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
Exodus 11, 10-12,14
Moses and Aaron worked all these wonders in Pharaoh's presence, but Yahweh made Pharaoh stubborn, and he did not let the Israelites leave his country.
Yahweh said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt,
'This month must be the first of all the months for you, the first month of your year.
Speak to the whole community of Israel and say, "On the tenth day of this month each man must take an animal from the flock for his family: one animal for each household.
If the household is too small for the animal, he must join with his neighbour nearest to his house, depending on the number of persons. When you choose the animal, you will take into account what each can eat.
It must be an animal without blemish, a male one year old; you may choose it either from the sheep or from the goats.
You must keep it till the fourteenth day of the month when the whole assembly of the community of Israel will slaughter it at twilight.
Some of the blood must then be taken and put on both door-posts and the lintel of the houses where it is eaten.
That night, the flesh must be eaten, roasted over the fire; it must be eaten with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.
Do not eat any of it raw or boiled in water, but roasted over the fire, with the head, feet and entrails.
You must not leave any of it over till the morning: whatever is left till morning you must burn.
This is how you must eat it: with a belt round your waist, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. You must eat it hurriedly: it is a Passover in Yahweh's honour.
That night, I shall go through Egypt and strike down all the first-born in Egypt, man and beast alike, and shall execute justice on all the gods of Egypt, I, Yahweh!
The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are. When I see the blood I shall pass over you, and you will escape the destructive plague when I strike Egypt.
This day must be commemorated by you, and you must keep it as a feast in Yahweh's honour. You must keep it as a feast-day for all generations; this is a decree for all time.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Lord continues to speak to Moses and Aaron. God intervenes in their lives to free them from Pharaoh. It takes a long time to be freed from evil, which makes us slaves and wants us to be subservient to it and its system! God’s people cannot be prisoners of worldly logic or slaves of the world. God promises his Passover, his passage, which opens the always-difficult passage from slavery to freedom, from sin to love. God ordains the supper with the lamb, the Passover that Jesus wanted to celebrate with his disciples, who are for him a true family, the new people that he has chosen. The lamb will serve as both nourishment and protection, because its blood will be sprinkled on the doorposts and the lintel of their houses so that they will be spared. These indications will reach their fullness in the Passover of the Lord Jesus, the true lamb sacrificed to open for us the way to complete victory over evil and to the even more difficult - yet indispensable - victory of life over death. Jesus is the lamb that John the Baptist points to, the ultimate sacrifice for a fullness of love that is confirmed once and for all. God indicates how Passover is to be eaten. In many images of the Last Supper, for example, the disciples are shown with staffs at their feet to represent God’s command to sit at the table with “your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in hand.” It is a good image of the disciple, who is always ready, so as to avoid being lured by the logic of evil. This day will be a day of remembrance for the people of God, celebrated as a festival to the Lord.
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
