Seventeenth Sunday of Ordinary Time
Memorial of Mary, a mentally ill woman who died in Rome. With her we remember all who are mentally ill.
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Seventeenth Sunday of Ordinary Time
Memorial of Mary, a mentally ill woman who died in Rome. With her we remember all who are mentally ill.
Reading of the Gospel
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Yesterday I was buried with Christ,
today I rise with you who are risen.
With you I was crucified;
remember me, Lord, in your kingdom.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
John 6, 1-15
After this, Jesus crossed the Sea of Galilee -- or of Tiberias-
and a large crowd followed him, impressed by the signs he had done in curing the sick.
Jesus climbed the hillside and sat down there with his disciples.
The time of the Jewish Passover was near.
Looking up, Jesus saw the crowds approaching and said to Philip, 'Where can we buy some bread for these people to eat?'
He said this only to put Philip to the test; he himself knew exactly what he was going to do.
Philip answered, 'Two hundred denarii would not buy enough to give them a little piece each.'
One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, said,
'Here is a small boy with five barley loaves and two fish; but what is that among so many?'
Jesus said to them, 'Make the people sit down.' There was plenty of grass there, and as many as five thousand men sat down.
Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were sitting there; he then did the same with the fish, distributing as much as they wanted.
When they had eaten enough he said to the disciples, 'Pick up the pieces left over, so that nothing is wasted.'
So they picked them up and filled twelve large baskets with scraps left over from the meal of five barley loaves.
Seeing the sign that he had done, the people said, 'This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world.'
Jesus, as he realised they were about to come and take him by force and make him king, fled back to the hills alone.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Yesterday I was buried with Christ,
today I rise with you who are risen.
With you I was crucified;
remember me, Lord, in your kingdom.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
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
