FAUSTI - John is the prototype of the man that God has prepared to stand before His face, which is Jesus, and to open this way of access to others. It is the person ready to welcome the Lord Who comes. Living synthesis of the Old Testament, in him we see the fundamental characteristic of the whole history of Israel: the expectation. Fruit of an absolute faith in the promise, it is the indispensable condition for the accomplishment. God was so late in fulfilling His promise, because He waited to be expected by someone who should had welcomed Him. If He is not received, even if He comes, it is as if He had not come. Whoever waits "tends to" what do not yet ther'is. John is all outstretched towards God's future and calls the men to break their balancing act. to turn to God. Whoever waits "tends to" what i do not yet have there. John is all outstretched towards God's future and calls people to break their balance to turn to it. The Word of God is addressed to all, religious or not; every flesh is called to conversion to see salvation. The place where the Word reaches us is the wilderness. It is the empty and uninhabitable space where man finds his own truth and God's truth. Only its silence is earthly suitable for accepting His Word. The desert recalls the fundamental experience of exodus, the exit from the non-identity and slavery towards freedom and the service of God. John lives in the desert to indicate that the permanent situation of man is that of exodus. He must constantly come out of all slavery and walk towards God's promise, with no other guarantee except His faithfulness. In the desert heaven and earth are equally empty, strained of silence. Nothing distracts. In this nothing of what ther'is , the new and creating Word can resonate and be heard. The desert is in synthesis the life of God, the opposite of that of man who escapes from it. In fact, he prefers the tombs of Egypt, the flight from freedom. John travels through the region of the Jordan, the threshold of the promised land. This geographical fact is also theological. It qualifies him as the last prophet before the fulfillment. He preaches a Baptism. To be baptized means to immerse oneself, to go to the bottom. To the acceptance of one's own symbolic death, expressed in immersion in water, the desire for a rebirth is added, symbolised by the emergence. John calls to a baptism of conversion. It is not simply a rite. It really implies a change of mentality and life. This conversion is ordered to the remission of sins. Evil should not be expiated: it is forgiven by the One who loves us. God is Love, therefore gift. Evil is conquered by forgiveness, the eminent super-giving of His Love for us, so that there, where sin abounded, Grace may had overabounded. The important thing is to recognize before Him one's own sin. Sin is objective, and it is towards God. They come out from it with His forgiveness. Guilt, on the other hand, is subjective: it is a sense of failure towards oneself, which leads to an expiation that never redeems. One can only come out of it with a correct sense of sin, in an experience of God as Love that forgives.
John, in accordance with his name, proclaims the Grace and Consolation of God It is a cry that rises in that place of truth of man that is the desert. It is a human cry, a voice, but not yet a word: "I am the voice of one who cries out in the desert: prepare the way of the Lord, straighten his paths". (Is 40,3). We perceive the voice before the word. John then indicates Christ, just as the Word is expressed by the voice. The voice gives a substance to the Word, the Word gives a meaning to the voice. So each of us, like the Baptist, must be a voice whose Word is Christ. The whole of human history is a voice-over and a nonsenseful shouting, which finds in Jesus, the Eternal Word of God, its own meaning and its own life. This cry also invites us to make right His paths, that is, God's paths. Man does not know this paths, loses them, and goes wrong on this paths. Filled precipices are inequalities and levelled injustices. May the abyss of injustice be filled with the mercy of man and the abyss of despair be filled with the Mercy of God. Faith, the first gift of God's Mercy, fills the ravine of distrust. Humility is the truth of man, who is earth, and in this truth the man encounters God who alone in it comes to meet him to save him. To each one who experiences the precariousness of his being a man and the sinfulness of not being a man, God's salvation is given.
Second Sunday of Advent Lectionary: 6 Reading 1 BAR 5:1-9 Jerusalem, take off your robe of mourning and misery; put on the splendor of glory from God forever: wrapped in the cloak of justice from God, bear on your head the mitre that displays the glory of the eternal name. For God will show all the earth your splendor: you will be named by God forever the peace of justice, the glory of God’s worship.
Up, Jerusalem! stand upon the heights; look to the east and see your children gathered from the east and the west at the word of the Holy One, rejoicing that they are remembered by God. Led away on foot by their enemies they left you: but God will bring them back to you borne aloft in glory as on royal thrones. For God has commanded that every lofty mountain be made low, and that the age-old depths and gorges be filled to level ground, that Israel may advance secure in the glory of God. The forests and every fragrant kind of tree have overshadowed Israel at God’s command; for God is leading Israel in joy by the light of his glory, with his mercy and justice for company.. Responsorial Psalm PS 126:1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 6. R. (3) The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy. When the LORD brought back the captives of Zion, we were like men dreaming. Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with rejoicing. R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy. Then they said among the nations, "The LORD has done great things for them." The LORD has done great things for us; we are glad indeed. R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy. Restore our fortunes, O LORD, like the torrents in the southern desert. Those who sow in tears shall reap rejoicing. R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy. Although they go forth weeping, carrying the seed to be sown, They shall come back rejoicing, carrying their sheaves. R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy. Reading 2 PHIL 1:4-6, 8-11 Brothers and sisters: I pray always with joy in my every prayer for all of you, because of your partnership for the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus. God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer: that your love may increase ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception, to discern what is of value, so that you may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God. Alleluia LK 3:4, 6 R. Alleluia, alleluia. Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths: all flesh shall see the salvation of God. R. Alleluia, alleluia. Gospel LK 3:1-6 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias was tetrarch of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the desert. John went throughout the whole region of the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah: A voice of one crying out in the desert: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths. Every valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill shall be made low. The winding roads shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”
FAUSTI - John is the prototype of the man that God has prepared to stand before His face, which is Jesus, and to open this way of access to others.
RispondiEliminaIt is the person ready to welcome the Lord Who comes.
Living synthesis of the Old Testament, in him we see the fundamental characteristic of the whole history of Israel: the expectation.
Fruit of an absolute faith in the promise, it is the indispensable condition for the accomplishment. God was so late in fulfilling His promise, because He waited to be expected by someone who should had welcomed Him.
If He is not received, even if He comes, it is as if He had not come.
Whoever waits "tends to" what do not yet ther'is.
John is all outstretched towards God's future and calls the men to break their balancing act. to turn to God.
Whoever waits "tends to" what i do not yet have there.
John is all outstretched towards God's future and calls people to break their balance to turn to it.
The Word of God is addressed to all, religious or not; every flesh is called to conversion to see salvation.
The place where the Word reaches us is the wilderness. It is the empty and uninhabitable space where man finds his own truth and God's truth.
Only its silence is earthly suitable for accepting His Word.
The desert recalls the fundamental experience of exodus, the exit from the non-identity and slavery towards freedom and the service of God.
John lives in the desert to indicate that the permanent situation of man is that of exodus. He must constantly come out of all slavery and walk towards God's promise, with no other guarantee except His faithfulness.
In the desert heaven and earth are equally empty, strained of silence. Nothing distracts.
In this nothing of what ther'is , the new and creating Word can resonate and be heard. The desert is in synthesis the life of God, the opposite of that of man who escapes from it. In fact, he prefers the tombs of Egypt, the flight from freedom.
John travels through the region of the Jordan, the threshold of the promised land. This geographical fact is also theological. It qualifies him as the last prophet before the fulfillment. He preaches a Baptism. To be baptized means to immerse oneself, to go to the bottom. To the acceptance of one's own symbolic death, expressed in immersion in water, the desire for a rebirth is added, symbolised by the emergence. John calls to a baptism of conversion. It is not simply a rite. It really implies a change of mentality and life.
This conversion is ordered to the remission of sins. Evil should not be expiated: it is forgiven by the One who loves us. God is Love, therefore gift.
Evil is conquered by forgiveness, the eminent super-giving of His Love for us, so that there, where sin abounded, Grace may had overabounded.
The important thing is to recognize before Him one's own sin.
Sin is objective, and it is towards God. They come out from it with His forgiveness.
Guilt, on the other hand, is subjective: it is a sense of failure towards oneself, which leads to an expiation that never redeems. One can only come out of it with a correct sense of sin, in an experience of God as Love that forgives.
John, in accordance with his name, proclaims the Grace and Consolation of God It is a cry that rises in that place of truth of man that is the desert. It is a human cry, a voice, but not yet a word: "I am the voice of one who cries out in the desert: prepare the way of the Lord, straighten his paths".
RispondiElimina(Is 40,3). We perceive the voice before the word. John then indicates Christ, just as the Word is expressed by the voice.
The voice gives a substance to the Word, the Word gives a meaning to the voice.
So each of us, like the Baptist, must be a voice whose Word is Christ.
The whole of human history is a voice-over and a nonsenseful shouting, which finds in Jesus, the Eternal Word of God, its own meaning and its own life.
This cry also invites us to make right His paths, that is, God's paths. Man does not know this paths, loses them, and goes wrong on this paths.
Filled precipices are inequalities and levelled injustices.
May the abyss of injustice be filled with the mercy of man and the abyss of despair be filled with the Mercy of God.
Faith, the first gift of God's Mercy, fills the ravine of distrust. Humility is the truth of man, who is earth, and in this truth the man encounters God who alone in it comes to meet him to save him.
To each one who experiences the precariousness of his being a man and the sinfulness of not being a man, God's salvation is given.
Second Sunday of Advent
RispondiEliminaLectionary: 6
Reading 1 BAR 5:1-9
Jerusalem, take off your robe of mourning and misery;
put on the splendor of glory from God forever:
wrapped in the cloak of justice from God,
bear on your head the mitre
that displays the glory of the eternal name.
For God will show all the earth your splendor:
you will be named by God forever
the peace of justice, the glory of God’s worship.
Up, Jerusalem! stand upon the heights;
look to the east and see your children
gathered from the east and the west
at the word of the Holy One,
rejoicing that they are remembered by God.
Led away on foot by their enemies they left you:
but God will bring them back to you
borne aloft in glory as on royal thrones.
For God has commanded
that every lofty mountain be made low,
and that the age-old depths and gorges
be filled to level ground,
that Israel may advance secure in the glory of God.
The forests and every fragrant kind of tree
have overshadowed Israel at God’s command;
for God is leading Israel in joy
by the light of his glory,
with his mercy and justice for company..
Responsorial Psalm PS 126:1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 6.
R. (3) The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
When the LORD brought back the captives of Zion,
we were like men dreaming.
Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
and our tongue with rejoicing.
R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
Then they said among the nations,
"The LORD has done great things for them."
The LORD has done great things for us;
we are glad indeed.
R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
Restore our fortunes, O LORD,
like the torrents in the southern desert.
Those who sow in tears
shall reap rejoicing.
R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
Although they go forth weeping,
carrying the seed to be sown,
They shall come back rejoicing,
carrying their sheaves.
R. The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy.
Reading 2 PHIL 1:4-6, 8-11
Brothers and sisters:
I pray always with joy in my every prayer for all of you,
because of your partnership for the gospel
from the first day until now.
I am confident of this,
that the one who began a good work in you
will continue to complete it
until the day of Christ Jesus.
God is my witness,
how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.
And this is my prayer:
that your love may increase ever more and more
in knowledge and every kind of perception,
to discern what is of value,
so that you may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ,
filled with the fruit of righteousness
that comes through Jesus Christ
for the glory and praise of God.
Alleluia LK 3:4, 6
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths:
all flesh shall see the salvation of God.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel LK 3:1-6
In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar,
when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea,
and Herod was tetrarch of Galilee,
and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region
of Ituraea and Trachonitis,
and Lysanias was tetrarch of Abilene,
during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas,
the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the desert.
John went throughout the whole region of the Jordan,
proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,
as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah:
A voice of one crying out in the desert:
“Prepare the way of the Lord,
make straight his paths.
Every valley shall be filled
and every mountain and hill shall be made low.
The winding roads shall be made straight,
and the rough ways made smooth,
and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”