Opera Omnia

JAMES ALBERIONE
ABUNDANTES DIVITIÆ GRATIÆ SUÆ
Charismatic History of the Pauline Family
This edition edited by ANGELO COLACRAI and ELISEO SGARBOSSA

Grateful acknowledgment is made to: Alison Berger, Andrea Damino, Antonio da Silva, Guido Gandolfo, Luigi Giovannini, Antonietta Martini, Fedele Pasquero, Franco Pierini, Maurizio Tirapelle and M. Damien Vieira.

Abbreviation: AD
Translated by Mike Byrnes
Seen, approved for printing
Rome, 4 April 1998
SAC. SILVIO PIGNOTTI, Sup. Gen. SSP

Imprimatur:
10 October 1985
Albano Laziale
+ DANTE BERNINI, Bishop

© Società San Paolo, Casa Generalizia, 1998
Publication for private circulation
FOREWORDToward the end of 1953 when some senior members asked him to reveal something about himself, about his own call and the mission of the Pauline Family, Fr James Alberione set out in his own handwriting the notes contained in these pages.
The words of Saint Paul Abundantes divitiæ gratiæ suæ (cf Eph 2:7), written at the top of the first page and which then became the title of the whole work, eloquently express the author’s approach. It is not his intention to narrate what he did and realized, albeit with the help of God; rather, it is to fix the reader’s attention exclusively on that marvelous pedagogy whereby the extraordinary riches of grace willed to make use of him, an unworthy and incapable person, to realize a project for the benefit of the Church (cf. AD 350).
Thus these simple and bare notes come alive and turn into a prolonged act of thanksgiving to God. Guided by the Spirit Fr Alberione goes back over his past, his heart deeply moved as he perceives his life in the embrace of the Father’s benevolence: in the light coming from the Host he has indeed seen the Lord; the half-blind man (AD 202) was always enlightened and guided step by step; yet once again God has made use of an inadequate instrument (cf. AD 209) to repeat endless marvels...
In presenting this new edition of Abundantes divitiæ gratiæ suæ, known also as the Charismatic history of the Pauline Family, I invite the reader to assume the same feeling of gratitude and active response to God’s call as that shown by Fr Alberione. Following his example, each one of us intends today to enter with increasingly greater love into the mystery of the vocation-mission we have received and to adhere to it with all our strength.
Rome, 4 April 1998.

FR SILVIO PIGNOTTI
Superior General SSP