The prayer for peace is held in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere.
Prayer for unity of Christians. Particular memory of the Churches of the Anglican communion.
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The prayer for peace is held in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere.
Prayer for unity of Christians. Particular memory of the Churches of the Anglican communion.
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
Hebrews 5,1-10
Every high priest is taken from among human beings and is appointed to act on their behalf in relationships with God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins; he can sympathise with those who are ignorant or who have gone astray, because he too is subject to the limitations of weakness. That is why he has to make sin offerings for himself as well as for the people. No one takes this honour on himself; it needs a call from God, as in Aaron's case. And so it was not Christ who gave himself the glory of becoming high priest, but the one who said to him: You are my Son, today I have fathered you, and in another text: You are a priest for ever, of the order of Melchizedek. During his life on earth, he offered up prayer and entreaty, with loud cries and with tears, to the one who had the power to save him from death, and, winning a hearing by his reverence, he learnt obedience, Son though he was, through his sufferings; when he had been perfected, he became for all who obey him the source of eternal salvation and was acclaimed by God with the title of high priest of the order of Melchizedek.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Jesus - the letter underlines - has all the qualifications required by the Biblical tradition to be high priest, and so he can stand before God and "to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins." As a member of the people, the high priest is aware of his own weakness. And this permits him to have compassion on everyone and to intercede for everyone's as well as his own. But with Jesus we are on a different plane: he is the "great high priest," because he was established as high priest by God himself. He did not "glorify himself in becoming high priest," but it was given to him by the one who told him, "You are my Son, today I have begotten you." He was chosen by God as Aaron was chosen. God is at the origin of everything that is truly religious. In Jesus, God brings to completion the priestly ministry that he had only begun with Aaron. And Jesus began exercising this priesthood here on earth, "in the days of his flesh," offering "up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able to save him from death." The author underlines the absolute gratuity of God's love for us: "Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered." Compassion is at the heart of this mystery of love: he came among us to save us. Like every priest, he was "chosen from among mortals is put in charge of things pertaining to God on their behalf, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins." The extraordinary thing about this mystery is that, while every other priest chosen from among mortals is marked by sin, Jesus, who is immune from it, is established as a priest by God so that we might all be freed from sin. And all this for love. Jesus' extraordinary "piety" continues to open heaven for us.
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
