Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Whoever lives and believes in me
will never die.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
James 2, 8-13
Well, the right thing to do is to keep the supreme Law of scripture: you will love your neighbour as yourself;
but as soon as you make class distinctions, you are committing sin and under condemnation for breaking the Law.
You see, anyone who keeps the whole of the Law but trips up on a single point, is still guilty of breaking it all.
He who said, 'You must not commit adultery' said also, 'You must not kill.' Now if you commit murder, you need not commit adultery as well to become a breaker of the Law.
Talk and behave like people who are going to be judged by the law of freedom.
Whoever acts without mercy will be judged without mercy but mercy can afford to laugh at judgement.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
If you believe, you will see the glory of God,
thus says the Lord.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
James cites the passage from Leviticus that commands the love of one’s neighbour so as to invite the disciples to put into practice this commandment of love, upon which Jesus has the entire law and all the prophets depend. He calls this law "royal" to underline the primacy that it has among all the other commandments. As the First Letter from Peter recalls (2:9), a "royal priesthood" rightfully requires a "royal law", the law of love. The apostle affirms that only by fulfilling this law can the believer perform God’s will and therefore deserves to receive what God promised. A discriminatory attitude, therefore, kills Christian love. God does not show favouritism (Acts 10:34), but pours out his mercy on everyone. Christian love, then, takes its initiative from God’s way of acting. It is one law of love. This is why it is impossible to believe that we can trespass one part of the law and believing to be all right with the rest. All commandments regarding our love for our neighbour, those that compose the second tablet of the law, derive from the first, the law concerning our relationship with God. Only by accepting God’s love are we able to love our neighbour. Unfortunately, the lack of love is the reason for all the evils in the world. James’ letter reminds us that the world will be healed when we overcome arrogance, egotism and enmity. And it is gospel love that sets us free from every form of slavery because it is stronger than evil. True liberty, therefore, lies not in doing what we please, but in loving and serving others. James connects freedom and mercy: true freedom, as well as true justice, becomes true in mercy, in putting the interest for others at the first place and having a heart that is able to look at others without excluding or judging. Whoever lives this freedom from now on will see mercy reign over the earth.
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
