The Christmas message as an occasion to encourage all men and women of good will, the ecclesial associations and movements, the paths and all the parishes, to continue their commitment to build an entirely synodal Church, “open to listening, capable of relationships and closeness, above all aware that in every passage of the history and periphery of our society we are called to generate Christ, fullness of humanity and a sensible answer to every existential question”. A journey from Bethany to Bethlehem: this is how the bishop of Nola, mgr. Francesco Marino, in the Christmas message. A text that arises from the desire to share some simple reflections, “the fruit of my meditation – says the prelate – which, starting from the evangelical scene of Bethany, spiritually takes me back to the events of Bethlehem, in a certain sense it prefigures the house of Bethany, as a building site for listening and for new humanity”.
“The grotto of Bethlehem – continues mgr. Marino – with his poverty also stimulates us to rethink the meaning of the dynamics of our proclamation which, as we see, no longer take advantage of the immediacy of a place in which to identify and not even on a shared Christian culture from which to start, rather we must find sharing and synergies on an experience of authentic humanity and in the search for the common good with all those who have at heart the desire to redeem the weak. We are discovering it in the discussions and in the synodal reflections: it is urgent to move from a pastoral care structured in predefined forms and circumstances, in circumscribed physical places, to an ‘outgoing’ proximity towards the existential peripheries. It will not be a question of rejecting ecclesial structures or abandoning them, rather of making them ever more habitable, flexible, allowing all those who experience poverty of all kinds to enter after having gone out to meet them. We must certainly hope that the distrust of the inhabitants of Bethlehem today will be overcome, but also for us believers to avoid being ‘distracted’ by the many services such as Martha of Bethany who, although organizing everything for hospitality, ends up not really welcoming”.
For the bishop, “one of the greatest poverties of our time is determined by an anthropology closed to transcendence, to ulteriority, to eternity; in other words we are building an idea of man in which there is no place for God. It is no coincidence that Jesus praises Mary in Bethany, who, unlike her sister Martha, knows how to choose the ‘better part’, that reality of listening to the Word which he does not exclude assistance services, but nevertheless pays attention not to let himself be distracted by that Essential which gives meaning to everything to be done”.
The invitation is therefore to make a choice like Mary’s. Not only of Mary of Bethany but first of all like that of Mary of Nazareth: “Even before the sister of Martha and Lazarus, it is the Virgin of Nazareth who chooses the ‘best’ in the presence of Jesus. Guarding and meditating in the heart is the dynamic of discernment, the art of living that spirituality of listening and authentic Christian commitment. Christianity is based on an integrative, inclusive logic, never absolutizing one aspect or despising other necessary ones; the Christian is, therefore, the one who in his actions knows how to choose the ‘best’ to live the ‘whole’ in an aware and free way”.
