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
Ephesians 1, 1-2
Paul, by the will of God an apostle of Christ Jesus, to God's holy people, faithful in Christ Jesus.
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Look down, O Lord, on your servants.
Be it unto us according to your word.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Paul introduces himself as an "apostle of Christ Jesus," that is, someone sent by the Risen to serve the Gospel. In many letters, he repeats that his charism is not a result of personal merit or skill. Rather, he says that his poverty - as expressed in the words, "the very least of all the saints" (3:8) -is the guarantee of the message entrusted to him. God manifested his power in the "nothing" of the apostle. Paul calls the Christians of Ephesus "saints and faithful brothers and sisters in Christ," just as he had called the Colossians (cf. Col 1:2), as chosen by God to be a "holy temple" (Eph 2:21). The term "holy" (the apostle uses the plural in Greek) does not indicate a moral dimension of the Christians of Ephesus. It refers instead to an objective condition: Christians are "holy" because their lives are offered to God. This holiness does not relate to them as a group of single individuals but rather as an ecclesial body. It is the community that is holy. Every individual in it is holy in so far as he or she is a member of the Church. It is not by chance that the Pauline letters do not use the term "holy" in the singular, except once in Philippians 4:21, where it functions as a collective. We are holy together, because together we are drawn out of the world of sin and placed in the life of Christ, the wellspring and centre of communion. As members of the Church we are the body of Christ. Obviously, if holiness is the grace received by Christians at baptism, it follows that their behaviour must be conformable to the new life received. Since they are saints they should have a holy behaviour.
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
