A Letter for the New Time

Solomeo, 2 April 2020

The rising of a new time has already begun from the shadows of a painful night; this new time, my esteemed friends, I see it brimming with fabulous opportunities, a bearer of new lifeblood, a creator of ideas revolving around a renewed desire for life. I know that there will be a new economic growth; I know that enthusiasm will make our hearts soar. But at the end of this all we will be different; we too, like time, will be somehow new. Something has been transformed and it will make us see things and life in a different, beautiful, enchanted light. That very same bread, which we took for granted yesterday, will now be a new surprise, a warning to remind us of those who do not have any bread, and should have it. In every man we will recognize another man: our brother. Something has changed, and it will reveal us that family is the bud of society. And so water, the fields of wheat, the orchards, and the animals that feed us, will take on a new look, they will be full of a meaning that is their natural, just, balanced one, they will become almost sacred. This value is that of the rhythm of Creation, which beats in our hearts.

Dear friends, I am convinced that the new time will be a fascinating opportunity for us to shape a virtuous relationship between humanism and technology, between spirit and harmony, between profit and giving back. We must know that behind every problem there is an opportunity. Michelangelo, a larger-than-life human being, used to say that life is an art form, and like art, you need your heart more than your hands if you want to enjoy it.

So I would like to say that this is an opportunity that does not concern an individual man only, but every single man in the world. I would like our eyes, our hearts, our whole being to be ready to grasp the universal gift that our destiny has prepared for us. I am fascinated by Confucius' words: "He who does not foresee things far away exposes himself to close-range misery."

When the end of this eclipse comes, and the sun returns to colour life, then our hearts will be filled with joy; but that will be a moment of utmost caution. If we know how to set the pace, if we continue for a little while to comply with the tested rules of painful events, if we focus on the language of Creation, we will naturally return to our usual life equipped with some extra values, fascinated by everything that is worthy of being called "human".