EVERYDAY PRAYER

Memory of the Poor
Word of god every day
Libretto DEL GIORNO
Memory of the Poor
Monday, May 10


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

John 15,26-16,4

When the Paraclete comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who issues from the Father, he will be my witness. And you too will be witnesses, because you have been with me from the beginning. I have told you all this so that you may not fall away. They will expel you from the synagogues, and indeed the time is coming when anyone who kills you will think he is doing a holy service to God. They will do these things because they have never known either the Father or me. But I have told you all this, so that when the time for it comes you may remember that I told you. I did not tell you this from the beginning, because I was with you;

 

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

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

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Jesus has just warned the disciples of the hatred and persecution they will suffer from the "world" because of his name (Jn 15:18-25). But he wants to reassure them that he will not leave them alone to face opposition and courts. He will accompany and support them so that they will persevere in mutual love and in the witness of the Gospel to the ends of the earth. And this will happen even after his ascension to heaven. And he says to them: "When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, he will testify on my behalf." We may think of the events of the Church at the end of the first century, the community of John that was persecuted by both the Jewish authorities and those of the Roman Empire: "They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, an hour is coming when those who kill you will think that by doing so they are offering worship to God." It is a sad story that has repeated from time to time up to the present day. And it is particularly exemplified by the many Christian martyrs of this time by fundamentalists who kill in the very name of God. The Holy Spirit that the Son transmits from the Father to his disciples is the strength that sustains the Church. It is a spiritual force that gathers the disciples, binds them together, makes them good and strong, and sends them everywhere in the world to bear witness to the love of God who saves from evil and frees them from all slavery. For this reason He will always have to face the opposition, even violent opposition, of those who want division to reign among human beings. The Lord does not abandon his own to their fate. The great responsibility for the disciples remains: to communicate the Gospel of love to this world of ours so that it may distance from evil. The disciples are asked to spend their lives on this mission that only they can accomplish. Not in the solitude of their weakness, but in the power of the Spirit that the Father has sent.

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!