I’ll begin where it ended. On the last day of the International Meeting of Responsibles in Corvara, just before the synthesis from Fr. Carrón, we sang La Strada. I had sung it a hundred times before, quoted it in lessons, used it in wedding homilies, and belted it out in the car. But, as if for the first time, I listened to it that morning and it began to melt my heart to the point of tears: God is truly great and great is this life of ours. There I sat with people all over the world who walk the same road: the SAME road, in a different place, a different country, a different culture, but the same road. I could never have imagined this. It was, as we heard two days before from the trembling voice of Giussani himself, “unforeseen and unforeseeable.”

At the risk of exaggeration, I will say that everything found its place in that moment: the education from my parents, the relationship with my siblings, my time in seminary and every day of priesthood, my times of forgetfulness and betrayal, my flashes of faithfulness and joy; all of it. All of it found its place in that moment, nothing was out of place, nothing was wasted: everything found its place in the embrace of the Father who invited me to travel this beautiful road.

Even as I say He invited me, which sounds so small compared to what has happened as a result, I almost immediately take it for granted, as if this invitation were expected. But He didn’t have to invite me. He invited me, but He didn’t have to invite me! He didn’t have to make this proposal to me: to place Himself before me through a human presence. He didn’t have to do this. It is His undeniable gratuitousness that is so striking. It could not have been, but it is, in a completely unforeseen and unforeseeable way; in a way that I could have never imagined.

It is the same tenderness I saw in the face of a dear friend, Lucia, who traveled over eight hours on a train to spend two hours with me before I returned to the States. This was the synthesis in the flesh: a presence that arrives bearing the memory of what I have met. And what have I done to deserve this tenderness? What good thing was required for the Father to express his affection for me in this way? Nothing. His mercy requires none of that. God is truly great and great is this life of ours.

Fr. Alex, Indiana, USA