To us too, Jesus says: “Rise, take your life as it is; take it up and go on. Do not fear; go on with your pallet — ‘But, Lord, it is not the latest model...’ — Go on, with that pallet”, which may be “ugly, perhaps, but go on! It is your life; it is your joy”.

Thus, the first question the Lord asks everyone today is: “Do you want to be healed?”. And if the answer is “Yes, Lord”, Jesus exhorts: “Rise!”. Thus, the Pontiff concluded, recalling the antiphon of the day’s Mass (“All who are thirsty, come to the waters ... though you have no money, come and drink with joy”), if “we say to the Lord: ‘Yes, I want to be healed. Yes, Lord, help me; I want to get up’, we will know what the joy of salvation is”.

[Pope Francis, at St. Martha 28 March 2017]

Victory of the Risen Lord, without hysteria

(Jn 20:24-29)

The Gospel passage has a liturgical flavour, but the question we glimpse in the watermark is crude. We too want «to see Him».

How to believe without having seen?

It is the most common question starting from the third generation of believers, who not only hadn’t known the Apostles, but many of them not even subsequent pupils.

In particular: how do we go from «seeing»… to «believing» in a defeated, even subjected to torture?

There is an authentic Church, but held together by fear (v.19).

Not only because the arrest warrant always hangs over the real witnesses.

Also out of fear of confrontation with the world, or inability to dialogue.

Thomas is not afraid to stand outside the barred doors.

He does not withdraw into himself; he does not dread the encounter, the confrontation with life that pulsates and comes.

In this sense he is «said to be the twin» [δίδυμο] of each one - and of Jesus.

Our context resembles that of the Johannine realities of Asia Minor, lost in the immensity of the Roman Empire; small churches sometimes seduced by its attractions.

Ephesus in particular had hundreds of thousands of inhabitants.  Commercial emporium, banking center and major cosmopolitan city [whose centerpiece was of course the great Temple of Artemis - wonder of the ancient world] was the fourth city of the empire.

Distractions were many.

And already from the first generations of faithful the routine began to take over: the fervor of the beginnings was dying out; participation became sporadic.

Under Domitian, believers suffered social marginalization, discrimination.

Even today, one of the decisive elements of the ability to manifest the Risen One Present remains the direct encounter with sisters and brothers, within a living fraternity.

People who welcome surprises and encourage the ability to think and debate; who are themselves and make others breathe.

Women and men who spend their material resources and wisdom, according to particular history and sensitivity.

Where each one as he is and where is - real in the round, not dissociated from himself - becomes food for others with the crumbs he has.

Here then is the «recognize»: it’s a question not of obedience to an abstract world, but of personal Likeness.

It’s a matter of attuning the “physiognomy” and our small «actions» with the Source of Love consumed to the end [our «finger» and its «Hands»;  our «hand» and his «pierced Side»].

Even with our limitation, 'by entering into the wounds'. And by attraction, Faith will spring forth spontaneously (v.28).

Thus (vv.29-31 and 21:25) Jn invites each one to write his own personal Gospel.

When our works are at least a little the same as Christ's, everyone will ‘see’ Him.

So is there any evidence that Jesus lives?

Of course. He concretely manifests Himself in an assembly of non-conformist people, who are themselves; endowed with the capacity for autonomous thinking skills.

«Twins» of Him and of Thomas.

People Free to live in the world; outside locked doors - to listening, descending, serving.

And doing it with conviction: personally, without forcing or hysteria.

We too want to «see» Him.

[St. Thomas the Apostle, July 3, 2024]

Thomas: without hysteria

(Jn 20:19-31)

The Manifestation, the Spirit, the remission

(Jn 20:19-23)

The Johannine Pentecost does not suffer any temporal delay (v.22), yet the Lucan account also emphasises the link with Easter, of which it is but a further specification.

Pentecost is not a matter of a date, but rather an event that happens without ceasing, in the assembled assembly; where a joy-filled Peace is made present, which founds the Mission.

Jesus did not assure easy life. But the "closed doors" indicate that the Risen One has not returned to his former existence: he has been introduced into the divine condition, into a total form of life.

The complete configuration of his being is not in the order of flesh and bones; it eludes our senses.

'Resurrection of the flesh' is not the same as the improvement of the previous condition. From a man [as from a seed] there has blossomed a form of life that subsists in God himself.

The disciples rejoice at seeing the wounds (v.20). The reaction is not surprising: it is the perception-vertigo of Presence, springing up and pouring out from inner senses.

The Risen One who reveals Himself is the same Jesus who delivered the gift of life, in the Spirit.

The Father's World bears his Name - that is, his whole history, all real.

The heavenly World no longer remains that of religions. It is not exclusive, nor is it fanciful or abstract; nor is it sterilised.

The Manifestation is placed on "the one of the Sabbaths" (v.19) to say that the disciples can meet and see the Risen One every time they come together on the Lord's Day.

Thanks to the Gift of the Spirit (v.22) his disciples are sent on Mission, to continue and expand the work of the Master - insisting in particular on the work of remission of sins (v.23).

At the time, there was a widespread conception that men acted badly and allowed themselves to be defiled by idols, because they were driven by an unclean instinct that began to manifest itself at an early age.

One was under the illusion that one could overcome or at least keep such an evil spirit at bay with the study of the Torah - but it was easy to see the failures: the indications of the Law, though right, did not give the strength to follow that path.

After so many failures even of kings and the entire priestly class, it was expected that God Himself would come, precisely to deliver us from impurities, through the outpouring of a good impulse.

Throughout the ancient world [also in classical culture: especially Ovid] people wondered about the meaning of this creaturely block.

Inwardly, humanity was caught and torn between intuition and desire for goodness, and inability to realise it (cf. Rom 7:15-19).

No religion or philosophy had ever guessed that it is in the discomfort and imperfection that the most precious mouldable energies, our uniqueness, and the non-conformist solution to problems lie.

Through the mouth of the Prophets, God had promised the gift of a new heart - of flesh and not of stone (Ez 36:25-27).

An outpouring of the Spirit that would renew the world, enliven the desert and make it fruitful.

On Easter Day, the prophecies were fulfilled.

The "breath" of Christ recalls the moment of Creation (Gen 2:7; cf. Ez 37:7-14).

We are at the origin of a new humanity of generating mothers and fathers - now able to bring forth only life, eliminating death from the face of the earth.

Jesus creates the new man, no longer a victim of the invincible forces that lead him to evil, despite his profound aspirations.

He transmits an enterprising, clear, alternative, self-confident energy that spontaneously drives to goodness.

Where this Spirit reaches, sin is annihilated.

It was the first experience of the Church: the unmistakable action of divine power, which became present and operative in people who were fearful and disregarded.

Throughout the book of Acts of the Apostles, the protagonist is precisely the impetuous Wind of the Spirit.

Up to this point, the concept of forgiveness of sins was missing in John. But the meaning of the expression in v.23 is not strictly sacramental.

Neutralising and defeating defaults concerns everyone who gets involved in the work of improving life in the world.

In short, we are called to create the conditions so that by tilling the soil of hearts, everyone is opened to divine action.

Conversely, the inability to do good drags on: in this way, sin is not 'remitted'.

The Shalôm received by the disciples is to be announced by them and transmitted to the world.

It is a Peace that is not the fruit of worldly, cunning compromises: the only powerful means to be used is forgiveness.

Not so much for tranquillity and 'permanence', but to introduce unknown powers, to accentuate life, to bring to the surface aspects we have not given space to; to transmit a sense of adequacy and freedom.

In each and all times, the Church is called upon to make the complete and personal Gratis of the Lord effective.As a Gift in the Spirit: without ever "holding back" (v.23) the problems, nor making them paradoxical protagonists of life [even of assembly].

Such the priestly, royal and prophetic dimension of the fraternal Community. Such is its Newness.

Victory of the Risen One, Church of free people

Without hysteria

(Jn 20:24-31)

The passage has a liturgical flavour, but the question that we discern in the watermark is stark. We too want to "see".

How can we believe without having seen?

And even how could the identification of the sufferer with the bliss experienced, and the divinity itself, go without saying?

This is the most common question from the third generation of believers, who had not only not got to know the Apostles, but many of them not even their pupils.

The evangelist assures us: compared to the first witnesses of the Resurrection, our condition is not disadvantaged at all, on the contrary: more open and less subject to conditioning or special circumstances.

We must go deeper than immediate experience.

Even the direct disciples struggled, trying to move to another vocabulary and grammar of revelation; and from 'seeing', to 'believing'.

There are unfortunately common traits, e.g. the search for Magdalene in the places of death. Or here the carefully barred doors, where one does not enter without forcing the closures - but above all significant deviations.

In particular, we reiterate the burning question. How do we go from 'seeing'... to 'believing' in a defeated, even subjected to torture?

We do not believe, just because there are truthful witnesses.

We are certain that life supersedes death, because we have 'seen' first-hand; because we have gone through a personal recognition.

For He does not make Himself a leader, but repeatedly "in the midst" (vv.19.26).

In the collection of the Manifestations of the Risen One [so-called "Book of the Resurrection"] Jn designates the conditions of Easter Faith.

He sets out the witnessing experiences of the first churches (morning and evening, and eight days later) as well as of the disciples who accept the missionary mandate.

Then as now, perceiving the realities hidden to the simple gaze, internalising the readiness to make an exodus to the peripheries, depends on the depth of the Faith.

Nor does the readiness to stake one's life on building a kingdom of upside-down values compared to common, ancient, imperial religious values.

At the time the Thomas episode is written, the dimension of the eighth day [Dies Domini] already had a prevailing configuration, compared to the Sabbath of the early, radically Judaizing Messianics.

"Shalôm" is, however, still understood in the ancient sense: it is not a wish, but the present fulfilment of the divine Promises.

Messianic "Peace" would have evoked the undoing of fears, liberation from death; reconciliation with one's life, the world, and God.

"Shalôm" - here - comes to surprise us: it comes from the gift of self carried to the end; beyond, the capacity.

Wounds are part of the character of the Risen One.

Any image that does not make explicit the signs of the excessive gratuitousness of the new kingdom inaugurated by Christ [even the gilded bronze sculpture in the Sala Nervi] is misleading.

Joy comes from the perception of the Presence 'beyond' biological life.

Our happiness is diminished and lost if we lose the Witness of life - through whom every slightest gesture or state of mind (even fear) becomes unveiling, meaning, intensity of relationship.

By going out into the world, the Sent Ones embrace the same mission as Jesus: that all may be saved.

And the gift of the working Spirit is precisely like the beginning of a new creation.

In fact, the Johannine Pentecost springs from the unprecedented and genuine perspective of salvation: loving, serene, not "whole", nor forced.

On closer inspection, according to the book of Acts, Peter's preaching provokes a ruckus of conversions. In Jn everything is conversely discreet: no roar or fire and storm; nothing appears from outside, nor does it remain external.

These are apostles empowered to open locked doors, and to arrange the conditions of gratuitousness.

This with passive rather than active virtues; e.g. 'forgiveness', where there is none. 

In this way, all gratuitousness to lift people out of any trouble, so that good triumphs over evil and life over death.

All in the concrete, therefore through a process that demands time; like walking a Way.

Intensity of a very 'different' nature, to which our contemplation alone is suitable - in comparison with the more propaganda and less collected literature of Acts 2, where the reflections of disbelief and doubt disappear.

As if the identity of the crucified Jesus and the Risen One were of no concern whatsoever!

And in the Fourth Gospel the concept of "forgiveness of sins" was missing so far.

But precisely it is necessary to pass from ocular "vision" to Faith.The new way of life of the Son is known in the life of the Church, but it is best and fully accessible only to those who, although a little inside and a little outside, do not remain closed.

Thomas is chosen by Jn as the junction point between generations of believers.

Like each of us, he is not an indifferent sceptic: he is not afraid of the world, rather he wants to verify, to scrutinise well.

In him, Jesus launches his appreciation towards future believers, who will recognise his divine status on the basis of their own experience - as profound as it is intensely lived.

There is perhaps an elite part of the authentic Church, yet held together by fear (v.19).

Not only because the warrant of arrest always hangs over the true witnesses. Also because of fear of confrontation with the world, or incapacity for dialogue.

Even today: fear of culture, science, Bible studies, emancipation, philosophical, ecumenical, interreligious confrontation; and so on.

Thomas is not afraid to stand outside barred doors.

He does not retreat and does not fear the encounter, the relationship with life that pulsates and comes.

In this sense he is 'said to be the twin' [δίδυμο] of each one - and of Jesus.

Our context resembles that of the small Johannine realities of Asia Minor, lost in the immensity of the Roman empire; sometimes seduced by its attractions.

Ephesus in particular had hundreds of thousands of inhabitants.

A commercial emporium, banking centre and major cosmopolitan city [the centrepiece of which was of course the great Temple of Artemis - wonder of the ancient world] it was the fourth city of the empire.

The distractions were many.

Already in the first generations of believers routine began to set in: the fervour of the beginnings was fading; participation became sporadic.

Under Domitian, believers also suffered marginalisation and discrimination.

Some believers were then disappointed by the closed and monologue attitude of community leaders. Others by ambiguous internal grey areas and the mixture of compromises (especially of the leaders) that discouraged the most sensitive.

Even today, one of the discriminating elements of the ability to manifest the Risen One Present remains the direct encounter with the brothers, within a living solidarity.

Coexistence not held hostage by confined circles, which only integrate members on the nomination of those already in office.

People who welcome surprises and stimulate the capacity for thought and debate.

Women and men who are themselves, and make others breathe.

Not indoctrinated and plagiarised gullible people - or spineless sophisticates.

Sisters and brothers who spend their material resources and wisdom, according to particular history and sensibilities.

Where each one as he is and where he is - real in the round, not dissociated from himself - makes himself food for others with the crumbs he has.

Here then is 'recognition': it is a question not of obedience to an abstract world, but of personal likeness.

It is a matter of attuning our physiognomy and our little 'actions' to the Source of Love consumed to the full [our 'finger' and His 'Hands'; our 'hand' and His 'pierced side'].

Even with our limitation, 'entering into the wounds'. By attraction, Faith will spring forth spontaneously (v.28).

Thus (vv.29-31 and 21,25) Jn invites each one to write his own Gospel.

When our works are at least a little the same as Christ's, everyone will 'see' him.

Is there, then, evidence that Jesus lives?

Certainly, He manifests Himself concretely in an assembly of non-conformist people; who are themselves.

Souls endowed with the capacity for autonomous thought. 'Twins' of Himself and of Thomas.

Free creatures to be in the world; outside locked doors - to listen, to descend, to serve.

And to do so with conviction: personally, without forcing or hysteria.

We, too, want to "see Him".

Proverbial scene of the doubting Thomas that occurred eight days after Easter is very well known. At first he did not believe that Jesus had appeared in his absence and said:  "Unless I see in his hands the print of the nails, and place my finger in the mark of the nails, and place my hand in his side, I will not believe" (Jn 20: 25).

Basically, from these words emerges the conviction that Jesus can now be recognized by his wounds rather than by his face. Thomas holds that the signs that confirm Jesus' identity are now above all his wounds, in which he reveals to us how much he loved us. In this the Apostle is not mistaken.

As we know, Jesus reappeared among his disciples eight days later and this time Thomas was present. Jesus summons him:  "Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side; do not be faithless, but believing" (Jn 20: 27).

Thomas reacts with the most splendid profession of faith in the whole of the New Testament:  "My Lord and my God!" (Jn 20: 28). St Augustine comments on this:  Thomas "saw and touched the man, and acknowledged the God whom he neither saw nor touched; but by the means of what he saw and touched, he now put far away from him every doubt, and believed the other" (In ev. Jo. 121, 5).

The Evangelist continues with Jesus' last words to Thomas:  "Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe" (Jn 20: 29). This sentence can also be put into the present:  "Blessed are those who do not see and yet believe".

In any case, here Jesus spells out a fundamental principle for Christians who will come after Thomas, hence, for all of us.

It is interesting to note that another Thomas, the great Medieval theologian of Aquinas, juxtaposed this formula of blessedness with the apparently opposite one recorded by Luke:  "Blessed are the eyes which see what you see!" (Lk 10: 23). However, Aquinas comments:  "Those who believe without seeing are more meritorious than those who, seeing, believe" (In Johann. XX lectio VI 2566).

In fact, the Letter to the Hebrews, recalling the whole series of the ancient biblical Patriarchs who believed in God without seeing the fulfilment of his promises, defines faith as "the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (Heb 11: 1).

The Apostle Thomas' case is important to us for at least three reasons:  first, because it comforts us in our insecurity; second, because it shows us that every doubt can lead to an outcome brighter than any uncertainty; and, lastly, because the words that Jesus addressed to him remind us of the true meaning of mature faith and encourage us to persevere, despite the difficulty, along our journey of adhesion to him.

[Pope Benedict, General Audience 27 September 2006]

The Upper Room in Jerusalem too was a kind of “school of faith” for the Apostles. However, in a sense, what happened to Thomas goes beyond what occurred near Caesarea Philippi. In the Upper Room we see a more radical dialectic of faith and unbelief, and, at the same time, an even deeper confession of the truth about Christ. It was certainly not easy to believe that the One who had been placed in the tomb three days earlier was alive again.

The divine Master had often announced that he would rise from the dead, and in many ways he had shown that he was the Lord of life. Yet the experience of his death was so overwhelming that people needed to meet him directly in order to believe in his resurrection: the Apostles in the Upper Room, the disciples on the road to Emmaus, the holy women beside the tomb. . . Thomas too needed it. But when his unbelief was directly confronted by the presence of Christ, the doubting Apostle spoke the words which express the deepest core of faith: If this is the case, if you are truly living despite having been killed, this means that you are “my Lord and my God”.

In what happened to Thomas, the “school of faith” is enriched with a new element. Divine revelation, Jesus’s question and man’s response end in the disciple’s personal encounter with the living Christ, with the Risen One. This encounter is the beginning of a new relationship between each one of us and Christ, a relationship in which each of us comes to the vital realization that Christ is Lord and God; not only the Lord and God of the world and of humanity, but the Lord and God of my own individual human life.

[Pope John Paul II, vigil at Tor Vergata, 19 August 2000]

We have to get out of ourselves and go onto the streets of mankind to discover that the wounds of Jesus are still visible today on the bodies of all those brothers and sisters who are hungry, thirsty, naked, humiliated, enslaved, in prison and in hospital. And precisely by touching these wounds, by caressing them, it is possible to 'adore the living God in our midst'.

The anniversary of the feast of St Thomas the Apostle offered Pope Francis the opportunity to return to a concept that is particularly close to his heart: putting his hands into the flesh of Jesus. The gesture of Thomas putting his finger into the wounds of the risen Jesus was in fact the central theme of the homily given during the Mass celebrated this morning, Wednesday 3 July, in the chapel of the Domus Sanctae Marthae. Concelebrating with the Pope, among others, was Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, who accompanied a group of employees of the dicastery.

After the readings (Ephesians 2:19-22; Psalm 116; John 20:24-29), the Holy Father first of all dwelt on the different attitudes taken by the disciples "when Jesus, after the resurrection, showed up": some were happy and cheerful, others doubtful.

Unbelieving was also Thomas to whom the Lord showed himself only eight days after that first apparition. "The Lord," said the Pope in explaining this delay, "knows when and why he does things. To each one he gives the time he thinks most opportune". To Thomas he gave eight days; and he wanted the wounds to still appear on his own body, even though it was "clean, beautiful, full of light", precisely because the apostle, the Pope recalled, had said that if he did not put his finger in the Lord's wounds he would not believe. "He was a stubborn man! But the Lord,' the Pontiff commented, 'wanted precisely a stubborn man to make us understand a greater thing. Thomas saw the Lord, he was invited to put his finger in the plague of nails, to put his hand in his side. But then he did not say, 'It is true, the Lord is risen'. No. He went further, he said: 'My Lord and my God'. He was the first of the disciples to make the confession of Christ's divinity after the resurrection. And he worshipped him'.

From this confession, the bishop of Rome explained, we understand what God's intention was: exploiting unbelief led Thomas not so much to affirm the resurrection of Jesus, but rather his divinity. "And Thomas," said the Pope, "worships the Son of God. But to adore, to find God, the Son of God had to put his finger in the wounds, put his hand at his side. This is the path'. There is no other.

Of course 'in the history of the Church,' the Pontiff continued in his explanation, 'there have been some mistakes on the path to God. Some have believed that the living God, the God of Christians" could be found by going "higher in meditation". But this is "dangerous; how many get lost on that path and do not arrive?" the Pope said. "They arrive, yes, perhaps, at the knowledge of God, but not of Jesus Christ, Son of God, second Person of the Trinity," he pointed out. They do not arrive at that. It is the path of the Gnostics: they are good, they work, but that is not the right path, it is very complicated" and does not lead to a good end.

Others, continued the Holy Father, "have thought that to reach God we must be good, mortified, austere and have chosen the path of penance, only penance, fasting. Even these have not arrived at the living God, at Jesus Christ the living God". These, he added, "are the Pelagians, who believe that by their own effort they can arrive. But Jesus tells us this: 'On the way we saw Thomas. But how can I find Jesus' wounds today? I cannot see them as Thomas saw them. You find the sores of Jesus by doing works of mercy, by giving to the body, the body and also the soul, but I emphasise to the body of your brother who is soiled, because he is hungry, because he is thirsty, because he is naked, because he is humiliated, because he is a slave, because he is in prison, because he is in hospital. Those are the wounds of Jesus today. And Jesus asks us to make an act of faith in him through these wounds'.

It is not enough, the Pope added, to establish "a foundation to help everyone", nor to do "many good things to help them". All this is important, but it would only be the behaviour of philanthropists. Instead, Pope Francis said, "we must touch the wounds of Jesus, we must caress the wounds of Jesus. We must tend the wounds of Jesus with tenderness. We must literally kiss the wounds of Jesus". St Francis' life, he recalled, changed when he embraced the leper because he "touched the living God and lived in adoration". "What Jesus asks us to do with our works of mercy," the Pontiff concluded, "is what Thomas had asked: to enter into the wounds.

[Pope Francis at s. Marta, in L'Osservatore Romano of 04.07.2013]

(Mt 8:23-27)

Our adventure proceeds like on a boat tossed by seisms. We go hopeful, but sometimes adversities threaten drowning us, and with us seem to drag down all life.

Using paraphrases from the book of Exodus, Mt tries to help his communities understand the Mystery of the Person of Jesus.

Not a few converted Jews considered Christ a character all in line with their mentality and tradition, in agreement with prophecies and figures of the First Testament.

Elsewhere, some pagans who had accepted the Lord advocated an understanding with the worldly mentality - a kind of agreement between Jesus and the Empire.

But Who could appease the storms?

The situation of the tiny Christian families of Galilee and Syria was still dark. Christ seemed not entirely present, and the sea rough, the wind against.

Could the Exodus be re-created?

Precisely in the condition of tossed pilgrims, in approaching his Person,  a strange and different stability was experienced: the against the current enduring.

A crossing towards freedom that came from clinging to Jesus alone, in the chaos of security. For a discordant permanence.

As the disciples caressed nationalist desires, the Master began to make it clear that He’s not the vulgarly awaited Messiah, restorer of the late empire of David or the Caesars.

The Kingdom of God is open to all humanity, which in those times of upheaval sought security, acceptance, points of reference. Everyone could find home and shelter there (Mt 13:32c; Mk 4:32b).

But the apostles and church veterans seemed averse to Christ’s proposal; they remained insensitive to an overly broad idea of fraternity - which was crowding them out.

The teaching and call imposed on the disciples is that of passing to the other shore (cf. Mk 4:35; Lk 8:22), that is, not to hold God’s treasures in favour of themselves.

The Apostles have the task of communicating the Father’s riches even to the pagans, considered impure and infamous.

Yet it were precisely the intimates of the Master who didn’t want to know about risky disproportions, which would actually the wide-meshed action of the Son of God bring out.

They were willingly calibrated to habits of common religiosity, and an (circumscribed) ideology of power.

Already in the 70s, resistance to divine proposal as well as the tearing internal debate that had ensued from it, had unleashed a great storm in the assemblies of believers.

«And behold, there came a great agitation into the sea, so that the boat was covered by the waves» (Mt 8:24).

The storm were concerning the disciples, the only dismayed; not Jesus: «but He was asleep» (v.24c) [it’s the Risen Lord].

What happened "inside" the little boat of the Church was not the simple reflection of what happened "outside"! This is the mistake to be corrected.

Emotionally relevant situations make sense, carry a meaningful appeal, introduce a different introspection, the decisive change; a new 'genesis'.

Trial in fact activates souls in the most effective way, because it disengages us from the idea of stability, and brings us into contact with dormant energies, initiating the new dialogue with events.

In Him, we are therefore imbued with a different vision of danger.

[Tuesday 13th wk. in O.T.  July 2, 2024]

(Mt 8:23-27)

Excita, Domine, potentiam tuam, et veni

"Excita, Domine, potentiam tuam, et veni" - with these and similar words the Church's liturgy repeatedly prays [...].

These invocations were probably formulated in the period of the decline of the Roman Empire. The disintegration of the supporting orders of law and of the basic moral attitudes, which gave them strength, caused the breaking of the banks that had hitherto protected peaceful coexistence between men. A world was passing away. Frequent natural cataclysms further increased this experience of insecurity. No force could be seen to halt this decline. All the more insistent was the invocation of God's own power: that He would come and protect men from all these threats.

"Excita, Domine, potentiam tuam, et veni". Today, too, we have many reasons to associate ourselves with this prayer [...] The world with all its new hopes and possibilities is, at the same time, distressed by the impression that the moral consensus is dissolving, a consensus without which legal and political structures do not function; consequently, the forces mobilised to defend these structures seem doomed to failure.

Excita - the prayer is reminiscent of the cry addressed to the Lord, who was sleeping in the disciples' storm-tossed boat that was close to sinking. When His powerful word had calmed the storm, He rebuked the disciples for their little faith (cf. Mt 8:26 and par.). He wanted to say: in yourselves faith has slept. He also wants to say the same thing to us. Even in us so often faith sleeps. Let us therefore pray to Him to awaken us from the sleep of a faith that has become weary and to restore to faith the power to move mountains - that is, to give right order to the things of the world.

[Pope Benedict, to the Roman Curia 20 December 2010].

Our life proceeds as on a small boat tossed about by earthquakes. We go hopeful, but sometimes adversity threatens to drown us, and with us it seems to drag our whole life down.

Episodes that nevertheless make us realise how much Christ's friendship is worth to us and what it conveys to us.

For we experience that only the Lord overcomes the fear of upheavals.

But he does so without rushing, and without any set patterns that would frame him forever (it would be like making him perish).

If we welcome Him in a simple and forthright manner, we realise that there is another realm, that every element is in His power.

On such a wave that has become vital, everything will serve to reactivate us - even the headwind and the pitfalls of evil.

The Invisible Friend guides and fulfils us infallibly. And he brings us to Riva. Landing that is the ultimate condition.

Dry land that the force of the waves cannot affect, even when we have the feeling of being swept away by the waves.

Using paraphrases from the book of Exodus, Mt tries to help his communities understand the Mystery of the Person of Jesus.

Not a few Jewish converts considered Christ to be a person in line with their mentality and tradition, in agreement with First Testament prophecies and figures.

Elsewhere, some pagans who had accepted the Lord advocated an understanding with the worldly mentality - a kind of agreement between Jesus and the Empire.

But who could calm the storms?

The situation of the tiny Christian families in Galilee and Syria was still dark. Christ seemed not quite present, and the sea was rough, the wind contrary.

Could the Exodus be re-created?

Faith in Him was shaken, not relaxed. The disciples did not possess the Master's same calm trust in the Father.

And yet, in the very condition of shaken pilgrims, in approaching His Person they experienced a strange and different stability: the perseverance against the tide.

A crossing towards freedom that came from clinging to Jesus alone, in the chaos of security. A discordant permanence.

Even today, it is the unaccustomed and critical path of growth that reveals Him capable of manifesting His quiet strength, restoring the disrupted elements to calm.

The direction of travel imposed by Jesus on His disciples seems to go against the grain, and brazenly breaks the rules accepted by all.

While the disciples fondle nationalist desires, the Master begins to make it clear that He is not the vulgarly expected Messiah, restorer of the defunct empire of David or the Caesars.

The Kingdom of God is open to all mankind, who in those turbulent times sought security, acceptance, points of reference. Everyone could find home and shelter there (Mt 13:32c; Mk 4:32b).

But the apostles and church veterans seemed averse to Christ's proposals; they remained insensitive to an overly broad idea of fraternity - which displaced them. This is still a live and very serious problem.

The teaching and call imposed on the disciples is to cross to the other shore (Mk 4:35; Lk 8:22), that is, not to keep to oneself.

The Apostles have the task of communicating the riches of the Father to the pagans, who are considered impure and infamous.

Yet it was precisely the Master's intimates who did not want to know about risky disproportions that would actually make the Son of God's wide-ranging action stand out.

They were willingly tarred by common religiosity, and a circumscribed ideology of power.

The resistance to the divine commission, and the resulting lacerating internal debate, had already stirred up a great storm in the assemblies of believers in the 1970s.

"And behold, there came great turmoil in the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves" (Matthew 8:24).

The storm concerned the disciples alone, the only ones who were dismayed; not Jesus: "but he was asleep" (v.24c) [this is about the Risen One].

What was happening "inside" the little boat of the Church was not a mere reflection of what was happening "outside"! This is the error to be corrected.

For us too, such identification can block and make life chronic, precisely from the handling of emotionally relevant situations - which have their own meaning.

They always carry a meaningful appeal, introduce a different eye, introspection, dialogue.

In short, from the peace of the divine condition that dominates chaos, the Lord calls attention to and rebukes the apostles, accusing them of lacking Faith.

Though devout, they lack an ounce of risk. They lack love - like a mustard seed (v.26) - to bring to humanity to renew it.

And are we believers still confused, embarrassed? Is the chaos of patterns still raging - not excluding selfishness, which inexorably peeps out?

We paradoxically go the way of the Exodus, of the experience of the first; right 'knowledge', because it is direct. The only caveat: we must not be taken in by fear.

In Him, we are imbued with a different vision of danger.

Says the Tao Tê Ching (xxii): "The saint does not see by himself, therefore he is enlightened". Even in straits.

At all times it seems that Jesus expressly wanted the dark moments of confrontation and doubt for the apostles (Mk 4:35; Lk 8:22b). First and foremost, it will be some church leaders who will be called upon to cleanse themselves of repetitive convictions. Only in this way will their proclamation not remain misplaced.

For textbook expectations (and the habit of setting up conformist harmonies) block the flowering of what we are and hope for.

Especially what is annoying or even 'against' has something decisive to tell us.

Even in the boat of the assemblies [cf. Mk 4:36] discomfort must express itself.

"And they drew near and awoke him, saying, Lord, save us, we are lost!" (v.25).

The peril is an opportunity to revive the essence of each person and of the community itself.

The trial introduces change (hidden or repressed) and activates it in the most effective way.

Novelty comes from natural contact with hidden, primordial energies.

More than opposing frictions and conflicting external events, anxiety, impression, anguish, arise from the very fear of facing the normal or decisive questions of existence.

This can happen out of distrust: feeling the danger perhaps only because we perceive ourselves to be intimately undeveloped, and incapable of other conversation; of discovering and reworking, converting, or remodelling.

The fatigue of questioning ourselves and the suffering that the adventure of Faith holds, will also fade amidst the discomfort of the rough sea - which precisely does not want us to return to 'those of before'.

It is enough to disengage from the idea of stability, even religious stability, and listen to life as it is, embracing it.

Even in its throng of bumps, bitterness, shattered hopes for harmony, sorrows - engaging with this flood of new emergencies, and encountering one's own deep nature.

The best vaccine against the anxieties of adventuring together with Christ on the changing waves of the unexpected. will be precisely not to avoid worries upstream - on the contrary, to go towards them and welcome them; to recognise them, to let them happen.

Even in times of global crisis, the apprehensions that seem to want to devastate us, come to us as preparatory energies of other joys that wish to break through. New cosmic attunements; for wonderment from within ourselves - and guidance from beyond.

Our little boat is in an inverted, inverted, unequal stability; uncertain, unseemly - yet energetic, prickly, capable of reinventing itself.

And it may even be excessive, but it is disruptive.

For a proposal of Tenderness (not corresponding) that is not a relaxation zone, because it rhymes with terrible anxiety and... still unfulfilled suburbs!

To internalise and live the message:

On what occasions have you found easy what before seemed impossible? Do you ever raise your voice to Jesus? By what Name did He reveal Himself to you? By what title would you call Him? Have you crossed waters you did not foresee in your plans and intentions? Who has calmed your storms? How do you experience harmony?Some other providence, which you ignore

"It is good not to fall, or to fall and rise again. And if you happen to fall, it is good not to despair and not to become estranged from the love the Sovereign has for man. For if he wills, he can do mercy to our weakness. Only let us not turn away from him, let us not be distressed if we are forced by the commandments, and let us not be disheartened if we come to nothing (...).

Let us neither hurry nor retreat, but always begin again (...).

Wait for him, and he will show you mercy, either by conversion or by trials, or by some other providence that you do not know."

[Peter Damascene, Second Book, Eighth Discourse, in La Filocalia, Turin 1982, I,94]

Excita, Domine, potentiam tuam, et veni. Repeatedly during the season of Advent the Church’s liturgy prays in these or similar words. They are invocations that were probably formulated as the Roman Empire was in decline. The disintegration of the key principles of law and of the fundamental moral attitudes underpinning them burst open the dams which until that time had protected peaceful coexistence among peoples. The sun was setting over an entire world. Frequent natural disasters further increased this sense of insecurity. There was no power in sight that could put a stop to this decline. All the more insistent, then, was the invocation of the power of God: the plea that he might come and protect his people from all these threats.

Excita, Domine, potentiam tuam, et veni. Today too, we have many reasons to associate ourselves with this Advent prayer of the Church. For all its new hopes and possibilities, our world is at the same time troubled by the sense that moral consensus is collapsing, consensus without which juridical and political structures cannot function. Consequently the forces mobilized for the defence of such structures seem doomed to failure.

Excita – the prayer recalls the cry addressed to the Lord who was sleeping in the disciples’ storm-tossed boat as it was close to sinking. When his powerful word had calmed the storm, he rebuked the disciples for their little faith (cf. Mt 8:26 et par.). He wanted to say: it was your faith that was sleeping. He will say the same thing to us. Our faith too is often asleep. Let us ask him, then, to wake us from the sleep of a faith grown tired, and to restore to that faith the power to move mountains – that is, to order justly the affairs of the world.

[Pope Benedict, to the Roman Curia 20 December 2010]