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 10, 13-16
'Alas for you, Chorazin! Alas for you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes.
And still, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon at the Judgement than for you.
And as for you, Capernaum, did you want to be raised high as heaven? You shall be flung down to hell.
'Anyone who listens to you listens to me; anyone who rejects you rejects me, and those who reject me reject the one who sent me.'
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
This Gospel passage comes in the middle of the instructions Jesus gives to the seventy-two disciples, which we heard yesterday. Jesus has just urged them to travel to every city to preach the Gospel. But he adds that if any of these cities do not accept their preaching, they should leave, even shaking the dust off their sandals. At this point Jesus speaks directly to Chorazin and Bethsaida, two cities of Galilee, threatening them with ruin. Despite the fact that Jesus himself had preached there and performed many miracles, they changed neither their lives nor their sinful behaviour. To these two he adds Capernaum, the city he had chosen as his new home with the Twelve. Despite having been privileged with Jesus’ physical presence, Capernaum did not return the love that it had been shown but remained deaf and ungrateful, continuing to live in a dissolute and corrupt way. Instead of being exalted, it will be brought down and humiliated. These are harsh words, and they should make us question how the life of our cities is organized. How often are the cities of today deaf to the preaching of the Gospel? As disciples of Jesus, certainly we have to ask ourselves whether we know how to communicate the Gospel to the hearts of our cities and peoples. We often risk wearily repeating doctrines and rites that pass over people without bringing about any change. We need to ask ourselves whether we are truly a leavening of brotherhood and love or whether we are unwitting accomplices - unwitting but not guiltless - of the individualism that makes our cities so sad and violent. Jesus’ own journey to Jerusalem shows us how, as Christians, we must enter our cities and affirm that Jesus is the savoir, not the countless myths and powers that crush the lives of the millions and millions of poor and weak people who live on the edges of today’s metropolises. Jesus goes to Jerusalem to give his life, to be the first leavening, the first light, the first seed of a new city, built to human scale. Those who do not welcome him, or, worse, refuse him, are cultivating their own ruin. Even Tyre and Sidon - Jesus says - would have converted if they could have heard the words and seen the works that were being performed at that time. Let us not let the Gospel be preached in vain. We must be aware of our responsibility towards the great cities of today, which the Lord has entrusted to us: “Whoever listens to you listens to me, and whoever rejects you rejects me.” Every word that is preached comes from on high. This is a responsibility for those who preach and those who listen.
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
