EVERYDAY PRAYER

Memory of the Poor
Word of god every day
Libretto DEL GIORNO
Memory of the Poor
Monday, March 30


Reading of the Word of God

Praise to you, o Lord, King of eternal glory

This is the Gospel of the poor,
liberation for the imprisoned,
sight for the blind,
freedom for the oppressed.

Praise to you, o Lord, King of eternal glory

Daniel 13,1.9.15-17.19-30.33-62

In Babylon there lived a man named Joakim. They threw reason aside, making no effort to turn their eyes to Heaven, and forgetting the demands of virtue. So they waited for a favourable moment; and one day Susanna came as usual, accompanied only by two young maidservants. The day was hot and she wanted to bathe in the garden. There was no one about except the two elders, spying on her from their hiding place. She said to the servants, 'Bring me some oil and balsam and shut the garden door while I bathe.' Hardly were the maids gone than the two elders sprang up and rushed upon her. 'Look,' they said, 'the garden door is shut, no one can see us. We want to have you, so give in and let us! Refuse, and we shall both give evidence that a young man was with you and that this was why you sent your maids away.' Susanna sighed. 'I am trapped,' she said, 'whatever I do. If I agree, it means death for me; if I resist, I cannot get away from you. But I prefer to fall innocent into your power than to sin in the eyes of the Lord.' She then cried out as loud as she could. The two elders began shouting too, putting the blame on her, and one of them ran to open the garden door. The household, hearing the shouting in the garden, rushed out by the side entrance to see what had happened to her. Once the elders had told their story, the servants were thoroughly taken aback, since nothing of this sort had ever been said of Susanna. Next day a meeting was held at the house of her husband Joakim. The two elders arrived, full of their wicked plea against Susanna, to have her put to death. They addressed the company, 'Summon Susanna daughter of Hilkiah and wife of Joakim.' She was sent for, and came accompanied by her parents, her children and all her relations. All her own people were weeping, and so were all the others who saw her. The two elders stood up, with all the people round them, and laid their hands on her head. Tearfully she turned her eyes to Heaven, her heart confident in God. The elders then spoke, 'While we were walking by ourselves in the garden, this woman arrived with two maids. She shut the garden door and then dismissed the servants. A young man, who had been hiding, went over to her and they lay together. From the end of the garden where we were, we saw this crime taking place and hurried towards them. Though we saw them together, we were unable to catch the man: he was too strong for us; he opened the door and took to his heels. We did, however, catch this woman and ask her who the young man was. She refused to tell us. That is our evidence.' Since they were elders of the people and judges, the assembly accepted their word: Susanna was condemned to death. She cried out as loud as she could, 'Eternal God, you know all secrets and everything before it happens; you know that they have given false evidence against me. And now I must die, innocent as I am of everything their malice has invented against me!' The Lord heard her cry and, as she was being led away to die, he roused the holy spirit residing in a young boy called Daniel who began to shout, 'I am innocent of this woman's death!' At this all the people turned to him and asked, 'What do you mean by that?' Standing in the middle of the crowd, he replied, 'Are you so stupid, children of Israel, as to condemn a daughter of Israel unheard, and without troubling to find out the truth? Go back to the scene of the trial: these men have given false evidence against her.' All the people hurried back, and the elders said to Daniel, 'Come and sit with us and tell us what you mean, since God has given you the gifts that elders have.' Daniel said, 'Keep the men well apart from each other, for I want to question them.' When the men had been separated, Daniel had one of them brought to him. 'You have grown old in wickedness,' he said, 'and now the sins of your earlier days have overtaken you, you with your unjust judgements, your condemnation of the innocent, your acquittal of the guilty, although the Lord has said, "You must not put the innocent and upright to death." Now then, since you saw her so clearly, tell me what sort of tree you saw them lying under.' He replied, 'Under an acacia tree.' Daniel said, 'Indeed! Your lie recoils on your own head: the angel of God has already received from him your sentence and will cut you in half.' He dismissed the man, ordered the other to be brought and said to him, 'Son of Canaan, not of Judah, beauty has seduced you, lust has led your heart astray! This is how you have been behaving with the daughters of Israel, and they have been too frightened to resist; but here is a daughter of Judah who could not stomach your wickedness! Now then, tell me what sort of tree you surprised them under.' He replied, 'Under an aspen tree.' Daniel said, 'Indeed! Your lie recoils on your own head: the angel of God is waiting with a sword to rend you in half, and destroy the pair of you.' Then the whole assembly shouted, blessing God, the Saviour of those who trust in him. And they turned on the two elders whom Daniel had convicted of false evidence out of their own mouths. As the Law of Moses prescribes, they were given the same punishment as they had schemed to inflict on their neighbour. They were put to death. And thus, that day, an innocent life was saved.

 

Praise to you, o Lord, King of eternal glory

The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.

Praise to you, o Lord, King of eternal glory

The story of young Susanna, persecuted by two old judges of Israel at the time of the exile in Babylon, is emblematic of the strength of weakness. The prophet Daniel appears as a young visionary through whom the Lord shows his justice, while the young Susanne becomes a symbol of the remnant of the people of Israel that remains faithful to God and resists every seduction, even the insidious one of the leaders of the people who seem truly like brigands who steal to satisfy their own desires. What emerges strongly, is, in fact, the firm faith in the Lord who loves the little ones, the weak, the innocent and who never leaves alone those who trust in him. Without any human support, the young Susanna faces the very difficult decision to die rather than yielding to evil. Condemned to death, she poses her faith solely in the lord who "knows secrets." This is why she is given the gift of experiencing God's intervention. He arrives through the voice of a "youth," someone her same age. Yes, the strength of God comes through the weak. A youth saves another youth. Truly, no one is so weak that they cannot save another weaker than him. This passage questions all of us, even the youth, on how to defend so many women, even the youngest, who still today are oppressed in so many ways, and with them to defend the entire population of poor people. Today too, we urgently need Daniels to rise up to call for justice and defend whoever is oppressed.

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!