EVERYDAY PRAYER

Sunday Vigil
Word of god every day
Libretto DEL GIORNO
Sunday Vigil
Saturday, June 10


Reading of the Word of God

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Whoever lives and believes in me
will never die.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Tobit 13,2.6-8

  Blessed be God who lives forever,
  because his kingdom lasts throughout all ages.

2 For he afflicts, and he shows mercy;
  he leads down to Hades in the lowest regions of the earth,
  and he brings up from the great abyss,
  and there is nothing that can escape his hand.

6 If you turn to him with all your heart and with all your soul,
  to do what is true before him,
  then he will turn to you
  and will no longer hide his face from you.
  So now see what he has done for you;
  acknowledge him at the top of your voice.

7 Bless the Lord of righteousness,
  and exalt the King of the ages.

8 In the land of my exile I acknowledge him,
  and show his power and majesty to a nation of sinners:
  “Turn back, you sinners, and do what is right before him;
  perhaps he may look with favour upon you and show you mercy.”

 

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

If you believe, you will see the glory of God,
thus says the Lord.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Today, the liturgy has us pray with the last prayer (the fifth) that appears in the book of Tobit. Over the past few days, the daily mass has presented us with the story told in the book of Tobit. Today, with the reading of the last chapter, it places on our lips the prayer of Tobit, who blesses God for the good he has received from him and for the mercy he has shown towards him. The elderly father – who still lives in exile – knows that he may never see Jerusalem again. And his heart is fixed on Jerusalem, the city that will be “his house forever” (13:16), where the people will be able to live together in peace. Tobit’s dream gathers together the universal aspiration to live in a city of peace. Even for Christians, the heavenly Jerusalem – as it is presented in Revelation – represents the dream that all cities might be places of peace. Today, however, we know all too well that cities, especially the giant metropolises, are often places of injustice and violence. Tobit’s vision reveals that human cities are always fragile and weak, but “there is nothing that can escape his hand” (13:2). He is the one who “leads down…and brings up.” Tobit has personally experienced weakness and precariousness, and felt the burning of adversity, but he lifted his eyes to God and discovered that “he is your God, our Father and God forever and ever!” (v. 4). And, after having discovered this personally, he communicates it to his brothers and sisters in faith (and not just to them): if they entrust themselves to the Lord in times of darkness, they will experience his mercy. Hope in the Lord is never misplaced. God desires joy for his children. But we must trust in him. Tobit declares, “If you turn to him… then he will turn to you and will no longer hide his face from you” (v. 6). He insists, “Turn back, you sinners, and do what is right before him; perhaps he may look with favour upon you and show you mercy” (v. 6). If people chose the path of conversion to the Lord – as Tobit’s own personal experience proves – he adds, “So now see what he has done for you; acknowledge him at the top of your voice” (v. 6). Later he writes that Jerusalem will become “A bright light [that] will shine to the limits of the earth” (v. 11). From it will come salvation for all nations: “Many nations will come to you from afar, and inhabitants of all the ends of the earth to your holy name” (v. 11). This is the vision of universal salvation that the prophets revealed and that each believer is called to welcome and make his or her own. Tobit passes it on to us, too, at the beginning of this new millennium. We need to dream and work so that all people will gather around the Lord as one family in peace.

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