This blog post opens a new category in my personal website, which will be related to religion - more specifically to my own religion, Roman Catholicism. Well, of course I won't discuss of theology - it's not my matter - but of the practical implications affecting a catholic person living in this century.

It has been a tough decision, which I've been thinking of for a very long time. Not because it's an argument that I'm shy of - all my friends and co-workers know very well my credo. In fact, I've always rejected that school of thought that pretends to see religion as something confined in one's own private life: Roman Catholicism is also about witnessing Christ, you can't be catholic without doing that in the open. Nor I think that talking of God, angels and demons is anachronistic in our “modern” world, where some suppose that science explains everything. Nor I'm worried about contrasting the “mundane way of thinking” by asserting my non-negotiable values, such as the sanctity of human life from conception to natural death, of the heterosexual marriage, of chastity outside marriage, of charity towards the needy brothers, and so on - even though some “liberal” minds in some countries have approved bills that try to limit the freedom of speech about many of these themes, and the debate is running in my own country too.

My doubts stemmed from the inherent difficulty of debating in nowadays diabolic world - and here I'm referring to the original etymology of διάβολος that means “prone to slander”, “calumniator”, “instigator of chaos and confusion”. A chaos strategy that mainly acts in a very subtle way, by confusing good with evil, covering poisoned things with a sweet taste, corrupting things that started with the best intentions and hijacking them into the wrong direction. And since Good and Evil fight not only in the world, but also within us, well, mainly within us, my fear of embarking in a task beyond my forces was great. It is still great. What will inspire my blog posts on religion? The feeling that I belong to the Truth, or the capital sin of thinking that the truth belongs to me? The sincere devotion to the Truth, or my own desire to stand out? As Pope Benedict XVI said, the man of the XXI century faces with the tough decision to choose between “ego” and God (“Io o Dio”, as it beautifully sounds in Italian). Writing about religion could be just another temptation to be under the spotlight, to achieve those “fifteen minutes of fame” that today are the hectic impulse to accumulate links, “I like” or re-tweets. While I'm not particularly prone to spotlights, I know I've a strong personality and this is a concrete risk. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, after all - wouldn't it be diabolic to let my own ego to turn the good fight into the wrong path?

Add to these points that I lack the most appropriate cultural background for dealing with this topic, having instead a technological/scientific education; and I've decided to write in English, in harmony with the rest of my personal website, but it's a language that I seldom use for religious arguments.

So - I'm still really wondering whether I'm doing something inappropriate. But now I feel I should really do this. Why? Because in this Annus Fidei Benedict XVI and Francis called for a missionary spirit, that is something for everybody, not only priests, and not only related to far away continents. Because Sancta Romana Ecclesia is living one of the most critical periods of her history (supremely resumed and superbly witnessed by Benedict XVI resigning from his mandate) and because many forces, external and internal, are trying to prevent her from exiting this phase - for instance, purportedly misinterpreting or cherry-picking the statements by her members, including Pope Francis. Clearly it's not in the skills of any single man, let alone me, to come up with a solution for this, but - much like as it happens for civil activism - it's up to anybody who cares to stand up and take action, not just thinking that it's somebody's else affair. Many single voices, united, can dispel the chaos; even if one might be unfit for the purpose, his mere attempt might inspire others who are more skilled.

As an antidote to my human fallacies, I know that my blog has got just a minuscule bunch of readers and I never took actions for promoting it. I'll leave things as they are, without explicitly searching for a spotlight. If my words will be just another small drop in the river to bring freshness to a fragment of land, it will happen for God's will; otherwise, they will be just dispersed in oblivion. I'm fine with both of these possibilities. I'll try to compensate my cultural deficiencies with good sense and my rational attitude. Of course, the most effective antidote to one's own fallacies is prayer, and I'll be praying God to give me the humility and sapience not to write wrong things. If you are a believer, please add your own prayer for me and for all the other people who have got the responsibility of speaking and writing.

As usual I also rely on the fact that my few readers will always interpret my posts as hints, more as questions than answers, and they will reason with their own mind.

Don't expect any regular frequency of posts - after all, I've not posted here, in any category, for more than one year.