Chiara Lubich

Chiara Lubich (born Silvia Lubich; January 22, 1920, Trento – March 14, 2008, Rocca di Papa), was an Italian teacher and author who founded the Focolare Movement, which aims to bring unity among people and promote universal family.

After the suppression of the newspaper by the Italian fascist regime, he opened an export business of Italian wines into Germany, but due to the crisis of 1929, he was forced to close it.

Having refused to become a member of the National Fascist Party, he found it impossible to get work and had to resort to doing odd jobs to support his family.

Thus, the family lived in financial hardship for years.

Her mother and the local Sisters of the Child Mary provided her with a solid formation in the Christian faith.

She developed a strong sense of social justice from her father; her brother Gino, who was also a socialist; and the family's life of poverty, becoming very sensitive to the needs of the poor.

At the age of 15, she joined the ranks of Catholic Action in Trento and soon became a diocesan youth leader.

Chiara attended a teachers' college and became a passionate student of philosophy.

Her great desire was to attend the Catholic University of Milan, but she failed to win a scholarship.

Initially deeply distressed, she suddenly felt consoled by an inner certainty from God: "I will be your teacher".

As soon as she graduated, she took jobs teaching in elementary schools in the valley regions around Trento (1938–39), and then in Cognola (1940-1943), a town close to Trento, in a school for orphans run by the Capuchins.

She was a charismatic figure who broke with many female stereotypes as early as the 1940s, opening a previously unheard of role for women in society and the Roman Catholic Church.

She later took the religious name Chiara upon entering the Franciscan Third Order (1942-1949).

Luigi Lubich worked as a typesetter for the socialist newspaper Il Popolo, directed by Cesare Battisti.

In autumn of 1942, in the wake of a simple conversation about the love of God with a Capuchin friar, Casimiro Bonetti, he proposed that Silvia enter the Franciscan Third Order.

Attracted by Clare of Assisi's radical choice of God, she took the name Chiara, which is Italian for Clare.

Her experience of God's love was the topic of conferences she gave to the young women of the Third Order.

Among them was Natalia Dallapiccola, who, at the age of 18, was the first to follow Lubich.

In the autumn of 1943, she left teaching and enrolled at the Ca'Foscari University of Venice, continuing to give private lessons.

On September 2, 1943, Anglo-American forces began bombing Trento, which took it by surprise.

Following the armistice between Italy and the Allies, the territory around Trento was occupied by Nazi forces and annexed to the Third Reich.

Her brother Gino joined the communist partisans and fought against the Nazi-fascist regime.

On December 7, 1943, in the chapel of the Capuchin College, she pronounced her total “Yes, forever” with a vow of perpetual Chastity.

As she and her first companions ran to the air-raid shelters, they took only a copy of the Gospel, which they read and tried to put it into practice.

However, due to the circumstances of the war, at the end of 1944, she had to interrupt her studies.

Focolare was founded against the backdrop of the horrors of World War II.

In the midst of this, Chiara discovered the life-giving alternative: God, who is Love.

It would become the inspiring spark for the movement for peace and unity that would later emerge.

In the summer of 1944, he was arrested and tortured.

Amidst the uncertainty about the future and fear for life itself caused by the war, Chiara realized how everything passes, everything collapses, everything is "vanity of vanities" (Eccl. 1:1) and "only God remains".

She became convinced that "the salvation of the twentieth century is love".

She shared this great news with "letters of fire" that she wrote to her relatives, to the young women of the Third Order, and to her colleagues.

Soon other young women joined her in living what they called a "divine adventure".

In 1948 she wrote: "We have understood that the world needs to be healed by the Gospel because only the Good News can give back to the world the life it lacks. This is why we live the Word of Life (…). We have no other book except the Gospel, no other science, no other art. That is where life is!"

Chiara and her early friends dedicated themselves to the people in the poorest sections of Trento, recognizing in them the presence of Jesus.

Thanks to a growing number of people being involved, food, clothing and medicine arrived with unusual abundance.

Lubich is considered a notable figure in ecumenical, interreligious and intercultural dialogue, as recognized by UNESCO, which awarded her the Prize for Peace Education in 1996; and the Council of Europe, with the Human Rights Award in 1998; among others.

She took her place in the history of contemporary spirituality among teachers and mystics for the authentic Gospel-based inspiration, universal outlook, and cultural and social influence that distinguish her charism, spirituality, and work.

The second of four children, Lubich was baptised Silvia.

Her mother Luigia Marinconz, was a fervent Catholic, while her father Luigi, was a socialist and convinced anti-fascist.