Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Spirit of the Lord is upon you.
The child you shall bear will be holy.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Psalm 34, 2-3.6-7.17-19.22
1 I will bless the Lord at all times;
his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
2 My soul makes its boast in the Lord;
let the humble hear and be glad.
5 Look to him, and be radiant;
so your faces shall never be ashamed.
6 This poor soul cried, and was heard by the Lord,
and was saved from every trouble.
16 The face of the Lord is against evildoers,
to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth.
17 When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears,
and rescues them from all their troubles.
18 The Lord is near to the broken-hearted,
and saves the crushed in spirit.
19 Many are the afflictions of the righteous,
but the Lord rescues them from them all.
22 The Lord redeems the life of his servants;
none of those who take refuge in him will be condemned.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Look down, O Lord, on your servants.
Be it unto us according to your word.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The psalmist concludes the series that began with psalm 25 by giving thanks and praise to God. With joy and gratitude, a poor person prays to the Lord: “I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth” (v. 1). The words of this poor person are full of faith in God, who should be blessed, praised, glorified, magnified, and exalted. The reasons for this faith are listed throughout the psalm: the Lord answers those who seek him, hears the cry of the poor, makes those who invoke him lack for nothing, is near to those who love him, and saves those who are cast down. The psalmist places words on our lips that are full of steadfast and profound trust, and brimming with serene and simple faith. This poor person, sorely tested, as are all who are righteous, remains steadfast in his trust in the Lord: “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord rescues them from all” (v. 19). This poor person is a believer and one of the anawim, a Hebrew word describing those pushed to the margins who are given no consideration or attention by men and women. They are, however, loved by the Lord, who holds them in great esteem, watches over them, listens to them and is attentive to their cry. The psalmist says, “This poor soul cried, and was heard by the Lord, and was saved from every trouble” (v. 6). There is a direct link between the eyes of the Lord and the eyes of the “poor”: they look into each other and trust in each other. We believers are all asked to enter into this double gaze, that of God towards the poor and of the poor towards God. It is the way to salvation, just as it is the way to transmit into the world the mercy that saves. Believers are invited to listen to the cry of the poor, just as they listen to the Lord and his word. For indeed it is the Lord, long before us, who listens to their cries and bends down with mercy to help them. Blessed are we if we imitate the Lord! And we will be equally blessed if we look to the Lord with the trusting gaze with which the poor look to him. In this they are our teachers.
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
