We should look ahead without ever losing sight of the project that God has for the world. He, the Creator, is the Father of his creation and we, men and women from all over the earth, are his sons and daughters, all members of the one human family.

The history of humanity is a slow and labored rediscovery of this universal brotherhood. After millennia in which we have experienced the consequences of violence and hatred, we have every right today to ask that humanity begin to experience the consequences that love can have.

And not only the consequences of love among individuals, but also among peoples. God made humankind in his image, in the image of the Trinity, not only as individuals, but as society.

It was on man and woman together that God placed the imprint of the Trinity. And he intends the same design of communion for all humanity. Consequently, nations are also called to love one another, not to ignore one another or fight with each other.

Mutual love must become the law, not only for relationships among individuals, but also among communities. To love the other’s country as we love our own must become a reality. If it is a right that every nation cultivates its own identity and develops its own spiritual and material gifts, they should also know that these gifts will be perfected and enhanced by putting them at the service of other nations, in respect and mutual exchange.

Then yes, we can rightly dream (if we, along with everyone else, will do our part) as did Paul VI dream when he foresaw the world one day guided by a world authority. We will be able to dream that the Lord is leading the world toward a “new” order, to the point of forming one global community.

However, this is not a dream or a utopia if God is present and works with us for world unity. Indeed, it would not be a bad idea for us to take responsibility from now on and spread this concept by speaking about it, writing about it, and communicating it through every means at our disposal. We should present this project to government leaders, to intellectuals, to people in social and cultural fields of every kind and at all levels.

We should make it available to educators, to young people, men and women of the entire world so that all people may search the depths of their heart and ask what personal contribution they can give.

No one should feel excluded from this “gestation of a new world.” Every person in his or her large or small world of daily activities–in the family, office, factory, or labor union, immersed as they may be in local or more general problems, in public institutions of the city or beyond, all the way to the United Nations–can truly be a builder of peace, a witness to love, an instrument of unity. Indeed, as far as we are concerned, let us walk as the children of Israel walked behind Moses.

Let us walk behind Jesus who is among us. He will accomplish his plans as he has done thus far, never abandoning us. Then one day, he will show us the Promised Land: a world that is united and in peace, for his glory and for the good of humanity.

Chiara Lubich

From the book, Unity pp.119-120, excerpt from the talk of Chiara Lubich given in Castelgandolfo, June 11, 1988.