Returning* by Mariella Colosimo of the meeting of biblical reflectionof the PAROLA… E PAROLE group** of 2 March 2018

The group WORD… AND WORDS, to which some boys have been added, is measured with the song of Luke 2,41-51, an evangelical page that speaks to us of "Jesus disciple", a believing boy, capable of listening and asking himself questions, but in which a moment of the childhood of Jesus is also highlighted in which family relationships become tense and difficult and arise. Perhaps for this reason the choice of the group has fallen on this song.

To grasp that family, who wants to be exemplary for our families, in a conflict situation is comforting for those who in turn live daily conflicts with their children and are equally reassuring those words referring to Mary and Joseph: "But they did not understand". It is too early, in fact, to understand. It is still along the path.

Accepting the incomprehensibility of some emotions, some gestures, of behaviors of our sons and our daughters, and stopping while waiting to understand little by little, enriching the relationship of thoughts, feelings, shared experiences in the meantime, is a challenge that can involve not only the parents but also the boys and girls who in turn have to deal with the choices and behaviors of their parents, for them equally uncomfortable.

The parents/children relationship, the conflict between anguished parents and the son who wants to go on his way brings out the great concern of a mother who in his solitude never knows when and how to intervene towards his daughter.

Living the coming out of one's child as a second birth with all the suffering and sense of rebirth that every childbirth brings with him, feeling crossed by the strength of life that is reborn from pain, can be an opportunity to encourage inner growth and faith that seems to have to accompany us throughout life.

What deeply questions us is that ability of Mary to "keep all those things in her heart", an ability that does not always belong to us. Guard It is not the same as hold One thing in the heart, refers to the idea of ​​carefully preserving something in the heart, meditating it and making it germinate in a fruit of authentic love.

The humanity that can be seen in Maria's words: "Son, why did you do this? Here, your father and I, we were looking for you anguished" evokes another equally anguished question: "Mom, why did you ask us this?". However, a question that is experienced as unnatural, almost not human and all the more disturbing the more unexpressed, silent.

And again. The humanity of Mary, who perhaps glimpsed the fate towards whom the son would have gone to meet, recalls the refusal of a mother compared to this destiny, the irrepressible desire to protect his creature.

"Without the parents noticing it" says Luca: this sentence arouses bitter and painful memories. How many signs, how many requests for help have not been caught by parents closed in their concern and unable to relieve the solitude of a child in search of love and recognition.

Yet it has laboriously walked towards mutual acceptance in the awareness of wanting to love each other, despite everything.

That implicit reproach in Maria's words: "Son why did you do this?" He returns and re -emerges a scream of anger in those who in turn felt reproached, often more, despised and not recognized in their creative identity. What about the pain aroused by that same question, accompanied by a request all the more unbearable if they pronounce it are parents: "Live hidden, why are we right to our serenity"? How to maintain a serene relationship with parents who to his son, praised by others for his sensitivity, his intelligence, his commitment, know only to say bitterly sighing: "If they knew what you really are ...".

The word of hope where to trace it?

Become educators of their parents looking for a bridge to reach them. But is such a reversal of roles really desirable? Learning from your children is one thing, more is the reversal of roles.

Word and words: interpreting, playing with words can go in the direction of opposition and accusation or, if the words are read lightly, in the direction of mutual understanding, of reviewing things from other points of view. If we removed the "Ci" from that question of Mary, perhaps it would play in another way: "Why did you do this?"

Listening to others allows each to rethink the words of the Gospel, in particular to understand more deeply the loneliness of Jesus, who in that circumstance does not feel understood by his parents.

Inventing their children to stay serene, to overcome guilt, to share their experiences with others, overcoming any form of isolation to which society seems to confine, is a way to reassure both parents and children.

"If I saw an incarnate love experience I saw it in that hospital room ...", words of hope that have gone through the group, words that make sense of a life situation that can sometimes appear senseless.

Luke 2,41-52

His parents went to Jerusalem every year for the Easter party. When he was twelve years old, they got into the custom; But, after the days of the party, while resumed the way back, the boy remained in Jerusalem without the parents noticing it. Believing that he was in the party they made a day of travel, and then they started looking for him between relatives and acquaintances. Having not found him they returned in search of him to Jerusalem. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the middle of the teachers, while listening to them and questioned them. And all those who heard it were full of amazement for his intelligence and responses. When you see him, they were amazed and his mother said to him: "Son, why did you do this? Here, your father and I was looking for you anguished." And he replied, "Why did you look for me? Didn't you know that I have to deal with the things of my Father?" But they did not understand what he had told them. He then went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. Her mother kept all these facts in her heart. And Jesus grew in wisdom, age and grace before God and men.

*The return is a sort of report of what has been said during the meeting. As in a collage, significant fragments of the interventions of the individual participants, words and thoughts expressed by each and each one are placed together.

** WORD… AND WORDSIt is a Christian experiential meeting group for parents of LGBT people and LGBT parents from Rome. We meet to travel and trace the journey together towards an inclusive society and church, where nobody is put on the edge. We do it following in the footsteps of that Jesus of Nazareth, who, on the streets of Palestine, shared his life with the excluded and excluded of his time. We meet once a month, normally the first Friday, at 8 pm at a place adjacent to the church of Sant'Ignazio. Those who are interested can contact us in these contact details: Alessandra Bialetti Cell. 346 221 4143 -alessandra.bialetti@gmail.com; DEA SANTONICO CELL.338 629 8894 -dea.santonico@gmail.com