Common house

When we speak of the "common home" the first reference falls on the creation we inhabit, for which we continue to be inattentive, caring for it little or ruining it with small and large daily gestures, with lack of system choices that shorten its life and compromise it on various fronts. But there is a "common home" which also should not be bypassed, which encompasses us and touches us, and how. We were reminded of it last June 2, on Republic Day. In fact, it is by no means trivial to tell us that we urgently need to understand the value of our common home which is called the Republic. It can be healthy to refocus on the democratic values that over 75 years ago saw the generations of the time radically turn the page, after the darkness of the dictatorship and the abyss of war, thanks also to those who courageously knew which side to take in the most complicated situations crossed by our country. Now the Republic has been containing us for many decades, strengthening its fixed points, passing through so many difficulties and recurring critical seasons, coming to terms with assorted calamities, recovering with courage and determination, also cultivating innovative visions such as the European dimension, seeking answers to the needs of a people who must look ahead.

The Republic is there. It is the habitat in which to find ourselves, counting on a common denominator that gives security. Because everyone can feel like a protagonist, with rights and duties, supported by solidarity and democratic convictions, with openness to freedom and dignity for everyone, in mutual respect. You can always start afresh from a source that never dries up, which is our Constitution. The challenges abound. From feeling part of a Europe that smacks of peace and sharing, investing in the primacy of the person and of life, banishing the logic of war and of opposing and increasingly armed blocs, of discrimination, of closures, of creeping racisms, of walls that divide... to overcoming the temptation to fall back on micro or macro-selfishness, to abdicate in taking charge of public affairs ending up in the shallows of absenteeism at the polls. But the Constitution is still an authentic light on all this. And it would take a constituent climate, like in 1946-1947, to summarize the Constitution as a founding scenario, always. The rest comes later, within the coordinates of the Charter.

Corrado Avagnina

NP Giugno-Luglio 2023