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
2 Corinthians 4, 1-6
Such by God's mercy is our ministry, and therefore we do not waver
but have renounced all shameful secrecy. It is not our way to be devious, or to falsify the word of God; instead, in God's sight we commend ourselves to every human being with a conscience by showing the truth openly.
If our gospel seems to be veiled at all, it is so to those who are on the way to destruction,
the unbelievers whose minds have been blinded by the god of this world, so that they cannot see shining the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
It is not ourselves that we are proclaiming, but Christ Jesus as the Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake.
It is God who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' that has shone into our hearts to enlighten them with the knowledge of God's glory, the glory on the face of Christ.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
You will be holy,
because I am holy, thus says the Lord.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Once again, Paul returns to the ministry which has been entrusted to him. He is well aware of having been chosen by the mercy of God to communicate the Gospel to men and women. He is not a minister of the Gospel because of his own work or his own choice, but because he was called from on high. He has no fear of claiming the truthfulness of his message and of recalling the frankness with which he announced it without falsifying its contents and without cushioning its force. In the first Letter to the Thessalonians he writes, “For our appeal does not spring from deceit or impure motives or trickery As you know and as God is our witness, we never came with words of flattery or with a pretext for greed.” (1 Thess 2.3-5) It is true that in Corinth there were those who did not think truthfully. Already at the end of the third chapter, Paul had mentioned those who trade on the Word of God; and now he speaks even of possible falsification. Obviously, it is not enough to belong to the church or to the community in order to be immune from pride, envy and criticism. It is these instincts which “veil” one’s eyes and prevent them from seeing the Gospel clearly. Even Jesus has said, “if your eye ...” Only when we turn the eyes of our heart toward Jesus are we able to understand the mystery of God and to taste its power. In the same sense, Jesus had said: “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (Jn 14:9). Paul asserts his preaching for the life of the community on the centrality of Jesus: “We do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord” (v. 5). He presents himself as their “servant” for the love of Jesus, the Jesus who appeared to him glorious, full of light, and blinded him, on the road to Damascus.
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
