EVERYDAY PRAYER

Feast of Mary, Mother of God
Word of god every day

Feast of Mary, Mother of God

Feast of Mary, Mother of God
Prayer for peace in the world and for the end of every war.
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Libretto DEL GIORNO
Feast of Mary, Mother of God
Sunday, January 1

Homily

“The Lord bless you and keep you! The Lord let his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you! The Lord look upon you kindly and give you peace!” (Num 6:24-25). With this ancient biblical blessing we enter the New Year, sure that the Lord will watch over us, be near us, and accompany us day after day. “This is the one whom I approve: the afflicted one, crushed in spirit, who trembles at my word” (Is 66:2). Yes, the Lord’s gaze, at the dawn of this New Year, is on the humble and the weak, on those who make themselves available to listen to the words of the Gospel and try to put them in practice every day.
Once again, the Gospel has us see with the eyes of those shepherds from Bethlehem. They are an example for believers. They were considered so impure and sinful that they were excluded from official religious life. And yet the gaze of the Lord came to rest upon them: the night was filled with light and their lives found meaning and a direction in which to go. Those humble shepherds became the “first Christians”: they listened to the words of the angel, left their flocks, and headed where they had been told to go. Christians are always “going out” of themselves and their usual spaces to go towards the Lord and other people. With great mercy, Pope Francis invites Christians not to live in fear of losing the saved but to let themselves be carried away by the desire to save the lost.
When those shepherds reached the manger – they were the ones looking this time – they saw a child. And, “when they saw this,” that is, when they had contemplated him, “they made known the message that had been told them about this child.” The entire life of a Christian is contained in this little scene. If it had been the angels who had spoken to them of the child the previous night, it is not difficult to imagine that in the manger it was Mary who spoke of her Son. She certainly showed him to them. Without her they would have had difficulty understanding that mystery. Mary, who “kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart,” was well aware of the mystery present in that child.
With incredible tenderness, the liturgy invites us to look at Mary, to celebrate and worship her as the Mother of God. Seven days have passed since Christmas when we looked upon a small child and, in so doing, upon all the little and weak children of this world. Today the Church feels the need to look upon Mary and celebrate her. It does us well to stress that when we contemplate her we do not find her alone: she has Jesus in her arms. As soon as the shepherds arrived in Bethlehem, we read in the Gospel, they “found Mary and Joseph and the child” (v. 16). It is beautiful to imagine the baby Jesus no longer in the manger, but in Mary’s arms: she shows him to the humble shepherds and continues to show him to the humble disciples of every age. The image of Mary with Jesus on her lap or in her arms is one of the most familiar and tender images of the mystery of the incarnation. According to the tradition of the Eastern Church, the relationship between the Mother and the Son is so strong that there are no images of Mary without Jesus. She exists for her Son, and her responsibility is to give birth to him and show him to the world. This is the icon of Mary, the mother of Jesus, but it is also the image of the Church and every believer: to embrace the Lord affectionately and to show him to the world.
Just as the shepherds, who departed from the manger glorifying and praising the Lord, so too must we, with the same energy and enthusiasm, leave the liturgy and enter into the New Year with Jesus in our arms to love him and show him to the world. It would be a great consolation if someone could write these words today: “All who heard it were amazed at what [they] told them” (v. 18). Unfortunately, the people of our cities are amazed by other things! Perhaps we should ask ourselves if there are “shepherds” (and I am not referring only to priests - every believer is in his or her way a “pastor”) who know how to communicate the joy of meeting the Child to others.
It is by now a well-established tradition that the Church gathers together in prayer to invoke peace on the first day of the year. It is a way to extend to the entire world, to the family of nations, the blessing we heard from the book of Numbers: “The Lord look upon you kindly and give you peace!” We need the Lord to widen his gaze on the nations. Unfortunately, in our time conflicts are becoming more common. The only response is for us to intensify our prayer for peace. We know that peace demands the tenacious dedication of men and women, but it is above all a gift that comes from on high, a fruit of the Spirit of love that works in the hearts of men and women. At the beginning of this year, let us repeat the angel’s song on Christmas night: “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to those on whom his favour rests.” This is our prayer at the dawn of this New Year. May the Spirit of the Lord descend into the hearts of men and women, melting their hardness so they may be touched by the Child’s weakness. May the Spirit transform the hearts of our cities, driving out hatred, jealousy, slander, injustice and indifference. May the Spirit transform the heart of the nations and peoples at war, disarming violent spirits and strengthening those who work for peace. May the Spirit make the hearts of the rich compassionate, opening their eyes to the needs of the poor and making them compete in generosity. May the Spirit transform the hearts of poor countries and nations, teaching them to abandon the path of violence and embrace the path of development. May the Spirit transform the heart of every man and woman so that they may rediscover the face of the one God, the Father of all.

WORD OF GOD EVERY DAY: THE CALENDAR

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!

WORD OF GOD EVERY DAY: THE CALENDAR