Today the Gypsy people, including those of Islamic faith, celebrate St. George, who died a martyr to free the Church. Read more
Today the Gypsy people, including those of Islamic faith, celebrate St. George, who died a martyr to free the Church.
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
Philippians 3, 1-16
Finally, brothers, I wish you joy in the Lord. To write to you what I have already written before is no trouble to me and to you will be a protection.
Beware of dogs! Beware of evil workmen! Beware of self-mutilators!
We are the true people of the circumcision since we worship by the Spirit of God and make Christ Jesus our only boast, not relying on physical qualifications,
although, I myself could rely on these too. If anyone does claim to rely on them, my claim is better.
Circumcised on the eighth day of my life, I was born of the race of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrew parents. In the matter of the Law, I was a Pharisee;
as for religious fervour, I was a persecutor of the Church; as for the uprightness embodied in the Law, I was faultless.
But what were once my assets I now through Christ Jesus count as losses.
Yes, I will go further: because of the supreme advantage of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, I count everything else as loss. For him I have accepted the loss of all other things, and look on them all as filth if only I can gain Christ
and be given a place in him, with the uprightness I have gained not from the Law, but through faith in Christ, an uprightness from God, based on faith,
that I may come to know him and the power of his resurrection, and partake of his sufferings by being moulded to the pattern of his death,
striving towards the goal of resurrection from the dead.
Not that I have secured it already, nor yet reached my goal, but I am still pursuing it in the attempt to take hold of the prize for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.
Brothers, I do not reckon myself as having taken hold of it; I can only say that forgetting all that lies behind me, and straining forward to what lies in front,
I am racing towards the finishing-point to win the prize of God's heavenly call in Christ Jesus.
So this is the way in which all of us who are mature should be thinking, and if you are still thinking differently in any way, then God has yet to make this matter clear to you.
Meanwhile, let us go forward from the point we have each attained.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The community of Philippi was not living easily, as this passage evidences. Paul had spoken of adversaries. Here, he talks of “dogs”, of “evil doers”, and of others who were using circumcision, a symbol of belonging to the people of Israel to claim superiority over others within the community made up of people of diverse origins. The apostle is almost forced to praise himself as a perfect member of the people of Israel (vv. 5-6). However, this is only to clarify that this belonging is not what matters before the Lord. The “flesh”, that is one’s origin, condition, culture and whatever else distinguishes one from the other, does not count toward being a disciple. Essentially, one is not a disciple by birth or by membership, but only by faith. Paul considers everything else “rubbish” compared to the gift he received: the grace of encountering the Lord and of becoming similar to Him. For this reason, he sees his life as a race to conform himself to Christ totally, to immerse himself in his death and resurrection. Paul also transmits to us this desire for a Christian life completely oriented toward the realization of full communion with the Lord. Even through tribulation, the Christian lives out the same joy to which the apostle exhorts the Philippians to live out (3:1)
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
