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
Acts 10,9-23
Next day, while they were still on their journey and had only a short distance to go before reaching the town, Peter went to the housetop at about the sixth hour to say his prayers. He felt hungry and was looking forward to his meal, but before it was ready he fell into a trance and saw heaven thrown open and something like a big sheet being let down to earth by its four corners; it contained every kind of animal, reptile and bird. A voice then said to him, 'Now, Peter, kill and eat!' But Peter answered, 'Certainly not, Lord; I have never yet eaten anything profane or unclean.' Again, a second time, the voice spoke to him, 'What God has made clean, you have no right to call profane.' This was repeated three times, and then suddenly the container was drawn up to heaven again. Peter was still at a loss over the meaning of the vision he had seen, when the men sent by Cornelius arrived. They had asked where Simon's house was and they were now standing at the door, calling out to know if the Simon known as Peter was lodging there. While Peter's mind was still on the vision, the Spirit told him, 'Look! Some men have come to see you. Hurry down, and do not hesitate to return with them; it was I who told them to come.' Peter went down and said to them, 'I am the man you are looking for; why have you come?' They said, 'The centurion Cornelius, who is an upright and God-fearing man, highly regarded by the entire Jewish people, was told by God through a holy angel to send for you and bring you to his house and to listen to what you have to say.' So Peter asked them in and gave them lodging. Next day, he was ready to go off with them, accompanied by some of the brothers from Jaffa.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Look down, O Lord, on your servants.
Be it unto us according to your word.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The next day while praying, Peter has a vision. Prayer always dives into a vision and it is always an ecstasy, a coming out of oneself to allow oneself to be wrapped up in God’s thoughts, in His word, His teaching, His mercy. The vision before the eyes of the apostle is very concrete: it regards pure and impure foods. As a pious Jew, the apostle resists the Lord who calls him to eat impure foods. It is not the resistance of the past, a resistance of pride and fear that led him to betrayal. It is, instead, the resistance of a religious observant who is having a hard time understanding the depth of God’s heart and who allows himself to be constrained by his own traditions, even religious ones. Peter is closed in on his own horizon and wants to defend it. The Lord intervenes yet again. It is a decisive moment for the Church: perhaps the most important one in history. Peter, first of the apostles, represents the entire Church in that moment, the entire Christian community. The author of Acts notes how disturbed the apostle is before the vision and describes him as he reflects on the vision, as if to suggested the necessity of meditating on the teachings we receive; and it is the same Holy Spirit who illuminates the apostle and drives him to receive those sent by the centurion and to follow them. The journey of Peter from Joppa to Caesarea is emblematic of every Christian community’s journey, which is compelled by the Lord to get out of itself to become a missionary community, to go toward those who still have not received the gift of the Gospel. The immense peripheries of the world open up before us, like the house of Cornelius awaiting the preaching of the good news. The Lord is already there. He waits for us to arrive. We must hurry.
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
