Memory of Lazarus of Bethany. Prayer for all those who are gravely ill and for the dying. Memory of those who have died of AIDS. Read more
Memory of Lazarus of Bethany. Prayer for all those who are gravely ill and for the dying. Memory of those who have died of AIDS.
Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Whoever lives and believes in me
will never die.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Song of Songs 8, 5-7
Who is this coming up from the desert leaning on her lover? I awakened you under the apple tree, where your mother conceived you, where she who bore you conceived you.
BELOVED: Set me like a seal on your heart, like a seal on your arm. For love is strong as Death, passion as relentless as Sheol. The flash of it is a flash of fire, a flame of Yahweh himself.
Love no flood can quench, no torrents drown. Were a man to offer all his family wealth to buy love, contempt is all that he would gain.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
If you believe, you will see the glory of God,
thus says the Lord.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
We are now at the end of the Song. A woman enters the scene, and the chorus asks, "Who is that coming up from the wilderness, leaning upon her beloved?" This theme, which has already been touched on (3:6-11), evokes the experience of the people of Israel, sustained by the Lord through forty years of wandering in the desert. This story also symbolizes the journey of the pilgrim Church on earth, which is sometimes like a desert, empty of love, towards God’s Heaven. More than a series of declarations to believe, biblical faith means recognizing that the Lord upholds us with his arms. Yes, we need to hold fast to the strong arms of God. Faith means recognizing the strength of God’s love, which sustains us and saves us. The prince of this world pushes men and women in the opposite direction, to let go of God’s arms and walk on their own, that is, to trust only in themselves. But when we try to become independent from God we become slaves of ourselves or of merciless masters. And so the world grows wicked. On the contrary, depending on God dismantles human pride and strengthens the bonds of love between the children of the Church, which is loved by God. The beloved man tells the woman that he woke her up under the apple tree, which is a symbol of the groom himself. It is there, where her mother gave birth to her, that she experiences a new birth, a new life. The woman makes a daring request of her lover: she asks to be his seal, the indelible sign of irrevocable belonging: "Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm." She asks her beloved to take her as the guarantee of his very identity, that is, to become an essential part of his identity. This is an incredibly bold request, if we think that the lover is the Lord. It is as if we asked the Lord to be recognized as such by other people through the seal of the Church, that is, as the lover of the Church. It seems unimaginable. It means claiming to be the justification for God’s existence. And yet that is exactly how it is. In a certain sense, the Lord has made his ability to be recognized dependent on the Church’s testimony. This has dramatic consequences. If there are many people who do not believe in the Lord, or who abandon him, is this not, at least in part, the result of our poor testimony? Does faded and unkempt love not fade the seal on the Lord’s arm? Nonetheless, the love that unites these two lovers (the Lord and the Church) and makes of them "one flesh" is the culmination of history, the pinnacle of the universe. Such love is compared to the strength of death: "for love is strong as death." This means that love can even resist death. But only true love. The greatest achievement of this love is to have saved the Son of God from death: the worlds of the Song are fulfilled in the resurrection. We can even say more clearly that "love is stronger than death." Nothing can destroy love; indeed, its flames destroy every obstacle: "Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame." There is no water that can quench love: "Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it." Love has no price and cannot be bought: "If one offered for love all the wealth of one’s house, it would be utterly scorned." Love is God himself. And anyone who welcomes love and lets him or herself be overwhelmed by love has God in his or her heart.
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
