Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
This is the Gospel of the poor,
liberation for the imprisoned,
sight for the blind,
freedom for the oppressed.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Genesis 3,1-8
Now, the snake was the most subtle of all the wild animals that Yahweh God had made. It asked the woman, 'Did God really say you were not to eat from any of the trees in the garden?' The woman answered the snake, 'We may eat the fruit of the trees in the garden. But of the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden God said, "You must not eat it, nor touch it, under pain of death." ' Then the snake said to the woman, 'No! You will not die! God knows in fact that the day you eat it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods, knowing good from evil.' The woman saw that the tree was good to eat and pleasing to the eye, and that it was enticing for the wisdom that it could give. So she took some of its fruit and ate it. She also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened and they realised that they were naked. So they sewed fig-leaves together to make themselves loin-cloths. The man and his wife heard the sound of Yahweh God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from Yahweh God among the trees of the garden.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
When God placed the man and woman in the garden, he told them that they could eat the fruit of any tree they saw except for the one in the centre of the garden. They did not listen to God's Word; rather they let themselves be seduced by a foreign voice, the voice of the serpent, that is the voice of evil. This voice smoothly insinuates itself in our everyday lives. It may come out of our hearts and touches upon our pride or caresses self-congratulation or deludes us that anything is within our reach. In any event, it lures us into focusing solely on ourselves. It is also the voice of false prophets who propose riches, well-being, healing and success as the goal of life. Truly, these words and suggestions are deceptive, and they distance us from the Lord. What the tempter proposes is simple: do not believe the voice of God, but the voice of others. The tempter's approach is always the same: he stimulates our pride, our self-love and our search for greatness without God. We can say that original sin, the origin of every sin, lies in our lack of trust in God's Word and our refusal to listen to it, most of all by trusting ourselves, our own pride. The Apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans rightly affirms that "So faith comes from what is heard" (10: 17). The root of original sin is not listening to the Word of God. Often the Bible condemns a man or woman's choice to listen to himself or herself, to follow evil and turn to idols rather than to listen to the Lord who speaks with so much love and wisdom. Listening to the tempter makes human beings lose their friendship with God and mutual solidarity. Adam and Eve, who claimed to know everything and who thought they could do it alone, found themselves naked, and fearful. Pride deprives us of friendship with God, separates us from Him and renders us poor. Without the Lord, each one of us sadly discovers our poverty and fragility, and comes to grips with our powerlessness. Adam and Eve hid themselves before God who nonetheless continued to love and take care of them. Those who stop listening to God's voice and trust solely in themselves and their beliefs distance themselves from the Lord and create division and pain.
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
