Chiara made her first visit to North America in 1964. She often wrote about what she was living in those days...

March 31, 1964
“Yesterday I spent the whole day with the Focolarini. Today they are working. They have a great desire for God… With them I understood that Jesus in our midst is like the loudspeaker of Jesus in each soul. His presence makes his voice inside of us grow and prepares us to hear it, to understand it, and as a consequence, to live the ‘new man’ in us.
This discovery seems even more beautiful to me, new and apropos, here where the characteristic is to have the biggest things in the world – the biggest roads, the biggest skyscrapers, like the Empire State Building.

We visited it right after our meeting and we went up, I don't know how many stories, 102 or so. From up high, since the sun was shining, we could see a good part of New York, all the way to the Statue of Liberty. That liberty which seems to be the striking note of this country. Certainly the Focolarini are few here if we think of the millions of people living in this city. They are millions but they are all entrusted to the heart of Jesus because this city lends itself to a fire of divine love."

To be continued...