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
Revelation 7,1-8
Next I saw four angels, standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the world to keep them from blowing over the land or the sea or any tree.
Then I saw another angel rising where the sun rises, carrying the seal of the living God; he called in a powerful voice to the four angels whose duty was to devastate land and sea,
'Wait before you do any damage on land or at sea or to the trees, until we have put the seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God.'
And I heard how many had been sealed: a hundred and forty-four thousand, out of all the tribes of Israel.
From the tribe of Judah, twelve thousand had been sealed; from the tribe of Reuben, twelve thousand; from the tribe of Gad, twelve thousand;
from the tribe of Asher, twelve thousand; from the tribe of Naphtali, twelve thousand; from the tribe of Manasseh, twelve thousand;
from the tribe of Simeon, twelve thousand; from the tribe of Levi, twelve thousand; from the tribe of Issachar, twelve thousand;
from the tribe of Zebulun, twelve thousand; and from the tribe of Benjamin, twelve thousand had been sealed.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
You will be holy,
because I am holy, thus says the Lord.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
With the opening of the sixth seal, the apostle has a new vision: he sees four angels who stand at the four corners of the earth (in ancient cosmology the earth was thought of as square) to hold back the winds. It is as if they are keeping the day of "great wrath" from being unleashed. Immediately another angel appears - the angel with the seal, who comes from the East and postpones the "end." We could say that God’s mercy postpones the "end" in order to save all those destined for salvation from the destructive work of the evil one. Before the "end," the Lord sends the angel to mark the forehead of all those who are to be saved with his sign, the "tav," the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet that generally was used in place of a signature. It is God’s "signature" on his children: the power of evil can no longer touch them. Ezekiel prophesised about this when he mentioned the mark (the "tav") that was to be placed on the foreheads of the Israelites who had not bowed down to idolatry during the tragic time of Jerusalem’s destruction (Ez 9:4): they would be saved. John then sees the first group of people who are to be "marked." They come from all twelve tribes of Israel. The complex figure of one hundred and forty-four thousand is symbolic: it signifies fullness, perfection, and totality. We could compare this first group to the people of the first covenant: God has chosen them as his own forever. This is the mystery of the salvation of the people of Israel. From this perspective, Christians and Jews can wait together for the Messiah who will save us from the power of Evil and bring us into the heaven of full and definitive peace.
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
