Learning to be reborn/13 - The transformation of a charisma in the organizational phase, from the first generation of the founder to the second
by Luigino Bruni
published in Città Nuova on 21/02/2025 - From the magazine Città Nuova no. 9/2024
The Bible is many things at once. It is also a great map for times of crisis and transition in communities. I am talking about the whole Bible, especially its prophets, who are the model of every charism, because there is no better paradigm for understanding community founders and their movements than that of the biblical prophets.
The book of the prophet Daniel is a complex text, dominated by dreams and the interpretations that Daniel manages to find for his own dreams and those of others. In general, Daniel has a great ability to interpret dreams. However, there is one vision, that of the unicorn goat, which Daniel cannot decipher, despite the help he receives from Gabriel, the angel-interpreter. In fact, at the end of the vision, he writes: “I, Daniel, was exhausted and felt ill for several days: [...] I was stunned by the vision, because I could not understand it” (Daniel 8:27). Sometimes prophets understand their visions, other times they do not.
True prophets, unlike false prophets, cannot interpret all the visions they receive from God, because they are not masters of their dreams; they are not technicians with ready-made solutions for every problem. This inability of prophets to interpret certain dreams also applies to the dreams of that form of collective prophecy which are communities and movements born of charisms and founders: the founder is not the only prophet, the whole community participates in the prophetic gift.
In the transition from the founder's generation to the next, it is common and normal for communities to be unable to interpret visions, both those of yesterday and those (more rare) of today. Two things become difficult: (a) interpreting today the dreams and visions that the founder had yesterday, (b) deciphering the new dreams that continue to arrive. This double difficulty hides much of the secret that allows movements born in the twentieth century to continue their charismatic journey today. Let us see how.
In fact, a real paradox occurs. A charism comes to earth to fulfill a word that is different and new, even if already present in tradition. This word is announced and lived in the first generation as the dawn of a bright day, which then continues and in some way is fulfilled only in future generations. But it often, if not always, happens that when that word begins to truly be fulfilled, the community that yesterday understood it when it was still an announcement is no longer able today to interpret yesterday's prophetic “dream.” It becomes fearful, discouraged, experiences collective disappointment, and is unable to understand its dream as it is being realized.
It is much easier to understand when it is announced as a future project, but as soon as it begins to be fulfilled in history, something very similar to what Daniel experienced happens: “I, Daniel, was exhausted and felt ill for several days,” precisely because he could not understand his vision. The vision had been given to him, but he was the one who did not understand it. Often we remain “exhausted” for many years, decades, until something happens, which does not always happen: a reform or a new light that shines somewhere in the community.
Think, for example, of a charism that came to shed new spiritual light on the abandonment and death of Jesus. In the founding phase, when everything speaks of light and life, Jesus' abandonment on the cross is clear, fascinating, and luminous. The founder and all the members of his community understand the heart of the charism, namely that “God is where there is no,” that there is light in the darkness, that the Risen One is already within the Crucified One, that there is a mysterious but true value in diminishing, in becoming small. Then decades pass, the founder dies, the community shrinks, becomes less powerful, less strong, smaller, more fragile, and that reality announced yesterday in the light of dawn begins to fade.
In reality, if we were able to interpret the dream correctly, we would have to say that the charism is finally being fulfilled precisely as we become small and fragile, but what was fascinating when it was announced is now, in its fulfillment, no longer understood and only causes fear. We cannot see the dawn in the twilight because that collective body that is finally embodying its charisma cannot look at itself from outside and from afar, the only vision that would allow it to truly understand what is happening.
This is the time when we must return to the Bible, to its prophets, and use their essential maps to see from outside and above the true story that is unfolding. To continue the race.