Daniele, seminarian: "Friendship with Jesus makes our life flourish".

Daniele, an Italian seminarian, belongs to the Fraternity of St. Charles Borromeo, which was founded in 1985 by Bishop Massimo Camisasca, in the charism of Communion and Liberation. Its mission is to form young people for evangelization and to respond to the mandate that, in September 1984, John Paul II had given to Communion and Liberation, on the occasion of the audience for the thirtieth anniversary of the birth of the movement: "Go into all the world - the Pope had said on that occasion - to bring the truth, beauty and peace that are found in Christ the Redeemer".

A seminarian friend of Jesus

Today, many young people make the teachings of Father Luigi Giussani their own by living in a Fraternity that is nourished by his teachings in a spirit of "communion," "virginity," and "silence," but also of deep friendship with Jesus and with each other. Daniele defines his vocation as follows: "Friendship with Jesus makes our life flourish. 

My name is Daniele Bonanni and I was born in February 1990 in Milan, in northern Italy. However, I grew up in a small village north of the big city, just below the lakes that the famous Italian writer Alessando Manzoni talks about in his work "The Betrothed", one of the most important works of Italian literature.

I have to thank God for the beauty of my family.. I am the youngest of three brothers and my father, Fabio, together with my mother, Antonella, have always been a clear sign of unity, love, optimism and hope for life. First among themselves, but then also towards us. Their union founded on faith has given me the certainty that my life is something good, that it is positive and worth discovering its true meaning.

We are worth much more than the mountains

This became clear to me during a vacation with the guys from Communion and Liberation (my family has always belonged to this movement), when I was in high school. In fact, in those years I used to go to the mountain with a group of boys from my school, accompanied by teachers and priests belonging to this movement. On the way down the mountain I remember that the priest who was guiding us, don Marcello, made us stop in front of an immense panorama of valleys and mountains, which crossed in front of us. A spectacle that made me feel an infinitesimal point in an immense universe that was almost terrifying.

However, Don Marcello told us that each one of us was worth much more than all those mountains. Those mountains had no meaning without anyone looking at them, while we have our own meaning, even without them, because we are loved by God. From that moment on, and thanks to my family, I began to search for that which gave so much value to my life, apparently so small.

Soccer and love

I started to study and to play soccer... But most of all to play soccer! It felt good and I found in it a source of hope about the value of my life. However, I realized, during my high school years, that this was not enough. In fact, soccer, although I was very passionate about it, was not able to change my life in all its facets. It was like a positive parenthesis, most of the time, but everything else didn't change. It was in those years, thanks to a girl I fell in love with, that I met real friends. They were kids my age who followed Christ in all aspects of life.

I was struck by how these young people sought the radical nature of their faith and lived it in friendship, and that is what caught my attention. Everything had a place in our relationship with them and, therefore, with Jesus: if one of our relatives was sick, we went on pilgrimage together; if one of us was behind in his studies, the others tried to help him by donating their time. We watched movies, we discovered the world by traveling and getting to know it, we spent our lives together: this won me over! They were young people living the charism of Communion and Liberation.

Moving away from the road

However, soon after, in the university years, I went back to look for my value, that positive value of my life I was talking about, in other things. I started studying mathematical engineering at the Politecnico di Milano, where I graduated in 2014. Soon after, I started working in Luxembourg for investment funds. I thought I had achieved what I dreamed of. A job, a girl to share life with, friends, but, nevertheless, he was not happy.

Something inside me kept telling me that the value of my life could not be reduced only to that which, although great, did not satisfy me. It seemed to me that my life had been reduced to a fixed plan that I was content with. But, once again, life began to divide, as it did when I was playing soccer. What I was doing at work no longer had anything to do with what I was living with friends, with my girlfriend, with my family. All this made me sad and passive.

A wise priest changed my life

Then I met Father Maurice, a Jesuit priest who was in his eighties at the time. I was in Luxembourg on a mission and I was struck by the unity of life he showed. He was serene, at peace, always and everywhere, with every person. For all that, he was capable of loving any person. But I was not, I was not. After a confession with him, for the first time, this strange thought came to my mind: "Maybe God is calling me to be like Father Maurice: a missionary priest". And I realized that it was basically that relationship with Jesus that had turned Fr. Maurice's life into unity and happiness.

Fear and discernment 

But I was very afraid of this thought. The following days, while working in the office, I could think of nothing else. So I had to tell Father Maurice everything. Trembling, and specifying that it was nothing important just a thought, I told him about my life. He told me something that gave me peace, namely that a vocation is not something that we must create, that we must deserve, but that it is something that God gives and that it is already given, we just have to recognize it.

Thus I began a work of discernment of this thought, meditating, writing, praying, participating in the Holy Mass, etc. before going to the office, conversing with God and with that holy priest.

I discovered that, thanks to these simple gestures that awakened my friendship with Jesus, my whole life blossomed. That is why I am convinced: "Friendship with Jesus makes our life flourish."

Relationships in the office, with friends, with my siblings became more real, more intense. The unity of life that was born out of it was true happiness.

With a particular charisma

After some time, I decided to apply for admission to the seminary of the Fraternity of St. Charles Borromeo, a priestly, missionary fraternity, but anchored in the charism of Communion and Liberation, which - I realized - was the path chosen by God to call me.

The Fraternity of St. Charles is a society of apostolic life founded by Bishop Massimo Camisasca, in the charism of Communion and Liberation, composed of about 150 priests, who live all over the world. What strikes me most about this new family is the friendship among the members of the mission houses.

I realize more and more, from what we are taught in the seminary, how we are called to live with other seminarians, and from what our missionaries tell us, that the mission is nothing other than the expansion of friendship among us. For this reason, the houses of the Fraternity are always composed of three or more priests, because, as for the Apostles, it is impossible to take Christ to the world alone.

Seminarian in Rome 

Today I am in my sixth year of seminary in Rome - with a year of formation in Bogota, Colombia - studying at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, where I am preparing to receive, God willing, ordination as a deacon in the coming months.

In these years of theological studies I have seen the fascination of having a united life. That is to say, a life that is not the sum of several different areas, school, prayer, common life, that come together, but that is animated, in all the areas in which I am called to live, by the same desire to live with Christ.

I want to express my personal gratitude to all my CARF benefactors, and also that of all my brothers and sisters of the Missionary Fraternity of St. Charles BorromeoI would like to thank you for all the help you are giving us for this particular vocation we have to take Christ to every corner of the earth, through the expansion of our friendship with him and with each other. I conclude by repeating what I said at the beginning: "Friendship with Jesus makes our life flourish."