Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Whoever lives and believes in me
will never die.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
1 Kings 12,26-32; 13,33-34
Jeroboam thought to himself, 'As things are, the kingdom will revert to the House of David. If this people continues to go up to the Temple of Yahweh in Jerusalem to offer sacrifices, the people's heart will turn back again to their lord, Rehoboam king of Judah, and they will put me to death.' So the king thought this over and then made two golden calves; he said to the people, 'You have been going up to Jerusalem long enough. Here is your God, Israel, who brought you out of Egypt!' He set one up at Bethel, and the people went in procession in front of the other one all the way to Dan. In Israel this gave rise to sin, for the people went to Bethel to worship the one, and all the way to Dan to worship the other. He set up shrines on the high places and appointed priests from ordinary families, who were not of levitical descent. Jeroboam also instituted a feast in the eighth month, on the fifteenth of the month, like the feast kept in Judah, when he offered sacrifices on the altar. This he did at Bethel, offering sacrifices to the calves which he had made and, at Bethel, installing the priests of the high places which he had set up. Jeroboam did not give up his wicked ways after this incident, but went on appointing priests for the high places from the common people. He consecrated as priests of the high places any who wished to be. Such conduct made the House of Jeroboam a sinful House, and caused its ruin and extinction from the face of the earth.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
If you believe, you will see the glory of God,
thus says the Lord.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
After Solomon's death, Rehoboam returns from Egypt and recaptures the kingdom of Judah. Jeroboam decides to wage war on him, thinking of re-establishing the unity of a single kingdom. The prophet Shemaiah dissuades him from the war, as it would have been a massacre between brothers. To convince him, he also reminds him that the division of the two kingdoms, that of Judah and that of Israel, had been allowed by God: "Thus says the Lord, you shall not go up or fight against your kindred the people of Israel. Let everyone go home, for this thing is from me." God does not want the division of his people. Sometimes he "gives in" to avoid worse evils and chooses a pedagogy of patience in growth. Rehoboam "listened to God's word" and the conflict, which would have been a fratricidal massacre, was averted. Jeroboam, for his part, did not abandon his plot for power. And, having neither Jerusalem nor the temple, he tried to replace them with other places and another religiosity. The intention was to make his subjects forget Jerusalem and the temple, thus being able to preserve his power. He diligently created new altars, new religious rites, and new festivals. His subjects accepted this decision of their king, except for a group of Levites who emigrated en masse to the southern kingdom, according to the second book of Chronicles (11:13-14). In fact, Jeroboam managed to detach his subjects from Jerusalem and the kingdom of the South by making them practice a cult that took them away from the God of their Fathers. And "this matter became sin," the sacred author notes bitterly. Jeroboam, in fact, concerned only with his own power, had forgotten that it was not he who freed the people from slavery in Egypt, but the Lord, and that only the Lord remained the true ruler of his people. Pride and thirst for power had blinded him even to the point of taking the people away from God.
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
