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 12,1-6
Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman, robed with the sun, standing on the moon, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.
She was pregnant, and in labour, crying aloud in the pangs of childbirth.
Then a second sign appeared in the sky: there was a huge red dragon with seven heads and ten horns, and each of the seven heads crowned with a coronet.
Its tail swept a third of the stars from the sky and hurled them to the ground, and the dragon stopped in front of the woman as she was at the point of giving birth, so that it could eat the child as soon as it was born.
The woman was delivered of a boy, the son who was to rule all the nations with an iron sceptre, and the child was taken straight up to God and to his throne,
while the woman escaped into the desert, where God had prepared a place for her to be looked after for twelve hundred and sixty days.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
You will be holy,
because I am holy, thus says the Lord.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
In this passage, John presents the central theme of the book of Revelation: the incarnation of the Son of God, who died and has risen. The woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and her head encircled by a crown of twelve stars, is the new Eve. She is Mary, figure of Israel and of the Church. She is pre-chosen by God to keep watch over his mystery, his presence. She gives birth to the Saviour, the Emmanuel, the "great portent" that God gives to men and women. John’s primary intention is show the woman as the personification of the people of God, the Church, within whom the Messiah is born (the twelve tribes of Israel). The Child who is generated is Jesus. But just as the woman is about to give birth, an enormous red dragon leaps in front of her, ready to devour the Child as soon as it is born. With this birth, the author is not referring to the birth of Bethlehem as much as to the birth that took place on the morning of Easter with the resurrection. And the birth pangs correspond to the suffering of Calvary. With his seven heads, the dragon is the symbol of an enormous power whose ten horns manifest an invincible strength and whose seven royal crowns incarnate the abusive, usurping brutality of evil that often hides under great powers. Yes, Evil opposes the Gospel with all of its strength in a never-ending war that has been a part of human history since the beginning when Adam and Eve let themselves be ensnared by its poisonous and persuasive voice. At the end of history, Evil unleashes all of its strength for a final battle. Even the Church is called to fight to stay faithful to God and to generate the Son of God in the hearts of men and women. Through the communication of the Gospel, Jesus himself can be born in people’s hearts, which is how the Christian community is formed. Every generation is called to listen to the Gospel anew and be reborn. This is the meaning of the image of the woman fleeing into the desert, a place that recalls Israel’s exodus from Egypt and is seen both as a place of temptation and sin and as the moment of intimacy between God and Israel. The Christian community has to retrace in its own heart the journey made by Israel. This cannot be done without effort and opposition. Just as the Lord protected Israel from its enemies, so he will also protect the Community of believers. We will have to struggle against evil all along this path, starting in our own hearts. The Lord stands beside us, as he himself has said: "And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age" (Mt 28:20).
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
