A Sociologist on the Contribution of Mystique and Theology in Interreligious Dialogue

Abstract

One of the spectacular changes in the Catholic Church in the 1960s was her positive judgement on the other religions, as transmitted by the texts of the second Vatican Council (1962–1965). A sociologist is by profession interested in the diverse processes of cultural changes, and the birth of Catholic interreligious dialogue is therefore a very good case to study. For Catholics involved in interreligious dialogue, we can observe ideal-typically two attitudes at work that hinder a true dialogue between different religions: one is named ‘religious imperialism’ and the other is the contrary attitude, ‘religious indifferentism’. The present article studies how, in a crucial moment for the Catholic understanding of interreligious dialogue (around the year 2000), the mystical insights of Chiara Lubich (1920–2008), foundress of the Focolare Movement, alongside the theology of Piero Coda have made an interesting contribution to sustaining the process of change towards an always more convincing engagement in interreligious dialogue. In the context of the controversy on ‘Dominus Jesus’ (August 2000), they found a way to navigate between religious imperialism and religious indifferentism.

1. Introduction: From a Spirituality to a Theology of Universalism

1.1. An Interesting Case of Hybridization?

When the well-known Polish sociologist Z. Bauman launched his analysis of contemporary societies using the metaphor of a liquid modernity (Bauman 2000), an interesting question was to see how this could be applied to the field of religions. How, for example, a new ecclesial Catholic movement such as the now widespread Focolare Movement (Masters and Uelmen 2011) presented an original trait that might be studied as a possible case of cultural change in the Catholic world. In a religious domain with still traditionally clear distinctions between Churches, denominations and new religious movements, from a certain point on, the Catholic Focolare Movement (founded in 1943) attracted people from other religions. How was it possible for a movement so deeply embedded in the Catholic Church, to be able at the same time to go so far outside the Church’s boundaries and embrace Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and so forth who consider themselves to be part of the Focolare Movement? Did we have here a case of contamination, or hybridization, as understood by G. Giordan (2008)?1 An interesting factor was that these people from other religions who considered themselves part of the Focolare experience did not convert to Catholicism, as might be supposed as the ultimate outcome of strong attraction. They remained Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus and so on. They did not invent a Christo-Buddhist or Christo-Muslim hybrid form. Rather, they manifested the reality of living as a Muslim Focolare follower or Buddhist Focolare follower, which has nothing to do with the mix of two religions. Instead, it has to do with the stimulus of a Catholic-born spiritual input that promotes and preserves one’s own religious origin2 but at the same time nurtures openness to the idea of a united human family under the universal fatherhood of God. In some cases, these individuals engaged themselves in the Focolare with the blessing of their religious authorities! This was, to say the least, a surprising evolution, something without precedents in the Catholic world.3 Was it useful here to apply Bauman’s metaphor of a more and more liquid society, with more and more vanishing barriers? The answer seemed to be no; this evolution seemed to be more a case of an evolution where a growing sense of unity and diversity enriched without mutual contradiction, and not simply a situation where diversity seems to vanish.

Putting the question to some Focolare intellectuals, they answered that an explanation was to be found in the core concept of its spirituality, which was able to link saint Paul’s notion of kenosis (of Christ) to Chiara Lubich’s approach of the mystery of Jesus’ abandonment on Golgotha (Mk 15:34) illustrating the way for Christians to play a redemptive role for the salvation of humankind (Callebaut 2015). Studying more in depth this theological affirmation and the reality behind it, a conclusion became clear (Callebaut 2017) that the Focolare way of operating was not syncretistic nor building a new super-religion. Rather, together with É. Poulat, a well-known French sociologist, one could perhaps say here to be in the presence of a new and surprising reality that has arisen within the Catholic Church, and this without denying the teachings of the Catholic Church (Poulat 1996, p. 261).4 Perhaps this cultural process could be described in sociological terms as a move from a Catholic mentality of exclusion towards one of inclusion. For such an enormous cultural reality as the Catholic Church, this evolution, if fully accepted, could be understood as a major process of cultural change in mentality in a seventh or eighth part of the planet.

1.2. A New Reality, Also a New ‘Symbolic Universe’?

In his introduction to the 2014 Conference, where for the first time, the Focolare had brought together their closest friends from different religions, by applying a multilateral logic, R. Catalano noted that “We all have the same origin, which is God, the Absolute, and we are on a journey, notwithstanding all the tragic and cruel events of history, a journey towards making of all humankind one family” (Centro per il Dialogo Interreligioso del Movimento dei Focolari 2017, p. 18).5 Let us pause here to explain the context. The Catholic Church started her active policy regarding the interreligious dialogue officially in 1965. The Focolare initiatives in the field of interreligious dialogue6 began in the 1970s, and the Movement became in the next decades one of the important Catholic players on the field. For the most part, their international meetings with people of other religions concerned Focolare adherents (mostly Catholics) and persons from only one other religion (bilateral dialogue). Only in 2014 did the Focolare people in charge of interreligious dialogue think the time had come to gather at least the core persons of various other religions in contact with them and have them meet together (multilateral dialogue), even if most of them had never met one another before. This was obviously a delicate and very important step after more or less thirty years of building mutual confidence on a bilateral level. Catalano’s introductory words had a particular weight; they had to bring to conscience in all the participants the newness of the situation thus created. He had to put the right words on an ungiven situation. Words that in Berger–Luckmann terms7 can be understood as the drafting of a (new) symbolic world, within which it was intended to gather all those of different religions, where all the participants could feel included. It was, in a certain way, the words that gave birth to a new theoretical tradition, at least for the Focolari. The sociologists Berger and Luckmann, who specialized in the sociology of cultural processes, refer to these symbolic universes as a fourth level of legitimacy. They wrote:

These are bodies of theoretical tradition that integrate different provinces of meaning. (…) Symbolic processes (…) are processes of signification that refer to realities other than those of everyday experience. Now [at that level] all the sectors of the institutional order are integrated in an all-embracing frame of reference which now constitutes a universe in the literal sense of the word, because all human experience can be conceived of as taking place within it. (…) The entire historic society and the entire biography of the individual are seen as events taking place within this universe. (…)

(Berger and Luckmann 1973, pp. 113–14, 128–29)8

1.3. Universalism: The Definition of Chiara Lubich’s in 1946

Without entering now into the sociological discussion on symbolic universes, the exercise Catalano did was explicitly aimed at constructing a (for Focolare, new) symbolic universe, or at least, one could translate the sociological concept very roughly, as ‘a new common ground’ for the 400 participants coming from many religions but united by their relationship with or even within the Focolare. The key word here was clearly the human family.

“With your thought and with the affections of the heart always go beyond every limit imposed by a (merely) human life and tend constantly, and because of an acquired habit, to universal brotherhood in one Father: God”, wrote Chiara Lubich in 1946 (Lubich 1985, p. 29). In the early years, when things were more intuitive but had not yet become theologically rationalised, Lubich describes in those few lines “her” symbolic universe where everything is permeated by the idea of the one Father, and we are all brothers and sisters. It represents the symbolic universe of the human family seen as one body. If, in the 1940s already, she linked the world of God and the human world through the idea of unity, in 1950 (Callebaut 2017, p. 116) she felt the need to legitimize also theologically this symbolic universe of the unity of the human family.

In the meantime, the perception of that universe had been enriched by a mystical experience, which lasted for more than two years (1949–1951).9 How are we to understand the role of mysticism? Here are just two brief comments of important Focolare scholars: the theologian Piero Coda who accompanied Chiara Lubich on her visit and conference at the Harlem mosque noted after Lubich’s speech (New York 1997): «Theology has this task. To start from life, from the action of the Spirit [what is understood here as mysticism], and to illuminate it further to give it new impetus» (Coda 1997, p. 30). And another of Lubich’s very first collaborators, Don Paquale Foresi, confirms: «To prepare ourselves for dialogue with other religions we need, yes, a certain amount of preparation, but above all we need to live the mystical life that flows from the Gospel» (Coda 1997, p. 48). Undoubtedly, therefore, the authors referred to are clearly aware of the driving role of mysticism, and its influence on theology goes without saying, but they also point out that theology has its own contribution to make.

2. Sociologists and Two Possible Ideal-Types of Theology

Sociological reflection, starting from research on the relationship between theology and ecumenism, has come to realize a significant factor. Following the methodological approach of sociology in the weberian tradition concerning ideal-types (Aron [1967] 2014, pp. 472ss.), the Swiss sociologist Willaime developed two opposite ideal-types of theologies (Willaime 1989). Some theologies end up making the ecumenical journey more difficult because they focus on the arguments that defend the theological riches acquired in the past, and therefore end up accentuating the differences. But at the opposite end of the spectrum, there are theologies which, instead, starting from the urgency of change, perceive it as necessary to place themselves in that ecumenical perspective. J.-P. Willaime (1989, p. 28) wrote: «Theological discourse will tend to re-confessionalize10 when it seeks less to renew tradition than to preserve it from any danger of cultural dissolution».11 It is important to note here that the ideal-typical approach is an artificial construct that as such will probably never exist in reality. Rather, it is meant to attempt to make useful distinctions and consider distance and proximity in particular circumstances, having the ideal-type in mind. It is therefore clear that one cannot say in a particular concrete case: this theology is opposed to ecumenism, but one can only say: “tends to”, attempting in one circumstance or another to render precise the distance or proximity perceived (Callebaut 2017, p. 24). The Willaime distinction for the field of ecumenism, can be adopted also for the analysis of the role of theology in the interreligious ‘field’. A theology stressing the proper identity can risk to be judged as an exercise of religious imperialism: “My religion is superior, I possess the real religious truth, so all the others must come and join me”, and block all healthy relationships between religions as (equal) partners in dialogue. Or, at the other extreme, theological reasoning about religious pluralism can develop a kind of religious indifference, seemingly stimulating interreligious dialogue but in the fact promoting indifference, because there is no further need to interact.

The Focolare Movement in 2000 already had a rather articulated experience in the interreligious field (Catalano 2010). Within the Catholic Church at that moment, an important discussion arose which seemed to a lot of observers to undermine the Catholic experiences and projects for interreligious activities. The following analysis will illustrate how Lubich and later her collaborators contributed to formulating a way forward. Piero Coda, already mentioned above, was one of the most competent theologians among the collaborators of Chiara Lubich in the Focolare Centre for Interreligious Dialogue.12

At the heart of the Catholic reflection and debates on religious pluralism and theology in the 1990s was the question of whether it was not convenient to put less emphasis on the unique role of Christ in the mediation of salvation and try other ways, out of respect for other religious founders, to include those such as Buddha or Mohammed. P. Berger spent in his books (especially in The Sacred Canopy) some remarkable passages about the relation between nomos and cosmos. Berger states that our socially constructed world above all is an effort to put order in our experiences. He defines nomos as the order that makes sense for us and writes that nomisation is the most important function in a society. Here with the building of a space in society for interreligious dialogue, we are confronted with the effort of elaborating a new worldview, a new norm (nomos) about religions and their dialogical capacities. And one of the most frequent ways to legitimize nomos is to make the link with the cosmic order: ‘on earth like in heaven ..’. In our case here, the nomos–cosmos interplay can be applied to the effort to legitimize the new norms. If you can prove that God in himself is ‘dialogue’ and wants that we practice interreligious dialogue, because that is in his divine nature, it is part of the cosmic order, it becomes much easier to propose to accept interreligious dialogue down here on earth. The whole story of the growth of the interreligious dialogue can then be told in terms of building this new nomos, a kind of ‘dialogical’ order that gives sense to the new situation of religious pluralism in the modern world. And there is no doubt about the fact that you can tell the whole story of the Catholic effort, from the 1960s on, to change her relationship with the world on a more dialogical base, as an effort to present dialogue as the merging nomos. Returning to our discussion about the mediation of Jesus Christ and the tendency, in order to facilitate dialogue between equals, to put less emphasis on his role, which was a manoeuver to stress less a part of the traditional nomos, because of the danger of ‘imperialism’, but at the same time, it touched a cornerstone of the Christian cosmos!

Reacting to this way of thinking, the Vatican document Dominus Jesus (2000) strongly reaffirmed the traditional position but did not offer any new insights on the topic.13 At a first glance, it seemed that its theology emphasized the already acquired knowledge, and as a result risked blocking any interreligious Catholic creativity.14 We would have thus been in the presence of a clear example of Willaime’s ideal-typical approach about the (negative) role of a certain theology, in this case not regarding ecumenism, but relevant for interreligious dialogue. In some circles, it was effectively perceived as an example of the persisting tendency towards religious imperialism still present in the Catholic Church. But this interpretation was not necessarily the right one. In some ways, the document was effectively meant as a warning to the world of theological research not to venture into what was considered a dead end in the eyes of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from which the text emanated. The question remained, could this reaffirmation of the unique mediating role of Christ eventually also be interpreted as a sign of the will to go further with the other religions on the path of dialogue? Sociologically speaking, Coda will proceed with the help of new insights in Trinitarian theology (cosmos), thanks to the input of new mystical insights transmitted by Chiara Lubich, with the result of implementing not less dialogue, but more dialogue to become the nomos. Instead of lessening the role of Christ, he accentuates his role, but reading it with new accents, he achieves the result of keeping tradition alive, but opening it up to more, not less, dialogue. For him, a new interpretation of the cosmos helps here to legitimize the emerging dialogical nomos.

The assistance to formulate a theological way out came for Coda from Chiara Lubich. In the midst of the debate on Dominus Jesus (2000), Chiara Lubich was invited to talk about her ecumenical and interreligious commitment in Assisi. She pointed out that «(…) according to Thomas Aquinas, the Church must not be considered as including only Catholics, but all those for whom Christ died. Now, Christ died for everyone. If Christ died for everyone, we must also love everyone».15 The undisputed authority of Aquinas was used here to sustain the conviction that Lubich had already invoked in 1946; the meaning of the discourse was the same, but Lubich’s theological capacity had become more refined over the decades. But her speech only indirectly touched the raw nerve. Anyway, her deep conviction in that context was a good stance to encourage others not to give up the search for new ways to legitimize dialogue, although the theological work that was to explain the “possibility of practicing a new spirit” had to come from professional theologians.

How would Coda position himself between the two approaches, to repeat the classic position and the one no more ‘Christ-centered’ but more ‘God-centered’? In the ideal-typical approach using two opposite types, it is not unusual to find positions that combine aspects of two opposite ‘poles’. The French sociologist J. Séguy illustrated this in the case of the two opposite ideal-types of charism linked to the priestly function (office charism) and the personal role (personal charism), for which pope John Paul II was able to combine elements of both, showing characteristics sometimes of a personal charism and (most of the time) instead very close to the classic type of the priest (Séguy 1988).

Already in a published interview given in 2000, Coda affirmed that Christ as ‘the only mediator’ should not be interpreted as an affirmation of the superiority of Christians, and noted that the fullness of Christ «does not mean that we understand what this full and definitive revelation of God is» (Coda 2000, p. 68).16

He continued to further explore this issue in later work. As a disciple of Chiara Lubich, Coda, in his book, Il Logos e il Nulla (2004)17 outlines the fruits of his theological research and years of teaching, as well as his experiences with Chiara Lubich in the field of interreligious dialogue. He accompanied her on some important trips abroad such as her visit to the Masjid Malcolm Shabazz mosque in Harlem, New York (already mentioned above), which also helped him to integrate, as a theologian, the mystical insights of the foundress of the Focolare.

3. Does Jesus Christ Hinder or Welcome and Promote Interreligious Dialogue?

3.1. What Was at Stake?

The central idea of Coda’s book Il Logos e il Nulla (2003, in Engl. The Logos and Nothingness) is that the theology of interreligious dialogue should not avoid, out of delicacy towards other religions, putting Jesus Christ at the centre of attention but should do so in such a way that it becomes clear that Jesus Christ himself demands and encourages interreligious dialogue. Starting with Lubich’s mysticism and her understanding of the crucial role of the abandonment on the cross, Coda theologically explains that interreligious dialogue is possible and necessary for Christians: not despite Jesus Christ, but precisely because of Jesus Christ. In another published interview in the year 2000, Coda makes clear his point in this way:

(…) In what is called the “radical pluralist theology of religions” or even the “theocentric” vision of the religious phenomenon is affirmed that it is not only possible, but even necessary, to go beyond the face of God as proposed to us in Jesus Christ. This is essential if we want to find a crucial meeting point between all religions. At the end of the day, Jesus Christ would be like a signpost of the direction our gaze should take, although it would certainly not exhaust his face, nor would it be his final image’.

(Zavoli 2000, p. 287)

Coda, however, notes that the New Testament reaffirms the truth of the event of Jesus Christ, in such a way that “(…) [Christ] is the signpost and the instrument of truth, the only mediator between God and men. Ultimately, the one who shows us the face of God in fullness”. At first, this may seem only a reaffirmation of the classical Christian position, but Coda draws a different conclusion: we must not think that the Catholic position is one of exclusion but rather as one of inclusion.18 «Jesus Christ, therefore, does not exclude other ways of access to God, but rather includes them in himself. Freely, and not forcibly » (Zavoli 2000, p. 288). Instead of a theology where tradition becomes an obstacle, Coda sees here tradition as the possibility of thinking new evolutions, “think the unthinkable”, a growth from within.

3.2. How Does This Contradiction Get Unravelled?

Coda sees clearly that it is a matter of answering the question of how the ‘contradiction’ of the Church will be unravelled. On the one hand, it confesses the uniqueness and universality of Christ the Saviour, and on the other hand, it seeks a relationship with other religious experiences. ‘This is among the major challenges of theology’, he states without hesitation (Zavoli 2000, p. 288). Coda delves into Chiara Lubich’s mysticism, in particular the experience of Jesus’ abandonment on the cross, and he then manages to shine some light on the issue in his book Il Logos e il Nulla.19 Coda always expressed clearly in all his publications that the way Chiara Lubich understood the biblical passage regarding the abandonment of Jesus on the cross was a novelty in the history of Christian thought (Coda and Rossé 2020, p. 292). Is this what explains Coda’s capacity to legitimize the inversion he practices on Jesus as obstacle or facilitator of interreligious dialogue? From a sociological point of view, a charismatic figure, according to the classic Weberian approach, is someone who proclaims a new message or is at least thought to do so. The other condition is that a personal charism normally engenders followers, disciples…20 We have both in the case of Chiara Lubich. Regarding the originality of Lubich’s interpretation of what she calls Jesus Forsaken, there is no real debate. Her writings have an originality, also compared to modern authors who wrote about the same theme, but never made it the core item of their thinking or the heart of a spirituality.

«Until the twentieth century, the theological and spiritual tradition did not sense in the cry—or at least perceived it only fleetingly, in some vertex of mystical experience and in some rare peak of intelligence of faith—the theological and anthropological depth that we begin to read in it today. (…) It is also necessary to take into account—carefully—the fact that the charismatic illumination of Jesus Forsaken lights up precisely in our time, and not in another. It is the crisis of modernity: the experience of the absence and even of the ‘death’ of God (…)»

(Coda and Rossé 2020, p. 130)21

And he continues:

«In Chiara’s way of living and conceiving Jesus Forsaken there is actually an originality that cannot be found elsewhere. (…). Much more than one would be led to think at first (…). Indeed, in the charism of unity, Jesus Forsaken not only has a precise Christological and theological relevance, but also has a decisive anthropological, ecclesial, social and cultural relevance, since it ultimately expresses a way of living Christianity, a style of Christian life. It is therefore—and this seems to me a specific and original qualification—a performative interpretation of the entire Christian mystery, as Chiara writes: “the whole Gospel in that cry”.22

But it is not only through reasoning23 and in comparisons that the conviction of originality is rooted. As is the case for other religious charisms, also in Chiara’s life elements of a direct intervention from above can be found. The most interesting argument here is what Coda and Rossé (2020, p. 297) and others (Gillet 2009, p. 34) mention, but which Lubich herself cites only a very few times and only en passant as the mystical foundation of her charism. «One day Chiara perceived as suggested to her soul by Him, Jesus Forsaken: “I waited 2000 years to reveal myself to you”». What is to consider here now is the link with interreligious dialogue.

Returning to the controversy around Dominus Jesus, the fear of a certain theological investigation was that Jesus by his stature as the ‘only mediator’ would in fact have ‘outshone’ the other founders of religions and made dialogue impossible.24 Coda instead remains within the great (Pauline) tradition of reflection on kenosis. He draws on the inspiration of Lubich’s focus about Jesus forsaken on the cross which presents Jesus not only as the unique savior but also as the one who empties himself to reveal the love of God. Coda explains that it is a love that leaves the space for the other, that values the other and creates with the other a mutual relationship in the image of the Trinity.25

3.3. A Question of Love and Walk Together on the Journey

A deeper understanding of what love and its kenotic dimension mean for Christ allows Coda to specify:

Jesus, in fact, for the Christian faith, is not only the Logos made flesh, the definitive Word of God for humanity, so that by seeing him one sees the Father (cf. Jn 12:45), but he is also the One who "empties” himself (cf. Phil 2.7) to the point of giving everything on the wood of the cross—even God in himself. Indeed, the revelation of God accomplished in the logos made flesh takes place precisely through this free and active self-denial. The Logos of God made flesh who, before dying on the cross, cries out: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? (cf. Mk 15:34; Mt 27:46) is the fulfilment of the revealing by this event of whom He is in his person. In Him, in that supreme and decisive hour of His existence and mission, the Logos and Nothingness coincide because the Logos made flesh is giving all of Himself, even God in Himself. This is how Paul reveals the Agape (unselfish Love) that is God the Trinity by happening on this earth in our history.

(Coda 2004, frontpage 4)26

Here, we have a key to a theological understanding of the pluralism of religions and, at the same time, a practical spiritual key for dialogue and encounter between them in this troubled and promising dawn of the third millennium. For Coda, an element of the change of epoch in which we live is seen in the passage from an interpretation with an exclusivist tendency to a tendency towards a universal conception: «We are perceiving that if the God who revealed himself to my people, the God venerated in my tradition, is a God for me, that is, a God who loves my people and wants their good; precisely for this reason—perhaps in different ways but which in any case converge—is also the One who reveals himself to other peoples, loving them in the same way » (Zavoli 2000, p. 298).27

For Coda, if we experience that God is for us, then we [Catholic Christians] can and must think that God is for everyone. This means, however, that for him, the conclusion is not that every religion must “close down” but should open towards others, and so remain open to the breath of the Spirit that urges it to seek the light of God and the meaning of the person outside itself. Coda himself wrote in a concise formula: «Join not to annihilate each other but to walk together on the journey» (p. 299).

3.4. Thinking the Unthinkable, Walking Together as Religions

Central to our theme, therefore, is our relationship with other religious experiences, but also our awareness that we can interpret them as the love revealed by Jesus Christ. It is through our experience of unity that we can live and dialogue with each other and with other religions. This does not mean altering them, diminishing them or upsetting them, but instead it means protecting them, bringing them to express the possibilities that they already carry within themselves, not despite the relationship but because of the relationship. «Because the very structure of Love that Christ reveals elevates the other, highlights him, helps him to become more himself» (Zavoli 2000, p. 299).

And here we can remember a famous quote from Msgr. Fr Rossano (1923–1991), who affirmed that all the riches present and hidden in Christian revelation can never be fully expressed and known until the inspirations, languages, experiences of all the cultures and religions of humanity are used.28 Stimulated by the law of mutual love, one can only hope that we will enrich one another through a mutual self-emptying and that the fullness of the Spirit of God will, at the same time, fill this self-emptiness by bringing about a unity in distinction: «(…) so that [as noted by Piero Coda] the various identities can act with each other, each with its own voice, mutually opening up to an unreserved understanding, a premise of a transcendence towards a common conscience which as of yesterday was not only unexpected, but even unthinkable» (Zavoli 2000, p. 299).

4. Conclusions on the Impact of a Cultural Evolution

An evolution in a culture that was for centuries oriented in a more exclusivist sense is a phenomenon that interests philosophers eager to understand the history of ideas, how they are generated, develop, are welcomed and eventually disappear. A sociologist is interested in how these ideas spread starting from the mind of a thinker and become known, accepted or forgotten or contrasted, moving people and institutions in one or another direction. In the case of Chiara Lubich, we can say that especially P. Coda but also others managed to universalize her mystical intuitions, translating them into theological concepts and reasoning, which influenced the engagement of the Focolare Movement in favor of interreligious dialogue.

As a charismatic figure, Chiara Lubich managed to establish relations with significant leaders of other religions, building bridges where they did not exist before between leaders of other religions and Catholic leaders (Catalano 2022). How far does the influence of Lubich’s mysticism and Coda’s theological work on interreligious dialogue extend, what impact do they have in religious circles, or in society as such? The answer is difficult to give today but at least in the circles of militants in the interreligious cause, the reputation of the Focolare, Lubich and Coda is firmly established, and their activity on Church levels is greatly valued in the Vatican and by many bishops. So also is their engagement in international organizations such as Religions for Peace (Callebaut 2021, p. 148).

In building social impact, the leap from intuitions of a single person to a coherent cultural proposal is an important intermediary step. The quote that where ideas once passed, fifty years later canons pass, is attributed to G. F. Hegel. The Focolare engagement in interreligious dialogue has at least built up a solid reputation at a cultural and institutional level accompanying their activity all over the planet, stimulated by their worldwide diffusion. How far the impact of this contribution reaches on Church level and in the broader society has not been studied yet.

In the end, the sociology of theology has gained an interesting example here that partly contradicts—or perhaps better said, refines—Willaime’s ideal-typical typology: here we are effectively in the presence of a theology that, starting from a classic point of view and thus in danger of obstructing the need for change and progress in interreligious dialogue, has instead been capable of stimulating change and progress towards inclusion, beginning from tradition and developing a new viewpoint from within the classic position. In other words, it is an interesting case study for change and growth but from within tradition…

From a sociological point of view, our interpretation could count on the weberian way of labeling charismatic leaders and their original insights, applying to the case of Chiara Lubich and her central mystical insight in the kenosis of Christ. And remembering P. Berger’s (1967) comments in his The Sacred Canopy, on how theology tries to link cosmos and nomos, we see exactly that this is the way Coda elaborates his theological legitimation of a much more open interpretation of the same unique mediating role of Christ. One would expect that this unique role would confirm the ‘religious imperialism’ of Christianity in dialogue. Taking into account a new (Lubich’s mystical) insight on how Christ is acting the redemption (cosmos), Coda helps theologically build an order (nomos) where religions can act together, a worldview that accepts the interreligious dialogue as a new field for the application of the brotherhood model. This intellectual effort to promote a kind of new religious norm, a new nomos—where dialogue becomes the new norm, rooted in a new interpretation of cosmos because God is dialogue, i.e., trinity -, offers the Catholic culture a way out of the alternative between the dangerous path of imperialism and the not less dangerous path of indifference.