READING OF THE DAY First reading form the Acts of the Apostles ACTS 8:5-8, 14-17
Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed the Christ to them. With one accord, the crowds paid attention to what was said by Philip when they heard it and saw the signs he was doing. For unclean spirits, crying out in a loud voice, came out of many possessed people, and many paralyzed or crippled people were cured. There was great joy in that city.
Now when the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent them Peter and John, who went down and prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Spirit, for it had not yet fallen upon any of them; they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit.
Second reading from the first letter of Saint Peter 1 PT 3:15-18
Beloved: Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts. Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope, but do it with gentleness and reverence, keeping your conscience clear, so that, when you are maligned, those who defame your good conduct in Christ may themselves be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that be the will of God, than for doing evil.
For Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the sake of the unrighteous, that he might lead you to God. Put to death in the flesh, he was brought to life in the Spirit.
GOSPEL OF THE DAY From the Gospel according to John JN 14:15-21
Jesus said to his disciples: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows him. But you know him, because he remains with you, and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me, because I live and you will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you. Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one who loves me. And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and reveal myself to him.”
WORDS OF THE HOLY FATHER These words remind us first of all that love for a person, and for the Lord, is shown not with words but with deeds; and also, “observing the commandments” should be understood in the existential sense, so as to embrace the whole of life. In fact, being Christian does not mean mainly belonging to a certain culture or adhering to a certain doctrine, but rather joining one’s own life, in all its aspects, to the person of Jesus and, through Him, to the Father. For this purpose Jesus promises the outpouring of the Holy Spirit to his disciples. Owing to the Holy Spirit, to the Love that unites the Father and the Son and proceeds from them, we may all live the very life of Jesus. The Spirit, in fact, teaches us all things, that is, the single indispensable thing: to love as God loves. (Regina Caeli, 15 may 2016)
FAUSTI - Christianity is first of all of all love for Jesus, who assimilates us to Him, the Son, giving us His Love for the Father and for our brothers and sisters. By loving Him, we become what He is; and we can love our brothers and sisters with His Love, which is the same as that of the Father. Love is not only a feeling. It engages the whole person, giving him or her a new way of being. It informs his or her understanding, will and action. Concretely one loves through facts and in truth. (1 Jn 3:18). Observing His commandments is the condition for remaining in the covenant of the faithful God, who has loved, chosen and freed us. We can observe them out of duty, as slaves, as elder brother does... (Lk 15:29), or for the love of sons. For Jesus the principle of observance is the love of a heart that knows how to be loved, the new heart of the new covenant. He calls them "my" (commands) because the Scriptures and Moses are written about Him, and He speaks of "commands" in the plural because His command, even if it is one (Jn 13:34), is also manifold. Love in fact expresses itself in every single action and makes us discern, here and now, what is best to do. Jesus, with His leaving, becomes the pontiff between us and God, the Brother intercessor with the Father . He opens up for us access to Him and to His gifts. Jesus asks for us to the Father the definitive gift. He obtains everything He asks. (11,42). For this reason the Counselor is certainly given to us. We pray .. in order to dispose ourselves to receive Him. " The Comforter" because " to be with someone who's alone , so that he's not alone anymore. The Comforter is the One who is "with" us, offering us that company that overcomes our radical loneliness. This Comforter is another compared to Jesus, who is now leaving. He is given by the Father to those who love the Son and observe His commands. The Spirit is Life; the Spirit of Truth can be translated as "true, authentic life", the life of God. This Life is given back to us by the knowledge of the Son, who frees us from lies and makes us live in the Love of the Father. The Spirit of truth is the opposite of the spirit of lying, the origin of our evils. The Spirit of Truth is the Spirit of the Son, who said to Thomas: "I am the Way, the Truth, the Life". The world, as a succubus of lies, cannot yet receive the Spirit of Truth. It cannot receive Him, because it is incapable of seeing Him and knowing Him. In fact, in a few hours, it will take and hang on wood the Lord of Glory. The Spirit of Truth has reside with us in Jesus, the Son who lives the very Love of the Father for us: in Him we have known and believed in the Love that God has for us. In a few hours, that Love which was "with" and " among" us, will be "in us". This is the supreme gift that the Son communicates to us from the Cross, where "all is accomplished" and where He delivers His Spirit. The disciples, through the death of Jesus, are not left orphans. On the contrary, they find their place with the Father, because they receive the same Love of the Son. His leaving is in reality His coming to us, indeed His being in us with His Spirit who makes us sons, in communion with Him and with the Father. The world, which now does not see the Spirit of Truth in Jesus, will soon no longer see Jesus either. It will physically eliminate Him. The disciples will continue to see Him. But they will see Him in a new way: through the wounds of His hands and side, which show His Love, source of joy and peace.
Jesus has in Himself the life that overcomes death (11:25). On Easter Day we will know that Jesus is in the Father, that He loves Him and raises Him up; we will also know that we are in the Son, because He loved us and gave His Life for us; we will know that He is in us, because we love Him and keep His Words. Through the mutual immanence of us in the Son and the Son in us, we know that the Son is in the Father and the Father is in the Son. On that day we will share in the knowledge of love that exists between Father and Son: we will share in the Life of God. "To have Jesus' commands means to make them one's own and to live them. Listening to the word and not observing it is the impiety denounced by the prophets. Jesus says that he who loves Him observes His commands, here He says that the one who observes His commands loves Him. Love is the beginning and the aim of following His commandments: if love makes one live as He does, then living as He realizes the love. The Father loves all men, even if they ignore Him and reject Him. But only those who love the Son and observe His commands have the Son within themselves and experience the Father's love for Him. Accepting the Father's gratuitous love is the act of freedom that makes us what we are: sons who love because they are loved. The Son too has always loved us, like the Father, even if we deny Him like Peter and betray Him like Judas. The fact that He loves us in this way will allow us to experience His love for us. Only he who loves knows the love by which he is loved. Without love for Jesus, there is no knowledge of Him, nor of the Father, nor of the Spirit: "He who does not love has not known God, because God is Love," says the Evangelist in His first letter.
ENCYCLICAL LETTER DEUS CARITAS EST OF THE PONTIFF BENEDICT XVI He has loved us first and he continues to do so; we too, then, can respond with love. God does not demand of us a feeling which we ourselves are incapable of producing. He loves us, he makes us see and experience his love, and since he has “loved us first”, love can also blossom as a response within us.
In the gradual unfolding of this encounter, it is clearly revealed that love is not merely a sentiment. Sentiments come and go. A sentiment can be a marvellous first spark, but it is not the fullness of love. Earlier we spoke of the process of purification and maturation by which eros comes fully into its own, becomes love in the full meaning of the word. It is characteristic of mature love that it calls into play all man's potentialities; it engages the whole man, so to speak. Contact with the visible manifestations of God's love can awaken within us a feeling of joy born of the experience of being loved. But this encounter also engages our will and our intellect. Acknowledgment of the living God is one path towards love, and the “yes” of our will to his will unites our intellect, will and sentiments in the all- embracing act of love. But this process is always open-ended; love is never “finished” and complete; throughout life, it changes and matures, and thus remains faithful to itself. Idem velle atque idem nolle [9]—to want the same thing, and to reject the same thing—was recognized by antiquity as the authentic content of love: the one becomes similar to the other, and this leads to a community of will and thought. The love-story between God and man consists in the very fact that this communion of will increases in a communion of thought and sentiment, and thus our will and God's will increasingly coincide: God's will is no longer for me an alien will, something imposed on me from without by the commandments, but it is now my own will, based on the realization that God is in fact more deeply present to me than I am to myself.[10] Then self- abandonment to God increases and God becomes our joy (cf. Ps 73 [72]:23-28).
18. Love of neighbour is thus shown to be possible in the way proclaimed by the Bible, by Jesus. It consists in the very fact that, in God and with God, I love even the person whom I do not like or even know. This can only take place on the basis of an intimate encounter with God, an encounter which has become a communion of will, even affecting my feelings. Then I learn to look on this other person not simply with my eyes and my feelings, but from the perspective of Jesus Christ. His friend is my friend. Going beyond exterior appearances, I perceive in others an interior desire for a sign of love, of concern. This I can offer them not only through the organizations intended for such purposes, accepting it perhaps as a political necessity. Seeing with the eyes of Christ, I can give to others much more than their outward necessities; I can give them the look of love which they crave. Here we see the necessary interplay between love of God and love of neighbour which the First Letter of John speaks of with such insistence.
READING OF THE DAY
RispondiEliminaFirst reading form the Acts of the Apostles
ACTS 8:5-8, 14-17
Philip went down to the city of Samaria
and proclaimed the Christ to them.
With one accord, the crowds paid attention to what was said by Philip
when they heard it and saw the signs he was doing.
For unclean spirits, crying out in a loud voice,
came out of many possessed people,
and many paralyzed or crippled people were cured.
There was great joy in that city.
Now when the apostles in Jerusalem
heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God,
they sent them Peter and John,
who went down and prayed for them,
that they might receive the Holy Spirit,
for it had not yet fallen upon any of them;
they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
Then they laid hands on them
and they received the Holy Spirit.
Second reading from the first letter of Saint Peter
1 PT 3:15-18
Beloved:
Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts.
Always be ready to give an explanation
to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope,
but do it with gentleness and reverence,
keeping your conscience clear,
so that, when you are maligned,
those who defame your good conduct in Christ
may themselves be put to shame.
For it is better to suffer for doing good,
if that be the will of God, than for doing evil.
For Christ also suffered for sins once,
the righteous for the sake of the unrighteous,
that he might lead you to God.
Put to death in the flesh,
he was brought to life in the Spirit.
GOSPEL OF THE DAY
From the Gospel according to John
JN 14:15-21
Jesus said to his disciples:
“If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
And I will ask the Father,
and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always,
the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot accept,
because it neither sees nor knows him.
But you know him, because he remains with you,
and will be in you.
I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.
In a little while the world will no longer see me,
but you will see me, because I live and you will live.
On that day you will realize that I am in my Father
and you are in me and I in you.
Whoever has my commandments and observes them
is the one who loves me.
And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father,
and I will love him and reveal myself to him.”
WORDS OF THE HOLY FATHER
These words remind us first of all that love for a person, and for the Lord, is shown not with words but with deeds; and also, “observing the commandments” should be understood in the existential sense, so as to embrace the whole of life. In fact, being Christian does not mean mainly belonging to a certain culture or adhering to a certain doctrine, but rather joining one’s own life, in all its aspects, to the person of Jesus and, through Him, to the Father. For this purpose Jesus promises the outpouring of the Holy Spirit to his disciples. Owing to the Holy Spirit, to the Love that unites the Father and the Son and proceeds from them, we may all live the very life of Jesus. The Spirit, in fact, teaches us all things, that is, the single indispensable thing: to love as God loves. (Regina Caeli, 15 may 2016)
FAUSTI -
RispondiEliminaChristianity is first of all of all love for Jesus, who assimilates us to Him, the Son, giving us His Love for the Father and for our brothers and sisters.
By loving Him, we become what He is; and we can love our brothers and sisters with His Love, which is the same as that of the Father.
Love is not only a feeling. It engages the whole person, giving him or her a new way of being. It informs his or her understanding, will and action.
Concretely one loves through facts and in truth. (1 Jn 3:18).
Observing His commandments is the condition for remaining in the covenant of the faithful God, who has loved, chosen and freed us. We can observe them out of duty, as slaves, as elder brother does...
(Lk 15:29), or for the love of sons.
For Jesus the principle of observance is the love of a heart that knows how to be loved, the new heart of the new covenant.
He calls them "my" (commands) because the Scriptures and Moses are written about Him, and He speaks of "commands" in the plural because His command, even if it is one (Jn 13:34), is also manifold.
Love in fact expresses itself in every single action and makes us discern, here and now, what is best to do.
Jesus, with His leaving, becomes the pontiff between us and God, the Brother intercessor with the Father .
He opens up for us access to Him and to His gifts.
Jesus asks for us to the Father the definitive gift.
He obtains everything He asks. (11,42).
For this reason the Counselor is certainly given to us.
We pray .. in order to dispose ourselves to receive Him.
" The Comforter" because " to be with someone who's alone , so that he's not alone anymore. The Comforter is the One who is "with" us, offering us that company that overcomes our radical loneliness.
This Comforter is another compared to Jesus, who is now leaving.
He is given by the Father to those who love the Son and observe His commands. The Spirit is Life; the Spirit of Truth can be translated as "true, authentic life", the life of God. This Life is given back to us by the knowledge of the Son, who frees us from lies and makes us live in the Love of the Father. The Spirit of truth is the opposite of the spirit of lying, the origin of our evils.
The Spirit of Truth is the Spirit of the Son, who said to Thomas: "I am the Way, the Truth, the Life".
The world, as a succubus of lies, cannot yet receive the Spirit of Truth. It cannot receive Him, because it is incapable of seeing Him and knowing Him. In fact, in a few hours, it will take and hang on wood the Lord of Glory.
The Spirit of Truth has reside with us in Jesus, the Son who lives the very Love of the Father for us: in Him we have known and believed in the Love that God has for us.
In a few hours, that Love which was "with" and " among" us, will be "in us".
This is the supreme gift that the Son communicates to us from the Cross, where "all is accomplished" and where He delivers His Spirit.
The disciples, through the death of Jesus, are not left orphans. On the contrary, they find their place with the Father, because they receive the same Love of the Son.
His leaving is in reality His coming to us, indeed His being in us with His Spirit who makes us sons, in communion with Him and with the Father.
The world, which now does not see the Spirit of Truth in Jesus, will soon no longer see Jesus either. It will physically eliminate Him.
The disciples will continue to see Him. But they will see Him in a new way: through the wounds of His hands and side, which show His Love, source of joy and peace.
Jesus has in Himself the life that overcomes death (11:25).
RispondiEliminaOn Easter Day we will know that Jesus is in the Father, that He loves Him and raises Him up; we will also know that we are in the Son, because He loved us and gave His Life for us; we will know that He is in us, because we love Him and keep His Words.
Through the mutual immanence of us in the Son and the Son in us, we know that the Son is in the Father and the Father is in the Son.
On that day we will share in the knowledge of love that exists between Father and Son: we will share in the Life of God.
"To have Jesus' commands means to make them one's own and to live them. Listening to the word and not observing it is the impiety denounced by the prophets.
Jesus says that he who loves Him observes His commands, here He says that the one who observes His commands loves Him.
Love is the beginning and the aim of following His commandments: if love makes one live as He does, then living as He realizes the love.
The Father loves all men, even if they ignore Him and reject Him.
But only those who love the Son and observe His commands have the Son within themselves and experience the Father's love for Him.
Accepting the Father's gratuitous love is the act of freedom that makes us what we are: sons who love because they are loved.
The Son too has always loved us, like the Father, even if we deny Him like Peter and betray Him like Judas.
The fact that He loves us in this way will allow us to experience His love for us.
Only he who loves knows the love by which he is loved.
Without love for Jesus, there is no knowledge of Him, nor of the Father, nor of the Spirit: "He who does not love has not known God, because God is Love," says the Evangelist in His first letter.
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
RispondiEliminaDEUS CARITAS EST
OF THE PONTIFF
BENEDICT XVI
He has loved us first and he continues to do so; we too, then, can respond with love. God does not demand of us a feeling which we ourselves are incapable of producing. He loves us, he makes us see and experience his love, and since he has “loved us first”, love can also blossom as a response within us.
In the gradual unfolding of this encounter, it is clearly revealed that love is not merely a sentiment. Sentiments come and go. A sentiment can be a marvellous first spark, but it is not the fullness of love. Earlier we spoke of the process of purification and maturation by which eros comes fully into its own, becomes love in the full meaning of the word. It is characteristic of mature love that it calls into play all man's potentialities; it engages the whole man, so to speak. Contact with the visible manifestations of God's love can awaken within us a feeling of joy born of the experience of being loved. But this encounter also engages our will and our intellect. Acknowledgment of the living God is one path towards love, and the “yes” of our will to his will unites our intellect, will and sentiments in the all- embracing act of love. But this process is always open-ended; love is never “finished” and complete; throughout life, it changes and matures, and thus remains faithful to itself. Idem velle atque idem nolle [9]—to want the same thing, and to reject the same thing—was recognized by antiquity as the authentic content of love: the one becomes similar to the other, and this leads to a community of will and thought. The love-story between God and man consists in the very fact that this communion of will increases in a communion of thought and sentiment, and thus our will and God's will increasingly coincide: God's will is no longer for me an alien will, something imposed on me from without by the commandments, but it is now my own will, based on the realization that God is in fact more deeply present to me than I am to myself.[10] Then self- abandonment to God increases and God becomes our joy (cf. Ps 73 [72]:23-28).
18. Love of neighbour is thus shown to be possible in the way proclaimed by the Bible, by Jesus. It consists in the very fact that, in God and with God, I love even the person whom I do not like or even know. This can only take place on the basis of an intimate encounter with God, an encounter which has become a communion of will, even affecting my feelings. Then I learn to look on this other person not simply with my eyes and my feelings, but from the perspective of Jesus Christ. His friend is my friend. Going beyond exterior appearances, I perceive in others an interior desire for a sign of love, of concern. This I can offer them not only through the organizations intended for such purposes, accepting it perhaps as a political necessity. Seeing with the eyes of Christ, I can give to others much more than their outward necessities; I can give them the look of love which they crave. Here we see the necessary interplay between love of God and love of neighbour which
the First Letter of John speaks of with such insistence.