A BIRTHDAY REFLECTION

I will be turning 51 next Tuesday, the 16th of June.

Wow. How did it happen?

Where have I been all this time?

What have I done with my life?

Somewhere in my heart I can still see the boy I once was, full of dreams and expectations. I can still watch him digging beneath the medieval castle of my village with his friends, searching for a treasure that might change their lives.

I am not particularly fond of my birthday, because it forces me to face all these questions, and one above all: have I done what I was meant to do? Or have I lost myself somewhere in the intricate weave of life? Will I meet gratitude on my deathbed, or will I be visited by a crowd of merciless regrets?

So, for me a birthday means wrestling with the famous question of Francis of Assisi, the essential one: “Who are you, God? And who am I?”

Francis of Assisi

Who are you, God?

You may ask: Mirko, you have been in the Church since you were a boy — what have you come to understand about God?

I would answer with a single word: Silence.

God is silence. By this I mean that everything I have experienced, studied, and understood — every thought and prayer of mine, every homily I have ever preached — is utterly inadequate to express what God is for me. If the whole world, every human being and every living creature, could fall silent for one minute, that minute would be the finest theology of all. For every word is too poor to express who He is. Silence is the most eloquent theology.

Who am I?

This question is no easier. I wonder sometimes whether I have truly understood myself, whether I have ever grasped that unique trait called Mirko, or understood what I was meant to do with this life.

To begin to answer, I can start with where I come from. I come from two people named Edda and Giacomo.

My mother was a seamstress. She could knit wonderful jumpers from wool and work delicate patterns with a crochet hook. And yet what I remember most about her is her beauty: her smile, her kindness, her warmth.

My father was a farmer and a factory worker. He was known as a communist, a man who spent most of his working life fighting for the rights of labourers. I wonder whether I inherited from him my distrust of every kind of power, especially the power that seeks to limit freedom and creativity, the power that takes pleasure in humiliating others and keeping them quiet.

The memories of my parents are painful, too. I remember their constant struggle against poverty, the effort to give us a dignified life, the humiliations when they could not pay their debts. Above all I remember my mother fighting for her life: the hospitals, the doctors, and my own overwhelming sense of powerlessness.

A story of light and darkness that has forged the person you see today. This is my story, and I hold it tightly to my heart.

Fr Mirko