EVERYDAY PRAYER

Prayer for the sick
Word of god every day

Prayer for the sick

Memory of Saint Nicholas (+ 350). He was a bishop in Asia Minor (present day Turkey) and is venerated throughout East.
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Libretto DEL GIORNO
Prayer for the sick

Memory of Saint Nicholas (+ 350). He was a bishop in Asia Minor (present day Turkey) and is venerated throughout East.


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

Luke 5,17-26

Now it happened that he was teaching one day, and Pharisees and teachers of the Law, who had come from every village in Galilee, from Judaea and from Jerusalem, were sitting there. And the power of the Lord was there so that he should heal. And now some men appeared, bringing on a bed a paralysed man whom they were trying to bring in and lay down in front of him. But as they could find no way of getting the man through the crowd, they went up onto the top of the house and lowered him and his stretcher down through the tiles into the middle of the gathering, in front of Jesus. Seeing their faith he said, 'My friend, your sins are forgiven you.' The scribes and the Pharisees began to think this over. 'Who is this man, talking blasphemy? Who but God alone can forgive sins?' But Jesus, aware of their thoughts, made them this reply, 'What are these thoughts you have in your hearts? Which of these is easier: to say, "Your sins are forgiven you," or to say, "Get up and walk"? But to prove to you that the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins,' -- he said to the paralysed man-'I order you: get up, and pick up your stretcher and go home.' And immediately before their very eyes he got up, picked up what he had been lying on and went home praising God. They were all astounded and praised God and were filled with awe, saying, 'We have seen strange things today.'

 

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

"Seeing their faith," Jesus cured the paralytic, Luke the evangelist notes. The miracle happened because of the faith of the paralysed man’s friends, a faith made of love, tenacity, perseverance, and even cunning. They want to bring their sick friend to Jesus and, when they see the crowd thronged at the door, they even open a hole in the roof so they can place their friend before Jesus. How much we should learn from this attitude! Friendship among us is often empty and superficial. It takes little for us to forget one another. We are so concentrated on ourselves that we put others on the back burner. The friends of that paralytic did not do thus. Doesn’t this page exhort us to take good care of whoever is sick, poor or defenceless? It is a matter of making a kind of covenant between the disciples and the poor, between the disciples and the sick. This unique covenant allows these miracles to take place. The miracle, in fact, begins when that sick man was put at the centre of the scene, a centre which is not only physical, but of the heart. Jesus, on his part, seeing that faith, seeing how great the love of these friends is, heals the sick man fully, even more than they expected. In fact turning to that sick man, Jesus says: "Your sins are forgiven." None of the people present had asked for this. None among the present sought this. If anything they all wanted that man to be healed; thus when Jesus forgives his sins, all react like the Pharisees. But the prophet from Nazareth Jesus goes beyond the body and sees the heart of the paralysed man. Jesus sees his need to be forgiven, welcomed, and loved. And he makes him healthy in body and heart. It is full healing, the one that Isaiah already had seen in a vision and foretold to the people of Israel (35:1-10). We too are called to take part in God’s remarkable plan to bring peace and love to the world. We could transform Jesus’ reply to the "tempter" in the desert: "It is not on bread alone that the poor live, but also on love." And we believers need to keep doing the same thing that that group of friends did. It is beautiful to say that Christians are the friends of the poor, the sick, and the weak. This is where the transformation of the world begins, the world of love that Jesus came to establish on the earth.

WORD OF GOD EVERY DAY: THE CALENDAR

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!

WORD OF GOD EVERY DAY: THE CALENDAR