EVERYDAY PRAYER

Memory of the Saints and the Prophets
Word of god every day

Memory of the Saints and the Prophets

Memorial of the deportation of the Jews of Rome during the Second World War. Read more

Libretto DEL GIORNO
Memory of the Saints and the Prophets
Wednesday, October 16

Memorial of the deportation of the Jews of Rome during the Second World War.


Reading of the Word of God

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

You are a chosen race,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation,
a people acquired by God
to proclaim his marvellous works.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Romans 2,1-11

So no matter who you are, if you pass judgement you have no excuse. It is yourself that you condemn when you judge others, since you behave in the same way as those you are condemning. We are well aware that people who behave like that are justly condemned by God. But you -- when you judge those who behave like this while you are doing the same yourself -- do you think you will escape God's condemnation? Or are you not disregarding his abundant goodness, tolerance and patience, failing to realise that this generosity of God is meant to bring you to repentance? Your stubborn refusal to repent is only storing up retribution for yourself on that Day of retribution when God's just verdicts will be made known. He will repay everyone as their deeds deserve. For those who aimed for glory and honour and immortality by persevering in doing good, there will be eternal life; but for those who out of jealousy have taken for their guide not truth but injustice, there will be the fury of retribution. Trouble and distress will come to every human being who does evil -- Jews first, but Greeks as well; glory and honour and peace will come to everyone who does good -- Jews first, but Greeks as well. There is no favouritism with God.

 

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

You will be holy,
because I am holy, thus says the Lord.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Paul writes that men and women are more inclined to serve themselves than God. This is a deep instinct that accompanies us all, a sort of "idolatrous" attitude that affects men and women of every time. This conviction should put us on guard against easily giving in to ourselves and our traditions. Instead it is normal for us to condemn others and absolve ourselves. Jesus urges us not to look at the speck in the eye of another but to notice the log in our own eyes. We are all poor men and poor women in need of help from the Lord. This is why Paul, a little later, repeating an assertion of the psalm, writes: "There is no one who is righteous, not even one" (Rom 3: 10). To the man who flattered him by calling him "Good Teacher," Jesus himself responds, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone" (Mk 10:18). Our smallness should encourage us not make ourselves the judges of others. Speaking directly to "whoever you are," to all men and women, Paul has harsh words for those who judge without mercy, and words of accusation to believers: they judge (and condemn) others, but then they commit the same errors and behave like those upon whom their judgment weighs. In doing so, not only are they cruel, but they forget that there is a judge who practices justice with a just measure: God. "For he will repay according to each one's deeds...for God shows no partiality." The apostle reminds us believers, too, that we need to be forgiven, that is, judged by a merciful God, abounding in love. We all need God's mercy, which is salvation.

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!