Early in the morning Moses went up Mount Sinai as the LORD had commanded him, taking along the two stone tablets. Having come down in a cloud, the LORD stood with him there and proclaimed his name, "LORD." Thus the LORD passed before him and cried out, "The LORD, the LORD, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity, Moses at once bowed down to the ground in worship. Then he said, "If I find favor with you, O Lord, do come along in our company. This is indeed a stiff-necked people; yet pardon our wickedness and sins, and receive us as your own."
Book of Daniel 3,52-56. Blessed are you, O Lord, the God of our fathers, praiseworthy and exalted above all forever; and blessed is your holy and glorious name, praiseworthy and exalted above all for all ages.
Blessed are you in the temple of your holy glory, praiseworthy and exalted above all forever. Blessed are you on the throne of your kingdom, praiseworthy and exalted above all forever.
Blessed are you who look into the depths from your throne upon the cherubim; praiseworthy and exalted above all forever. Blessed are you in the firmament of heaven, praiseworthy and glorious forever.
Second Letter to the Corinthians 13,11-13. Brothers and sisters, rejoice. Mend your ways, encourage one another, agree with one another, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the holy ones greet you. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the holy Spirit be with all of you.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 3,16-18. God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.
Today’s Gospel (cf. Jn 3:16-18), on the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity, demonstrates — with the Apostle John’s succinct language — the mystery of God’s love for the world, his creation. In the brief dialogue with Nicodemus, Jesus presents himself as the One who brings to fulfilment the Father’s plan of salvation for the world. He affirms: “For God so loved the world that He gave his only Son” (v. 16).
These words are to indicate that the action of the three divine Persons — Father, Son and Holy Spirit — is all a single plan of love that saves humanity and the world; it is a plan of salvation for us. The world God created was good, beautiful, but after sin, the world is marked by evil and corruption. We men and women are sinners, all of us; hence, God could intervene to judge the world, to destroy evil and castigate sinners. Instead, He loves the world, despite its sins; God loves each one of us even when we make mistakes and distance ourselves from him. God the Father loves the world so much that, in order to save it, He gives what is most precious to Him: his only-begotten Son, who gives his life for humanity, rises again, returns to the Father and together with him sends the Holy Spirit. The Trinity is therefore Love, wholly at the service of the world, which He wishes to save and re-create. And today, thinking of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, we think of God’s love! And it would be beautiful if we felt that we were loved: “God loves me!”. This is today’s sentiment.
When Jesus affirms that the Father has given his only-begotten Son, we spontaneously think of Abraham and his offering of his son Isaac, of whom the Book of Genesis speaks (cf. 22:1-14): this is the “immeasurable measure” of God's love. And let us also think of how God reveals himself to Moses: full of tenderness, merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness (cf. Ex 34:6). The encounter with this God encouraged Moses, who, as the Book of Exodus tells us, was not afraid to stand between the people and the Lord, saying to Him: although it is a stiff-necked people, pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for thy inheritance (cf. 34:9). And this is what God did, by sending his Son. We are children in the Son with the strength of the Holy Spirit! We are God’s legacy!
Dear brothers and sisters, today’s Feast Day invites us to let ourselves once again be fascinated by the beauty of God; beauty, goodness and inexhaustible truth. But also beauty, goodness, and humble and close truth, which became flesh in order to enter our life, our history, my history, the history of each one of us, so that every man and woman may encounter it and have eternal life. And this is faith: to welcome God-Love; to welcome this God-Love who gives himself in Christ, who moves us in the Holy Spirit; to let ourselves be encountered by him and to trust in him. This is Christian life. To love, to encounter God, to seek God; and He seeks us first; He encounters us first.
May the Virgin Mary, dwelling-place of the Trinity, help us to welcome with an open heart the love of God, which fills us with joy and gives meaning to our journey in this world, always guiding us towards our destination, which is Heaven.
BENEDICT XVI - Jesus and the Church can no more separate one from the other than they can simply identify with each other. He always infinitely surpasses the Church. It wasn't only with the Second Vatican Council that it became clear to us that he, as Lord of the Church, is also its greatness and measure. I've always experienced this as both a consolation and a challenge... As a consolation, because we've always known that the scrupulousness of rubrics and jurists has nothing to do with Him, with the infinite generosity that comes to us from the words of the Gospel like a breeze that brings refreshment and topples like a house of cards all pedantic devotion. We've always known that closeness to Him is totally independent of the ecclesiastical dignity one possesses, as well as legal or historical erudition. This has always enabled me to look at external things with the necessary calm, always drawing from the figure of Jesus a sense of liberating optimism. But on the other hand, we never lose sight of the fact that Christ, in many respects, demands much more than the Church knows how to demand. The radicalism of his words can only be truly matched by the radicalism of choices such as those made by the hermit Anthony, the father of the desert, or by Francis of Assisi in accepting the Gospel message to the letter... I know that the Jesus of the Gospels is the real Jesus, I know that I can trust him far more peacefully than the most learned reconstructions, and that he will outlive them all. All the breadth and nuances of the gospel tradition inform me about who Jesus was and is. He makes himself heard and seen again and again...
To you, Father Almighty, origin of the cosmos and man, for Christ, the Living One, Lord of time and history, in the Spirit who sanctifies the universe, praise, honor, glory, today and in the endless centuries. Amen! St. John Paul II
FAUSTI - "For God loved the world so much" God has always loved the world, even if the world rejects Him. The love of the Father is free and without reserve. The Son, who knows Him and lives by Him, bears witness to it from the cross. This verse presents to us the center of John's Gospel, which is intended to lead us to confess with wonder. "We have recognized and believed in the love that God has for us. For "God is Love" (1 Jn 4:16). " He gave us the Only Begotten Son" because only in him, who loves as he is loved, do we see our identity as children of the Father. Jesus, being Son, lived what we too are called to live: "filiality" and the consequent fraternity. He loves us with the same Love that the Father has for Him and assures us that the Father loves us as He loves us (17:23), with a love that is before the foundation of the world (17:24). Salvation is to believe in Jesus Crucified, the Son of Man raised up . He is the Word, the light and life of every man, who became flesh to tell us the absolute Love of the Father. In Him we receive our identity as children and we are what we are. Outside of Him, we are what we are not, the nothingness of ourselves. That is why to welcome Him, the Son, is to find oneself; to reject Him is to lose oneself. "Not to judge the world, but that the world may be saved through Him." The Son has the same judgment as the Father. He comes with the scourge into the temple not to judge or condemn the sinful world. He has come to save it precisely by "purifying" the Temple, by laying aside with His Cross the diabolical image that man has of God and of himself. In Him raised up we have the true knowledge of Him and of ourselves, which the mouth of the serpent had taken from us. To adhere to Him is true holiness and justice: it is to live of the Son and as children, to share in the common glory of the Father and the Son. Whoever does not believe in the absolute love offered by the lifted Son of man, excludes himself from love and life. The decision of faith towards the Flesh of Jesus gives us birth from above: it is eternal life. The prologue does not say that those who reject Him in the testimony of the wise men and prophets are judged. On the contrary, the Word became Flesh in order to save this world that did not receive the light and condemned itself to darkness. For this reason every man, like Nicodemus, despite uncertainties and difficulties, must be led to be born from above through the knowledge of Son. The meaning of human history is the revelation of the Son, his growth to his full stature (Eph 4:13) so that God may be everything in all.
Book of Exodus 34,4b-6.8-9.
RispondiEliminaEarly in the morning Moses went up Mount Sinai as the LORD had commanded him, taking along the two stone tablets.
Having come down in a cloud, the LORD stood with him there and proclaimed his name, "LORD."
Thus the LORD passed before him and cried out, "The LORD, the LORD, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity,
Moses at once bowed down to the ground in worship.
Then he said, "If I find favor with you, O Lord, do come along in our company. This is indeed a stiff-necked people; yet pardon our wickedness and sins, and receive us as your own."
Book of Daniel 3,52-56.
Blessed are you, O Lord, the God of our fathers,
praiseworthy and exalted above all forever;
and blessed is your holy and glorious name,
praiseworthy and exalted above all for all ages.
Blessed are you in the temple of your holy glory,
praiseworthy and exalted above all forever.
Blessed are you on the throne of your kingdom,
praiseworthy and exalted above all forever.
Blessed are you who look into the depths
from your throne upon the cherubim;
praiseworthy and exalted above all forever.
Blessed are you in the firmament of heaven,
praiseworthy and glorious forever.
Second Letter
to the Corinthians 13,11-13.
Brothers and sisters, rejoice. Mend your ways, encourage one another, agree with one another, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you.
Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the holy ones greet you.
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the holy Spirit be with all of you.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
according to Saint John 3,16-18.
God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.
Whoever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.
POPE FRANCIS
RispondiEliminaANGELUS 7 June 2020
Dear Brothers and Sisters, Good morning!
Today’s Gospel (cf. Jn 3:16-18), on the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity, demonstrates — with the Apostle John’s succinct language — the mystery of God’s love for the world, his creation. In the brief dialogue with Nicodemus, Jesus presents himself as the One who brings to fulfilment the Father’s plan of salvation for the world. He affirms: “For God so loved the world that He gave his only Son” (v. 16).
These words are to indicate that the action of the three divine Persons — Father, Son and Holy Spirit — is all a single plan of love that saves humanity and the world; it is a plan of salvation for us. The world God created was good, beautiful, but after sin, the world is marked by evil and corruption. We men and women are sinners, all of us; hence, God could intervene to judge the world, to destroy evil and castigate sinners. Instead, He loves the world, despite its sins; God loves each one of us even when we make mistakes and distance ourselves from him. God the Father loves the world so much that, in order to save it, He gives what is most precious to Him: his only-begotten Son, who gives his life for humanity, rises again, returns to the Father and together with him sends the Holy Spirit. The Trinity is therefore Love, wholly at the service of the world, which He wishes to save and re-create. And today, thinking of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, we think of God’s love! And it would be beautiful if we felt that we were loved: “God loves me!”. This is today’s sentiment.
When Jesus affirms that the Father has given his only-begotten Son, we spontaneously think of Abraham and his offering of his son Isaac, of whom the Book of Genesis speaks (cf. 22:1-14): this is the “immeasurable measure” of God's love. And let us also think of how God reveals himself to Moses: full of tenderness, merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness (cf. Ex 34:6). The encounter with this God encouraged Moses, who, as the Book of Exodus tells us, was not afraid to stand between the people and the Lord, saying to Him: although it is a stiff-necked people, pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for thy inheritance (cf. 34:9). And this is what God did, by sending his Son. We are children in the Son with the strength of the Holy Spirit! We are God’s legacy!
Dear brothers and sisters, today’s Feast Day invites us to let ourselves once again be fascinated by the beauty of God; beauty, goodness and inexhaustible truth. But also beauty, goodness, and humble and close truth, which became flesh in order to enter our life, our history, my history, the history of each one of us, so that every man and woman may encounter it and have eternal life. And this is faith: to welcome God-Love; to welcome this God-Love who gives himself in Christ, who moves us in the Holy Spirit; to let ourselves be encountered by him and to trust in him. This is Christian life. To love, to encounter God, to seek God; and He seeks us first; He encounters us first.
May the Virgin Mary, dwelling-place of the Trinity, help us to welcome with an open heart the love of God, which fills us with joy and gives meaning to our journey in this world, always guiding us towards our destination, which is Heaven.
BENEDICT XVI - Jesus and the Church can no more separate one from the other than they can simply identify with each other.
RispondiEliminaHe always infinitely surpasses the Church.
It wasn't only with the Second Vatican Council that it became clear to us that he, as Lord of the Church, is also its greatness and measure.
I've always experienced this as both a consolation and a challenge...
As a consolation, because we've always known that the scrupulousness of rubrics and jurists has nothing to do with Him, with the infinite generosity that comes to us from the words of the Gospel like a breeze that brings refreshment and topples like a house of cards all pedantic devotion.
We've always known that closeness to Him is totally independent of the ecclesiastical dignity one possesses, as well as legal or historical erudition.
This has always enabled me to look at external things with the necessary calm, always drawing from the figure of Jesus a sense of liberating optimism.
But on the other hand, we never lose sight of the fact that Christ, in many respects, demands much more than the Church knows how to demand.
The radicalism of his words can only be truly matched by the radicalism of choices such as those made by the hermit Anthony, the father of the desert, or by Francis of Assisi in accepting the Gospel message to the letter...
I know that the Jesus of the Gospels is the real Jesus, I know that I can trust him far more peacefully than the most learned reconstructions, and that he will outlive them all.
All the breadth and nuances of the gospel tradition inform me about who Jesus was and is. He makes himself heard and seen again and again...
To you, Father Almighty,
RispondiEliminaorigin of the cosmos and man,
for Christ, the Living One,
Lord of time and history,
in the Spirit who sanctifies the universe,
praise, honor, glory,
today and in the endless centuries. Amen!
St. John Paul II
FAUSTI - "For God loved the world so much" God has always loved the world, even if the world rejects Him. The love of the Father is free and without reserve. The Son, who knows Him and lives by Him, bears witness to it from the cross.
RispondiEliminaThis verse presents to us the center of John's Gospel, which is intended to lead us to confess with wonder. "We have recognized and believed in the love that God has for us.
For "God is Love" (1 Jn 4:16).
" He gave us the Only Begotten Son" because only in him, who loves as he is loved, do we see our identity as children of the Father.
Jesus, being Son, lived what we too are called to live: "filiality" and the consequent fraternity. He loves us with the same Love that the Father has for Him and assures us that the Father loves us as He loves us (17:23), with a love that is before the foundation of the world (17:24).
Salvation is to believe in Jesus Crucified, the Son of Man raised up .
He is the Word, the light and life of every man, who became flesh to tell us the absolute Love of the Father.
In Him we receive our identity as children and we are what we are.
Outside of Him, we are what we are not, the nothingness of ourselves.
That is why to welcome Him, the Son, is to find oneself; to reject Him is to lose oneself.
"Not to judge the world, but that the world may be saved through Him." The Son has the same judgment as the Father. He comes with the scourge into the temple not to judge or condemn the sinful world. He has come to save it precisely by "purifying" the Temple, by laying aside with His Cross the diabolical image that man has of God and of himself. In Him raised up we have the true knowledge of Him and of ourselves, which the mouth of the serpent had taken from us. To adhere to Him is true holiness and justice: it is to live of the Son and as children, to share in the common glory of the Father and the Son. Whoever does not believe in the absolute love offered by the lifted Son of man, excludes himself from love and life.
The decision of faith towards the Flesh of Jesus gives us birth from above: it is eternal life.
The prologue does not say that those who reject Him in the testimony of the wise men and prophets are judged.
On the contrary, the Word became Flesh in order to save this world that did not receive the light and condemned itself to darkness.
For this reason every man, like Nicodemus, despite uncertainties and difficulties, must be led to be born from above through the knowledge of Son.
The meaning of human history is the revelation of the Son, his growth to his full stature (Eph 4:13) so that God may be everything in all.