La Speranza

Sunday, February 1, 2026

I 40 GIORNI DEL TERRORE ( The 40 Days of Terror) by Mauro Tonino

This book is my family's tragic story. Books like this one is very difficult for me to read time and time again but they need to be told and retold so we will always remember. ll Giorno del Ricordo is now celebrated on February 10 in order to commemorate the victims of the " foibe" ( mass graves) by the Yugoslavian-Communist regime of Tito.

February 10 is Giorno del Ricordo (Day of Remembrance) in Italy, a national holiday finally established in 2004 to commemorate the victims of the foibe ( mass graves) massacres and the Istrian–Dalmatian exodus after World War II. It honors the 300,000 of Italians forced to flee their homes in Istria, Rijeka (Fiume), and Dalmatia as my family did, by the grace of God, flee alive, just like in the story of "The Sound of Music" but hundreds of thousands did not.

February 10, the Day of Remembrance, in Italy is very important to me, as a refugee from Fiume

(presently Rijeka), who was given the privilege to come to America, the Land of the Free!

I 40 GIORNI DEL TERRORE

di Mauro Tonino (Autore)

25 aprile 1945. La guerra è finita ma non per tutti gli italiani. Lungo il Confine Orientale, terre di cultura e identità italiane da oltre un millennio vengono invase dall'orda dei partigiani comunisti slavi agli ordini di Josip Broz detto "Tito". Il solo fatto di essere italiani è un elemento sufficiente per essere scaraventati in una forra carsica. Un destino funesto che accomuna migliaia di italiani di Istria e Dalmazia e gli abitanti delle città di Fiume, Zara, Pola, Trieste e Gorizia. I " 40 giorni del terrore di Mauro Tonino suggella quello che è accaduto proprio a Gorizia per mano di infoibatori comunisti, grazie a documenti inediti portati alla luce dagli archivi della Farnesina.

https://www.ibs.it/40-giorni-del.../e/9791280132475...

Wednesday, January 28, 2026

Saint Valentine

This is a great children's book which narrates the historical account of St. Valentine. The modern culture calls Feb. 14th Valentine's Day and omits that he was a saint, a martyr for Christianity. Anthony DeStefano is a prolific writer of popular children's books that are filled with beautiful messages. I love the message in this book that St. Valentine will always be remembered as the saint who died for Love! When I taught the poetry of the 13th century Italian Dolce Stil Novo in February of AP Italian , I would also define St. Valentine's sacrificial act of love, as "CARITAS" or simply put as the highest form of love, which is spiritual love. This was one of my most beloved literary units to teach which culminated with the greatest Dolcestilnovista poet, Dante Alighieri. My deepest, heartfelt gratitude to my late Professore Dottor Mario Trovato from Northwestern University who taught me in his classes of the "Divine Comedy" how to love perfectly! What a transformative, monumental, life-altering experience!

youtube.com

Your Valentine by Anthony DeStefano

Thursday, November 6, 2025

Marriage

Marriage , the holy sacrament as we practicing Catholics understand it is forever.

We have to always work at it. We have to practice our faith and pray incessantly. We know from what we have learned from mother church and from what is written in our hearts that marriage is forever, indissoluble and that divorce was never an option. And once you approach that from every angle, it makes every mountain scalable for me by God's grace and protection and by our constant perfecting of our imperfections in ourselves and in our marriage.

Praise God!

There is no substitute for Hard Work in Marriage and no fairytale from beginning to end.

Love is not a feeling, it is a Decision. Pope Benedict XVI wrote regarding Levi, the tax collector:

"Sanctity does not consist in never having made mistakes or sin. Sanctity grows in the capacity for conversion and penance of willingness to start again and above all, in the capacity for reconciliation in forgiveness, to accept that mercy to be reconciled to God. We are not perfect. In our weakness, God strengthens us, heals us, and brings us to Salvation."

Lui e' il nostro Salvatore!

God's call is our cure if we can be HUMBLE in our weakness. Christ is our divine physician who will heal and open us if we repent and open ourselves to God's gaze as a child of God. God allows trials and tribulations in our life that test us and cause us to grow as we suffer in the process. God is always there in that arduous growth guiding us in His holiness. A good doctor as Jesus wants us to be healthy and encourages us through all our failures, trials, disappointments and sins. He strengthens us by the gift of the Holy Spirit because of His infinite Caritas/ Compassion. He suffers with us ("con") who are imperfect and who through our own volition, desire to be "perfect' as Jesus' Father is perfect. It is never hopeless because Jesus is always there to guide and strengthen us if we trust in Him who loves us. Such a beautiful message of SPERANZA for me, a wretched sinner but a repentful one.

"Grace perfects nature."

Thomas Aquinas

"We are not created for an easy life, but for great things and goodness."

Pope Benedict XVI

Faith and Reason must work harmoniously together. Faith is from God and Reason is from God. The culture of death architects have separated Faith and Reason. They make Reason come from man who becomes divinized as a god.

"All things work together onto good for those who love God."

St. Paul

Love is seeing the worst in someone and still loving them. We need people that will love us at our worst so that they will still love us because that is how God loves us, at our worst and always. When we are at our worst, God dies on the cross for us and in marriage, we are called to love our spouse at their best but more at their worst. We are called to go to the cross for our spouse in marriage. Christ in the center of marriage is very important because our mission is to bring our spouse to heaven. As God forgives us, we need to forgive our spouse. If I am so loved by God even in my sin, so I can do that to my spouse and forgive him or her and Forever love him or her.

Sweet heart of Mary show me the right path.

"Everything good comes by way of the cross."

Johnnette Benkovic

Women of Grace EWTN

Spiritual Malaise

I notice spiritual malaise in this very materialistic, godless society of our developed world. My students seem to be blase' about romance, marriage, about family or about having children, especially women. Young people, in particular, seem to have so much more materialism than in the past and yet, they lack more and more animation in living life. They often express the phrase, " I'm bored!" after immediately receiving a toy novelty of some kind after which I say, "Use your imagination and make it exciting." I tell my grandchildren that with only a handful of toys, I was able to fully enjoy my childhood. I fondly recall playing "store" as I called it, using my creativity and imagination in reconstructing a little cubicle area in the basement as a store. I used real objects such and food and shopping bags which made my imaginative play come to life. I was hardly ever bored. Today, parents seem to have to keep their children always distracted with sports, screens or other pastimes. Toys or video games need to be more and more complex or glitzy for children as they inevitably become yet, more bored and more unanimated. Families that just have one child, plan "play dates" for their children with children from bigger families to assist in removing "boredom" from setting into the humdrum day to day living of their "only child". What I experience now with my students in the U.S (after 54 years of teaching them) or when I travel to Europe as well, in countries like France or Italy, is that adults take the place of siblings for their single child which in the end, makes the child even more pampered and coddled. My observation of large families like the one I grew up in, is that we were happy overall, with very little in the sense of material things. We smiled a lot and we enjoyed family life. I also notice from my personal experiences with humanity in all walks of life and from diverse socioeconomic status in the world, that the happiest people seem to be poor people. If you look at children who smile the most, it is always the impoverished ones that do. Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven," It means that spiritual humility, a recognition of one's spiritual need and dependence on God, is what truly matters, not material wealth. To be happy does not require great wealth and materialism, it just requires us to live a simple life that has meaning and purpose with faith, hope and love in our hearts, mind and soul.

In Deuteronomy, 30:19 Moses states, "I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, that you and your children might live." "Life" is not just biological existence but a spiritual life of relationship with God, achieved by loving, obeying, and holding fast to Him. The call to choose life and not be distracted by worldly things. The Catholic Church views this passage as a call to live a life of obedience to Christ, which is the path to true and abundant spiritual life. We need hope in Christ to live life both physically and spiritually when life is dark and difficult. The body dies but so does the soul without it. Without a spiritual life of relationship with God, as with many people, especially young people today in modern society, their emptiness and depression is covered over with distractions, materialism and toys. What we need is relationship with God, with our families and with our fellowman in order to heal our spiritual malaise. The glitz, noise, busyness, sports, distractions, toys, hi-tech gadgets, etc all need to be tempered! I think I would want the word, "Moderation" on my tombstone as my message to humanity! No, all kidding aside, my message to humanity is that we need hope, hope in Christ to hold onto for all the spiritual malaise that exists in the world today.

Friday, June 14, 2024

The Journey of the Christian Pilgrims Dante and Pinocchio

The end of our journey in life is God. Both Dante in his medieval masterpiece, the Divine Comedy, and Lorenzini’s, Adventures of Pinocchio represent the journey of the Christian soul, of the pilgrim on earth who discovers that true happiness, true freedom, lie in desiring what God desires. True freedom is true happiness and true happiness is true freedom. Dante Alighieri in his final words to Beatrice as she is departing says:

“Tu mi hai portato da servo alla liberta’.”

“You brought me from slave to freedom.”

Pinocchio had to learn that in order to be truly happy and free, he had to learn how to truly love. He learned to go from self-centeredness to other-centeredness as he learned from his terrestrial father and his supernatural mother who both taught him how to love unconditionally and sacrificially.

The conscience, the inner sanctuary where the soul encounters God is a very biblical idea that takes center stage in Dante and Lorenzini’s works. Pinocchio’s conscience is a slow formation and awareness of what he ought to do. Conscience through the character of the Grillo Parlante (the talking cricket) was and is for us the living voice that speaks very concretely from our experiences of judgment of life. The movement of conscience is like a strong pull on our heart. It is a certainty of what must be done no matter the cost. It is not an oracle that whatever comes from it is necessarily right. Pinocchio went off the straight and narrow path many times in order to form his conscience correctly. It was essential that Pinocchio’s transformation from puppet (inanimate) to a human being ( animate) come from seeking knowledge for the right purpose. His experiences taught him wisdom that lead to truth and true happiness.

What is love without learning and what is learning without love? The natural law and the ten Commandments tell Dante and Pinocchio how to act reasonably in each area of life. These commandments give Pinocchio guardrails that prevent him ultimately to go off the road, off the right path. Pinocchio slowly learns how to love, how to reason and how to participate in God’s providence by using his free will in making good decisions. In this way, he flourishes, he is happy, and he is truly human made in the image and likeness of God. Pinocchio needs the virtue of prudence in serving his conscience on the right path. Prudence must be guided by the fundamental principle of the common good not just our own good. We can go astray as Pinocchio illustrates so lucidly by not using prudence. The direction of Pinocchio’s life and our life can be altered at any moment. So, we must take heed when making decisions that should impel us to ask:

What kind of person do I want to be?

The place where the decision is made for Pinocchio and for us in answering this most important question is called the well-formed conscience where we listen and heed the voice of God.

Pinocchio learned how to love sacrificially by saving his father and in saving his father, he saved himself!

These were my final thoughts in class after the viewing of Matteo Garrone's Italian film of Pinocchio and connecting it to Dante's Divine Comedy.