ITALY HAS CHOSEN WITH ITS DEMOCRATIC VOTE, BUT THE MOST LIBERTARIAN AND DEMANDING CHOICE REMAINS THAT FOR CHRIST

If the truth will be seen in Jesus everything will be recovered, otherwise everything will be lost for our poor Italy which has been struggling for some time in a Europe which is floundering lost between hatred towards its own Christian roots and an exasperated and maddening secularism which has lost, along with the Christian ones, also the roots of democratic liberalism itself.

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I just got back to the convent, after a retreat of a day and a half in the company of some priest confreres belonging to a priestly fraternity and I was unable to experience live the electoral count of the last political elections which involved all of Italy between Sunday and Monday, if not for short twitter beds before going to sleep, borrowed from some news agencies.

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During a sera to dinner, together with the other priests of this fraternity of which I belong, I was struck by the words of one of them, older than me in age and wiser in wisdom that thus began: "my experience with politicians has always been one of either disappointment or betrayal".

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This confession it was for me a bolt from the blue, because I found it profoundly topical and painfully true. The politician, when of his own free will he turns to the Church or to the priests, he does so either to ask for a vote or because he intends to carry out an exchange of favours. But surely he does not go to the priest as a baptized person who questions his being a politician and seeks the light of that Holy Spirit who is the only one who can obtain a wise heart in government, as we see done in the prayer of the young King Solomon [See. 1 Re 3, 5-15].

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It's very frequent for a politician running for election to identify as a Christian, but once elected he forgets it very easily, not hesitating to bite the hand of his electorate, not making the slightest scruple about going against the Gospel, to the Church and mocking the priests, the latter thing that many parish priests personally experience in the daily skirmishes with the various mayors and presidents of regions at any level, sign and color belong.

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To tell the truth, this occurrence occurs much more frequently with centre-right alignments which have always boasted a historic closeness to the Catholic electorate and even propose themselves as Defender of the Faith, except then endorsing anti-Christian policies using civil rights as a carpet and the untouchability of already established regulations that, needless to say, vary from abortion to euthanasia, from the recognition of marriage between same-sex couples to gender forced in schools and so on.

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This first look deserves careful reflection and at the same time a question: how come the Christian denomination within politics never coincides with adherence to the person of the living Risen One, except for some accident amarcord cultural, how is the matter of Halloween at the end of October or the crib before Christmas? Fare amarcord culture does not help salvation, both for man as well as for the State which is equally immersed in those pangs of Creation wounded by original sin which awaits a definitive redemption. We therefore need to walk a path of recovery that can only be undertaken with Christ and which is preserved within a path of holiness that, as John Chrysostom suggested, above all it needs the recognition of sin, so that the latter may be handed over to Him who has made a massacre of sin. Because it is clear, the baptized man, before any other work activity, social or political is a man handed over to Christ according to the words that the Blessed Apostle Paul will say to the Galatians:

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"Brothers, all of you are children of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for how many of you have been baptized into Christ, you have put on Christ. There is no Jew or Greek; there is no slave nor free; there is no male or female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus." [Gal 3,26-28].

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Christ is truly the all-encompassing element around which the new man reborn in baptism finds his deepest and truest identity together with that operation which drives him to build the Kingdom of God on earth (as we ask moreover in the Our father), which is not the antiquated implementation of an anachronistic theocracy but the definitive realization of that mystery of the incarnation in which "God became man to make human life, both personal and social, a concrete way of salvation [See. Speech of the Holy Father Francis on the occasion of 50 years after the encyclical Development of Peoples].

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It is not the political manifesto of an alignment that engages my characterization as a man but is the ontological resemblance to the Son of God who became man for me and in his humanity redeemed me by dying on the cross. With all due respect to the numerous baptized members of any political party, I would like to remind you that the ideal to be pursued in the Christian life, the fundamental option that informs action resides in the person of the glorious Crucified, in that tiring Amen daily uttered while following the Risen One in which all the authority of the Father is present who gives the possibility of doing things that would not be contemplated in our concrete possibilities [See. GV 21,1-14, MC 16,9-20].

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Christ is the life option that does not admit antagonists, which leaves no room for other suitors who aspire to win the heart of man, as we well know that those who are not willing to love Christ more than their father, of his own son, of his own daughter, of his wife, of his own party is not worthy of him [See. Mt 10,34-11,1]. Yup, dear, you understood correctly, even of his own party, just as the various disciples of Jesus who militated within the Zealot party had to learn.

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We often run the easy illusion to be disciples of Christ because we identify with perfect moral acts which not only do not lead to Christ but are revealing of that vanity and that narcissism which leads towards a pathological self-salvation. And of leader pathological narcissistic politicians and heads of state we can number several in this historical moment. Our local politics is sick and highlights the narcissistic aspect of the human, creating operational perspectives that are not redemptive because they lack the true Redeemer of man who is Christ. Invariably, with such programs based on narcissism, shipwreck is reached and the sovereign people go astray by revolting in the bed of their own conscience, now at right and now to left, in the fleeting hope of calming down and reaching the longed-for sleep, without knowing that he will still have to stay awake for a good part of the night waiting for that Bridegroom who he will only be able to recognize if his own baptismal lamp has not run out of oil.

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Italy has chosen the Centre-Right coalition with its vote, headed by the Honorable Giorgia Meloni. As a Christian and as a priest I can only pray for them as it is right to do, especially in a historical period so tormented by the specter of war, from a thousand human criticalities and the fragility of our planet's resources. I remain convinced that this last democratic expression is not yet fully mature, there is still too much evident passion that has guided the hand of the Italian voters. This portends an immediate future of bitter disappointments: from the appointment of ministers to the first measures in the courtroom, the veil will fall from the eyes of many and will be revealed, perhaps even betrayed and disillusioned with what one had hoped to be able to change.

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Meloni will be the first woman to head the Presidency of the Council of ministers in Italy, its task will be very difficult not so much for the fragile plethora of the current opposition but for the narcissistic dynamisms of the center-right coalition which will not allow it a serene government sheltered from snipers and moral blackmail. I am also very concerned about the possible tensions with the Quirinale which will entrust the task to a political coalition that does not seem to play its music and which in many respects has been prevented in various circumstances.

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I conclude with the reference to Italian Episcopal Conference which through the mouth of its Cardinal president affirms that the Church «will continue to indicate, severely if necessary, the common good and not personal interest, the defense of the inviolable rights of the person and of the community". I was surprised by the use of this noun in Cardinal Matteo Zuppi's communiqué, given that the Church in recent years has been everything, except strict with the various governments with mandatory traction PD. And so I thought, have you ever seen that also in via Aurelia n. 468 Has anyone thought of packing their bags and leaving the country as Chiara Ferragni proudly declared to the four winds, Fedez, Elodie, the Berte, Rula Jebreal, Roberto Saviano and many others still in view of Meloni's electoral victory? One might say, in both cases … God willing!

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Maybe it will be a mischievous thought but even within the Church the danger of parliamentarianism and narcissism is very strong, so as to obscure the primacy of the glorious Christ and it will certainly not be an unplanned severity to revive the fate of what appears lost. It takes seriousness to start afresh from Christ, not severity, it is necessary to invoke the Holy Spirit so that there may be a new Pentecost within the nation-states, this must be done by the Church.

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My very personal wish for the future premier italiano and his coalition is to start looking Christ in the eye and wondering like Governor Pilate: «What is truth?», if the truth will be seen in Jesus everything will be recovered, otherwise everything will be lost for our poor Italy which has been struggling for some time in a Europe which is floundering lost between hatred towards its own Christian roots and an exasperated and maddening secularism which has lost, along with the Christian ones, also the roots of democratic liberalism itself.

Laconi, 1October, 2022

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