Would I have forgiven her? Could I even think of having to forgive? That I am not able to excuse an act of rudeness in the ordinary rush-hour traffic, could I forgive my wife, which I found to have deliberately destroyed our marriage? And could I forgive me my made mistakes?

In all this suffering, all that pain, all in mutual bitterness that followed, an expression that made me hurt more was when my wife answered one of my requests for explanation, became insistent: "Look, at the end, I have my life !..". Then, it was clear that there was "our" life, but from then on there would be "her" and "my" life.

If there is an experience of "desert", if there is a "dark night" for me those moments were so. Moments of darkness and solitude, where nothing can bring relief that no one can understand the pain and leave you breathless. Feeling rejected, "thrown away". Find himself without an identity, in a situation of psycho-physical destabilization and estrangement. I could not watch our son without feeling a lump in my throat. Someone, sometimes, thinking that would please me, he spoke ill of her or saying "Poor you." He did not know how much it hurt me.

But then, in that silence I got rid of many things, so many unnecessary weight, many voices inside and outside of me, and I heard that "subtle wind," the Lord's presence next to me, that when all was well, I could not, I did not want to hear. And the question of faith, until then never fully resolved, it seemed like the key crossroads: on the one hand, only a senseless pain, and received an evil act, a road of death, the other through the pain, a promise of life, salvation and, yes, even joy!

I remember there was a time when the morning before going to work, "I had to" go to church and stop at the foot of the Crucifix. To be there, most of the time without being able to say and even think nothing has changed my heart. In the dark, those in my "hell", I heard for the first time the real and actual presence of the Lord. This has gradually changed the perspective of my inner life. My situation continued to remain as such, all the problems remained, nothing changed outside of me, my pain remained, at the same time it was nothing and would be the same again.

And I began to understand the meaning of those words I had spoken on the wedding day: "I welcome you, as my wife. By the grace of Christ's I promise to be faithful to you always, in joy and in sorrow, in sickness and in health, and to love and honor you all the days of my life. " Be faithful to you forever ... in joy and in sorrow. Those days, I never thought they could get, was the moment of pain - the most pain - it can be proved in love, that the shoulders turn, the "do not love you anymore", yet ... I will love you and will honor all the days of my life.

I felt that I could not survive without love. But I should not go and seek elsewhere what apparently I was torn, the love of my wife continued to live in our marriage, that right there where it seemed likely that she will instead end up finding its true dimension. It reassembles the fragments of human unity in the highest, a unit of "eternal marriage", project in the heart of God

The loyalty and forgiveness I have never seemed so unattainable goals, too much beyond my strength, but the consequence and effect of the first to feel loved by God, forgiven by God, who remained faithful in our marriage, giving meaning and joy to my day. I began to understand the words of the Psalmist: "His love endures forever" (Ps. 135).

This, however, not yet removed all my human fears. Would I not be crazy? I asked. Can a man live like that? Never before I had considered a possibility that even comes close. I was made for married life, couple, and certainly not to be alone. I then said to the Lord: "Think you about." And the same chastity seemed to me at that point, as what could save me from slipping down, to become brutalized. Before I suffered. Then, I chose it.

No longer a moral rule, long and incomprehensible, almost inhuman, but it could help me to watch my son was growing up with that look of calm and that he had need. Day by day ... I asked the Lord to give me the grace of fidelity, day by day.

My choice of loyalty has long been linked to the hope of a reunion. Until my wife told me she was expecting a child. I did not think I could slip back in the early moments of acute pain of separation. I could not bear the sight of my wife's belly. Yes, my wife. In my decision to remain faithful, I never doubted that I would always call it that, despite everything. But now? I felt humiliated, deeply hurt again.

I saw G. which will have had about ten days. We met on a sultry summer afternoon at the park, among the dried flower beds and benches in the middle of the road. My wife kept her close to him in a sling carrier. It seemed to me like you would protect it from me, looking a little 'suspicious, studying my reaction. I said nothing, but I had a smile, reached out and touched his arm when the foot G. I saw my wife's face light up. I had liberated from a burden: the thought that I could never accept the new situation, or that I could feel resentment towards the child, or that the relationship with our son could change. In an instant the foot of G. had melted all the frost of that long winter of the soul.

After many years since our separation, thanks to the journey with brothers and sisters who have made the same decision to be faithful to the sacrament of marriage, I felt the need to apologize to my wife. Pardon, I thought that it had no responsibility in what happened, forgiveness for sins that I had never acknowledged. There, the local bar, a neutral ground where we used to meet the usual "communications service", typical of divorced parents. Did not expect, were not the usual talk about programming alternating weekend or school performance. She listened me in silence, her eyes a bit shiny.

The next day, she sent three consecutive long sms. Words that I will always carry in my heart, that are part of our love story, which go beyond the barriers of time and a situation that can not be changed. And they are not only written in memory of silicon of my phone, but - I am sure - are already written in heaven.