood. We asked our friends and ourselves, “Do we still desire to do the Fraternity together? Or is it just another commitment to try to fit into our busy schedules? With freedom and honesty, we will start up again only if we truly desire to.” I already knew what would happen. One friend would say the Fraternity is so beautiful, but he doesn’t have time. Another friend would say the Fraternity is everything for her, but then she’d disappear. Instead, both of them bowled me over. The first friend said he feels alone with his three young daughters. He told me how, during this break of a few months, he tried to throw himself into parish life, to offer an environment of Catholic families to bring his daughters up in. He told us, “I look at you who are not perfect and who do not have children, and yet, you love my daughters as I would want them to be loved and there is no other place I would want to grow myself and have them grow.” The second friend has for a long time belonged to a youth group founded by two dear friends and she has frequently given priority to this group over School of Community. She told everyone how, in these months without the Fraternity, she had felt suffocated. “It’s true that my friends are in that group, but it’s not enough for me, it’s not enough to be together, to talk about Jesus and about Christian feelings without this having something to say to me about my life. I need someone to help me look at my life. Otherwise, I am closed off and I can’t breathe. I haven’t breathed in these months, until you invited me to come back, to come home.” That dinner left me in silence. In these weeks, the friendship among us and with these two friends has become deeper, the companionship more attentive, and the faithfulness among us, to the Church and to the Movement has become more constant. We have also seen the birth of an ever more surprising attention to our relationship with other friends of the community and with our city. I look at all of this and I realize how truly (even in this God-forsaken place in the great USA) we are taken to heart, we are loved and accompanied.

Myriam, St. Louis (USA)