First pages of Santa Scorese’S Diary August 6 - November 8, 1986 [Translated by Marisa Salvatores]

Note: Text drawn from the edition cared of Prof. Giuseppe Micunco for the Bari Diocese. The biblical quotations reported in the notes are not derived from the manuscript, but they have been included by Prof. Micunco to “evidence the richness of Santa’s biblical language and to favour reading”. Words and expressions reported in heavy type correspond to the ones Santa Scorese had put in evidence in her manuscript.

Muro Lucano, 6th August 1986 – h 1,05 a.m. (1 )

I lived today an Abandoned Jesus’ face!
I’ve been maltreated, abandoned by a friend and at once I minded only my sorrow. How difficult is to think you have been abandoned too! But I thought to You, to your abandonment and about Your sufferings when Your friends abandoned You (2) and You felt also Your Father far away! (3)

I have been able to recognize You and I loved You: in that moment You loved me even more. How not loving You in the others?

I got down to work and I tried to live the Ideal trying to make myself one with my friends! My sorrow changed into love! It is true, I’m sure You are sinking Your roots into me and I’m happy I’m falling in love with You, because I know Your love mustn’t die, but live and You are my Jesus to love in sorrow, but You are first of all my God that is Love! (4)

Muro Lucano, 10th August 1986

Thank You for loving me, for making me feel Your presence in me. I’m experiencing Your love in sorrow and in joy. Really, I feel I’m growing up, but the most beautiful observation is that I’m doing it with You.

You know, I’m realizing that discovering You is simpler because I want to love, but overcoming my limits, to die to myself is very hard.

Sometimes I really wish to be Mary, but I stop facing me in the mirror. I lack in humility and I wonder how You can love me the same, but I always find the answer: You are Love!
Thank You for my friends! Thank You for Enzo!

Borgonovo di Pontecchio, 15th August 1986 – h 11,20 p.m. (5)

I must say that my first day of spiritual exercises has been good enough because it meant making another little step on the path You have traced for me.

Since this morning I felt You were in me and then all my fears, all my anguishes of yesterday, vanished and I fell into love.

It seemed to me easy loving You in my girl friends, but the nicest discovery, what You have told me this morning (so Carmencita said to me) is that You love me even more. You love me to the point that You kindled in me the willing of joining Mary more and more so She could hold me tight with You.

It is not a passion, but it is a suite sensation that maybe Mary herself put into me.

The sentence that struck me the most was the one Rossella said this morning and Jesus had said it to a Blessed: “Make yourself capacity and I’ll make Myself a torrent”. It’s exceptional!!

It seems to me that You were saying this to me in that moment. How You can make Yourself understood!!

Even staying in the chapel, talking alone with You has been nice! It is wonderful knowing You are there, even in Your greatest pain, on the cross, in the most total abandonment (6), ready to listen to me and to love me!

Today I saw an abandoned Jesus’ face looking at father Luigi (7). You could see he was terribly suffering, he couldn’t even speak, but he still celebrated the Mass . In that moment I was suffering with him and I was saying to me: “ Here He is, He’s showing Himself to me! Don’t be sorry for the father but love him!” And It has been love his pain because in that pain he remembered Your sacrifice and then it meant loving You. I ask You to stop his sufferings but that he could love You for what You give, in the suffering, as You are loving him so. You look very strange sometimes!

And then it has been beautiful today to go over again the steps of Mary’s life as it seemed to me of living them again with her. It has been a discovery of this figure of a Mother ready to every thing , to die to herself for her son and therefore for us. I ask to myself: if God had chosen me, should I have said my yes as she did? I don’t know. I only know that you are asking me something, but I can’t understand it; but I trust You when You say:” I will show Myself to the ones who love Me” (8).

A very nice thing has been the possibility of staying with Carmencita in the group: it hasn’t been just a case, but it has been Your will, and I’m happy You are showing me Your tenderness through her and I can’t say to You nothing but that I adore You and You are my God Love!

Borgonovo di Pontecchio, 17th August 1986 – h 11,05 p.m.

Today I met Jesus. It has been so a great joy, but so great that it is impossible for me to express it with my words. We spoke about the Holy Spirit and then meditation and desert and I found myself alone, but as don Gigino was saying yesterday: face to face with God.

I must say that concentrating has been very hard , even because as usual I was frightened of feeling him so near and I wanted to give up, but here it is Rossella arrives and upsets everything!!

She moved me a bit, but I continued unmovedly in saying: yes, but. And then it has been nice to be said that first of all I have to say yes completely, yes to God and continue in doing the other things with serenity!!

Easy to say! I am so attached to the material things, to my projects, how can I choose God as my all?

At the end Rossella asked me if I wanted to talk to father Luigi and I answered I should have been thinking about. Sincerely I was frightened of what he could say to me because I knew in that moment Jesus would have spoken to me. I felt unable of doing it! And then... another sign! Carmencita came and called just me among the others and asked if I wanted to talk to the father as he was free, Vanna was washing herself and she wasn’t ready. When God gets something in His head!

While Carmencita was talking I was saying to myself that was a sign that God wanted to talk in that moment just to me, not to Vanna or other people... In that moment He wanted me and so I went there. I had no fear of talking and I relaxed and explained all the doubts I had.

The nice thing is that the father listened to me with serenity and told me the episode of the blind young man (9) and he told me that he wouldn’t this would happen to me. This made me worry, but he calmed me saying to continue in my studying, in my Christian life and my prayers, and to accepts also an eventual call without feeling it as a burden.

At the end he said that he already loves me. It has been nice because I felt myself loved and not by a man, but by God and that man in that moment was giving me a father’s confidence, ready to follow me in my walk. I remember Ginetta’s glance one evening in Mariapoli: it was Jesus that was looking inside me (10) and was loving me.

Now I am more serene and I really hope I can trust more God as I know He relies on me and I don’t want to disappoint Him.
I love You Jesus.

Bari, 24th September 1986- h. 4,45 p.m.

After such a long time I Have decided to write and this means finding me alone with myself and with God. Even if sometimes I wanted to write in joy and sorrow I was frightened to do it. But today I feel I have to start again even because today the school begins and this is very important for me.

This morning I felt very troubled because I didn’t like to come back among the same people, but then I thought I would have started by entrusting every thing to God and Mary, choosing Jesus as my fellow traveller, ready to recognize the faces of my abandon to love Him.

So I unusually accepted to sit at a place different from that I would have chosen and then I have been glad to have spoken to Giuseppe trying to make an agreement. I wonder whether we will reach it! Nothing is impossible to God! I really would live this year under banner of your love, because even if the things will not go on always well, I will know You are with me.

But what I would have from me is loving You more and more constantly because very often I find myself in avoiding you if in that moment you are uneasy to me. Then I would like that You would tweak my ears when I don’t accept Your company or I don’t do what You want.

All things considered, I’m glad of coming back to school because I saw people I love as Bia and De Letteriis, but first of all because You give me the opportunity of loving who I don’t like at all ( Angela, Flora) or who hurt me (11) (Sara , Grazia), but I realize that if I am there , with them, it is because You want that I train in loving, in forgiving and in witnessing Your love to us. I ask You to stand always by me because I rely so much on You and really I consider You my best friend and You know it!

Bari, 12th October 1986 – h. 9,15 p.m.

Today has been a very particular day for me. I have been to the mariapolites day and I felt like a fish out of water. I find myself without any friend and I felt uncomfortable because I couldn’t feel the unity and really it seemed to me an utopia.

I felt that those people didn’t really live the word and even Chiara’s resounding words, had a strange sound: I couldn’t think that Teresa, Rita or someone else were understanding all Chiara was saying.

But First of all I didn’t succeed in sinking me into those words. And yet Jesus was talking to me. I was thinking that I should have loved my friends, but I was feeling that I needed to define the situation to go on, but everything was too difficult for me. When later I talked to Antonella I was ill seeing her sad face, but I spoke because I really love her and I wanted she had joined me in my sorrow or at least she had known the reasons why I was so strange.

Really it seemed to me to have lightened my burden, but I don’t think I am completely free from it.
Now I wonder if I have to do the first step or I have to wait for Antonella to come and see me (I have a sort of foreboding that she will call me tomorrow). I really don’t know.

I only believe in one thing: You never let me alone. If today I was there notwithstanding my sorrow and my grief, it was to love Jesus and to be loved. I can say I have recognized an Abandoned Jesus’ face and then I want to love him, as He died on the cross for me. Mine will be a very little part of his pain and abandon, but it is very heavy for me and I want to offer it.

I still see how man is small facing the Eternal Father power. I realize that really you can trust men, you can believe they are friends, but your Friend “par excellence” is Jesus. I’m living now my sorrow with Him and for Him I want to give all my suffering to the Virgin, because as a Mother she can comfort me and be near me.

Anyway I want to say to myself that I don’t give up and that I’m ready to start again because I know that God loves me and if I am here is because He wants something from me. So I ask You, Father, to give me all the strength to go on, but first of all to say always yes to You with joy, even if this will be tiring for me. I want to be obedient to Your will. But, thank You for what You give to me!

P.S. After becoming clear, Antonella and I embraced one another and renewed our unity. I wish this will be a good point to start again.

Bari, 4th November 1986 – h 7,25 p.m.

It seems to me stupid staying here writing because this is only a way of speaking, but a piece of paper can’t surely give me any answer.

Probably I require from the others that I would like near to me, that they reach in solving my problems, to dispel all my doubts, or better, to make decisions on my place.

Maybe it can seem obsessing, but in this moment I feel like a call in making some choices that surely could influence all my future life.

Unfortunately I can’t see clearly in me and when I succeed in doing it I am frightened of knowing me as I am, so I avoid it. I fell that the others don’t make me happy and I think neither can I smile to who needs my friendship. Neither can I love thie sorrow of mine looking at it as an Abandoned Jesus’ face. I really can’t do it. I’m too selfish and in this moment nothing is enough for me.

I’m conscious God is here suffering with me, but I cant understand His love: I can’t even confess myself. I feel I’m changing but I can’t understand if it is in good or evil. It seems to me all so dark! Maybe I should say all this to the Gens, to Irene, but I can’t. I think that they certainly would listen to me, they would love me, but I couldn’t feel weel. I know I mistrust Jesus, because He would be among us, but I feel myself so materialist and rational that I can’t live well.

Really I realize I’m not living but getting along somehow and wasting so much time I could live intensely and that will never come back again. Chiara was saying in the last connection to live well the present moment, (12), but it is so difficult. Sometimes I feel like crying, but I feel I have no tears and I think I am unfeeling, not reaching even to cry.

Humanly I can rely only on one person: Sestilio. I don’t know why, but I feel as he is the only one who can understand me and be near to me. Maybe I feel he is lonely too and that he is sensible behind that couldn’t-care-less attitude of him.

Today I would have spoken to him, and I took ill not finding him, but then I say to myself it was better and that in front of him I wouldn’t have spoken.

Maybe I like this situation, but I think no one really loves me and cares me. Carmencita says we have to say to ourselves God loves us with all our limits, awful, but He loves us.Well! It is impossible for me in this moment to think I’m important to God’s eyes (13). Sestilio should say this is ludicrous, but I feel it is so!

I wonder how can Mum and Dad live side by side with me and not perceive anything, for them it is enough that I’, at home and that’s all. I feel them as stangers and I think that many strangers know much more things about me than Mum and Dad. Don’t they desire to become part of my life? Certainly I feel more Mother Mary and I love and respect more God than my father. (14).

In this moment I would only be very quiet inside and feeling well with the others and first of all choosing what to do with my life so that I will do the best, whatever will be.

Now I have to live, but I have to do it intensely because I mustn’t give up!

Bari, 8th November 1986 – 10,00 p.m.

I haven’t anything special to say, but I felt as writing as well. Yesterday I received the letter from Father Luigi and I realized God spoke to me through him. I got scared because according to him I have the vocation at the 70% and I ‘m more and more thinking about the choices I have to do and I’m asking myself if devoting myself to God is real what I want more..

I remember what Rossella sayed: “ Ask yourself what you want really to do? Do you really want to cure people for themselves or to feel yourself important? I think that really I have to ask myself these questions, without thinking I could disappoint Mum and Dad’s expectations. Anyway today speaking with Carmencita made me much more tranquil and I have thought to one thing.

Now I mustn’t put myself the question of becoming a missionary or a focolarine, but first of all if choosing God (15) as my companion for all my life trying to be faithful to him. On my opinion the important thing is saying yes to You and all the rest depends. Surely I’m living Chiara’s ideal and I feel that it is entering inside me and it is difficult now not living according the ideal of Unity (16), but I’m trying to live also the Virgin’s ideal.

Today then we went to a hospice and this experience troubled me a lot. I sayed to myself that anybody I had met was an Abandoned Jesus to be loved and I was so willing to declare Jesus in the middle (17) but I couldn’t feel an atmosphere of unity! Anyway our goal was to be like Mary going to Elizabeth (18) and this was a way to declare Jesus in the middle.

I realize how much loneliness could be in these places and I was saying to myself those people a long time ago were young as we are, active, and why have they feel now as the dregs of society? A man moved me, Giuliano, who was shouting to everyone but at the end he started crying and he told me his story and his problems.

Very strong and biting was Aldo, a very rich and even cultivated man, who told me:” But what you want? Let that we die in peace!”.

And when we told him we were ther also for him, he answered:” I tell you the truth: coming here, you bring with you what we have lost”. It’s true, we went there, we made the good deed, but I don’t feel quiet and satisfied because I know I haven’t been nice to those people going there and who knows when I will go back and see them!

I realize we arouse in them many rememberings, never fulfilled desires and now they are waiting nothing but death. So it didn’t seem to me I have given to those people a reason to continue in living, in praying. Everything is useless for them and I felt useless too! I really hope God will work a lot in them so that to have good fruits.

I must remember we are useless servants (19). But I want to pray, Eternal Father, in the name of Abandoned Jesus so that those people will find the strenght to continue in going on because they are important and precious to your eyes (20). I ask You this by the Virgin Mary ‘s intercession.

Notes:
1. Muro Lucano, province of Potenza, is the original place of Santa Scorese’s father. Her family used to go there every year for a period of holidays.
2. Cf. Mt 26, 56.
3. Cf. Mt 27, 46.
4. Cf. I Gv 4, 15.
5. Borgonuovo di Pontecchio Marconi (Bologna), in the Center of the “Virgin’s Missionaries Father Kolbe” where many times Santa Scorese went for spiritual retreat or formative meetings.
6. Cf. Again Mt 27, 46. It is a typical expression of the Focolari’s movement spirituality, that we will find many times in the short A.J. (Abandoned Jesus).
7. Father Luigi Faccenda, founder of the “Virgin’s Missionaries-Father Kolbe”.
8. Gv 14, 21.
9. Mt 19, 16-22.
10. Cf. Sal 138.
11. Cf. Mt 5, 44.
12. Cf. Mt 7, 34.
13. Cf. Mt 6, 25.
14. Cf. Mt 10, 37.
15. Cf. Mt 6, 33.
16. Key word in the movement of Chiara Lubich’s Focolari, inspired by Gv 17,23: “ut unum sint”: we will find it many other times and we won’t notice it.
17. Another typical expression of the Focolari’s movement, according to the Evangelical saying ”where two or three meet in my name I’m among them” (Mt 19, 20). The expression “Jesus in the middle” (short J.I.t.M.) will come again and we will not notice it.
18. Cf. Lc 1, 34 sgg.
19. Lc 17, 10.
20. Mt 6, 20.

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