Remembrance of Athenagoras (1886-1972), patriarch of Constantinople and father of ecumenical dialogue. Read more
Remembrance of Athenagoras (1886-1972), patriarch of Constantinople and father of ecumenical dialogue.
Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Spirit of the Lord is upon you.
The child you shall bear will be holy.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Genesis 32, 23-33
That same night he got up and, taking his two wives, his two slave-girls and his eleven children, crossed the ford of the Jabbok.
After he had taken them across the stream, he sent all his possessions over too.
And Jacob was left alone. Then someone wrestled with him until daybreak
who, seeing that he could not master him, struck him on the hip socket, and Jacob's hip was dislocated as he wrestled with him.
He said, 'Let me go, for day is breaking.' Jacob replied, 'I will not let you go unless you bless me.'
The other said, 'What is your name?' 'Jacob,' he replied.
He said, 'No longer are you to be called Jacob, but Israel since you have shown your strength against God and men and have prevailed.'
Then Jacob asked, 'Please tell me your name.' He replied, 'Why do you ask my name?' With that, he blessed him there.
Jacob named the place Peniel, 'Because I have seen God face to face,' he said, 'and have survived.'
The sun rose as he passed Peniel, limping from his hip.
That is why to this day the Israelites do not eat the thigh sinew which is at the hip socket: because he had struck Jacob at the hip socket on the thigh sinew.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Look down, O Lord, on your servants.
Be it unto us according to your word.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Jacob is going through a difficult time. He is on his way back to the promised land, but he is afraid of the impending meeting with his brother Esau, whom he had left on bad terms. He wants to re-establish a peaceful relationship with Esau. In the uncertainty of loneliness a mysterious presence starts to wrestle with him. The text does not immediately identify this figure, as if to help us discover him together with Jacob. In fact, over the course of his journey, Jacob seems to have forgotten about the company of God. But the Lord has not forgotten him, and wrestles with the believer to force him to recognize his presence again. We might say that the life of a believer is always conflictual, because it is a constant struggle against pride, self-sufficiency, and forgetfulness. It is God who fights against our selfishness. The believer must fight without knowing the identity of the opponent in order to win a blessing, not with a trick, but by struggling with his whole being. God changed Jacob’s name to Israel, because he fought. Faith is often a struggle in the dark, but it always leads to an encounter that is finally personal, face to face with God. And it leaves a sign, a mark, just as Jacob’s name and story were changed when he became Israel. Being with God means struggling with ourselves and with the evil that holds the world in slavery. But the Lord clothes us with the power of his love.
Prayer is the heart of the life of the Community of Sant'Egidio and is its absolute priority. At the end of the day, every the Community of Sant'Egidio, large or small, gathers around the Lord to listen to his Word. The Word of God and the prayer are, in fact, the very basis of the whole life of the Community. The disciples cannot do other than remain at the feet of Jesus, as did Mary of Bethany, to receive his love and learn his ways (Phil. 2:5).
So every evening, when the Community returns to the feet of the Lord, it repeats the words of the anonymous disciple: " Lord, teach us how to pray". Jesus, Master of prayer, continues to answer: "When you pray, say: Abba, Father". It is not a simple exhortation, it is much more. With these words Jesus lets the disciples participate in his own relationship with the Father. Therefore in prayer, the fact of being children of the Father who is in heaven, comes before the words we may say. So praying is above all a way of being! That is to say we are children who turn with faith to the Father, certain that they will be heard.
Jesus teaches us to call God "Our Father". And not simply "Father" or "My Father". Disciples, even when they pray on their own, are never isolated nor they are orphans; they are always members of the Lord's family.
In praying together, beside the mystery of being children of God, there is also the mystery of brotherhood, as the Father of the Church said: "You cannot have God as father without having the church as mother". When praying together, the Holy Spirit assembles the disciples in the upper room together with Mary, the Lord's mother, so that they may direct their gaze towards the Lord's face and learn from Him the secret of his Heart.
The Communities of Sant'Egidio all over the world gather in the various places of prayer and lay before the Lord the hopes and the sufferings of the tired, exhausted crowds of which the Gospel speaks ( Mat. 9: 3-7 ), In these ancient crowds we can see the huge masses of the modern cities, the millions of refugees who continue to flee their countries, the poor, relegated to the very fringe of life and all those who are waiting for someone to take care of them. Praying together includes the cry, the invocation, the aspiration, the desire for peace, the healing and salvation of the men and women of this world. Prayer is never in vain; it rises ceaselessly to the Lord so that anguish is turned into hope, tears into joy, despair into happiness, and solitude into communion. May the Kingdom of God come soon among people!
For the sick, in memory of the dead, for peace
