The Art of Loving
The foundation on which we built the "New Horizons" training programme can be summarised as follows:
The basic needs of existence is neither the need to please, nor the need for power, nor the need of giving our life meaning: it's the needThe basic needs of existence is neither the need to please, nor the need for power, nor the need of giving our life meaning: it's the need to love and to be lovedto love and to be loved.
To the extent that one responds to this need, they may find the right way not only for their self-realisation but also to live the fullness of joy.
The big revelation that Jesus Christ made us is that God is love; for this reason you can discover and become in the image and likeness of God, as everybody aspires to, only by learning how to love and receive love from the others.
The incredible adventure of New Horizons started from an act of faith in this revelation; that act of faith, for those who have become personally involved in it, became surprisingly real. In fact, it became the real experience for thousands of desperate people who could feel a joy none of them had ever before experienced: this had been possible from the moment they started to love and being loved.
This is why the name of the training programme of our community is the Art of Loving.
When people start it, they immediately realise how difficult and complex is this art, and it requires a great deal of commitment, constancy and perseverance.
Soon they realise that the greatest obstacle to love and being loved are the not-treated wounds of their hearts - wounds caused during childhood and perpetuated throughout their lives - which have generated fear to love and be loved. To heal them you need to become deeply and clearly aware of them; then you have to plung into the ocean of suffering the cause, with the help of the group and the community; lastly, you show them to the one true Doctor that is Jesus, so that He can heal them one by one.
Here is a summary of the programme: the harder you try to love, faster your wounds will heal up; the faster they heal up, more you can love and receive love. Thus, you start a virtuous circle that breaks the vicious circles that trapped you.
In two ways:
- through the theoretical and experiential method of New Horizons, particularly applied to therapeutic and training groups;
- through our community and fraternal lifestyle in a constant learning experiment.
What are the means?
The newness of this programme is the integration of different psychological techniques to serve the goal of growth and change of individuals by activating a strong involvement of the spiritual dimension that is propulsive in respect to the psychic and the physical ones.
The weekly group training is dynamic theory and practice through self-knowledge, sharing, spirituality, intercomparison. Living together every day, in a close relation of mirroring, all committed to learn the art of loving and being loved, to heal one’s own wounds and those of others, is a tremendous learning experience that generates fast changes.
Everybody places themselves at the service of their the others and of themselves in this research: the other becomes a valuable tool of self-discovery. Thus, work in groups is like lighting the fuse of the dynamics of knowledge and of comparison, which then are tested and implemented in the reality of each moment.
Everyday life is the place and the method of training.
God, who is Love and full Truth for every person, lives by his Spirit in every heart and transforms our lives in the fullness of God's Children
