Spirto Gentil

Whenhe was a young seminarian, the teacher in Luigi Giussani’s singing class playeda recording of an aria from a Donizetti opera, “Spirto gentil” (“Gentle spirit,you once shone in my dreams, but after, I lost you forever. . . .”). At thatmoment, Giussani “understood for the first time that God existed, and thus thatnothing could exist without a meaning; that the heart could not existunless the heart’s goal existed: happiness.” Manyyears later, after founding Communion and Liberation—a lay moveme