My daughter Roberta and I joined Fede e Luce in early 1975, when the movement had only recently arrived in Italy and was preparing the pilgrimage to Rome for the Holy Year. There was electricity in the air, and so much work to do. You, dear Mariangela, certainly never spared yourself. But the mothers of Fede e Luce are close to one another—often we understand each other with just a glance—and you were always there for all of us, even in the midst of endless organizational demands.
After the pilgrimage came the group meetings that formed one after another, the summer camps at Alfedena, the Fede e Luce office that needed organizing, the little houses—gatherings where young people and friends could spend a Sunday together at the Istituto Nazareth, where you had taught and felt at home. Then came "the connection" with the French Seminary, to find a priest who could guide us.
Gradually, as new groups formed in Rome, others began to spring up in Parma, Milan, Cuneo—everywhere you could reach, bringing family and friends with you. Those weekend trips to visit the new groups in their cities were wonderful! The young people became our young people immediately, and their parents and friends became ours.
And those evenings when we stayed late talking, exchanging news, feeling like friends, sharing. In Marie Hélène's words, feeling "never alone again."
I remember that first year when my daughter and I were alone at home, and you invited us to your New Year's Eve party in your garage with your whole extended family—and there are so many of you!—and your closest friends. It's a moment I will never forget: my daughter was happy at the center of a circle of friends.
But then Chicca fell ill, and even the countless classical music pieces she listened to for hours, lying on her blanket on the grass at the Alfedena camps, with her cassette player always nearby, were no longer enough. The memory of our farewell to Chicca before she flew away pierces me still: one evening all of us sitting on the ground beside her in her room, singing and singing the songs from the camps, tears streaming down our faces and smiles on our lips.
From the very beginning you established a newsletter here in Italy, so that Fede e Luce groups could share information, announce initiatives, and stay in touch. At first it was called Insieme—two or three pages stapled at the top. Then it became Ombre e Luci, the magazine we all know and read in one breath.
Meanwhile, Fede e Luce groups continued to grow in Rome and other cities (throughout Emilia, in Naples, Sicily, Puglia…). From Fede e Luce came Chicco, il Carro, and l'Arcobaleno—group homes—and perhaps other wonderful initiatives will be born from it yet.
How many beautiful memories we all have of so many things we did together beyond our regular meetings: from katimavich gatherings to outings, to group weekends outside Rome. And then the celebrations together: the opening of the year, the Feast of Light, the Feast of Spring, the pilgrimages to Lourdes, Assisi, Loreto… And you were there nearly always.
You know, Mariangela, I want to say that your life, from the birth of Chicca onward, was lived constructively within Fede e Luce, thinking of all of us. We remember you today with such gratitude, with deep appreciation, and with great affection. All of us: those who were beside you every day, and those who, perhaps less present, were nonetheless very close to you.
And now—if there is a place above the clouds where the "righteous" go, from which one can look down and see the world—surely you are there in the front row to receive our embrace.
Enrica Cofano, 2014
