My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ (Mt 27:46).”

Given that we are approaching Easter, I reflected a bit on how much God loves me, each one of us, us as humanity. We are “designed” to be in a relationship of unity with one another
When unity is broken, when you experience the suffering of disunity, the remedy that the spirituality of the Movement proposes is this: Jesus crucified and forsaken.
But who is Jesus forsaken?
In order to understand this, I must tell you about another episode from the early days of the Movement.
The war was raging and in reading the Gospel, we, first focolarine, had found the description that Jesus gives of when he will come to judge all men and women at the end of the world. He will say to the good: “I was hungry and you gave me food”. And the good will ask: “Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you?” And Jesus will reply: “Whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me” (Mt 25:40).
Once we had understood this, I remember that we would go around the city looking for the poor and giving them whatever we had.
Not only this. We had identified the three poorest neighborhoods in the city and, entering dark and desolate hallways and climbing old and dangerous flights of stairs, we would visit the elderly who were abandoned, sick, and lonely.
One day, one of my companions went to visit a little old lady out of love for Jesus. She cleaned her poor, shabby room, fixing her bed, washing the floor and all the rest.
Because of these acts of love, she caught an infection on her face which was now covered with sores. But she didn’t mind; indeed, she was happy to be a little similar to Jesus crucified.
I had gone to visit her on a very cold day, and because she wanted to receive Holy Communion, we thought of inviting a priest to her home so that he could bring it to her.
The priest came, and before leaving, he asked us: “Do you know when Jesus suffered the most?
We answered according to the common mentality among Christians at that time: “In the Garden of Olives”, where Jesus sweat blood because he had begun to experience sadness and anguish. He said: “My soul is sorrowful to the point of death.”
We really believed that that was his greatest suffering.
But the priest affirmed: “No, Jesus suffered the most when, on the cross, he cried out: ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ (Mt 27:46).”
He said this and then he left.
We were deeply impressed by these words of his, convinced that it was the truth because said by a minister of God.
At the same time, because we were young, because we wanted to live a lively and authentic Christianity, but especially because of the grace of God, we felt a strong impetus to follow Jesus in that very moment of his abandonment for the rest of our life.
So as soon as we were alone, I said to my companion: “We have only one life. Let’s spend it in the best possible way! If Jesus suffered the most when he felt abandoned by his Father, we will follow him forsaken.”
At that time, no one spoke of Jesus forsaken, except for some rare theologian. Instead, quite soon we tried to understand more about his immense torment, and we have done so throughout all these years.
But during these past weeks, we had the very great joy of hearing our Pope John Paul II speak about him at length in his recent letter entitled: At the beginning of the new millennium. Among other things, he says that when we speak of Jesus forsaken we confront the most “paradoxical” aspect of the mystery of the cross, before which we cannot but prostrate ourselves in adoration.
And he calls this suffering “paradoxical” because Jesus is one with the Father, whereas in the abandonment he appears to be mysteriously disunited, almost separated from him, and he says that it is not possible to imagine a greater agony, a more impenetrable darkness. However, he adds that Jesus’ cry is not the cry of anguish of a man without hope.
It is the prayer of the Son who offers this tremendous sense of abandonment, of separation from the Father, in order to reunite all people to God, detached as they were by sin, and to reunite all people with one another.
Therefore, Jesus forsaken reunited what was separated.
This is why, quite soon, this mysterious suffering of his appeared to us as being linked precisely to the unity I spoke about before.

In fact, Jesus faced the trial: when he experienced the most dramatic separation from the Father, he didn’t remain still and frozen: On the contrary! With a paradoxical strength, with a boundless trust, he re-abandoned himself, he reunited himself to the Father saying: “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit” (Lk 23:46). And he recomposed the broken unity of human beings with God and among themselves.
So he had done all his part. He had redeemed us and reunited us into one family. Now it was up to us to correspond to this grace and to do our part.

To some extent, we have all experienced division, disharmony, abandonment in and outside of ourselves.
Is there anyone who does not in some way feel separated from God when a bit of darkness invades his soul? Is there anyone who has not experienced doubt, perplexity, anxiety, confusion? All these sensations remind us of Jesus precisely in his abandonment; on the cross, he doubted, he was puzzled, he asked “why?”.
Well then, when we experience one of these sufferings, what should we do? We should think: “This suffering reminds me of him; I am a little like him. But I don’t want to stop. Like him, I embrace this trial: I want it; I love him, Jesus forsaken, in this trial.
And often, we realize that in doing so and in continuing to love, that suffering disappears and peace returns.

We can also experience small or big divisions in the small communities we live in – in our families, groups, offices, schools – and this causes great suffering. There too, we can recognize the presence of Jesus forsaken and our love for him makes us capable of personally overcoming that suffering within us and of doing all we can to recompose unity with the others.
The same applies to the greatest realities, like those of our Church. We must work, suffer, and love, and if unity is lacking, we must recompose it among people, among different groups, and so on. In this way we will build up the Church as communion which is what the Holy Spirit wants today. (…)
If only a few lived like this we soon will not find ourselves alone in our daily sufferings and pains. We will discover the immense love of God for us, as Jesus did once he continued to love (“into your hand I commend my spirit”)