Totus Tuus

“I was about to leave everything when I read in the newspaper:  «Crisis in the Legion of Christ».  Immediately I thought: «I am a crisis specialist, I have always worked in crisis organizations and the Legion of Christ is in crisis… this is proof of my vocation».”

My work consisted of helping people change. I specialized in corporate crises: guiding processes of change, organizational, institutional, and personal. I have always admired and studied human talent to highlight it, make it emerge, to help entrepreneurs and professionals put it in the right place at the right time. I helped many people grow, change, so one day I asked myself who would help me. I hadn’t entered a church since confirmation. And at 30, the call came.

I am a Legionary of Christ because I searched “vocation” on Google and that day the Legion was at the top of the search. After a couple of interviews, I was invited to a pilgrimage, so on that Immaculate Conception in 2008 in Medjugorje, I climbed Krijevaz and knelt under the cross and said: “Totus Tuus”. A few minutes passed, and I was silent under a tree, becoming aware of what I had just said as if gathering a seed fallen deep into my heart. I turned around due to a gust of wind coming from behind, hitting the tree and forcefully moving its branches over me, so much so that I noticed and memorized how the power of God, poured out spontaneously, unexpectedly, and surprisingly, struck me. It was as if the heavens opened, pouring waterfalls of living water inside me. I cried so much that my shirt was already soaked after a few seconds: all the emptiness in my heart was released, pushed out by the strength of what was entering and my desire to contain more and more. The emptiness went out, and grace entered.

It was a baptism in the Holy Spirit, a spontaneous outpouring that I understood years later, in Mexico, where I learned to live my missionary experience in the Legion of Christ among the gifts and charisms that had been poured into me that day in Medjugorje and that now emerged in the apostolate. With the support of superiors and spiritual directors of the Legion, I learned to use them as a toolbox for liberation and healing pastoral care, in spiritual direction and prayer. Bringing my charismatic renewal experience into Regnum Christi, I learned to understand my religious mission and my priestly vocation in the Legion of Christ.

Every crisis situation is an opportunity offered by Providence to pause and discern the reality in which we are immersed. We remember the journey made, the gifts and benefits received, as well as the wounds and abuses suffered. When I entered the Legion of Christ, I was stunned by what I encountered in many methods, structures, authority exercises, and training systems. I asked the Crucifix what all this was, and He answered me each time: “I will fix it, trust Me.” Entering in September 2009 amidst scandal, today I am a witness to the miracles of these years, contemplating how the Institute responded to the reforms requested by the Church, how many superiors and formators, with tears and blood, learned to be obedient and to modify judgment criteria and systems of governance, methods, and institutional and personal attitudes, thus initiating a process that will allow the Legion to unite victim to Victim Christ and to place the Lord Jesus at the center of its being, thinking, and acting according to the Gospel.

Being a priest means becoming a holy host and a living chalice, offering oneself as a victim soul that gathers all the sufferings of oneself and others, consecrating them on the altar as a gift of God offered to God. The mission is in a new Pentecost through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, operated by the Holy Spirit who asks us to “be docile to His inspirations,” “ask Him for His gifts,” as expressed in the Constitutions of the Legionaries of Christ. We are wounded healers sent to heal the sick and to free the Church guided by the Spirit in a time of profound renewal.

Massimo Merlino is from Acitrezza, Sicily. Born on June 11, 1978, he trained in Siena, Milan, and Brussels working in organizational development for family and international businesses. In 2009, he entered the novitiate in Gozzano (NO), and in 2011 began studies in philosophy in Thornwood (New York) and Rome, where he collaborated in the General Administration. In 2013, in Mexico City, he began his apostolic internship at the Anáhuac University, Area of Integral Formation. Returning to Rome in 2015, he studied theology at the International College, collaborating with the Vocational Center of the Diocese of Rome and in marriage and family pastoral care in various communities.