My name is Filippo Pellini, I am thirty years old and I am currently in my third and final year of my bachelor's degree in theology at the University of California, Berkeley. Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, in Rome, chosen from among the various pontifical universities present in the city for thethe recognized quality of the teaching and the relationship of mutual esteem that has linked us for several years. So far, expectations have not been disappointed.
God willing, I will be ordained a deacon in June. I belong to the Priestly Fraternity of the Missionaries of St. Charles Borromeo. It is a society of apostolic life founded in 1985 by Mons. Massimo Camisasca, now bishop of Reggio Emilia, together with other priests who wished to live their ministry following the charism of Communion and Liberation, the ecclesial movement born around the figure of Father Luigi Giussani.
The essential characteristics of St. Carlo's are mission and communion. At the moment of our definitive entry into the Fraternity, which occurs with the ordination to the diaconate, we give our willingness to be sent to any part of the world to founding houses for priests in which to live fraternal life. Among ourselves we often repeat that "mission is nothing other than the expansion of communion among us": our fundamental proclamation is the radiance of the newness of life introduced by Christ into the world through our own unity. In fact, we are convinced that the possibility of a true human communion is the true novelty and the true attraction of Christianity and the Church.
This introduction about my vocation is related to my story and the journey of my life that has brought me this far, to study at Holy Cross and a step away from my definitive "yes" to the vocational form that God has chosen for me. But perhaps it is better to start from the beginning.
I was born and raised in Milan, in a family that was not particularly religious, but which encouraged me to study catechism and gave me the opportunity to receive the sacraments of Christian initiation. However, like so many young people, After receiving confirmation, without any great existential dramas, I simply stopped attending the parish. I was 12 years old at the time and had nothing against God or the Church.
If I distanced myself from Him for some time, it was because neither one nor the other seemed to me to have anything meaningful to say about my concrete life. They were all beautiful things, but they had nothing to do with "real life", which was something else. However, Thanks to those years of catechism and parish, I did not forget some of the people I met, respecting their faith and their way of life. I believe that this has allowed me not to fall into the nihilism of many of my peers. and not to embrace anti-Catholic ideologies. Above all, he put in my heart that good seed that would later bloom in the meeting with the Communion and Liberation movement.
Filippo Pellini is 30 years old and is currently in his third and final year of a degree in theology at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome. He belongs to the Priestly Fraternity of the Missionaries of St. Charles Borromeo, a society of apostolic life founded in 1985 by Bishop Massimo Camisasca, now bishop of Reggio Emilia, together with other priests who wanted to live their ministry following the charism of Communion and Liberation, the ecclesial movement born around the figure of Father Luigi Giussani. This June he will be ordained a deacon.
"I was born and grew up in Milan, in a family that was not particularly religious, but which nevertheless made me study catechism and gave me the opportunity to receive the sacraments of Christian initiation. However, like so many young people, after receiving confirmation, I stopped attending the parish. I was 12 years old at the time," he recounts.
The support of a good priest and good friendships were key to discovering intimacy with Christ and considering a priestly vocation.
During my school years, deep friendships were born - which are still with me - with boys for whom faith was really about life, that is, about study, about their passions, about reading and, above all, about their relationships.
What attracted me most to these friends was the way they looked at each other and treated each other, as if in everyday things lay the very meaning of life. Each one had at heart the destiny of others, the human fulfillment of others.and that brought them together. Basically, these young people lived a true friendship. So I started hanging out with them, doing all the things teenagers normally do: studying together, going on vacation, forming a band, playing soccer, etc. But all this had a new flavor, somehow more human and more real. It was in that period that, in a still confusing way, I felt that Christ really had something to do with life and had the power to transfigure it.
All this, however, was not lived without spiritual drama: the fascination that these friendships awakened in me was counteracted by the voice of the world, which offered me a very different mentality and gratifications. I lived a few years with "the foot in two shoes", internally divided between two opposing visions of the world and of life. In spite of some mistakes, thanks to the friendship and unconditional affection of some people, the doubts were solved during the university years.
I started attending the faculty of design at Bovisa, the seat of the Politecnico di Milano, a very prestigious university. There I decided to keep the company of friends who brought me closer to God and to the universal Church. Making a definite decision and accepting that the Catholic faith was beginning to fully define me as a person was for me a first big step towards maturity.
From that moment on, would never have left the company of the CL movementNeither during the specialized years I spent in Lausanne, nor during my short and busy year of work before entering the seminary.
Providence would have it that during my last years of university, Father Antonio, a priest of the San Carlo Fraternity, was chaplain at Bovisa. The encounter with him was the encounter with a father who knew how to accompany me in the labyrinth of affections.events and desires that from time to time occupied space in my heart.
It was at that moment that some fundamental points became clear to me. First of all, I realized that what made me most happy was when I was able to communicate with others. the fullness of life he had found or, better yet, that this fullness remained so only when it was communicated. It was the first intuition of the beauty of the mission. A second aspect was the deepening in my daily life of the dimension of silence and prayer, which happened especially after a pilgrimage to Medjugorje.
For me it was the discovery of a personal intimacy with ChristI was a very strong and strong person, which then overflowed in all the daily tasks, in the faculty or in the house I lived in with some classmates. Finally, in the relationship with a girl with whom important feelings were born. I also had the opportunity to intuit the true nature of virginityThe idea is not the renunciation of affections, but the possibility of living them to the fullest.
All these elements led me, a few days after obtaining my degree, to go to Mr. Antonio to ask him the following question vocational question I could no longer avoid: What if the path by which the Lord calls me is the priesthood?
Therefore, we decided to take some time to verify this hypothesis. I started working as a graphic designer, working in an editorial office and as an assistant at the Polytechnic. Months went by and I liked the work, I was even hired at a well-known graphic studio to do exactly the work I was most passionate about, working on important and professionally rewarding projects.
However, all this was not enough. None of this made me happier than when I was announcing and witnessing to the newness of Christ.. I did not understand why the Lord was asking me to take that big step, but I realized that if I had not taken it, I would have lost the most beautiful things that filled my life: Lord, if we turn away from you, to whom shall we go? You alone have the words of eternal life [cf. Jn 6:68]. So it was that in the spring of 2015 I went to Rome to ask Fr. Paolo Sottopietra, our Superior General, to be admitted to the Fraternity of St. Charles.
After more than five years of life in the Fraternity and having reached the threshold of ordination, looking back, I can only be grateful for the adventure God has called me to, full of kind faces and trials to face.
I can only wish the same for the years to come and, therefore, I can't help but wish you all the best for the future. to thank those who, with prayers and material help - such as my benefactors of CARF, who supported me with their prayers and financial help to be able to study in this great University where I met many new friends from all over the world and I was able to deepen with excellent professors, so many disciplines that will help me in my mission as a priest of the Lord and that allow me to walk this path.
