The prayer for the sick is held in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere.
Memorial of Don Andrea Santoro, a Roman priest killed in Trebizond, Turkey, in 2006.
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The prayer for the sick is held in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere.
Memorial of Don Andrea Santoro, a Roman priest killed in Trebizond, Turkey, in 2006.
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
Mark 6,53-56
Having made the crossing, they came to land at Gennesaret and moored there. When they disembarked people at once recognised him, and started hurrying all through the countryside and brought the sick on stretchers to wherever they heard he was. And wherever he went, to village or town or farm, they laid down the sick in the open spaces, begging him to let them touch even the fringe of his cloak. And all those who touched him were saved.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Jesus went to the other side, reaching the disciples who were overwhelmed by the waves of Lake of Galilee. Like other times, his presence calms the sea and the wind, like it calms our hearts when we are distressed and focused on ourselves. As soon as they disembarked, the Gospel says that "people at once recognized him" and the people thronged around him and brought their sick people so that he may heal them. Everyone trusted him and his healing power: for many it was sufficient to touch the hem of his cloth to be healed. Jesus did not withdraw from their questions; he did not send anyone away. It is a style that questions each of us and our communities. Shouldn't we be like the hem of the cloth of the Lord that the poor and the sick can reach and touch with their hands? There is need that the weak and the poor may "touch" easily the "body of Christ," that is the community of the disciples and be healed and cured. Besides, a church without the poor who come to be helped and without the sick who receive consolation does not conform to the Gospel. A question arises spontaneously on how we live the power of healing and salvation that the Lord put in our hands. Don't we risk being stingy keepers of what we have received, and we should distribute generously to the many who are waiting for healing and salvation? It is true that in this time many knock at the doors of the Church, of the Christian community. It is urgent to respond. But it is also necessary to go out and go towards those who are waiting. It is necessary that we do not keep under the ground of our stingy egocentrism the talent of love the Lord gave us. We need to trade and multiply it because the needs and the requests for salvation and help have grown. Pope Francis invites us to "touch the wounds of Jesus touching those of the poor." At times we are more fearful, dominated by a false respect that makes us harder, colder, and brisker. So, we lack the gestures of tenderness and friendship. In fact, there is an incredible need of tenderness and company, of listening and accompanying. Let others invade our territory, let them cross our boundaries, and occupy our time so that through us they may meet the power of the love of Jesus who heals and saves.
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
