Reading of the Word of God
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
You are a chosen race,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation,
a people acquired by God
to proclaim his marvellous works.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
Luke 1, 39-45
Mary set out at that time and went as quickly as she could into the hill country to a town in Judah.
She went into Zechariah's house and greeted Elizabeth.
Now it happened that as soon as Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the child leapt in her womb and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.
She gave a loud cry and said, 'Of all women you are the most blessed, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.
Why should I be honoured with a visit from the mother of my Lord?
Look, the moment your greeting reached my ears, the child in my womb leapt for joy.
Yes, blessed is she who believed that the promise made her by the Lord would be fulfilled.'
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
You will be holy,
because I am holy, thus says the Lord.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia
The Gospel we listened to wants to hurry us to prepare our hearts for the birth of Jesus. The evangelist writes that after hearing from the angel that Elizabeth was pregnant, Mary travels to see her "with haste." The Gospel always hurries us. It pushes us to step outside of our habits, maybe even the good ones, but still they are only ours. It exhorts us not to stop in front of the usual concerns and thoughts and to leave the small village of our horizons to hurry towards the day and the place of the birth of Jesus. We can easily imagine how many thoughts Mary must have had just after the Word of God had completely turned her life upside down! Nevertheless, Mary left Nazareth to go to see her old cousin Elizabeth, who was at that time six months pregnant and who certainly was in need of help. It was not easy for the very young and pregnant Mary to cope with a long and uneasy journey. She had to pass through "the mountain," as Luke points out, stressing the seriousness of her enterprise. The Gospel always forces us to leave behind our tired habits and urges us to support those who suffer and those in need. It is not a spontaneous choice, especially for us who, unlike Mary, are often guided by our laziness. We need to rely on the Word of God to go beyond ourselves. However, we often trust only our beliefs, our certainties, which obviously appear to us as always right. The example of Joseph - the figure on whom we meditated a few days ago - is our warning. Mary was touched in the heart by the needs of her cousin; thus, she went to see her without hesitation. As soon as Elizabeth saw her coming into the house, Elizabeth rejoiced in her very womb. This is the same joy that the weak and poor feel when they are visited by the servants, men and women, of the Lord, those "who believe that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to them by the Lord." The benediction for those, who come with their love to help, arises from the mouths of the poor. A real epiphany of the Holy Spirit is then realized. The smile of the poor is the smile of God, and their joy is the joy of God. The believers will feel the beauty and the strength of the joy caused deep in the hearts of the poor. The embrace between the young Mary and the old Elizabeth is the icon of the love that all the Christians are called to give to the world at the beginning of this millennium.
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
