A great day of celebration

Forty-five years after the first ecclesiastical approval comes final papal approval from the Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life, signed Dec. 8, 2023

It was 1979, in February, when the newly formed Magnificat Community received its first canonical approval from Archbishop Ferdinando Lambruschini of Perugia.
45 years later, on Dec. 8, 2023, the Vatican Dicastery dedicated to the care of the laity in the Catholic Church, at the hands of Cardinal Kevin Farrell, Prefect of the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life, the Magnificat Community-that “dream of God” that Tarcisio Mezzetti had evoked from the earliest years of its emergence – was recognized as a “charism aroused by the Holy Spirit“, a “Gift offered to all the faithful as a valid way to revive baptismal grace“, in the words of the cardinal himself, read during the Ceremony of awarding the Decree of Recognition, held in the Palazzo San Callisto, in Rome, on the morning of Friday, January 19, 2024.

Representing the Community were the General Managers, members of the General Council and many Fraternity moderators from: Italy, Romania, Turkey and Pakistan.
There were the “historical” Pastors and friends: cardinal Ennio Antonelli, cardinal Gualtiero Bassetti, Archbishop of Perugia Monsignor Ivan Maffeis, the Rector of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross Don Luis Navarro.

Connected via the Community’s official YouTube channel were more than 2,000 “viewers” from various continents.
After the opening song, the proclamation of the word of the Gospel passage from the annunciation to the singing of the Magnificat (Luke 1:26-55), Linda Ghisoni – Undersecretary for the lay faithful of the Dicastery – gave solemn reading of the Decree through which the “Magnificat Community as a private international association of the faithful, endowed with juridical personality,” as well as “The approval of the Statute of the said association […] for a period ad experimentum of five years“.

At the end of the lengthy applause with which the reading of the Decree ended, it was the Secretary of the Dicastery, Gleison De Paula Souza, on behalf of Prefect Cardinal Kevin Farrell (who was absent due to a slight flu), who handed over the text of the Decree to Maria Rita Castellani, the Moderator General of the Community, amidst the emotion of not a few of those present.

Maria Rita then took the floor for a greeting and thanksgiving in which, thanking the pastors of the Church who have accompanied the rise and growth of the Community, she had the opportunity to go over the significant stages of the Community’s history, not excluding the difficult ones, then outlining the task that the Lord entrusts to the Magnificat Community: “a task that is simple, though not easy: namely, that of allowing ourselves to be shaped by the providential hand of the Holy Spirit in order to build “With Jesus and on Jesus” a single body, modeled after the first Christian community described by the evangelist Luke: “They were persevering in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and in prayers.” We are that people whom God has chosen to proclaim his wonders; so much so that we can say with St. Paul, “For us to evangelize is not a title of glory, but a duty. Woe to us if we do not preach the gospel!” “.
The Moderator then concluded by recalling Tarcisio Mezzetti and the “dream of God” that he saw and then, through his testimony, inspired the entire Community to “spend their lives for the Gospel and to sing, tirelessly and full of joy, together with the Virgin Mary and Mother of God, “my soul Magnifies the Lord.“.

At that point, Secretary Gleison De Paula Souza, read Cardinal Kevin Farrell’s letter, an articulate text in which the Prefect of the Dicastery, after recognizing in the Magnificat Community “a charism aroused by the Holy Spirit” makes a point that – probably – will have to be deepened in the next community reflection. In fact, the prelate, starting from the date of birth of the Community in correspondence with the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary and the history of the very name of the Community received in Lourdes, stressed ” the Marian trait of the Magnificat Community precisely in the three main dimensions of your charism: evangelization, the promotion of community life and Eucharistic life. Mary is the first who received the proclamation and is the star of evangelization, as St. Paul VI defined her. Mary is the Mother who gathers the Christian community as in the hearth of Nazareth. Mary is the one who teaches us to adore her Son present in the Eucharist. You, too, then, like other ecclesial charisms inspired by Our Lady, are a gift of Mary to the Church of our time “…
After also recalling the figure of Tarcisio “for the exemplary apostolic zeal that drove him to proclaim the Gospel and to make the Community known to so many people, especially to young people, a zeal he maintained until the last moments of his earthly life” the cardinal concluded by inviting the Magnificat Community, from now on, to consider the Dicastery, whose doors will always be open for its members, as “own home“.

At that point, the Secretary gave the floor to the guests the Community had wished to have present on this occasion.
Cardinal Ennio Antonelli – who approved the Rule of Life in 1995 – told how, after having known the Community “as a child,” ten years after its inception, he then accompanied it to grow and finds it now “coming of age,” grown and widespread. He wished therefore that the “quantitative growth” will echo the “qualitative growth in living enthusiasm, joy, Alleluia, The Magnificat in doing good!“.

Cardinal Gualtiero Bassetti, the one who in 2013 prompted the Community to go “to Rome” to obtain guidance and approval of its reality at the Pontifical Council for the Laity first and then at the Dicastery, highlighted how the Community started “in the right way because, when we set out in the Church for God’s big project, we must always have the humility to feel that we are a little seed, a little seed of the Gospel that goes to die in the ground and to the extent that it dies it is capable of producing a tree and even a big tree, and this tree has developed“.
He concluded by urging, “I say to you, Magnificat! It is enough to say this, because this word gathers the whole being and mission of Mary. And so: cheer up, Magnificat! “.

Monsignor Ivan Maffeis, current Archbishop of Perugia, then took the floor for a brief greeting in which he thanked “for the people encountered, for this shared journey and for this being Church in a time – in some ways – so confused. And so I found, really, a proposal that can meet this time, the people of this time, and make them feel the freshness of the Gospel and of ecclesial communion. So: let us move forward together “.

It was the Rector of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, Fr. Luis Navarro, who concluded the series of speeches, recounting his collaboration with the Community to arrive at the final draft of the Statute approved by the Dicastery. In particular, he said, “I realized that there is a very great docility to what is the authority of the Church, in the awareness that the Holy Spirit also acts within the ecclesiastical authority. […] This is the reality. Without the Church we are nothing, and I am convinced that the Magnificat Community is fully aware of this. […] I give thanks to the Lord and magnify the Lord for what He has done, has done in you and will continue to do“.

The final blessing, imparted by the cardinals and bishop present, followed by the singing of the Magnificat, closed the ceremony of the delivery of the Decree of Recognition of the Magnificat Community.
We give praise to the Lord that the “dream of God” knows this great moment of grace that opens the Community to a new time, of ecclesial maturity and new prospects for development.

For all this our soul magnifies the Lord!