Tuesday, Feb. 17, 7 p.m., at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican will be the meeting entitled “Before the sun, the light, the moon, and the stars are obscured.” Guest of the evening will be philosopher Massimo Cacciari. He will be in charge of the conclusions after a spiritual reflection by H.E. Card. Mauro Gambetti, Archpriest of St. Peter’s Papal Basilica and President of the Fratelli tutti Foundation, and the lectio by H.E. Card. Gianfranco Ravasi, Founder of the Cortile dei Gentili. The theme of the evening will be Youth and Old Age.

To participate, it is necessary to register at this link

The calendar of this year’s meetings

Lectio Petri – The Qohelet, the Crisis is the series of meetings organized by the Cortile dei Gentili and the Fratelli tutti Foundation to explore – with an eye to the present – the Qohelet.
Prominent personalities from the world of culture, entertainment, media and institutions will dialogue with Card. Ravasi and will offer their lay point of view in light of the themes that emerged in the readings.

The evening will be enriched by moments of musical meditation.

As a reminder, the second edition of the initiative gave birth to the podcast series available in multiple episodes. Listen to them

The meetings of the fourth Lectio Petri cycle featured Enrico Mentana, journalist; Noemi, singer, and Gianrico Carofiglio, writer. (Watch the full videos)

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Now in their fourth edition, the Lectio Petri are promoted by the Cortile dei Gentili Foundation and the Fratelli tutti Foundation.
Yesterday’s Lectio focused on the theme of death, introduced by the subtitle “In dust all returns,” in an intense comparison between Scripture, human experience, and radical questions of our time.

Starting from the religious relationship between life and death, between flesh and spirit, uniting the thread that holds together earthly life and eternal life, it was also an opportunity to discuss topics of great relevance today.

As always, the meeting, attended by about a thousand people, featured several moments of reflection: Father Francesco Occhetta, S.I., Secretary General of the Fratelli tutti Foundation, opened the evening with a spiritual reflection. Read it here (in Italian). This was followed by a reading by actress Nancy Brilli and commentary by H.E. Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, President Emeritus of the Pontifical Council for Culture and founder of the Cortile dei Gentili, with several musical interludes.

The final analysis was entrusted to writer Gianrico Carofiglio, who drew inspiration from the words of Father Occhetta and H.E. Cardinal Ravasi and from the biblical text to bring the delicate subject of death into today’s world.

Watch the entire meeting here (in Italian).

Reports, speeches, updates, and upcoming events are available on the websites of the Fratelli tutti Foundation and the Cortile dei Gentili. You can find the dedicated podcast on Spotify: click here to listen to it.

On February 17, the Lectio returns for the last event in this cycle. The topic will be Youth and Old Age, and the title will be: “Before the sun, the light, the moon, and the stars are darkened.” (in Italian)

The post The story of Death (and Life) in the third Lectio Petri dedicated to Qohelet. Next appointment on February 17: the relationship between Youth and Old Age. appeared first on Fondazione Fratelli tutti.

The book of Qohelet provides an opportunity for debate on current issues and the crisis.

The initiative brings together contributions from Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, founder of Cortile dei Gentili, and Cardinal Mauro Gambetti, Archpriest of St. Peter’s Basilica and President of the Fratelli tutti Foundation, for the fourth cycle of meetings organized to explore and update Qohelet.

Readings and reflections, with musical interludes, complete the inner journey between spirituality and meditation. Alongside them are testimonies from representatives of the worlds of culture, institutions, business, and the media who are committed to reinterpreting the events around us in the light of the book.

Listen to the third episode (in Italian)

The post Lectio Petri – Qohelet, the Crisis: the podcast of the Cortile dei Gentili and Fratelli tutti Foundation appeared first on Fondazione Fratelli tutti.

Tuesday, Nov. 18th, 7 p.m., at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican will be the meeting entitled “Vanity of vanities.” Guest of the evening will be singer Noemi. She will be in charge of the conclusions after a spiritual reflection by Fr. Francesco Occhetta S.J., Secretary General of the Fratelli tutti Foundation, and the lectio by H.E. Card. Gianfranco Ravasi, Founder of the Cortile dei Gentili. The theme of the evening will be Vanity. Actress Nancy Brilli will perform the readings.

To participate, it is necessary to register at this link

The calendar of this year’s meetings

Lectio Petri – The Qohelet, the Crisis is the series of meetings organized by the Cortile dei Gentili and the Fratelli tutti Foundation to explore – with an eye to the present – the Qohelet.
Prominent personalities from the world of culture, entertainment, media and institutions will dialogue with Card. Ravasi and will offer their lay point of view in light of the themes that emerged in the readings.

The evening will be enriched by moments of musical meditation.

As a reminder, the second edition of the initiative gave birth to the podcast series available in multiple episodes. Listen to them

The meetings of the third Lectio Petri cycle featured Silvia Avallone, writer; Massimo Gramellini, journalist; Speranza Scappucci,  Conductor and pianist, and Umberto Galimberti, philosopher, essayist, and writer. (Watch the full videos)

The post Lectio Petri: November 18, the 2nd meeting of the fourth cycle appeared first on Fondazione Fratelli tutti.

As in the traditional format, the spiritual reflection by H.E. Cardinal Mauro Gambetti, Archpriest of St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican and President of the Fratelli tutti Foundation, opened the evening. This was followed by a reading by actress Nancy Brilli and commentary by H.E. Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, President Emeritus of the Pontifical Council for Culture and founder of the Courtyard of the Gentiles, with several musical interludes.

The final analysis was entrusted to Enrico Mentana, journalist and director of TgLa7, who drew inspiration from the words of Cardinals Gambetti and Ravasi to emphasize in particular the role of religions in understanding an era of radical transformation.

Watch the first meeting (in Italian) here.

The second lecture, scheduled for Tuesday, November 18, will feature singer Noemi with a reflection on vanity (the title of the meeting is, in fact, “Vanity of vanities”).

The post The first Lectio Petri in St. Peter’s Basilica on Qohelet, the book of crisis. The next appointment is on November 18, when the topic will be vanity. appeared first on Fondazione Fratelli tutti.

1ST MEETING

Titled “On the Road to Damascus,” the first meeting had as its central theme that of the conversion of the Apostle Paul. After the introduction, entrusted to the spiritual reflection of Cardinal Gambetti, Cardinal Ravasi and writer Silvia Avallone addressed the theme of conversion through human weaknesses and frailties.

WATCH THE MEETING

2ND MEETING

Guest of the evening – entitled “At Corinth: Eros and Agape” – journalist and writer Massimo Gramellini, who was given the conclusion after Cardinal Gambetti’s introduction and Cardinal Ravasi’s lectio. He made it by quoting Paul, Plato, Aphrodite and reflecting on our emotions and the meaning of life.

WATCH THE MEETING

3RD MEETING

A completely unprecedented lectio was the one entitled “I Oppose Peter with an Open Face” and focused on the theme of interreligious tension. Here, the words of Cardinal Gambetti and Cardinal Ravasi were accompanied by commentary and notes played by conductor Speranza Scapucci.

WATCH THE MEETING

4TH MEETING

The last meeting focused on Paul’s theological masterpiece, the Letter to the Romans. In addition to catching up with Cardinal Gambetti and Cardinal Ravasi, on this occasion the philosopher Umberto Galimberti gave his talk, focusing on the relationship between faith and reason and the conditions necessary for there to be dialogue between antithetical positions.

WATCH THE MEETING

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On Tuesday, Feb. 18, 7 p.m., the meeting entitled “Paul’s Theological Masterpiece: the Epistle to the Romans” (in Italian) will be held at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. Guest speaker for the evening will be philosopher, essayist and writer Umberto Galimberti. He will be given the concluding reflections after the spiritual reflection by H.Em. Card. Mauro Gambetti, Archpriest of St. Peter’s Papal Basilica and President of the Fratelli tutti Foundation, and the lectio by H.Em. Card. Gianfranco Ravasi, Founder of the “Cortile dei Gentili.”

To participate, it is necessary to register at this link.

Lectio Petri – Paul is the series of meetings organized by the Cortile dei Gentili Foundation and the Fratelli tutti Foundation to explore – with an eye to the present – the figure of Paul.

Prominent personalities from the world of culture, entertainment, media and institutions will dialogue with Card. Ravasi and will offer their secular point of view in light of the themes that emerged in the readings.

The evening will also be enriched by some moments of musical meditation.

As a reminder, the second edition of the initiative gave birth to the podcast series available in multiple episodes. Listen to them

The previous meeting of this new Lectio Petri cycle, held on January 21, featured Speranza Scappucci, conductor and pianist, as guest speaker. (Watch the full video)

The post Lectio Petri, Feb. 18 meeting with philosopher, essayist and writer Umberto Galimberti appeared first on Fondazione Fratelli tutti.

On Tuesday, Jan. 21, 7 p.m., the meeting entitled «I objected to Peter with an open face» will be held at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. Guest of the evening will be Orchestra conductor and pianist, Speranza Scappucci. She will be in charge of the conclusions and musical meditation after a spiritual reflection by H.Em. Card. Mauro Gambetti, Archpriest of St. Peter’s Papal Basilica and President of the Fratelli tutti Foundation, and the lectio by H.Em. Card. Gianfranco Ravasi, Founder of the Cortile dei Gentili.

To participate, it is necessary to register at this link.

Lectio Petri – Paul is the series of meetings organized by the Courtyard of the Gentiles Foundation and the Fratelli tutti Foundation to explore – with an eye to the present – the figure of Paul.

Prominent personalities from the world of culture, entertainment, media and institutions will dialogue with Card. Ravasi and will offer their secular point of view in light of the themes that emerged in the readings.

The evening will also be enriched by some moments of musical meditation.

As a reminder, the second edition of the initiative gave birth to the podcast series available in multiple episodes. Listen to them

The previous meeting of this new Lectio Petri cycle, held on November 19, featured Massimo Gramellini, writer and journalist, as guest speaker. (Watch the full video)

The post Lectio Petri, Jan. 21 meeting with the Orchestra conductor and pianist, Speranza Scappucci appeared first on Fondazione Fratelli tutti.

Body and soul, this is how Plato in the “Symposium” explains love to us: only those who love create

A lectio on emotions and the meaning of life

In the New Testament the root of the Greek verb for love – agape – resounds no less than 320 times. You must trust me because I did not count them, but Cardinal Ravasi in his “Alphabet of God.” Two thousand years later, Love is the world’s most searched word on Google, with 18 billion results.

But what is this love, about which we talk so much and know so little? The emotional bond that unites two people, at least as long as their relationship produces the dopamine hormone, which is about three years on average? Or the supreme law of the universe, of which that emotional bond is only one of many manifestations? To answer such a question, not just any philosopher will do. It takes one who is also an artist. It takes Plato. He understood that love could not be arrived at by reasoning, but only by intuition. And he resorted to the only possible tool: myth.

Myth is like a parable, or a fable. It has two levels of understanding. The words it uses stop at our brain, but the images it evokes descend to our soul. The myth of the birth of love is found in the Symposium. From the same dialogue we often recall another, that of the soul mate, which, however, Plato recounts precisely in order to disprove it. It is not true, he says, that love consists in being reunited with our lost other half. Love is much more than that. And to convince us, he goes so far as to show us its identity card. Love, the myth states, was conceived on Mount Olympus on the same day that Aphrodite, the goddess of Beauty, was born, during the banquet set up for the happy event. Her mother is called Pena, Poverty, and her father Poros, which we might translate Resource or Expedient, although today a physics graduate would define the parents of love by more scientific names: Matter and Antimatter.

Poverty, that is, matter, is our existential condition. But in us there is also a principle antithetical to matter, a principle of attraction. In the myth this impulse is embodied by Poros and he falls asleep in the middle of the feast, drunk on nectar, in a corner of Zeus’ gardens. Poverty sees him, lies down beside him, and nine months later a beautiful child is born: Eros. Who, with such parents, can only have the character described by Plato in one of the most formidable pages of world literature. “Love is anything but beautiful and gentle. Love is hard, shaggy, barefoot and homeless. It always lies on the ground, without blankets, and sleeps outside in front of doors or in the middle of the street. Sometimes it flourishes and lives, sometimes it dies, but then it comes back to life. And what he procures always slips from his grasp, so that love is never poor or rich.”

Neither poor nor rich. When you have it, you fear to lose it. And when you lose it, you yearn to get it back. But what is it then, this “sweet bitter untamable beast,” as the poetess Sappho called it? Those who think that love is beautiful and delicate make the mistake of attributing to it the characteristics of the beloved. Instead, Plato is the first, at least in the West, to reveal to us that love is not found in the beloved, but in the lover. As a boy I was convinced to the contrary. I thought that love resided in the person I loved and coincided with the fulfillment of my desire: to be loved by her. Too many songs and perhaps too many fears had led me astray. Still, I could not expel the woodworm gnawing inside me: if being loved was the condition for being happy, why, when I was loved, was I not happy? Why couldn’t I dream big, believe in the impossible, imagine a better world? Why did I feel that I was betraying the mission of every human being, which, as George Bernard Shaw wrote, “consists in being a force of nature and not an agitated lump of trouble and resentment that complains and recriminates because the universe is not dedicated to making it happy”?

The answer comes from Plato. Since Eros is he or she who loves, each of us is not in harmony with himself or others when we receive love, but only when we give love. Without expecting anything in return. The Gospel calls it agape, St. Paul charity. If we were to summarize it in a tweet: love is what ego is not. So it is not a purchase, but a surrender. It is not possession, but freedom. Who among us has not experienced this at least once in our own skin? When you truly love, you step outside yourself and tune in to another dimension, that of eternity. Love does not have a why. Love is the why. And for a very simple reason: as Franco Battiato sang, the whole universe obeys love.

But it is not over. Plato still has a twist in store. Every man, he says, aspires to be immortal. It doesn’t matter if he says in words that he doesn’t care. His unconscious is irresistibly drawn to the desire to leave a trace of his own passing. Many try with hatred or anger and may even succeed, but it is an ephemeral success and in any case paid for dearly: anxiety and depression. Only love allows to become immortal in a natural way. How? Let Plato take us by the hand. Remember when, according to myth, love was conceived? On the day of the birth of Aphrodite, goddess of Beauty. It means that whenever we see Beauty in a person, in a phenomenon of nature, in a work of art or in an idea, we conceive love. We get excited. And by getting excited, we feel like generating and giving birth to something that will survive us. A child. Natural or spiritual.

Now, about what a natural child is, more or less, we all understand each other. But a spiritual child? There is not only the fecundity of the body, Plato explains. The soul, too, just like the body, can become aroused by what it feels beautiful and feel the irresistible urge to procreate something that will survive it. Love is thus an energy that takes possession of the lover and expresses itself in a creative tension. If it invades the body, it will lead to the birth of a flesh-and-blood creature. But if it invades the soul, it will generate works.

Of these works generated by love there is no complete catalog. Each person can make his or her own original contribution to it. Surely the catalog does not end with artistic creations, but touches every field of knowledge, from the humblest to the loftiest, because “humble” and “loftiest” are human judgments, while the universe considers them identical, since all contribute to its functioning. The words of Hugo Cabret in Martin Scorsese’s film come to mind: “Machines have exactly the number and kind of parts they need. If the world is a big machine, I must be here for some reason. And so do you!” We all have a job to do in this life. And we all have a talent that has been given to us for that purpose. The business of living is to find one’s talent. Recognizing it and then igniting it with the fire of passion.

What is Plato trying to tell us? That only those who love create. It is a simple and revolutionary message, more than ever in a time like this, dominated by anxieties, fears and emotional twists and turns, when we think the best is behind us and we cannot trust the future because we no longer have any in ourselves. But against all the fears, regrets and grudges, the moral of this fable stands fearless: every human being comes into the world to create something through love. All that remains is to spread the word.

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Which do you prefer? To love someone who does not love you or to be loved by someone you do not love?

This is not easy to answer. If we say, “to love someone who does not love us,” we join the ranks of the would-be heroes who expose themselves to the sadness of unlove to self and the anger that ingratitude provokes; and if we say, “to be loved by someone we do not love,” we affirm the value of our existence, which is in any case deserving of love, but also the selfishness that does not return the good received.

Then again, this sort of oxymoron of love condenses the daily tension of our journey of human and spiritual growth, which began in childhood. The child is loved by someone who does not love: protected, cared for, fed, kissed by a mother who plunders, exploits, devours. Conversely, in the adult state, the mother loves someone who does not love her: she takes the initiative, gives herself, is patient with a child who can often be ungrateful to her.

The binomial eros and agape is situated in this dynamic horizon of love, in which – as Benedict XVI writes in number 7 of his splendid encyclical Deus caritas est – “eros and agape – ascending love and descending love – never allow themselves to be completely separated from one another. The more both, though in different dimensions, find proper unity in the one reality of love, the more the true nature of love in general is realized.”

I offer some food for thought to delve into the theme of the evening.

Eros immediately refers back to desire. According to Greek myth, Eros was conceived on the day of Aphrodite’s birth from the union of Penia (poverty) and Poros (wealth). Hence he encompasses in himself both dimensions: that of the one who feels satisfaction from the vital energy and indomitable drive to seek that inhabit him and that of the one who continually feels in himself the lack of beauty (Aphrodite) and thus of the good. In this sense, desiring is a powerful drive, to life and of life, which merges with the irrepressible need for relationship, indeed which becomes a relationship with a you-the prime signifier of existence-or with something.

However, as Plato writes in the Symposium, “by his nature [Eros] is neither mortal nor immortal, but on the same day, sometimes he flourishes and lives when he succeeds in his contrivances, sometimes he dies, but then comes back to life because of his father’s nature. And what he procures quickly gets out of his hands, so that Eros is never poor or rich […].”

Desiring is vital. Young people who defy history by following a ‘star’ and the elderly who still know how to dream because they feel the ‘lack of stars’ growing stronger; those who are madly in love and those who live a religious vocation leaning toward seeking the face of God know it; those who leave for a distant country facing the risk of death and those who live far from their loved ones know it. But longing can be lethal. This is known by all those who have thought to find ultimate answers to the deep restlessness of the heart in the conquest of an ‘object’ of desire: always, once achieved, only bitterness remains in the mouth. If one does not learn not to identify with one’s needs and the objects/subjects that can satisfy them, they will dispose of me.

Without education, desire can be deceptive and deadly. It is necessary to exercise freedom and discernment about the ends toward which to direct one’s existential tension. To do so, it is essential to pose a radical decision.

I express it with an image. Desire places you in the middle of the ford of a navigable river, whose calm and placid waters flow into the ocean. The bank from which you have moved since childhood to cross the river of life is manned by your own needs; the opposite bank, which intrigues and attracts, is crowned with countless goods and gifts that are not your own. Only by stopping in the middle of the ford do you come to know the emptiness dug in your innermost self by lack, you can decide to hold back nothing to let the river of life flow in and out of you, and you can discover that desire expands until your heart joins the waters of love, in the open sea.

It is a matter of faith. Dante, in the XXIV canto of Paradise, responds thus to St. Peter who asks him to manifest the substance and origin of his faith: “And I answer, I believe in one God alone and eternal, who all ‘l ciel move, non moto, con amore e con disio” (130-132).

According to one of the interpretations of this triplet, God always creates and sustains the world with love, and his love is matched by the cooperating force of desire that he arouses in created beings and particularly in humans. The encounter between these two motions spreads fragrances of perfume, illuminates with beauty, and fills with bliss.

On the other hand, the word desire speaks of the stars (from Latin: de-sideribus), from which we come or are simply removed (de, a particle that can indicate origin or express motion from place). Dante recalls them at the conclusion of each cantica: coming out of hell those lights are barely glimpsed, very distant, yet capable of instilling hope and animating the desire to see them again (cf. Inf. XXXIV 139); at the summit of purgatory they have already become a sure destination and their nearness disposes one to climb to reach them (cf. Purg. XXXIII 145); at the summit of heaven the poet is as if assimilated to them, made a partaker of their heavenly life and their very splendor. It is worth listening again to this last triplet of the Comedy: “A l’alta fantasia qui mancò possa / ma già volgeva il mio disio e ‘l velle, / sì come rota ch’igualmente è mossa, l’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle” (Par. XXXIII 145).

I unite with the words of the Supreme Poet our wish that, as Pope Francis said in Candor Lucis, each person’s desire will lead to the final landing, to the truth, to the answer to the whys of existence, “until, as St. Augustine already stated, the heart finds rest and peace in God.”

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