HOME l Our Sisters l Our

Mirco...

Hello everyone! I’m Mirco. I lived for the first 20 years of my life in Semogo, in Valtellina in the Italian Alps, a small village of 1400 inhabitants, at an altitude of 4800 feet. Growing up in an environment in which you are familiar with everybody, in which you are in direct contact with nature, the beauty of the snowy peaks, the cold water springs, the icy winters and the cool summers, deeply tempered my personality. I always preferred work to study, during the afternoons when I was in junior and senior high school, I helped my grandparents work on the farm, helped my dad with work around the house, and a family friend who was a widow with outdoor work. I learned to do all types of manual labor: I worked four summers as a bricklayer for my uncle’s construction company, as well as light work as an electrician, plumber, technician, carpenter. Whenever there was some manual work to do, I was never one to shy away from it. My favorite hobby is to adjust things around the house: household appliances, the computer, work tools, the motorcycle, the car...

When I was 14 years old I began going to the parish center and the sport clubs in my home town: I was a member of Catholic Action and an educator for six years, a small group leader, a member of the youth group which organized various town and youth festivals, and also a member of the sports team. In short, I passed some of the most unforgettable moments of my life taking part in these groups with all of my friends.

After my high school graduation in 2004, I enrolled at the university with a major in constructional engineering. In December of that year I had an encounter that changed my life! I met the Apostles of the Interior Life community who had come to do a mission in my parish, one of whom is my cousin Sr. Maurizia, who was also born in Semogo. During one of their youth encounters I was struck by questions I didn’t know how to answer: “What is the meaning of your life? Do you know that you are called to holiness ... and that the two ways to be holy are marriage and consecration?” These questions set my heart in motion, I had to find an answer. In those days I was struck by another lightning bolt hearing the words of a song: “I met you Jesus and everything in me changed...” It was exactly what was happening in me!!

When the Apostles went back to Rome, I decided to contact one of them, Sr. Sabina. With her indispensable spiritual help I began to know myself more. After about three weeks I was sure: my vocation was (and is) consecration, the priesthood. I started to pray meditation everyday and go to daily Mass. I bought the breviary and I prayed that also. I went to Rome a few times to visit the community. I got to know the male branch and I was fascinated by them. Holy Thursday 2005 I expressed my desire to enter into the Apostles of the Interior Life. In April I left the university, I lived an experience in the community for a month from May to June, and the 14^th of September I officially entered. I don’t know how to thank the Lord for all the love He has given me: for my life in Semogo where I grew up in a truly Christian environment, pure and simple, for letting me have many awesome experiences that are now my heritage and very useful also in my new life, for giving me the grace to hear His call and to know how to respond to Him. How can I thank Him? By becoming a saint, a true Christian!