Hope Without Barriers: Living in Our Time in an Age of Uncertainty
Julián Carrón - Libreria delle Volte, in collaboration with the Diocese of Perugia-Città della Pieve, presents the following event as part of the series of meetings entitled 'HOPE WITHOUT BORDERS': 'LIVING IN OUR TIME' - Meeting with Julián Carrón. In conversation with Professor Roberto Contu, essayist and writer.
Presentation of the book 'Abitare il nostro tempo. Vivere nell'età dell'incertezza' (Living in Our Time: Living in an Age of Uncertainty) on Saturday, May 10, 2025, at 9:00 p.m. at the Sala dei Notari in Perugia.
The book is the result of a dialogue among three leading figures in contemporary culture: Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor, Emeritus Primate of the Anglican Church Rowan Williams, and Spanish theologian Julián Carrón.
The topics addressed concern each and every one of us: Where can we find hope, especially after the collapse of certainties accentuated by the pandemic crisis? Can we be free while at work and engaged in public relations? Is there such a thing as lasting affection, or are all relationships doomed to end when disagreement and conflict prevail? How can we deal with the fear that paralyzes so many, especially young people?
The thinkers featured in this dialogue are not afraid to delve into the most uncomfortable questions of our time, managing to look at all forms of humanity with sympathy, encompassing art, poetry, politics, and music. Faced with often painful enigmas, holding on to living hope remains the challenge to be embraced.
Through the voice of Julián Carrón, who, in 'Abitare il nostro tempo' (Living in Our Time), dialogues with other thinkers, we will embark on a journey into the heart of human values and their contemporary living space—an exploration of the meaning of faith today, the desire that moves us, and the freedom that expresses itself.
This is an unmissable opportunity to navigate the profound changes shaping our era, resonating in our deepest fears and reflections, and to find a light capable of piercing the veil of uncertainty that shrouds our present.
YouTube Original Video (Italian): HERE. The YouTube video translated by AI can be found here: PART ONE, PART TWO.
Roberto Contu - Good evening, everyone. It is a pleasure to be here tonight. This meeting truly begins with the story of a meeting, and that is what we will do tonight. First of all, I would like to thank those who invited us and those who organized everything. I would like to thank Don Carrón, who is here with us, and we are here because I hope that each of us will take home with us tonight a little of what I believe has happened to anyone who has read this book, namely, a spark of hope, because that is what it is all about. I said this earlier at dinner: the first thing that struck me about this book is the feeling of being inside a meeting. It is a book with three voices, but it is clear that it stems from a previous story, a significant story, a story that conveys meaning. An encounter that began ten years ago and brings together three important voices: a Canadian, a Welshman, and a Spaniard from the extreme north, in a place where cherry blossoms say more than many words. However, precisely because this aspect is so significant, I would like to give the floor to Professor Gerolin, who is in many ways the architect of this book but also of this experience, to tell us a little about how it came about.
Prof. Gerolin - Good evening. Rather than a professor, in this book I appear as Alessandra, because we were in Cambridge studying with a group of friends. I was doing my PhD at the University of Cambridge, and we happened to have this great encounter with a group of Anglican professors and students who had started a real movement within the Anglican Church. And, let’s say, even though it was a movement closely linked to the university, it invested a great deal in human encounters, so much so that after a very short time, one of the leaders of this movement, Professor John Milbank, a theologian and philosopher, introduced us to Rowan Williams, then Primate of the Anglican Church.
We felt like little dwarfs in comparison to him, not only and not so much because of his role, but because he is truly a very intelligent and highly educated person. He speaks many languages, and what amazed us most was his openness of heart, that is, how this man was searching for something truly meaningful in his life, but continuously, not once and for all, day after day. And so the relationship was born, through this Anglican professor, between Rowan Williams and Julián Carrón, which then developed in a way that was, let’s say, completely autonomous. And this was already before 2010, around 2010. And then there was this second big encounter with Professor Charles Taylor, because we were always with this group of friends, for study reasons, attending a conference by Professor Taylor in Rome. Then I was going to stay in Rome for an audience with Pope Francis. Professor Taylor is one of the greatest philosophers, a great scholar of the phenomenon of secularization. This huge book he wrote, almost 1,000 pages long, translated into Italian as “L’età secolare” (The Secular Age), won the Templeton Prize, a very important international award.
And there was always this group of Anglican friends, including Rowan Williams and John Milbank. At one point, Professor Taylor asked if he could stay for this audience. But he was supposed to leave for Canada the next day. So I told him that unfortunately there was nothing he could do, because it was impossible to change his ticket. And he said, “No, I want to come; help me change my ticket.” And so, because of this chance encounter, he completely changed his plans, and from there an intense dialogue began with him on the phenomenon of secularization. And once, when he returned to Rome to receive the Ratzinger Prize for Philosophy and Theology from Pope Francis, there was an opportunity for this dinner with Julián Carrón.
The two, who come from very different backgrounds and have very different sensibilities, really got fired up on this burning issue, namely secularization, in other words, our times as a great opportunity to discover our needs. What are the needs that really keep us alive, that make us get up every morning? And what can respond to these needs? And so together they had a lively discussion about the nature of Christianity as a possible response but also as a continuous reactivation of the fundamental needs and desires of human beings. So this book was not born out of an intellectual project, but rather it collects a piece of the history of a meaningful friendship between these three men.
Roberto Contu - But I would like to start immediately with the title, which I think is good for everyone: “Living in Our Time,” which is a truly prophetic expression by a giant of our time, Francis, on November 8, 2023, in a general audience. And today, as I was thinking about what we would discuss this evening, I started a little from my own experience, which I will share a little this evening. I am a teacher, so I am in a place, school, where by definition everything seems to be always in a hurry; everything changes. We live in a time when everything seems precarious, meaningless, and school is one of the places where these fears are projected a little more: these kids, what will happen to our future?
And then you read a title like this: “Living in Our Time,” not “being” in our time, but living in the sense of giving meaning to what we all do in our daily lives, in our places, at work, in our families, that is, really trying to stop for a moment and recreate a horizon of meaning. And even this challenge: “Living Without Fear in an Age of Uncertainty.” I believe that this is already a real perspective, a point of view, a glimpse of the spirit of the times, and it is what these three voices courageously do.
And the first issue that is raised is precisely this: we live in a time without evidence, says Taylor. “First of all, it seems important to me to observe that we no longer live in Christianity, but then what? I believe that this new situation will push Christians to take a step forward from the admirable achievements of Christianity.” Julián Carrón says: “We live in a time of the collapse of evidence.” First of all, there is this courage to address issues that we often remove, that we often feel working beneath the surface in our daily lives, creating uncertainty and anxiety, but that we do not know how to look at with clarity. This is the first point I would like to propose: what does it mean today to face a time without evidence?
Carrón - Good evening, everyone. Thank you for this invitation, for this opportunity to discuss issues that concern us all. The collapse of evidence may seem abstract, but we see it many times in our daily lives and at all levels: for example, the difficulty our children have in understanding certain things we say, the difficulty in relating to students, the difficulty in understanding our colleagues at work, the difficulty sometimes in understanding our spouse. Yes, why?
Why do so many of the things we used to share seem to no longer be shared? The first thing is to understand this: why? What happened? Why, almost without realizing it, do we find ourselves facing this difficulty, this lack of harmony on things that previously seemed so obvious?
If we don’t understand this, we struggle to understand what our times mean. Then we find ourselves struggling to relate to others. We can see that there are very concrete examples of this, always delving deeper into the various issues. But I find it very helpful to understand this by giving a little historical background, reading Pope Benedict.
When he describes what happened historically after the Protestant Reformation, the subsequent wars of religion between Christians, he means that unity was blown to pieces—it had been blown to pieces—and what had previously been common ground fragmented at a certain point.
Then, at a certain point, when Christians of different denominations—we can say—got tired of fighting, we had to rebuild something in order to live together. If there was no religion, what did we have in common? Reason. And so Kant, a leading exponent of this awareness, said: “Let’s create a religion within the limits of reason,” which is an attempt to say: let’s try to separate these fundamental values that Christianity has brought, which we all share because of our Christian identity, but let’s leave out all the ties to denominations and seek, for what we share together, evidence that can remain beyond our quarrels.
When the Enlightenment thinkers came up with this idea, they thought it would last. Time has shown us, when we look at the present, that these values brought by the Christian tradition—the family, life, the person, freedom—all these great issues, gifts, are beginning to be emptied of meaning, despite having been upheld for centuries by laws or convictions in nations, by traditional mentalities. At a certain point, it is as if they have lost their obviousness.
And so, suddenly, we find that the most obvious issues—apparently more obvious some time ago—are no longer obvious.
What we are trying to say with this expression, the collapse of things that were obvious, is this: it is what defines our time. Pope Francis has said repeatedly that we are in a time of change, but a change of era. The further we go, the more this diversity emerges. So, understanding the origin of this—which is not that it changed overnight, but that it has been a process that has gradually emptied certain words of their meaning, so that they now have a different meaning for people—helps us to understand an unmistakable feature of our time. We struggle to talk to others about the most basic issues.
I went to present this book in Battipaglia, in southern Italy. I could not have imagined that in a town near Salerno I would find such great religious and cultural diversity, as I did, as if I were in New York, London, or Hong Kong. Do I understand why? Because the world is totally different.
Roberto Contu - Yes, I would add a problematic element that I thought about a lot when I read the first part, precisely this first prompt. It is clear that we are all part of a generation that lives in an obvious fault line, right? Most of us have lived in a world that is essentially that of the twentieth century, where many of us were raised in a culture that was entirely Christian.
But then, thinking back to what I see in my mornings at school, you know, this year, in fifth grade, we’re going to be studying 2007.And this question that is asked, this strong awareness that is present at the beginning of the book: Taylor says: “We no longer live in Christianity.” In reality, in my students, in the sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds I see, it is absolutely evident. Whereas when I was in high school in the 1990s, the world was radically different. There is a fault line; we all understand that: communication has changed, the way we live in the world has changed, the way we construct and try to make sense of our answers has changed.
However, I would say that this very awareness of how much of a crisis this period really is opens up, in a beautiful and hopeful way, the next step that you take in this book. And the theme is this: a crisis forces us to return to the questions. At one point, you say that Taylor says we need to look to the figure of Christ. Christ is that figure who, in the moment of storm, remains calm; in the moment of crisis, when we seem to lose our bearings, that world we knew and in which we had sunk all our certainties seems to be failing. Young people today tell us that questions are becoming important again. What do you think are the questions that really need to be brought back, refocused, asked by all of us, even those of us who have already completed a large part of our life journey?
Carrón - We see questions constantly in many signs that we find in normal life. You just referred to the context in which Jesus began to enter human history. If we look back, Jesus entered a world where there was great religious diversity: Sadducees, Essenes, Pharisees, priests, Baptists, Essenes. Jesus stands before this diversity saying a word that the Pope used: “unarmed.”
He leaves his power behind and stands before everyone with this meekness. Then, Christianity in the Hellenistic world, a very diverse world where all religions are present in the Pantheon. Let us remember that Pantheon of gods, where there is a diversity of religious forms. Christianity has always lived in a very different cultural context, searching for meaning. This changed with the arrival of Constantine and especially
Theodosius, and lasted until almost the time of the Enlightenment and then to our own time. So we find ourselves in a world that is very similar to the one in which Christianity began. Jesus enters that world, as you say, in turmoil, where people are like sheep without a shepherd, each groping for a meaning to live, putting forward a way of being in reality that could contribute to the possibility of finding an answer to this search.
And what are the questions that people have? The meaning of life, the reason for getting up in the morning, the meaning of suffering. As Jesus says, “What good is it to gain the whole world if one loses oneself?” People have repeated this question in every way possible. Why? Because those who experience life cannot help but realize, as Leopardi said, that everything is little, small for the capacity of the soul.
Below is the polished version of the provided article, meticulously reviewed and corrected for grammatical errors, punctuation mistakes, sentence structure issues, verb tense consistency, word choice, and formatting. The revisions enhance readability and flow while preserving the original meaning, words, and tone. Following the polished text, I provide brief explanations for significant changes to aid the writer’s understanding of English grammar and punctuation rules.
Why does this dissatisfaction return in so many ways? But is there something that lasts? Is there something that can respond to the desire for fulfillment that we feel within ourselves? Or must we be content with the fact that there is no answer, as Marracash says: “I fill my time with my activities, but I can’t fill the void”? This is the big question. Does everything we feel as a desire for fulfillment have the possibility of finding an answer or not?
The difference from the past is that today Christianity is not the only option. This cultural unity has been blown apart, and now the Christian option is one of many possibilities, as it was in the Roman Empire in the time of first-century Palestine. We are groping with our questions, but there is no unanimity in proposing a hypothesis for an answer. We are faced with this diversity in this changing era, and each of us is called—this is the exciting aspect of the moment, from my point of view—to put ourselves on the line, as Taylor says, in search of an answer.
Taylor defines our time as a time of “seekers,” seekers of a reason to live. And this is what we share. The questions have not disappeared with secularization; on the contrary, they are even more acute because, whether religious or not, the questions that press upon life do not disappear. This is the fundamental characteristic of our time: we can no longer get on a “treadmill” that carries us along on its own. There is nothing that makes things easier for us: we are all a little lost, searching for something that gives taste, meaning, and fullness to life. And often, even if we manage to achieve our family, social, or career goals, they are not enough.
And there are many signs. To mention one that we all know: a few years ago, the song that won the Oscar. When asked, “Why were we made?” the girl singing says, “But why was I made?”—because seeing that it wasn’t enough just to survive. And when you see that nothing, not even fun, fulfills them, you start again: “But why was I made?” And when Marracash, after talking in a recent interview about his poverty, where he was born, and how he was able to earn money and become successful, says: “Guys, I would give you a Rolex, so you could understand that it wouldn’t be enough to get you up happy tomorrow morning.”
That’s why I’m now interested in understanding: “Who am I? What do I want?” He went from seeking success as the answer, but now he says: “Why, despite having achieved this success, do I find myself surrounded by an unnatural silence and emptiness? Who am I?” He has moved from seeking fulfillment in success to realizing that this is not enough. “Who am I? Why, even when I have this success, can’t I fill the void?” These are the questions that continue to press upon us in many ways throughout our lives.
Roberto Contu - In fact, the most human and humanizing experience that we perceive in this dialogue is first and foremost this, which is a great service to all of us, isn’t it? Putting my fear, your fear, our fear back at the center. This week made me think a little: by chance, in class, I brought Manzoni’s Pentecost, the sacred hymn, and there is all that initial church, isn’t there? Before the outpouring of the Spirit—which is hidden, which has doubts about failure—and the time of Holy Saturday, the time of the disciples of Emmaus who return defeated. So, looking at that possible dimension of faith, of our presence in history, and above all giving a new perspective of meaning, but also with the courage to understand what the negative attitude might be.
Because, appropriately, at a certain point we reflect that crisis is also the moment when divisions become strong. And we have spoken about this in all forums, on every possible occasion. We realize how polarized today’s world is: we divide ourselves, we quarrel with one another, we put up barriers. And this also happens to those who live the Christian message: fear of diversity, entrenching ourselves in the defense of what we see as a heritage that must not be lost, but at the expense of others.
At one point, Taylor says: “Christians often feel themselves on the border between two types of community, two types of relationships,” but there is also a Church that closes itself off. And so, before getting into the important and beautiful part, I would like to say a few words about this closing off, this feeling of being under siege and then, in fact, suffocating.
Carrón - Eh, but this really raises a big question, doesn’t it? Because if you feel under siege, you can simply perceive it as trouble. And if this were an opportunity to realize, “But am I right? Am I?” I found a boy in school who, for various reasons he told me, felt under siege, right? Because someone had talked about demons, and anything he felt wasn’t working, he blamed on demons. And so he says: “I felt anxious.”
So the principal brings him to me and says, “Can you talk to him?” I say, “What do you want?” He says, “I want the truth, because they’re making me anxious, all these issues. I want out of this situation.” I said, “But what do you think is making you so fragile? It’s that I’m going to end up, that I can’t... I can’t do it. I need to get out of this. I want to know the truth.” Because he had sensed that this was the only thing that could free him from this situation of anxiety, because his brother had had these panic attacks. I said, “But you see, you feel like you’re under siege—to give a concrete example of real people—because, deep down, you don’t know who you are. If you don’t become aware of yourself, you’ll always be at the mercy of what others tell you.”
So often, others highlight personal problems that we have not addressed, our inconsistency. What if all this were an opportunity to go deeper, to lay a foundation for our lives that would allow us not to feel the external situation as a siege? Why does Jesus enter history and not feel besieged? And many Christians live in history and do not feel besieged. We can live with certainty, can’t we? If we can walk a path that gives us such awareness of ourselves that we don’t simply see ourselves as frightened, afraid, as Jesus said before, in the face of the storm.
When Jesus wakes up and sees his disciples frightened, full of fear, he says: “Do you still have no faith? Why do you doubt?” I stand before this storm and I do not have this fear. Christianity entered history to respond to this situation, but this is only possible if one has an experience that can generate within him a person capable of being in reality without being determined by this fear, by this uncertainty that the book speaks of.
And so one does not feel under siege, because this feeling of being under siege is what then leads to rigidity with others, to feeling that I cannot go to the other, to feeling that the other is an enemy, to feeling that the other is only an obstacle, to feeling that everything is against me. But this is only a symptom of my own fragility. It is not others who generate this fragility; they merely highlight it. And so, for us, it can be, as Pope Francis said during his visit to Canada, an opportunity to embark on a journey that makes us no longer belligerent, but capable of having such certainty about what we are experiencing that we can live by communicating with others in different contexts.
And this certainty comes from an experience of maturity in life, which each of us must find for ourselves.
Because when you find yourself in front of someone like that, I too would like to be so free in a situation like the one we are living in. What if this were an opportunity to start a journey like this young man? I want this. When I propose this to him, to take this path, he says: “I want to follow this because I want to discover that you can live life without being determined by anxiety.”
Roberto Contu - Yes, and this perception is also one of the key points of the book: how, in this paradigm shift, there is a revolution at a very fundamental level that is personal, but in reality becomes global. Because we will get there: we will emerge from this fear. You say: “I have never perceived reality or people as enemies.”
Or Taylor says: “We live in a paradox where I feel that in my relationships with people who are on a very different path from mine, I am helped to move forward along what I recognize as my own.” And so, in the themes of ecumenism, forgiveness, and world peace, we understand that there are implications that resonate dramatically today, but also strongly. However, the first revolution is within us. And in fact, you just said it: embracing this perspective opens us up to the possibility of walking. But precisely because we are in a secular age, I was very struck by this, because it is something I have also found in myself, but I believe it is the experience of many, when at a certain point we say: stop believing that not believing precludes an experience of fulfillment, as believers think, or thinking that believing is a system for explaining what we experience, as atheists claim.
That is, to give up this judgment on the other and think that perhaps a non-believer, or someone who follows a path far from ours, cannot have an experience of fulfillment. And, on the other hand, to give up this idea that because someone embraces a greater path, which is that of faith, they claim to understand everything they experience. That is, truly stepping out of a comfort zone that is common to all.
Carrón - But this, in my opinion, is one of the big questions, isn’t it? Because everyone—not only non-believers but also believers—must verify in their lives the capacity that their experience, whether they are believers or non-believers, has to face the drama of living.
Because so often, due to the way they believe or live their faith, people live in fear and see the world as an enemy. Living like this, they want to defend themselves from this evil world by taking refuge in a bubble, right? We see how many Christians, in their way of living their faith, perceive the world as a risk and want to shut themselves up in a world that no longer exists. The result is not only that the problem remains unsolved, but that they are weakened even more.
I always remember an episode told by Don Burgio, a priest who works with the boys at Beccaria, the juvenile prison in Milan. He recounted an incident that happened to him: a young man who had been in another community before arriving at his said, “I lived there, in that community where everything was surrounded by protections, and I was with God there, because I couldn’t—I didn’t even have the temptation to deal drugs—because there was no possibility. I didn’t even have to ask myself questions, because there was no risk.”
The problem was that when he left to take a step toward freedom, he returned even weaker than before. Because so often we think that by taking refuge in a comfort zone or locking our children into this situation, we are helping them defend themselves, but we weaken them even more if we don’t offer them something that allows them to live in reality.
If we do not generate—yes, any ecclesial, educational, formative, and maturing reality for people—if we are unable to generate people to live in this real world, as we are describing our time, it will always be worse. Because it means our inability to communicate to the new generations a meaning of life and adequate reasons, and to help them follow a path that allows them to have the consistency to remain in this world without being determined by all these events we are talking about. And this is the great social and cultural challenge we find ourselves in.
If our society, whatever way it lives, in one way or another, is unable to produce people with such consistency—with such a powerful sense of self that they are able to avoid being overwhelmed by their reaction to evil, injustice, or simply the opinion of others—how can we build bridges and not walls? If we are the first, afraid, to build walls instead of bridges?
And how can we try to open ourselves to others and not remain in our bubble, if we cannot breathe the fresh air of the world, if we cannot go out into reality with the awareness that our consistency is not that we are more or less, but that the strength of the person, as Don Giussani said, lies in the intensity of their self-awareness?
If we do not raise people in this way, whatever type of education and lifestyle choices they make, the situation will only get worse. This is why I say that this is a truly worrying situation from an educational point of view. From the parents’ perspective: what do they need to raise children for this world? What is the challenge for schools to be able to raise people when we don’t know where they will end up working—whether in Madagascar, Kuala Lumpur, or Australia? If we don’t raise people for this reality, it is a total admission of failure.
Instead, I think that precisely in this situation, when the Christian proposal is presented as a proposal to reason and freedom, so that the person can verify it, it can offer a possibility that I don’t know how many realities are able to offer. But this means we must ask ourselves: Why did Jesus enter history? He was not afraid of the situation, yet we, as Christians, often witness almost the opposite, being afraid in the face of this situation. Because something is not right. Jesus was not only unafraid, but, as St. Paul says, he stripped himself of his divine condition to enter history as one among many.
We, on the other hand, seem to think that this situation is too risky, and we want to defend ourselves from it. And so we close ourselves off, each in our own bubble, whatever that may be. But this means that there is something in the transmission of the faith—in that experience that Christ placed in history—that is not capable of generating people like this: what St. Paul calls a “new creature.”
Because as soon as Christianity began to communicate itself, it brought this newness to a world that was totally foreign. Imagine when Christianity entered the great agora of the Roman Empire: there were just a handful of people; they were nothing; they didn’t touch the sphere of power.
But never was Christianity’s communication to us more powerful than in that moment. But if Christianity today—I use Christianity as an example, because any proposal claiming to offer a solution must verify it—even if it lacks it, because whatever the proposal, if it is valid, we will see if it generates people capable of living in this society without increasing tensions, walls, opposition, or rigidity, instead fostering a place for dialogue, discussion, and reasons to stay and build something together. This is the challenge we all face, whatever our allegiances.
Roberto Contu - There is a very beautiful expression that echoes throughout the text: “recognizing ourselves as spiritual seekers.” One aspect I appreciated in this book, and also in other things you have written, is that you have the courage to create a genealogy of all those voices that have paved the way.
So you quote that Black writer, you quote Jacopone—the poet of the immeasurable, but also of the cowardice of Péguy—Leopardi, of course. But it’s also a bit of what I’ve seen and discovered relatively recently while reading Giussani. However, as I was reading this part where you, at a certain point, open up personally about your own journeys, an episode came to mind that I’ll share with you.
When I was twenty, I was at university, going through a crisis, and I had read, searched, and discussed. But one day, I was in the university residence where I lived, and I met someone important to me. He was just climbing the stairs, and I asked him, “How’s it going?” He turned around and said, “Great, very good,” with a big smile. And for me, that someone could say that things were great—that life was genuinely beautiful—was a real turning point at that time.
Why am I telling you this? Because when you, at a certain point, recount your personal stories of conversion and the beginning of your faith journey, you really touch on deeply human aspects. The cherry blossoms in Extremadura moved me deeply.
So, I would ask you this: Tell us how, in the smallness of our experience, both personally and as a community—it was for me with that teacher who, at a certain point, simply by saying that life was beautiful at that moment, opened a path for me—we can take on this responsibility of witness, which is far less abstract and theoretical than we think. Sometimes, really, it’s enough just to meet someone and smile at them.
Carrón - But this, in my opinion, is the great challenge because when you find someone, it means you have found someone who has traveled a human journey and who lives in the same world you lived in and have in mind. And there you are—confused, in crisis, groping around, not knowing which way to turn.
You find someone who lives in a situation similar to yours, but they do so with a positivity and joy that inspire you to want something similar, right? That’s what happened to me when I found Fr. Giussani. I had gone to the seminary when I was young, and no one could tell me that I hadn’t taken the proposal they made to me seriously.
But I often felt that there was something in my way of being in reality—that I didn’t have this freedom, this ability to be amidst challenges with the peace and joy that your friend had. I saw others living in this situation, which is why I was interested in the proposal they offered. It was precisely for this reason, as I’ve always said since then, that from the moment I met him, I was able to embark on a human journey. Because I saw that, by verifying what he proposed, I could avoid being increasingly determined by this fear or this existential insecurity.
And so I saw more and more that, in these situations, it was possible to make a journey that allowed a person to be formed. That’s what you’re saying, isn’t it? That I can face diversity without fear, with a joy and freedom I couldn’t have dreamed of before. So, who can communicate this, you asked? A person who has followed a path can communicate this, right? Because, in the end, what can we… A father, a parent—what can he communicate to his child? His experience. Because your children, seeing you, observe how you react to the news on television, to the difficulties you face at work, to the challenges of society and your life.
They see you living together as a family—and so do we. Whatever the context in which we live, we document and bear witness to our fear, our uncertainty, or our ability to live in reality with a capacity for freedom that others see. What can we communicate, if we can communicate it? What we have lived and are living in our experience. Because what we need today, as Paul VI already said, is not only teachers, but witnesses who can demonstrate that it is possible, in this world—as you do for yourself—to live differently.
And this is what we don’t find much of today, unfortunately, because the problem of education is not a problem of young people, but a problem of adults. You said it with this example you gave, like the one I shared—what saved us? Seeing an adult who could live reality with a consistency and certainty that we desired for ourselves.
This is what arouses the envy and desire to become like them. This is the starting point for an educational push because, as I was saying, reawakening touches the inflamed point of the person. And this is what we can communicate if we have an experience. With the current difficulties young people face, which we were discussing earlier, it is so they can see people in front of them who are not tossed about here and there amidst the situation we live in, but who can live with a certainty they cannot yet dream of finding.
Below, I present the polished version of the article you provided, meticulously reviewed and corrected for grammatical errors, punctuation mistakes, sentence structure issues, verb tense consistency, word choice, and formatting. I have enhanced readability and flow while preserving the original meaning, words, and tone as requested. Following the polished text, I include brief explanations for significant changes to aid your understanding of English grammar and punctuation rules.
Roberto Contu - Yes, at a certain point you say: “It is not true that more God means less humanity and vice versa.” This is right at the heart of the book. You come to this realization that the first revolution is the one within us.
There is also a beautiful and comforting part, really, where the themes of happiness, desire, and freedom are addressed. However, in my opinion, the important and political aspect of this book is that the revolution that takes place within us—if we look at it, focus on that fear, make it human, and allow it to bring about change in us—then, in fact, that change of heart, which is personal, becomes a change for the whole world. And so, for example, at a certain point, the theme of ecumenism, peace, and the future is addressed.
But I believe that the methodological premise is what you say at a certain point, isn’t it? Because it is clear that we all have the perception of a historical moment in which the urgencies are truly, in the worst sense of the word, apocalyptic. It is something that really seems to have deprived us of the possibility of stopping a story that is going in a certain direction. And at a certain point, you say something that is initially unsettling but comforting: “I am certainly aware of the many urgent issues that characterize today’s reality.
At the same time, however, I am in no hurry to find an immediate solution, because it seems to me that the human journey requires time to mature.” And again: “What makes life life is the growth of the person. But in order to mature, we need to encounter reality, to face the most varied situations, learning to judge them. This is what makes us adults.” That’s why we mustn’t be in a hurry to arrive. Why am I showing you this passage? Because for me it was the source of an important question, right? Because the risk is that, even with good intentions, we bend to the logic of the world.
Carrón - What you say seems crucial to me, because I was recently at a meeting with schools in Monza, with Minister Valditara. A young man asked me if he could learn things, if the things that happen in life could leave something behind, a trace within him, right? Because otherwise, everything passes without leaving a trace.
I always remember this line from Eliot: “But where is the life we have lost living?” Because the tragedy is that so often the things we experience leave no trace, and so we waste our time living, because they do not have the capacity to shape the person we are. And young people feel this particularly urgently, because they often perceive that nothing remains that has the capacity to last.
I was very struck by one of my students last year. I said to her, “Tell me something, Giorgia.” “Yesterday I got a tip at work.” A 17-year-old girl who is studying at a vocational school and working to earn some money. “That’s great! Why do you think they gave you a tip?” “It’s because I worked hard.
I try hard to wait, to pay attention to everything my customers need.” “See, that’s you: when you were there looking at your cell phone to see when your work would be finished, or you were so caught up in that way of working that you were enjoying yourself and didn’t even remember your watch or look at your cellphone.”
I say, “With all the hours you have to work in your life, if you start enjoying yourself like you did last night, how much have you already earned? The tip? And in the enjoyment, then you get to the tip; it will be like the icing on the cake.” She looked at me very seriously and said, “Prof, everything in me is reset,” meaning that nothing remains.
What happened? Was this true? Two weeks later, I returned to the charge because I was so struck by the fact that a girl had realized that many of the things that happen in life, even if they are beautiful, do not generate her as a person, do not teach her anything. Nothing remains of what they experience. I had told at least twenty people about it; it had struck me so much. But she, after two weeks, when she came back, said, “Remember that word; it’s worth it.”
Nothing, not even about the episode. I mean, it’s not that good things don’t happen, but it’s as if nothing remains. Why? Because no one has taught her a method to help her use everything that happens to her to grow.
That’s why I’ve told, I don’t know, hundreds of times, about something that happened to me once with two girls in Barcelona. Talking about these things, I say to them, “But you, who are at the end of high school, would you have any certainties about math to share with your six-year-old sister?” “Sure, about life.” Silence. “How many hours of math have you done compared to your life? In a few hours of math, you achieve some certainty; in many hours of life, you have almost nothing to communicate.” And I said, “Why do you think that is?”
“Because in math, you are taught a method that allows you to gradually, through comparison, through exercises and more exercises, through comparison with the teacher, learn a method. But in life, no one has taught you a method by which you can learn, and so in the end you have nothing to communicate with certainty about life.”
While we were talking about this, the mother arrived—the lady who was waiting for me there in Barcelona—and she said to these girls, “Do you know what my daughter Claudia asked me? ‘Mom, is life always like this?’ She’s six years old.
Do you have anything to say to this girl?” Nothing. I mean, if we can’t offer them a method, as this young man said, responding to the young man from Monza: “If you don’t ask your teachers to teach you a method for learning math, don’t ask them, at the same time, to teach you a method for learning from the things that happen, for developing your personality.”
Nothing remains, and so in the end, people are not formed. And this seems to me to be one of the fundamental challenges, because what saved me is precisely this ability to learn from everything that happened to me. Why? Because someone suggested to me the method of comparing everything with my need to live. You see, when life truly responds to all your needs, when, even if you make mistakes, you realize that this is not necessary to respond to life.
If you don’t make this constant comparison, as the girl did with the tip, yes, everything is reset. In the end, you always go back to square one. And so we find ourselves increasingly frightened, increasingly empty, because it leaves no trace.
And this seems to me to be one of the most serious challenges we face as a society, because now no one can indoctrinate anything—because it is useless—but we can challenge the person to realize what emerges in their experience, what makes them understand where life flourishes and where life is emptied.
Where they—the person—grow, and where they remain without taking any steps. And where everything becomes part of an enrichment, and when everything is wasted. If this is not the case, in this world where there is no evidence of anything, in the end nothing remains. How? With the ability to convince people. And here we have a truly momentous challenge, because if we cannot help people grow, there will always be more and more people who are out of touch with reality, more violent, more incapable of fitting into reality, with more violence inside them. Not because they are bad, but because no one has made them an offer that makes them increasingly able to see what is best for them to live their lives better. So that they can enjoy life and do not need to do stupid things or commit violence, or the things we read about every day in the news, to ruin their own lives and those of others.
Roberto Contu - I have two final questions. The first is based on a real episode: before Easter, I did a civic education activity in my class and took a risk, and we talked about conflicts in the world, and so of course we also talked about what is happening in the Holy Land.
At one point, a boy—there were several of them; they had to write essays and then we had to discuss them together—a boy wrote, a stimulating boy with important thoughts: “They kill in the name of God.”
And then a girl intervened and said, “If they don’t forgive each other, there’s no way out.” In this book, at one point, you also address the theme of ecumenism, of relationships with others.
At one point you say: “Recognizing the seed of truth that we find in others” is a reflection that I think we are all making and that, however, I believe also allows us to highlight what is truly the great value that Christ taught us, which is forgiveness. You see, I believe that we all feel powerless in the face of what is happening, in the face of what is happening in these times, given the way things are turning out.
Here, you are effectively demonstrating dialogue between different worlds, which nevertheless emerge stronger and enriched. And I ask you, truly—I know the question is a big one—how can we truly make this gift of forgiveness, which Christ brought to earth, flourish at a time when it seems that we are actually going in a completely different direction?
Below, I present a polished version of the article you provided, meticulously reviewed and corrected for grammatical errors, punctuation mistakes, sentence structure issues, verb tense consistency, word choice, and formatting. I have enhanced readability and flow while preserving the original meaning, words, and tone as requested. Following the polished text, I include brief explanations for significant changes to aid your understanding of English grammar and punctuation rules.
Carrón: It is only through the experience of having been forgiven that one can forgive; no one can forgive unless they have been forgiven. Jesus said: “This woman has been forgiven much, and therefore she loves much.” Jesus says this to the sinful woman who washes his feet, responding to the Pharisee who thinks that Jesus is unaware of who the woman washing his feet is.
But I think that the ultimate root of this is not even forgiveness, even though it is important, because forgiveness is the response to a mistake we have made.
But if we do not find an answer to the real question of living, what is the question of living? We see this in the Samaritan woman, in Jesus’ dialogue with her. To give an example, it is not that Jesus is unaware that the Samaritan woman had had five husbands and that the one she had was not her husband, but what interests Jesus is responding to that woman’s thirst. And what did that woman’s thirst mean?
It meant a thirst for fulfillment. Because if she does not find the answer to her thirst for fulfillment, she will continue to look for another husband, because she cannot live without it. Even if she is forgiven, the problem will still not be solved unless the person finds such fulfillment that she no longer needs to do foolish things to look for something she has not yet found.
For this reason, if Christianity—if Jesus—does not respond to the problem of fullness, to life, to the urgency of living, what use is it to man? To gain the whole world if he loses himself? If he does not answer the question he has asked, and if he does not answer the question: “What can truly give satisfaction to life? What lasts over time?” I think that Jesus’ answer would not be credible. And I am amazed, looking at what we are now hearing in the liturgy, at the example of the dialogue that ensues after the multiplication of the loaves, which is recounted in the Gospel of St. John.
Because there Jesus began to respond to the problem of those who were standing there listening, and he did not want to send them home, poor things, without feeding them. After the multiplication of the loaves, they were so satisfied that they sought to make him king, recognizing who he was. But Jesus, with a surge of passion for the people, said: “Look, man does not live on bread alone.” He had responded to their hunger, but he knows very well that our hunger, like our thirst, cannot be satisfied simply by multiplying loaves of bread. And so he begins to raise the bar: “Look, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you cannot have life in you.”
But when Jesus raises the stakes even higher? “No! This is too much. This is crazy. But who can claim to bring the life that we cannot find in any of our attempts?” And so those who sought him abandon him. This is why I say: if Jesus had not challenged us, even at the risk of being left alone, as happened with the twelve—if Jesus had not challenged those seeking fulfillment in this way, to the point of risking that everyone would leave, as they did—he would not be credible, because he would not have faced the great drama of living: but is there something that fills life, this thirst for fulfillment?
Is there anyone who can fill it? Because if there is no answer, we will continue to do evil; we will continue to seek fulfillment elsewhere; and we will continue to feel the need for forgiveness. But in the end, we will never solve life. Jesus, on the other hand, says: this is the difference between the disciples who began to experience life differently.
And when Peter, who at one point had asked Jesus: “But we who have left everything and followed you, what will we have?” He does not think: “But Peter, don’t you have him before you who gives you life?” But Peter still did not understand. Now, when everyone left him after the multiplication of the loaves, Peter, who had made a journey and truly understood the significance of the presence of his friend Jesus.
But do you also want to leave? No one is spared, not even those who remain, because it would not be a passion for their destiny if they did not understand this. And so we see Peter’s journey: “But where shall we go?
Only you have words that fill our lives.” For this reason, if we do not have this experience of fullness, it will be difficult to be able to value others, the crumb of truth that others bring, because we will all be seeking to impose something, to find something to fill the void. Only someone who lives this fullness can be able to value everything, as Jesus did.
Without this, we are only searching for a fulfillment that we have not yet found and cannot find, and so we only seek to affirm our own navel. And this is the origin of so many quarrels which, as in most cases, are absolutely useless, which give us nothing that fills our lives, but only document that we have not—that we have not been able to find something capable of satisfying the hunger and thirst that is in the heart of each one of us.
Roberto Contu: For those who say that in order to hope, one must have received a great grace, we live in a time of grace, anyway. We are in the city of Leo XIII; we have all witnessed the joy that has come our way.
Today there was a meeting with the College of Cardinals of the new Pope Leo XIV. The speech was made public. I will read a passage that I consider important: Pope Francis masterfully recalled and updated its contents in the apostolic exhortation Evangelii gaudium, from which I would like to highlight some fundamental points: the return to the primacy of Christ in proclamation, the missionary conversion of the entire Christian community, growth in collegiality and synodality, attention to the sensus fidei, especially in its most authentic and inclusive forms, such as popular piety, loving care for the least and the discarded, courageous and trusting dialogue with the contemporary world in its various components and realities.
He then continues: “Feeling called to continue in this vein, I thought of taking the name Leo XIV.” There are several reasons, but mainly because Pope Leo XIII, in fact, with his historic encyclical Rerum Novarum, addressed the social question in the context of the first great industrial revolution, and today the Church offers everyone its heritage of social doctrine to respond to another industrial revolution and the developments of artificial intelligence, which pose new challenges for the defense of human dignity, justice, and work.
Carrón: When I hear all these things we have to do, I ask myself: who is the subject that will do them? And I say: all this is the great mission that lies before us, all of us as Christians, but no one gives what he does not have.
Can all this be possible, can we do it, can this possibility of being thus in reality emerge almost from the depths of our life experience? If we, as Christians in the Church, live an experience such that we can generate this subject capable of doing this, if these are not just appeals that find no foothold within us, because they can be reduced to a desire that cannot be realized unless the person capable of interacting at this level is generated, from artificial intelligence.
Artificial intelligence, to bring out all the novelty and richness that it offers, requires someone who is capable of asking the right questions. It requires a fullness of life, a capacity, a creativity to draw from this vast, endless library that will be artificial intelligence. We have questions.
So we return to the previous point. In my opinion, the real issue is that our society, at all social, cultural, and religious levels, faces a challenge: the generation of the person. Without this, all these things will remain ideals and desires, but it will be difficult for us to remain grounded in reality without fear, with the ability to dialogue with the least among us, to value everything, and to respond to the needs of others, if we do not live fully.
Because the whole Christian experience comes from richness, from gratitude for what Péguy said: “To have hope, and to be able to have hope in this world, one must have been touched by a great grace.” If this great grace is not the generation of such a person, I think it will be difficult for hope to take root within us..
Roberto Contu: I usually avoid underlining; I take notes, but I underlined these three lines. “I think we are facing a challenge that can be an opportunity. We didn’t seek it out. It is a call that comes from reality, and we cannot glimpse the plan behind it. We discover this to the extent that we engage with reality. Secularization, paradoxically, is an opportunity because it is calling me. It is calling everyone to a greater awareness of the nature of being human.”
Thank you.
Roberto Contu: Well, let’s invite our Bishop.
Bishop Ivan Maffeis: I have a very difficult task: to wish everyone good night. (Laughter) And I will do so. Just two days ago, we were all, in a sense, with our eyes and hearts in St. Peter’s Square.
We were there with our questions, as Alessandra said earlier, with our desires, with our expectations. And I think we were all caught up in it. And what cannot fail to have struck us is that the square—that square that is us—exploded with joy before a person whom no one knew, but whom everyone recognized as someone who could become a guide, a reference point, and help us find a way to answer these questions.
Tonight it is the same square, not a different one. And tonight it is filled with many people who, with their questions, their expectations, their concerns, are also willing to bear witness that the way forward exists. Thanks to Carrón.
Bishop Ivan Maffeis: Thank you very much.
Bishop Ivan Maffeis: Thank you, Roberto!
Carrón: Thank you.
This article is a summary of the preceding text, originally sourced from a YouTube video. The editorial board of Epochal Change undertook the transcription of the video text into Italian, followed by its translation and editing into this format. Please be aware that the authors and speakers have not revised this text.
This article has been posted from its original source (https://youtu.be/DfgxVTG-1QQ?si=hsUIH6iDxngQxSyV) solely for educational and informational purposes, intending to facilitate understanding and foster knowledge sharing. The translator or distributor makes no claims of authorship or intellectual property ownership of this version. All intellectual property rights, including copyright, remain with the original authors and publishers. The original rights holders strictly prohibit any reproduction, redistribution, or adaptation of this material for purposes beyond its intended educational use. This article respects and honors the integrity of the original work and its authorship, ensuring it is neither misrepresented nor plagiarized.
