"Come sale e lievito" is the new book with a preface by Pope Francis
Published : 05/14/2021 12:11:49
Categories : News
"Come sale e lievito. Appunti per una teologia della vita consacrata della Chiesa" is a new book by the Friars Minor Valentino Natalini and Ferdinando Campana. The text, published by Libreria Editrice Vaticana - Dicastero per la Comunicazione della Santa Sede, is enriched by the autographed presentation of Pope Francis.
This four-handed text," says the Holy Father, "is written by a Franciscan theologian, aged and tested, ninety years old, who reads the texts of the Magisterium with the purity of the neophyte, with simplicity and depth, without being deceived by biased theological schools, which are either too far ahead to wait for the time and way necessary to share their ideas with others, or too late to welcome the beauty of the novelty and the evolution of the Magisterium of the Church in step with the gifts of the Spirit who always amazes. The text, then, is enriched by the meditations and reflections of a younger brother, a liturgist and a lover of theology and spirituality, a long-time dear friend of mine, who has tried his hand at something ancient and something new, to make the Bride more beautiful and more attractive, following in the footsteps of the great Swiss theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar, who had spoken of the reciprocity of the "Petrine principle" and the "Marian principle" in the Church, and who had taken it for granted that the three states of life spoken of in this text are equally necessary and constitutive of the Church" (pp. 6-7).
"Come sale e lievito" is part of the theological series From Nail to Key. It is therefore a book on the theology of consecrated life in and of the Church. The text, prepared to present - on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of St John Paul II's apostolic exhortation Vita consecrata - a synthesis of the most recent theology of the life of the evangelical counsels is written in an immediate and simple manner. It aims to provide an overview of the various issues and main developments on the consecrated life that have emerged from the documents of the Magisterium and the main theological studies on this subject. With a little "parochialism [...] - the authors write - it also intends to pursue and embrace some lines of theological thought, which appear to the authors to be very fruitful and corresponding to what the Spirit of the Lord has given to his Church in this particular and providential period of history" (pg. 13), so that consecrated men and women may increasingly be in today's Church that evangelical sign and constant invitation to holiness for every baptised man and woman.
