Jesus is risen from the dead! He is alive! May His joy fill your heart!

Dear Family and Friends,

By the time you receive this, the universal Church may still be in prayer for our

Cardinals in Conclave, or we may already have a new Supreme Pontiff, the Vicar of Christ on earth. Comunita Cenacolo has united our prayers to those of our Blessed Mother since Benedict XVI, now Pope Emeritus, announced: “After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry…In order to govern the bark of Saint Peter and proclaim the Gospel, both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me.” Clearly consistent with his humility, his devoted prayer, his obedience to the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and his selfless and unflinching faithfulness to the needs of the Church, His Holiness Benedict XVI said another “yes” to God. Last year Benedict XVI Pope Emeritus announced a Year of Faith beginning October 11, 2012, and ending on November 24, 2013. Comunita Cenacolo rejoices because the foremost gift, which the Community desires to transmit to every young man and woman who

enters our Cenacolo family, is faith -- God’s gift to us through grace. As he wrote in his Apostolic Letter “Porta Fidei” (Door of Faith), “The Church…, like Christ, must set out to lead people out of the desert, towards the place of life, towards friendship with the Son of God, towards the One who gives us life, and life in abundance.”(PF, 2) Of all the drug addicts in the world who equally and desperately need help, we who have come to Comunita Cenacolo have been given a precious gift and a particular grace. A genuine realization of this undeserved embrace of mercy compels the heart to ask, “Why me, among so many who are full of darkness and desperation? I don’t deserve it.” Our response can only be a humble, “Thank you,” expressed concretely in the little and

big decisions, choices, and actions of every day. “The ‘door of faith’ is always open for us, ushering

us into the life of communion with God…It is possible to cross that threshold when the word of God is proclaimed and the heart allows itself to be shaped by transforming love.”(PF, 1) When we first enter Community, we do what we should do because we have no other option. Of course, the option to walk out the door always exists, but if we remain in Community, willingly or unwillingly, we must do certain things. Even if we do them the first few months with resistance, resentment, and anger, simply biding our time until we can leave, we do them. We kneel for Adoration with the rest of our brothers, singing and praying before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. We hear the diary in which a brother openly shares about his negative feelings and his struggles, but also the way he is experiencing some change, peace, and hope. We see smiles and hear laughter from guys who we

“Faith grows when it is lived as an experience of love received and when it is communicated as an experience of grace and joy.” (Porta Fidei 6)

know had hearts as dark, angry, sad, and fearful as our own. We hear the truth spoken to a brother in a direct, clear way that we know is tough to accept, yet we sense that it is said for his good. We kneel before the Eucharistic Jesus to pray the rosary day after day. We hear our brothers speak about the peace and self-control that comes when they are faithful to Adoration. We repeatedly see guys forgiven when they do what is wrong—when they fail—and we see that it is all left in the past, and a new beginning ensues.

“In the mystery of His death and resurrection, God has revealed in its fullness the Love that saves and calls us to conversion of life through the forgiveness of sins…This Love ushers us into new life...”(PF, 6) Little by little, we begin to feel some peace, and we begin to smile an authentic smile. We do not feel alone, isolated, and lonely, as we did be-fore we entered; instead, we feel happy for the first time

in years—or ever. But we still don’t truly understand why.

After a while, however, we begin to understand that the “why” is rooted in “Who,” in Jesus. “Faith working through love (Gal 5:6) becomes a new criterion of understanding and action that changes the whole of man’s life.”(PF, 6) We realize that the day really feels different when we try to pray to Jesus with our heart, rather than just being in the chapel only bodily. We feel our heart become unburdened and free when we ask for forgiveness. We notice that positive emotions replace anger and pride, when we have the courage to go speak with a brother about negative feelings we have toward him. We experience that, when we tell the truth, we feel free and don’t feel the anxiety of hiding what we did wrong. We see that we feel fulfilled after a day of super hard work, but we feel bored after a day in which we chose to be lazy and to avoid working.

“We must rediscover a taste for feeding ourselves on the word of God, faithfully handed down by the Church, and on the bread of life, offered as sustenance for his disciples. Indeed, the teaching of

Jesus still resounds in our day with the same power: ‘Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life.’” (Jn 6:27) (PF, 3) When we truly understand, then we actively begin to choose to do what is good and right in Community life, simple things that are good and right for everyone to do in life. We seek the Sacrament of Reconciliation for the cleansing of our soul. We admit to our brothers a wrong we have done, and we openly ask for forgiveness. We choose to go to Adoration on our own in the middle of the night. We choose to tell the truth, even when we can get away with a lie. We reach out in friendship with concrete actions to the very brother with whom we struggle the most.

“To the extent that he freely cooperates, man’s

thoughts and affections, mentality and conduct are slowly purified and transformed, on a journey that is never completely finished in this life.”(PF, 6) Through the consistent effort of our will, cooperating with grace, we experientially encounter the life-changing truth that prayer is the true driver and determining factor for everything good that is happening. We realize that, even though we may have to be in the chapel many times, if we don’t really try to pray from the heart, the good escapes us and the negative retains its death grip, but if we genuinely try to pray, we have more self-control, we treat others better, and peace and joy grow in our heart. We experience that we are loved by Love and forgiven by Mercy. We come to know, with a certainty we would have thought impossible, that we are no longer alone; God is with us, and He will never abandon us. The more we trust and abandon ourselves to the Father who is rich in mercy, to the Son who became one with us to save us, and to the Holy Spirit who always leads us deeper into Love, the more our heart expands in love and service for others. “Only through believing, then, does faith grow and become stronger; there is no other possibility for possessing certitude with regard to one’s life apart from self-abandonment, in a continuous crescendo, into the hands of a love that seems to grow constantly because it has its origin in God.” (PF, 7)

It’s so simple, but it is often so difficult to believe this direct cause and effect relationship! “… Knowing the content to be believed is not sufficient unless the heart, the authentic sacred space within the person, is opened by grace that allows the eyes to see below the surface and to understand…” (PF, 10)

“During this time we will need to keep our gaze fixed upon Jesus Christ, the ‘pioneer and perfecter of our faith’ (Heb 12:2): in Him, all the anguish and all the longing of the human heart finds fulfillment. The joy of love, the answer to the drama of suffering and pain, the power of forgiveness in the face of an offence received and the victory of life over the emptiness of death: all this finds fulfillment in the mystery of His Incarnation, in His becoming man, in His sharing our human weakness so as to transform it by the power of His resurrection.” (PF, 13)

We pray for you and all those you love,Comunita Cenacolo America