“Let’s go back human”, ecology and spirituality for people and the Planet

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Life is full of mystery. The mystery is everywhere: above, below, around us. Sometimes you feel it in an amazing way, sometimes you ignore it. We are all inhabitants of the same planet, yet so different in interpreting the signals we receive. Most of the time it would be enough to stop and look around even for a moment to grasp dimensions that are not necessarily beyond our human reach, but they require time, patience, and concentration to make themselves clear.

The days became a series of commitments which, paradoxically, took away the time at our disposal to… remain human. What should be done, then, to return, in fact, human? Tomorrow, Saturday 20 August at 9 am in San Paolo in the Laghetto areawill try to answer this complex dilemma Don Luigi Verdi and Father Ermes Ronchi.

In dialogue with Michela Faustini, vice president of the Province of Brescia Events Foundation, Father Ronchi and Don Verdi will discuss the topic “Let’s go back human: integral ecology and spirituality as a dimension of the human”. The meeting represents the last appointment of «Oro inmouth», the review promoted by Province of Brescia Events Foundation which touched the mountain communities of Valcamonica, Valsabbia, Sebino Bresciano and the lands of the Bassa, proposing morning meetings preceded by short walks immersed in nature.

Don Luigi Verdi

According to Don Luigi Verdi, founder of the Fraternity of Romena meeting and welcoming place, a Romanesque parish church located in Pratovecchio in the province of Arezzo, the first step towards becoming human is to ask oneself how the world I want should be and not the world I would like. «The world I would like, as a Vasco song says, is a bitch – says Don Luigi -. The first step is to get started to think of the world I wantas it should be, bringing up the will if you really intend to change it ».

According to Don Verdi the transformation is where it begins: in being an active part. Then, in all likelihood, “the evils of this time, which are the nihilism of which Nietzsche spoke and its consequences – tiredness, never feeling at home, loneliness – can begin to drift away”. Only in this way will we have the sense of “a new world, which will allow us to be a church in and around us”.

Father Ermes Ronchi

Father Ermes Ronchi with Pope Francis

Slowness and inner discipline are Father Ermes Ronchi’s “cure”, who has two doctorates in the History of Religions with a specialization in Cultural Anthropology at the Sorbonne and in Religious Sciences at the Institut Catholique de Paris. In 2016 Father Ronchi, on behalf of Pope francescoholds the meditations of the spiritual exercises at the Roman Curia and since then has lived in the small community of Santa Maria del Cengio, in Isola Vicentina.

«We must recover the slowness, that is the ability to do one thing at a time – he explains – and, with it, give us time every day for the mind and for the body: half an hour of silence to put the mind in order and half an hour of walking to return to experience that amazement that is in the realize the existence of a tree, learning its name ». They seem like simple gestures, yet, in everyday reality, they are so complicated. “Paying attention to beauty is an answer”. Starting from the flower, from the blade of grass.

“Because ecology is not an ornament, but a matter of life and death and we realize this by seeing what happens around us every day – concludes Father Ermes -. If the ship sinks with a quick and superficial glance, I can also lock myself in my cabin so as not to see, but this does not mean we will be unscathed from what will happen ». The answer lies “in not looking at nature as something you possess, but as a mystery to be experienced and enjoyed”.

Path

The Laghetto locality is part of the Strone River Park. At 8.30 we leave the car at the car park of the Pasini furniture factory (Via Roma 92, San Paolo), proceed along the cycle path and on a stretch of dirt road that leads to the lake. Estimated travel time: 20 minutes. Following the arrows along the path you enter the wood where, after a small bridge, you come to a meadow with a wooden construction.

In case of bad weather the event will be held in the parish church of San Zenone. Participation is free upon reservation at: reservations.oroinbocca@gmail.com.