Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Spirit of the Lord is upon you.
The child you shall bear will be holy.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Matthew 5, 43-48
'You have heard how it was said, You will love your neighbour and hate your enemy.
But I say this to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you;
so that you may be children of your Father in heaven, for he causes his sun to rise on the bad as well as the good, and sends down rain to fall on the upright and the wicked alike.
For if you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Do not even the tax collectors do as much?
And if you save your greetings for your brothers, are you doing anything exceptional?
Do not even the gentiles do as much? You must therefore be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.'
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Look down, O Lord, on your servants.
Be it unto us according to your word.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Love, the first commandment, lies at the heart of the lives of the disciples and the Church. The simple but profound words spoken by Jesus clearly demonstrate that this is the true way to be wise - not letting oneself be guided by hatred and revenge, feelings that, unfortunately, are instinctively present in each of us. Jesus goes so far as to propose to his disciples to love even their enemies. Jesus was the first person to live out this unsettling novelty: from high on the cross he forgave his executioners. This kind of love does not come from us, and it certainly does not rise naturally from our hearts: it comes from on high, from the Lord who Jesus says makes the sun rise on the just and the unjust, without distinguishing between them. None of us would merit being loved on our own merit. Yet, the Lord gives us his love gratuitously, without us meriting it. That is why he can ask his disciples: "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." If we accept his love, we begin to follow the path of God’s own perfection. At a time when the logic of opposition and the search for enemies dominate, the command to love one’s enemies seems totally upsetting, but it is actually liberating. This Gospel passage frees us from the search for enemies and for someone to oppose, which has become an obsession. Jesus is well aware of the fact that life can contain difficult relationships in which the encounter with another can degenerate into conflict; he knows that enmity easily arises between men and women. But it is to defeat this infernal cycle that he speaks the words no one else had ever dared speak: "Love your enemies." This is the only way for love to truly conquer. The Gospel does not deny the complexity of life; it denies that the logic of opposition is inevitable and that it is the only pattern that relationships can follow: in fact, the one who is an enemy today can go back to being or become a friend.
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
