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
2 John 1,3-9
In our life of truth and love, we shall have grace, faithful love and peace from God the Father and from Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father. It has given me great joy to find that children of yours have been living the life of truth as we were commanded by the Father. And now I am asking you -- dear lady, not as though I were writing you a new commandment, but only the one which we have had from the beginning -- that we should love one another. To love is to live according to his commandments: this is the commandment which you have heard since the beginning, to live a life of love. There are many deceivers at large in the world, refusing to acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in human nature. They are the Deceiver; they are the Antichrist. Watch yourselves, or all our work will be lost and you will forfeit your full reward. If anybody does not remain in the teaching of Christ but goes beyond it, he does not have God with him: only those who remain in what he taught can have the Father and the Son with them.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The "presbyter" who wrote this second Letter of John was probably a disciple of the apostle and thus was permitted to use "we" in referring to belonging to the Johannine community served with this letter. He addresses the community by calling it "dear lady," to highlight the fact that it is a community of the elect, of believers chosen by the Lord to be his children. From the beginning of the Letter, the author shows his love for them "whom [he loves] in the truth" (v. 1). In just a few lines the word "truth" (aletheia) is repeated four times, as if to make it the central theme of the letter. The love of God, in fact, is not a question of psychology or spontaneous feelings, but a "truth," that is, the Spirit of God poured into the heart of the disciples. To live in truth means allowing oneself to be guided by the Spirit of the Lord. Truth fully manifests itself in love. It is therefore obvious that in the Christian perspective there is no separation between truth and love, they are two sides of the same reality. The disciples must grow in truth and in love, that is, in the Holy Spirit. Jesus also says this to his disciples at the last supper: "And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you for ever" (Jn 14:16). Permanence in the truth of love generates in the hearts of the believers "grace, mercy and peace." For this reason the author of the Letter expresses his joy in learning that the community walks, "in truth according to the commandment that we received from the Father" (v. 4). This awareness does not excuse him from asking the community to persevere in and living the commandment "that we have received from the beginning" (v. 5), which is the commandment of love. Perhaps the author fears external threats which can damage the unity of the community. In any case, he feels it is a good opportunity to re-propose the primacy of loving each other, because it is easy to be preoccupied by worries about ourselves and to forget the primacy of God and of our brothers and sisters: the substance of the Christian life. Jesus himself says: "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another by this all will know you are my disciples" (John 13: 34-35). Tradition tells us that the apostle John, in the last years of his life, did nothing but repeat to the disciples to love one another. This is what we still need today.
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
