Real life in Jesus - condemned for living against the tide

(Jn 17:11b-19)

In Asia Minor, fraternities of the sons of God were easily targeted - harmless, yet considered a bombshell for that system.

World that did not want any alternative truth to enter its social and cultural imaginary.

Introduced in the death-resurrection of Christ, the communities of Faith were living as one big family, united in charity and mutual understanding - not according to already configured social obligations.

In the churches, the warmth of fraternal relationships could be perceived: a nucleus of alternative society to that of the empire, which on the horizon of its well-run universe excluded the access of the humble and needy.

Faith was playing on the edge.

In this context, Jesus asks the Father for an intimate custody of believers, consecrated in Him (vv.11-13.17.19)... not to remove them from tribulation, but for evangelization.

By proceeding the path of Exodus in His own intimates, and immersing Himself in the situations, his Person, Word, and affair prolonged the Gesuan act of the consecration of the world [according to Semitic categories].

Not a kind of protection of sisters and brothers, in the manner of a pagan deity, but to live the fullness of the Beatitudes.

All of this, within the framework of deep discernment, and capacity for incisive action - induced by the fraternal atmosphere and the sense of divine approval, with no more external diktats.

It was the "power" of the «Name» (vv.11-12): the reality of the new Face of the Most High, as revealed in the problematic story of the Son.

Primordial, intimate and empathic Energy, which in the same glorious and paradoxical terms invested the disciples, the called to manifest the divine condition; the becomed ones ‘as Christ’.

Even in the face of hardship, mockery and repulsion of others, in the mutual love lived in community, in the conviviality of the differences of faithful and assemblies, God's therapy and revival was manifested.

The Father revealed Himself unforeseeable love, precisely in the manifestation of this ‘Unity’.

But even Jesus' presence failed to protect Judas from self-destruction.

His case is a special result, precisely because he did not trust in love and the Word of the Life.

Victim of conditioning and calculation by false external guides.

This explains the exclusion of the «world» from Jesus' prayer (v.9).

Jesus promises a counter joy: genuine happiness, the gladness of radical 'differences'.

Not the cheerfulness guaranteed by the opulent and dispersive environment of the cosmopolitan emporium of reference in Jn: Ephesus [especially the harbour and the Artemision].

Christ did not wish to ensure the hilar frenzy of a religiosity contaminated by ambivalence and profit.

«Keeping in the Name» (v.11) should have been: having access to the Father, in the Son; precisely in the Gratis and raw experience of the carpenter's son, so harassed by the authorities.

In Him - by radiating his eccentricity, transparency, and selflessness - to build Unity.

Only in the awareness of this intimate seed pearls and concatenation could disciples devote their lives to witnessing Other beliefs - even in a climate of social intimidation.

Jesus turned his concern into prayer.

[Wednesday 7th wk. in Easter, June 4, 2025]

Real life in Jesus - the condemned for living against the tide

(Jn 17:11-19)

«Holy Father keep them in your Name which you have given me, that they may be One as we are» (Jn 17:11b).

At a time when intermediate social classes were coming to the fore, in a disenchanted environment such as capital Rome, Domitian also attributed himself divine titles in an attempt to stem the conspiracies of the envious senatorial aristocracy that had always been conservative, vain and scheming.

In the East - due to cultural issues - the deification of the emperor was taken more seriously, both by officials and the army ranks, as well as by the religious and social imagery of the crowds, who by mystery custom tended to identify power with sacred connubi.

For these reasons, fraternities of God's children were easily targeted in Asia Minor - harmless, yet considered a bombshell for that system, which did not want any alternative truth to enter its world.

Immersed in the death-resurrection of Christ, the communities of Faith lived as one big family, united in charity and mutual understanding - not according to already configured social obligations.

In the churches, the warmth of fraternal relationships was perceived: a nucleus of an alternative society to that of the empire, which on the horizon of its well-managed universe excluded the access of the humble and needy.

Faith played to the limit.

Thus Jesus asks the Father for an intimate custody of believers, consecrated in Him (vv.11-13.17.19)... not to remove them from tribulation, but for evangelisation.

Proceeding the path of exodus in his own and immersing himself in the situations, his Person, Word and affair prolonged the Jesuit act of consecrating the world according to Semitic categories.

Not a kind of protection of sisters and brothers, in the manner of a pagan deity, but to live the fullness of the Beatitudes.

All this, within the arc of profound discernment, and capacity for incisive action - induced by the fraternal climate and the sense of divine approval, with no more external diktats.

It was the 'power' of the 'Name' (vv.11-12): the reality of the new Face of the Most High, as revealed in the problematic story of the Son.

Primordial, intimate and empathic energy, which in the same terms - glorious and paradoxical - invested the disciples, those called to manifest the divine condition, becoming like Christ.

Even in the face of the hardships, mockeries and repulses of others, in the mutual love lived in community, in the conviviality of the differences of believers and churches, God's therapy and revival was manifested.

The Father was revealing unforeseeable love, precisely in the manifestation of this unity.

But even Jesus' presence failed to protect Judas from self-destruction.

His case is a special result, precisely because he did not trust in love and the Word of Life. Victim of influence and calculation of false external guides.

This explains the exclusion of the 'world' from Jesus' prayer (v.9).

In a closed environment, marked by the combination of 'power religion interest', one cannot be a humanising sign.

Without a life-wave, one cannot experience the sense of the Mystery in the vertigo of sharing, nor any teaching.

Sisters and brother friends must always have the grace to be freed from the world of conformist duties, which sometimes take over.

In this: "sanctified in truth" - for the mission rediscovers the density, internal rhythm and cascading effect of lived reciprocity.

In Jn, such a clear icon of the Lord is pressing in.

In his farewell, he does not demand that anyone kneel before him; rather, he dreams of a spirit of unity between disciples, and - indeed - churches.

It was the only attitude that could make it possible to resist the attacks, marginalisation and flattery of the Roman-Hellenistic world, in particular of Ephesus, the fourth city of the empire.

Jesus promises a counter joy: genuine happiness, of radical 'differences'.

Not the joy guaranteed by the opulent and dispersive environment (especially the port) of the cosmopolitan emporium of reference.

Christ did not wish to ensure the hilarious frenzy of a religiosity contaminated by ambivalences and turncoats.

In this regard, think of the great commerce guaranteed by the Artemision, and many other eminent, spectacular sacred sites, rooted in the urban layout and fabric of city life.

The ideal of the Risen One had to ferment in everyone's heart, even at that ambiguous and worldly point; not... escape into an unreachable tomorrow.

A bond that had its mirror in the intensity of the Father-Son relationship and in the dignity of the shaky and outcast who opened themselves to the Action of the Spirit.

As if to say: what was passed off as venerable had no human-divine foundation.The only sacred sphere had to be the Person and the respect for the profound, dissimilar Truth, proper to the intimate seed of the children; the one without any make-up.

"To 'keep in the Name' was thus to have access to the Father, in the Son. In Him - radiating his eccentricity, transparency and selflessness - build Unity.

Only in the awareness of this connection could the disciples dedicate their lives to witnessing other convictions - even in a climate of social intimidation.

Jesus turned his concern into prayer.

To internalise and live the message:

What do you think of a Jesus condemned for living against the tide? What is the soul and the foundation that you see reflected in the Son? How do you open yourself to the holiness of God? How do you launch yourself into the world? What do you pray for?

1. "For their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be consecrated in truth" (Jn 17:19).

Dear brothers and sisters, today, in the liturgy of this Sunday after the Ascension of the Lord, the Church proclaims the words of Christ's priestly prayer. In the midst of the apostles gathered in prayer in the Upper Room with Mary, the Mother of Christ, these words resound with an echo that is still relevant today. Christ pronounced these words very recently, in his farewell discourse on the evening of Holy Thursday, before entering into the passion.

He then turned to the Father, like so many other times, but in an entirely new way. He asked: "Holy Father, keep in thy name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we . . . Guard them . . . as I have kept them, as I have watched over them . . . but now I come to you . . I leave the world . . . I ask not that you take them out of the world but that you guard them from the Evil One . . Consecrate them in truth. Your word is truth . . . Those I have sent into the world, as thou hast sent into the world me. For them I consecrate myself, that they also may be consecrated in the truth" (Jn 17:11 ff.).

2. Here is the great prayer of Christ's heart. Today, it is spoken in this liturgy that we celebrate in the centre of your country, at the foot of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart. This is the language of the Redeemer's heart. Here we find expressed the most profound characteristics that marked his whole life, his whole messianic mission. Here comes the moment when this life and this mission come to their end and at the same time reach their climax.

The climax is this: "I consecrate myself". It is a mysterious, profound word, which in a certain sense is equivalent to saying: "I sanctify myself", "I give myself totally to the Father", or even "I sacrifice myself", "I offer my person, my life as a holy offering to God for mankind and, in so doing, they pass from this world to my Father". It is the supreme and definitive word, and at the same time the most elevated word in the dialogue between the figure and the Father. Through this sentence he places, in a certain sense, the messianic seal on the whole work of redemption.

At the same time, in this 'I consecrate myself' the apostles are included; the whole Church is included in it, until the end of time. And so do all of us who are gathered here in front of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart. In the words of the priestly prayer, the Church is born from the consecration of the Son to the Father, only to be born later on the cross when these words 'become incarnate', when this heart is pierced by the spear of the Roman centurion.

3. Qu'est-ce que Jésus demande pour ses Apôtres, pour l'Eglise, pour nous? Que nous soyons nous aussi consacrés dans la vérité. This Truth is the Word of the living God. Le Verbe du Père, le Fils. Et c'est aussi la parole du Père à travers le Fils. Le Verbe s'est fait chair, puis s'est exprimé, au milieu du monde. Au milieu de l'histoire de l'humanité.

Et en même temps, lui, le Christ, le Verbe incarné, "n'est pas du monde" (Cf. Io. 17, 14), La Parole qu'il a transmise du Père, la Bonne Nouvelle, l'Evangile, n'est pas du monde. Et ceux qui acceptent entièrement cette Parole peuvent facilement attirer sur eux la haine, par le fait de ne pas être du monde.

Et pourtant, seule cette Parole est Vérité. C'est la vérité ultime. C'est la plénitude de la vérité. Elle tait participer à la Vérité dont vit Dieu lui-même.

A travers l'expression pathétique de la prière sacerdotale, à travers la profonde émotion du Cœur du Christ, l'Eglise a conscience, une fois pour toutes, que seule cette Vérité est salvatrice, qu'il ne lui est permis, à aucune condition, de changer cette Vérité pour quelque autre que ce soit, de la confondre avec quelque autre, même si, humainement, elle semblait plus "vraisemblable", plus suggestive, plus adaptée à la mentalité du jour.

Par le cri du Cœur de Jésus au Cénacle et par la Croix qui l'a confirmé, l'Eglise se sent affirmie dans cette Vérité: consacrée dans la Vérité.

La prière sacerdotale est en même temps une grande "supplication" de l'Eglise. L'Apôtre Paul la reprendra en écrivant à Timothée: "Garde le dépôt" (depositum custodi) (1 Tim. 6, 20), ou encore: "Nevous modelez pas sur le monde présent" (nolite conformari huic saeculo) (Rom. 12, 2), autrement dit, ne devenez pas semblables à ce qui est transitoire, à ce que le monde proclame.

3. What does Jesus ask for his apostles, for the Church, for us? May we also be consecrated in the truth. This truth is the Word of the living God. The Word of the Father, the Son. And it is also the word of the Father through the Son: the Word became flesh, then was expressed, in the bosom of the world. In terms of the history of humanity.

At the same time he, Christ, the Word incarnate, "is not of the world" (cf. John 17: 14). The word that he transmitted from the Father, the good news, the gospel, is not of the world. And those who accept this word entirely can easily draw hatred upon themselves, for they are not of the world. And yet, this word alone is truth. He is the supreme truth. He is the fullness of truth. It partakes of that truth of which God himself lives.

Through the passionate expression of the priestly prayer, through the profound emotion of the heart of Christ, the Church is aware, once and for all, that only this truth is salvific, that she is not allowed, under any conditions, to change this truth in favour of any other, to confuse it with any other, even if, humanly speaking, it should seem more plausible, more suggestive, more suited to today's mentality. Through the cry of Jesus' heart in the Upper Room and through the cross that confirmed it, the Church feels consolidated in this truth: consecrated in truth.

The priestly prayer is at the same time a great "supplication" of the Church. The Apostle Paul took it up again when he wrote to Timothy: "Guard the deposit . . ." (1 Tim 6:20), or again: "Do not be conformed to the mentality of this age" (Rom 12:2), in other words, do not become similar to what is transitory, to what the world proclaims.

4. Telle est la grande prière du Cœur du Rédempteur. Elle explique tout le dessein de la Rédemption et la Rédemption trouve en elle son explication.

What does the Son ask of the Father? "Keep my disciples faithful to your name, which you have shared with me, that they may be one, as we are one" (Io. 17, 11).

L'Eglise naît de cette prière du Cœur de Jésus avec la marque de l'Unité divine. Pas seulement de l'unité humaine, sociologique, mais de l'Unité divine "pour qui'ls soient un comme nous" (Ibid. 17, 22), "Comme toi, Père, tu es en moi et moi en toi" (Ibid. 17, 21). This unity is the fruit of love.

"Si nous nous aimons les uns les autres, Dieu demeure en nous . . .". Nous reconnaissons que nous demeurons en lui et lui en nous, à ce qu'il nous donne part à son Esprit . . . Dieu est amour: "Celui qui demeure dans l'amour demeure en Dieu, et Dieu en lui" (1 Io. 4, 12-13. 16).

Il s'agit donc de l'unité qui a son origine en Dieu. L'Unité qui est en Dieu est la vie du Père dans le Fils et la vie du Fils dans le Père, dans l'unité de l'Esprit Saint. L'unité en laquelle Dieu un et trine se communique dans l'Esprit Saint aux cœurs humains, aux consciences humaines, aux communautés humaines.

Cette unité doit être vécue, concrètement, au niveau de chaque famille chrétienne, de chaque communauté ecclésiale, de chaque Eglise locale, de l'Eglise universelle, comme un reflet du mystère de l'unité en Dieu.

Cette unité stimule aussi l'esprit communautaire dans la communauté mondiale.

4. Such is the great prayer of the Redeemer's heart. It explains the whole design of redemption and redemption finds its own explanation in it. What does the Son ask of the Father? "Keep in thy name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are one" (Jn 17:11). From this prayer of the heart of Jesus the Church is born with the sign of divine unity. Not only of human, sociological unity, but of divine unity "that they may be as we are one" (Jn 17:22). "As you, Father, are in me and I in you" (Jn 17:21). This unity is the fruit of love. "If we love one another, God abides in that we abide in him and he in us: he has given us the gift of his Spirit . . . God is love; he who abides in love abides in God and God abides in him" (1 Jn 4:12-13. 16).

It is therefore the unity that has its origin in God. The unity that is in God is the life of the Father in the Son and the life of the Son in the Father, in the unity of the Holy Spirit. The unity in which the triune God communicates himself in the Holy Spirit to human hearts, human consciences, human communities. This unity must be lived out concretely, at the level of every Christian family, every ecclesial community, every local Church, the universal Church, as a reflection of the mystery of God's unity. This unity also stimulates the community spirit in society, in the nation, in the world community.

5. "Let them be one, as we are"! The unity inherited from Christ finds its first realisation in marriage and in the family, in that Church which is the home.

Such is the Creator's design from the beginning: 'Man shall cleave to his wife, and the two shall be one flesh' (Gen 2:24). Such is likewise the destiny of men and women redeemed by Jesus Christ: the sacramental union of spouses becomes the sign of Christ's total love for his Church, of his indissoluble union with it. "This mystery is great" (cf. Eph 5:32). This mutual gift of spouses for life will be inspired by a human love that is total, faithful, exclusive and open to new life (cf. Humanae vitae, 9). Christian spouses will always take it to heart to meditate on God's plan for marriage and the family and to correspond to what God expects of them in their interpersonal relationships, in the transmission of life, in conjugal chastity, in the education of their children, and in their participation in the development of society according to the doctrine of the Church, which I reminded them of in the apostolic exhortation Familiaris consortio, echoing what the bishops of the whole world had expressed in the 1980 Synod.

I am therefore happy to address myself especially to you, dear spouses and parents who have come to this Eucharist as a family. You know, both through the teaching of the Church and from your own experience, all that is required by the daily renewal of your conjugal and parental love. It acquires, in feelings and actions, a concrete face every day, in which the flesh is the support and expression of unity in the spirit; it presupposes in particular a sensitive attention to the other, an attitude of gratitude for what he is and what he brings to you, a willingness to let what is best in you blossom in him, sharing joys and trials by ceaselessly banishing selfishness and pride, taking time for a sincere dialogue on all that is dear to you, sharing the daily "bread", and, if necessary, forgiveness, as we ask in the "Our Father". In these conditions, your love fills you with joy and shines in your home and beyond.

Above all, never forget that your unity, your fidelity, the splendour of your love are graces that come from God, from the bosom of the Trinity. The sacrament of marriage enables you to draw on it constantly. But it is necessary that you often ask God, who is love, to help you dwell in love (cf. 1 John 4:16). What strength, what testimony, when you have the simplicity to pray as a family, parents and children! Together, before the Father, before the Saviour, your whole life can regain brightness and joy. Then, truly, the family deserves its name of domestic Church.

6. "Father, keep them in your name"! This prayer of Jesus for the disciples, is it not that of parents for their children?

Your deep love between spouses, "in truth", and your common love for your children constitute for them the first book in which they read the love of God.

This reading remains forever inscribed in the memory of their hearts and disposes them to accept, freely, the revelation of God's tenderness. Of course, in our day, family solidarity is not always an easy task. The children whom you have called to life and to whom you have given the best of yourselves, influenced by a society that has its values and its dis-values, sometimes choose other paths, hopefully for a short time. They are, for you, moments of suffering but also of deep devotion. With you, I pray as Jesus did: "I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one" (Jn 17:15).

Christian families remain a privileged space for the transmission of the Gospel, not only to their children, but to their neighbours, to the whole Church community. They can offer a hospitable home to those with worries, to children who do not receive enough love at home, to young people who wish to deepen their faith in preparation for confirmation or marriage. In Christian families, young people also learn through the example of their parents to be committed to others, both in the parish and in other places.

Dear parents, the way in which Peter proposes, in the first reading of this service, to choose a new "witness to the resurrection of Jesus", a new apostle (Acts 1:22) has perhaps struck you. This choice was prepared by prayer: "You, Lord, who know the hearts of all, show us which of these two you have appointed" (Acts 1:24).

The Lord knows the hearts of the young people of this time. He also knows their generosity, sometimes held back by adults. You also know the hearts of your children. Pray that they may discover their vocation and be thankful if they choose the way of the Gospel!

And you, dear children, the most beautiful thing you can ask of your parents is what the apostles asked of Jesus: "Teach us to pray". On the other hand, be happy if your parents do much for others, even if their commitment deprives you, some evenings, of their presence at home. You yourselves always try to be more fraternal among yourselves, in the family. And try to already make your life a service for others. This word of Jesus is also for you: "As the Father sent me into the world, I also sent you into the world".

7. "Quils soient un comme nous sommes un" (Io. 17, 11).Au-delà de la famille, cette prière de Jésus vaut pour toutes les communautés de ses disciples, partout où elles se réalisent, pour vos communautés paroissiales, pour vos mouvements chrétiens largement représentés ici. Puisse-t-on y trouver toujours l'unité héritée du Christ! La fidélité à sa Vérité! L'accueil fraternel et le soutien effectif des membres qui sont dans le besoin, étrangers ou malades.

Je salue ici avec une particulière affection les malades et les handicapés, spécialement ceux qui participaient hier aux "Spartakiades".

Chers Frères et Sœurs,

pour vous - comme pour vos familles et pour tous ceux qui n'ont pas pu être présents ici à cause de l'âge ou de la maladie -, je demande à Dieu, non seulement de vous garder en son Nom, mais de faire de vous, en ce monde, partout où vous conduisent vos relations et votre travail professionnel, les témoins de sa Vérité, de son amour. Pour donner un témoignage direct sur le Christ Sauveur, sur sa Bonne Nouvelle, de façon à faciliter à vos contemporains l'accès à la foi. Et pour contribuer, avec eux, à mettre votre société sur les chemins de la paix, de la justice, de la fidélité, de la fraternité, qui correspondent au Règne de Dieu.

7. "That they may be one, as we are one" (Jn 17:11). Beyond the family, this prayer of Jesus applies to all the communities of his disciples, wherever they are made, to your parish communities, to your Christian movements widely represented here. Vi si possa sempre trovare l'unità ereditata da Cristo! Fidelity to his truth! The fraternal welcome and effective support of people who are in need, foreigners or sick. I greet here with particular affection the sick and handicapped, especially those who participated yesterday in the "Spartakiadi".

Dear brothers and sisters, for you - as for your families and for all those who have been unable to be here because of age or illness - I ask God, not only to keep you in his name, but also to make you, in this world, wherever your social relationships and your professional work take you, Witnesses of his truth, of his love, to bear direct witness to Christ the Saviour, to his good news, so as to facilitate your contemporaries' access to the faith and to help, with them, to set your society on the paths of peace, justice, piety, fraternity, which correspond to the kingdom of God.

8. L'unité héritée des Apôtres, c'est celle de l'Eglise universelle, confiée aux évêques en communion étroite avec le successeur de Pierre. Elle est présente en chacune des Eglises locales, à commencer par la vénérable Eglise qui est à Malines-Bruxelles, Mechelen-Brussel, celle qui est à Antwerpen, à Brugge, à Gent, à Liège, à Namur, que je suis heureux de visiter aussi.

I would particularly like to greet the faithful who have come from the dioceses of Tournai and Hasselt. Le temps nécessairement limité de mon séjour dans votre pays ne me permet pas de vous rencontrer dans vos diocèses mêmes. Mais je vous remercie d'être venus ici en grand nombre pour me rencontrer.

Chers chrétiens du diocèse de Tournai, vous appartenez à un diocèse d'une tradition très riche. Aujourd'hui, vous essayez d'être des témoins fidèles de l'Evangile dans une période difficile. Vous vivez dans une des provinces belges les plus touchées par la crise économique. Comme chrétiens pratiquants, vous êtes souvent une minorité au milieu de beaucoup d'autres personnes que vous aimez et que vous voulez servir. Dans cette situation, je vous encourage à garder la paix et la joie. Car, comme le dit la devise de votre évêque, "la joie du Seigneur, c'est notre force".

8. The unity inherited from the apostles is that of the universal Church, entrusted to the bishops in close communion with the successor of Peter. It is present in Bruges, in Ghent, in Liège, in Namur, which I am happy to visit.

I greet in a special way the faithful who have come from the dioceses of Tournai and Hasselt. The necessarily limited time of my stay in your country does not allow me to meet with you in your dioceses. I thank you, however, for coming here in great numbers to meet with me.

Dear Christians of the Diocese of Tournai, you belong to a diocese with a very rich tradition. Today you are trying to be faithful witnesses of the Gospel in a difficult time. You live in one of the provinces of Belgium most affected by the economic crisis. As practising Christians, you are often a minority among many others whom you love and wish to serve. In this situation, I encourage you to preserve peace and joy, for, as your bishop's motto says, 'the joy of the Lord is our strength'.

Dear Christians of the Diocese of Hasselt, you seek to deepen the faith in your community by means of many pastoral initiatives. There are many young people in your diocese. Thanks to the training received in their movements and spirituality groups, they try to be witnesses of the Gospel wherever they live. Show solidarity in the economic crisis that is hitting you so hard. Continue to develop dialogue between the cultures of natives and immigrants in your diocese. And may the Blessed Virgin, "the reason for our joy", venerated at Tongres, the oldest place of Marian veneration in northern Europe, be for each of you a source of continuous joy!

Yes, in the name of Jesus, I repeat his priestly prayer for each of your Churches, for its bishop, the pastor whose task it is to gather it together in unity, to watch over it as Jesus did over his disciples, to preserve it in fidelity to the name of the Lord, in fidelity to the apostolic tradition, in union with the Apostolic See of Rome, to make it move forward in the love that comes from God.

9. In this place, which is the capital of the country, how can we not think of the Belgian nation as a whole? This land in which you live has had a turbulent history; it has had to struggle to preserve its cultural, economic, administrative, political and even religious personality. The rich personality of this nation and its availability have often been a source of cultural, artistic and economic exchanges with all the countries around it. Do not lose your rich personality, your communion in peace, mutual esteem and dialogue between the different Belgian and foreign communities. Be aware: the things that unite you are more than those that divide you. Cultivate this model of coexistence that can be an example to the world. Found it on love, on respect for the institutions of the nation, its governments and king, in fidelity to the Christian civilisation that has marked you so much.

10. Zusammen mit dem Nachfolger des heiligen Petrus betet die Kirche dieses Landes heute mit den Worten des Psalms:

"Lobe den Herrn meine Seele und alles in mir seinen heiligen Namen!" (Ps. 103:1).

Der Name Gottes ist uns in seiner Fülle durch Jesus Christus offenbart worden. Er ist "unser Vater": Gott, der die Liebe ist, der uns zuerst geliebt hat, der am Anfang wie am Ziel unseres Lebens steht, der uns auf dem Weg ständig begleitet, auch dort, wo das Leben hart mit uns umgeht, auch dann, wenn wir nicht nach dem Maß seiner Liebe gelebt haben; Gott, der uns an seinem göttlichen Leben teilhaben läßt, der uns mit der Freude Christi erfüllt, seines vielgeliebten Sohnes (Cf. I. 17, 13).

Ja, "Vater unser im Himmel, geheiligt werde dein Name, dein Reich komme, dein Wille geschehe . . .!".

Das Gebet, das uns Jesus Christus selbst gelehrt hat, ist tief im Hohenpriesterlichen Gebet des Abendmahlssaales verwurzelt.

"Lobe den Herrn meine Seele, und vergiß nicht, was er dir Guten getan hat" (Ps. 103, 27).

Vergiß es nicht!

Liebe Mitchristen deutscher Sprache, vergeßt nicht das Erbe so vieler Generationen des Bundes mit Gott in der Kirche Christi, vergeßt es nicht!

Chers chrétiens d'expression française, n'oubliez pas l'héritage de tant de générations de l'Alliance avec Dieu dans l'Eglise du Christ, n'oubliez pas!

10. Today, the Church in this country prays together with the successor of Peter in the words of the psalm: "Bless the Lord, my soul, what is in me bless his holy name" (Ps 103:1). The name of God has been revealed to us in the fullness of Jesus Christ: it is "Our Father": God who is love, who was the first to love us, who is at the origin of our life, at its horizon, is continually on the way with us, even if life hurts us, even if we have not lived up to his love; God who makes us share in his divine life, who makes us have the fullness of the joy of Christ, his beloved Son (cf. Jn 17:13).

Yes, our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done . . .! The prayer that Jesus Christ taught us is deeply rooted in the priestly prayer of the Upper Room. "Bless the Lord, my soul, do not forget so many of his benefits" (Ps 103:2). Do not forget!

Dear German-speaking Christians, do not forget the heritage of so many generations of God's covenant with the Church of Christ!

Dear Flemish-speaking Christians, do not forget the heritage of so many generations of the covenant with God in the Church of Christ!

Dear French-speaking Christians, do not forget the heritage of so many generations of the covenant with God in the Church of Christ, do not forget!

[Pope John Paul II, homily in Brussels 19 May 1985]

In recent catecheses, we have tried to highlight the nature and the beauty of the Church and we have asked ourselves what it means for each of us to belong to this people, the People of God, which is the Church. We must not forget, however, that there are so many brothers and sisters who share with us the faith in Christ, but who belong to other confessions or to traditions different from ours. Many have resigned themselves to this division — even within our Catholic Church many are resigned — which, in the course of history, has often been the cause of conflict and of suffering, also of war and this is a disgrace! Today too, relations are not always characterized by respect and courtesy.... But, I wonder: we, how do we feel about all this? Are we too, resigned, if not actually indifferent, to this division? Or do we firmly believe that one can and must walk in the direction of reconciliation and of full communion? Full communion, that is, for everyone to be able to partake together in the Body and Blood of Christ.

Divisions among Christians, while they wound the Church, wound Christ; and divided, we cause a wound to Christ: the Church is indeed the body of which Christ is the Head. We know well how much Jesus had at heart that his disciples should remain united in his love. It suffices to consider his words, written in the 17th Chapter of the Gospel according to John, in Jesus’ prayer to the Father when his passion was imminent: “Holy Father, keep them in thy name, which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are one” (Jn 17:11). This unity was already threatened while Jesus was still among them: in the Gospel, in fact, it is recorded that the Apostles argued among themselves about who was the greatest, the most important (cf. Lk 9:46). The Lord, however, emphatically insisted on unity in the name of the Father, allowing us to understand how much more credible our proclamation and our witness will be if we are first able to live in communion and to love each other. That is what his Apostles, with the grace of the Holy Spirit, would then deeply understand and take to heart, so much so that St Paul would reach the point of imploring the community of Corinth with these words: “I appeal to you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that there be no dissensions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment” (1 Cor 1:10).

During her journey in history, the Church has been tempted by the Evil One, who seeks to divide her, and unfortunately it has been marked by deep and painful schisms. They are divisions that at times, have been long and drawn out in time, up until today, which is why it is now difficult to reconstruct all the motivations and especially to find possible solutions. The reasons which have led to the fractures and schisms may be the most diverse: from disagreement on dogmatic and moral principles and on theological concepts and pastoral differences, to political motives and convenience, to disputes caused by dislikes and personal ambition.... What is certain is that, in one way or another, arrogance and selfishness have always been behind these lacerations, rendering us intolerant, incapable of listening and accepting one with a vision or a position different from ours.

Now, faced by all of this, is there something that every one of us, as members of the Holy Mother Church, can and must do? Certainly, there must never be a shortage of prayer, in continuity and in communion with that of Jesus, prayer for the unity of Christians. And together with prayer, the Lord asks us for renewed openness: He asks us not to be closed to dialogue and to encounter, but to welcome all that is valid and positive which is offered even by someone who thinks differently from us or who takes a different stand. He asks us not to fix our gaze on what divides us, but rather on what unites us, seeking to know and love Jesus better and to share the richness of his love. And this means a concrete adherence to the Truth, together with the capacity for reciprocal forgiveness, to feel a part of the same Christian family, to consider oneself a gift for the other and together to do many good things and works of charity.

It is grievous but there are divisions, there are many divided Christians, we have split amongst ourselves. But we all have something in common: we all believe in Jesus Christ, the Lord. We all believe in the Father, in the Son, and in the Holy Spirit, and we all walk together, we are on the journey. Let us help one another! You think this way, you think that way.... In all communities there are good theologians: let them debate, let them seek theological truth because it is a duty, but let us walk together, praying for one another and doing works of charity. And like this, we are in communion on the journey. This is called spiritual ecumenism: to journey on the path of life, everyone together in our faith, in Jesus Christ the Lord. They say that one should not talk about personal things, but I cannot resist the temptation. We are speaking about communion... communion among us. And today, I am so thankful to the Lord because 70 years ago today, I made my First Communion. To make our First Communion we must know what it means to enter into communion with others, in communion with the brothers and sisters of our Church, but also in communion with those who belong to different communities but who believe in Jesus. Let us thank the Lord for our Baptism, let us thank the Lord for our communion, in order that this communion become joint communion with everyone, together.

Dear friends, let us therefore proceed toward full unity! History has separated us, but we are on the path toward reconciliation and communion! And this is true! And we must defend it! We are all on the path toward communion. And when the goal seems too distant, almost unreachable, and we feel gripped by despair, let us be comforted by the idea that God cannot close his ears to the voice of his Son Jesus or fail to grant his and our prayer: that all Christians may truly be one.

[Pope Francis, General Audience 8 October 2014]

(Jn 17:1-11a)

Even in the fourth Gospel the Last Supper is followed by Jesus’ prayer, but unlike the Synoptics, Jn places it in the same Upper Room.

In the narrative of the first three Gospels, several notes tell of the Lord's intimate repugnance to the Cross - from which, however, He does not shy away, from which He does not allow himself to be overcome.

Here He only asks the Father for the indestructible quality of the Life of the Eternal in favour of his own, who have already come to know the intimacy of God: it opens up every reverberation.

To acknowledge the Son of Man as Lord is to accept a new form of existence in the Spirit.

Like a Wind that [regenerating us from within] makes itself the medium and continuer of the work of creation.

We are witnesses to a founding, glorious Relationship, that is of such value that it reactivates all destiny - beyond concatenations.

Such a platform overcomes the sense of unworthiness.

On it, here we are enabled to become passionate ‘inventors of roads’ everywhere.

Introduced into a Communion which is already here and now «Life of the Eternal» (vv.2-3). It comes from the ‘knowing’ the Father and the Son.

And it is concentrated in an Hour (v.1): an allusion that had run through the entire fourth Gospel.

Jesus' existence converges in the fruitful rawness of that point, which gives depth to everything.

The text differs from previous catecheses in that it is more amicable than teaching.

The Master retraces his story as a commitment to manifest the Father, to make us become signs of his Face.

Christ understands that the children are subject to seductions, and they risk losing the meaning of the believing in Him. Indeed, they still find it difficult to understand that Glory is not the fruit of worldly victory.

«Glory» in Jn stands for the manifestation of the Face of Eternal Love in the raising of the Cross.

Presence of the God-With - unveiling of His confidence, understanding, tenderness, recovery of opposing sides.

In this way, Glory of the Risen One is not a Relationship that remains closed in Heaven, between Father and Son.

The latter has given his intimates the «Name» (vv.6.11) i.e. revealed the Father and given access to his real Person - including the struggles undertaken.

Person who feeds us with the Word, and the sense of His events.

Such an unmistakable Voice reminds that every travail can lead us deeper with Jesus into the Glory and eternity of the Father.

God's intimate life is intensity of understanding; reciprocity that flows into expanded, open, fervent union, tending to transmute every tribulation into an appeal to new kabôd-glory.

It is about the specific [qualitative] weight that the believer assumes in a Heaven also perceivable by the senses.

Any difficulty, anguish, insecurity, now even becomes a point to converge on.

Like the Lord, the disciples do not go to death, but to the Way of complete Life that annihilates distance.

All this through a unity that deflects habits and puts one in touch with the energies of the intimate primordial bond, source-and-culmination, Father-Son.

[Tuesday 7th wk. in Easter, June 3, 2025]

(Jn 17:1-11a)

In the Fourth Gospel, too, the Last Supper is followed by Jesus' prayer, but unlike the Synoptics, Jn places it in the same place as the Last Supper.

In the narrative of the first three Gospels, several notes tell of the Lord's intimate repugnance to the Cross - from which, however, he does not shy away, from which he does not allow himself to be overcome.

Here he only asks the Father for the indestructible quality of the Life of the Eternal in favour of his own, who have already come to know the intimacy of God: it opens up every reverberation.

To acknowledge the Son of Man as Lord is to accept a new form of existence in the Spirit.

Like a Wind that [regenerating from within] makes itself the medium and continuer of the work of creation.

The nature, character and purpose of the Salvation Mission could not be undermined by normal adherence to the precepts and pious devotions of the 'world' (vv.9.11). Configurations always careful to warn us of what might happen if...

The Father-Son relationship directs the disciples, but the Spirit who gives impetus does not warn them about the destiny that awaits them. Why?

We do not go lightly towards labours, tears, humiliations - but in reality [through death] we are going like Christ, to the Father.

We are reaching out for the transmutation of state that in human history brings redemption, flashing in the very signs of the Son, united with God's excellent design.

We are witnesses of a founding, glorious Relation, that is, of such value as to enable us to rework cultures flattened on the chronological dimension of cause-effect concatenations. All this, to reactivate all destiny.

Such a platform glosses over the sense of unworthiness.

On it, here we are enabled to become passionate 'inventors of roads' everywhere.

Here we are, no longer a mass destined to mull over imperfections - or deviations from the standard, obsessively detected by official religious law, as well as fashions.

Introduced into a Communion that is already here and now Life of the Eternal. Not contraband, not fashionable.

The "Life of the Eternal" (vv.2-3) springs from 'knowing' the Father and the Son. It is concentrated in an Hour (v.1): an allusion that had run through the entire fourth Gospel.

The existence of Jesus converges in the fruitful rawness of that point, which gives depth to everything: because in the Son and the sons a twofold 'glorification' is manifested.

On the one hand, the unusual aspect of a God who does not intend to be obeyed and revered at all: from the step foreign to the normal devotion that enclosed everyone in the enclosure of prescriptions and standardised thinking.

On the other hand, in ourselves who participate in this downward push, which elevates us - what remains of Christ's world - different logical presences and a different life principle arise.

Alterities, even dreams of escape, which precisely reveal Him and give Him glory.

All of this thanks to a unity that deflects habits and brings us into contact with the great intimate and creaturely energies, made to reflect a different nature of relatedness: of the primordial bond, source-and-culmination, Father-Son.

Chapter 17 concludes the vast reflection of the previous passages with a heartfelt and concerned prayer of the Lord for his churches, subjected to distractions, doubts, and labours.

The Priestly Prayer was intended to make believers internalise the sense of the painful time that the Johannine communities were going through.

The text differs from previous catecheses in that it is more amicable than teaching.

The Master traces his story as a commitment to manifest the Father, to make us become signs of his Face.

Christ understands that the children are subject to seductions, and risk losing the meaning of believing in Him.

Indeed, they still find it difficult to understand that Glory is not the fruit of worldly victory.

"Glory" in Jn is synonymous with the manifestation of the Face of Eternal Love in the rising of the Cross.

Presence of the God-With - unveiling of his confidence, understanding, tenderness, recovery of opposing sides.

In this way, the Glory of the Risen One is not a Relationship that remains closed in Heaven, between Father and Son.

The latter has given his intimates the "Name" (vv.6.11) i.e. revealed the Father and given access to his real Person - including the struggles undertaken.

Person who feeds us with the Word, and the meaning of its events.

Such an unmistakable Voice reminds us that every travail can bring us deeper with Jesus into the Glory and eternity of the Father.

The intimate life of God is intensity of understanding; reciprocity that flows into dilated, open, fervent union, tending to transmute every tribulation into an appeal to new kabôd-glory.

This is the specific [qualitative] weight that the believer assumes in a heaven also perceptible to the senses.

"We can compare the union between Christ and us to the union between two wax candles, joined together so closely that they emit one light" (s. Teresa of Avila, Mansions, VII).

Any difficulty, anguish, insecurity, now even becomes a point to converge.

Like the Lord, the disciples do not go to death, but to the Way of complete Life that annihilates distance.

To internalise and live the message:

What do you consider "glorious"?

How do you penetrate the intimacy of the Son with the Father?

To love is to create: Glory

Commandment Liberation. Source Cause

(Jn 13:31-35)

Judas is among the guests, but he does not assimilate the Bread. He takes it, yes. But he does not take it at all.

He takes it and leaves, to run after his illusions of having and power. To pursue the occult pact, with the old spiritual guides.

Thus he 'sinks into the night'. Reminder for each of us.

Despite this, divine Glory manifests itself - even in the limit. It is Love without preconditions. Difference between relationship of Faith and code of devotions.

Paradoxical realisation. Source and Summit of the Core of Being. Unveiling and Manifestation of what God Himself is.

We are in the "Hour": announced by the whole unfolding of the Fourth Gospel. Love that does not depend.

Invincible Love, which does not fail even as a result of our uncertainties and inflections, or our denials.

We who are supposed to be His Intimates. Friends and Brothers of the "Son of Man".

"Son of Man" already designates from the First Testament the character of a holiness that surpasses the ancient fiction of the rulers, who piled on top of each other reciting the same script.

The masses remained dry-mouthed: whichever ruler seized power, the petty crowd remained subdued and suffocated.

The same rule was in force in religions, whose leaders lavished the people with a strong horde impulse and the contentment of the gregarious.

In contrast, in the Kingdom of Jesus there must be a lack of ranks - which is why his proposal does not fit in with the ambitions of the authorities, and with the Apostles' own expectations.

They too wanted to 'count'. 

But precisely 'Son of Man' is the person according to a criterion of humanisation, not a beast that prevails because it is stronger than the others [cf. Dan 7].

Every man with a heart of flesh - not of beast, nor of stone - is an understanding person, capable of listening, always attentive to the needs of the other, who makes himself available.

All this alludes to the broad dimension of holiness; transmissible to anyone, and as creative as love, therefore all to be discovered! 

In the Gospels, the "Son of Man" is the true and full development of the divine plan on humanity.

Such a plan is not hindered by the frequenters of bad places.

It is not a proposal compromised with doctrine-and-discipline religion, which drives back eccentricities.

That of the 'Son of Man' is the kind of holiness that makes us unique, not one that always abhors or exorcises the danger of the unusual.

In short, Jesus entrusts his Testament to the disciples. Mutual union is the Lord's Last Will. With a radical novelty.

Love for one's neighbour was already among the ancient prescriptions, and Christ seems to trace its very formulation (Leviticus 19:18).

Yet the Son does not only allude to compatriots and proselytes of his own religion.

He breaks down barriers hitherto considered obvious.

In fact, mutual love is on the same line as the encounter with oneself - where by grace and vocation lurks a possession of riches, of growing perfections, that want to surface.

From such a treasure chest-knowledge, a solid platform, arises the afflatus of being able to give life: but to increase it, make it full and cheer it up.

Starting not from external conditioning.

In fact, the commandment is 'new' not only because it is edifying and stimulating; even unsurpassable, and capable of supplanting all norms.

Above all, because it reveals one's own Vocation.

It expresses a manifestative bond, which becomes foundation, growing motive and driving force; lucid energy, which gives us the ability to shift our gaze and turn the page.

It introduces a new age, a new realm. Not one-sided.

It is the figure of the victory of Easter, theophany and testimony of its authentic People: "not with measure" (John 3:31-36: 34).

The "without measure" is that of the mystical wedding between the two "natures", of the intimate friendship that penetrates the life of the Father.

"Glory" [irreducible] with special characteristics.

Now the morality of ancient philosophies no longer applies: ours is a vocational and paschal ethic, in the Spirit who renews the face of the earth.

Every purpose is illuminated by the victory of life over death. In this way, behaviour is configured to the Mystery.

We live in Christ, the new man: we are no longer under 'proper' duties and prescriptions.

The baptismal attitude cannot be 'measured'.

The anointing and the call received respond to the intimate passion, the sense of reciprocity and personal fullness.In this way they move eminent goals: in participation in the fullness of life, excess that cannot be assimilated to conformism and average horizons.

For a pious Israelite to have 'glory' is to give specific 'weight' to one's existence, and to reveal its full value - but sometimes in an elective sense.

Blossoming is our complete 'pondus' and character and worth, which, however, germinate from the whole universe within, and from the different faces that belong to us; even from the 'shadow sides'.

Here is the blossoming of Messianic Peace-Presence; a sense of Friendship with the whole being and roots, with history and the sign of the times.

For the more human we are without duplicity, and the more capable we are of reading events, and the more sensitive we are in grasping the variegated powers - that Someone within something... the more the Heaven within us manifests itself.

This is the emblem of the New Commandment, which marks difference. Integrating; making opposites coexist in us.

New Covenant; new harmony.

Making us complete from within, like Jesus. Glory of the Father, and of humanity.

Mutual union is the Lord's ultimate will. Jesus entrusts his testament to the disciples, with a radical novelty.

Love for one's neighbour was already among the ancient prescriptions, and Christ seems to trace its very formulation (Lev 19:18).

But the Son of God does not only allude to compatriots and proselytes of the same religion. He breaks down barriers hitherto considered obvious. 

Yet the great novelty is in the fundamental motivation.

Mutual love is on the same line as the encounter with oneself - where by grace and vocation lurks a possession of riches, growing perfections, that want to surface.

From such a treasure chest, knowledge, solid platform, arises the afflatus of being able to give life: but to increase it, make it full and cheer it up - starting not from external conditioning.

In fact, the commandment is 'new' not only because it is edifying and stimulating, but first and foremost because it reveals one's vocation.

It is a manifestative bond, which becomes foundation, growing motive and driving force; lucid energy, which gives us the ability to shift our gaze and turn the page: it ushers in a new age, a new kingdom.

It is the figure of the victory of Easter, theophany and testimony of its authentic people: "not with measure" (Jn 3:31-36: 34).

The "without measure" is that of the mystical wedding between the two "natures", of the intimate friendship that penetrates the life of the Father.

Even in the waiting, the boundlessness vivifies existence and fulfils it, coming from the experience of substance and vertigo.

It is the life of the Son in us: perception of a constitutive 'being'. Therefore without losing interest in the time of absence.

And of being able to change; intuition of a different (irreducible) "glory" with special characteristics.

Now the morality of the ancient religions no longer applies: ours is a vocational and paschal ethics, in the Spirit that renews the face of the earth.

Every purpose is illuminated by the victory of life over death. In this way, behaviour is configured to the Mystery.

We live in Christ, the new man: we are no longer under 'proper' duties and prescriptions. The baptismal attitude cannot be "measured".

The anointing and the call received respond to the intimate passion, the sense of reciprocity and personal fullness, which transcend.

Thus they move eminent goals: in participation in the fullness of life, excess that cannot be assimilated to conformism and average horizons.

For a pious Israelite to have glory is to give specific weight to one's existence, and to reveal its full value - but in an elective sense.

"Was it true glory?" - Manzoni asks himself: from glory-vain and vain it rolls down. Quite another is glory as the real Presence of God.

Only if we are placed on the same wave of beauty and fascination as the 'Son of Man' do we contribute to not letting it fade or exclude it: the more we are human without duplicity, the more Heaven that is in us manifests itself.

The badge, the emblem of the full witness of children and outspoken communities is not its own production.

It retains an indestructible quality of elasticity and relationship that does not dismay, nor does it drop its arms: it gives breath.

This is the New Commandment, which marks difference.

Mutual union is the Lord's ultimate will. Jesus entrusts his testament to the disciples, with a radical novelty.

Love for one's neighbour was already among the ancient prescriptions, and Christ seems to trace its very formulation (Lev 19:18).

But the Son of God does not only allude to compatriots and proselytes of the same religion. He breaks down barriers hitherto considered obvious. 

Yet the great novelty is in the fundamental motivation.

Mutual love is on the same line as the encounter with oneself - where by grace and vocation lurks a possession of riches, growing perfections, that want to surface.From such a treasure chest, knowledge, solid platform, arises the afflatus of being able to give life: but to increase it, make it full and cheer it up - not from external conditioning and tasks to be performed or exploited.

In fact, the commandment is 'new' not only because it is edifying and stimulating, but first and foremost because it reveals one's vocation and the intimate life of God, the relationship between the Father and the Son, assumed.

It is a manifestative bond, which becomes a foundation, a growing motive and a driving force; lucid energy, which gives us the ability to shift our gaze and turn the page: it ushers in a new age, a new kingdom.

The "new" commandment of love - Christ's only delivery - is the figure of the Easter victory, theophany and testimony of his authentic people: "not with measure" (Jn 3:31-36: 34).

The "without measure" is that of the mystical wedding between the two "natures", of the intimate friendship that penetrates the life of the Father.

Even in the waiting, the boundlessness vivifies existence and fulfils it, coming from the experience of substance and vertigo - already in itself.

It is the life of the Son in us: perception of a constitutive 'being'. Therefore without losing interest in the time of absence.

And of being able to change; intuition of a different (irreducible) "glory" with special characteristics.

Now the morality of religions no longer applies: ours is a vocational and paschal ethics, in the Spirit that renews the face of the earth.

Every purpose, every role, every ministry, is illuminated by the victory of life over death.

In this way, behaviour is configured to the Mystery.

We live in Christ, the new man: we are no longer under 'proper' duties and prescriptions. The baptismal attitude cannot be measured.

The anointing and the call received respond to the intimate passion, the sense of reciprocity and personal fullness, which transcend.

Thus they move eminent goals: in participation in the fullness of life, excess that cannot be assimilated to conformism and average horizons.

For a pious Israelite to have glory is to give specific weight to one's existence, and to reveal its full value - but in an elective sense.

"Was it true glory?" - Manzoni asks himself: from glory-vain and vain it rolls down. Quite another glory as the real Presence of God.

Here are the disagreements between community and humanity (persons in fullness); liturgy and reality, prayer and listening, theology and life, proclamations and behind the scenes.

While the Synoptics proclaim universal love, the author of the Fourth Gospel is concerned that the unexpressed testimony of the children is not a blatant denial of the holiness preached to others [by the 'elect'].

As Paul VI said: 'Contemporary man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers'. Not only for an appropriate and due evaluation of moral coherence, but because they refer to the Mystery, to divine Gold.

Only if we are placed on the same wave of beauty and fascination as the "Son of Man" do we contribute to not letting it fade away or exclude it: the more human we are without duplicity, the more Heaven is manifested within us.

Of course, it seems impossible to love "like" Him (v.34), but here the Greek expression has another way of reading it. The original term does not merely indicate an ideal horizon or the lofty measure - unattainable by effort.

"Kathòs" [adverb and conjunction] is endowed with generative as well as comparative value.

The key expression of the passage can be understood as: "Love one another because I have loved you unconditionally" or "Because I have loved you unconditionally, on such a wave of life, you can now love one another".

It means: making one's neighbour feel already enabled - adequate and free - is the only unreduced mark of faith in Christ.

In short, the Father is not the God of prescriptions: he does not absorb our energies, but generates and dilates them.

He does not pretend to suffocate and exhaust us.

The badge, the emblem of the full witness of children and outspoken communities is not its own production.

It retains an indestructible quality of elasticity and relationship that does not dismay, nor does it drop arms: it gives breath.

It is not the work of fanatical pro- and anti-subversives, nor of a devout individualism that preaches the 'salvation of one's own soul' - an exasperation of religious piety and the pedestrian retributive morality of 'merits'.

It is the unfolding of the action of the Son of Man (v. 31) that empowers the downtrodden and petty.

The Master is not content to be a gregarious follower, like the heterodox Judas, a zealous apostle in appearance.

"Son of man" indicates Jesus who manifests the Father, the man who makes manifest the divine condition.

The Person who in his human fullness reflects the wholesome design of the Origins - possibility for all reborn in Christ.

The carnal feeling is in a hurry to regulate itself on the basis of goals and titles; of achievements and success, or of the beloved's perfections and prestige. 

It sets boundaries.Divine Love (and that of children) is disproportionate, it has a different conduct: it prevents, it recovers; it does not break understanding, it helps.

Non-wandering Love knows the small, the uncertain and the weak. It knows that they only grow through the experience of the Gift, otherwise they get stuck.

If the Free does not supplant merit, no one grows stronger; on the contrary, all - even the energetic - shrink. Condemned to an external cloak of norms and doctrines, or of disembodied abstractions and sophistications.

That is why the 'Son of Man' - the genuine and full development of the divine plan for mankind - is not hindered by public sinners, but by those who suppose of themselves and would have the ministry of making it known!

Divine glory has nothing to do with uniforms, coats, cockades or epidermal badges; it is manifested in the Communion without prior interdictions, in the service that is rendered to the inadequate and unmanifested - from which to hope for zero.

Nothing that can then be supplemented by adding a little something - a mere 'completion' - to the norms of the First Covenant [which did not insist on God-likeness but on mass obedience].

Fundamentalist inclinations, or circumstantial and à la page manners, the lust for worldly prestige - in reality - divide.

The conviviality of differences encompasses, dilates, accentuates the amalgam and unites, enriching. It opens to the unusual and unimaginable.

Founders of religions propose a worldview and are static models of behaviour.

They do not propose a growing offer (Jn 14:12: "greater works"). Widely personal invitations - deep and sharp, more so than their own.

Jesus is not a predictable 'model' to be imitated.

He is above all - we repeat - a Motive and an Engine: let us love like and because Christ. Living by Him, each one.

We risk everything because we are within an Event that we have seen, of a Relationship that not only persuades, but leads us and generates beyond; not in a downward spiral.

We are no longer under a Law that appoints God by obligation, but in the challenge of a gesture that re-creates and gradually fulfils, making our weakness strong.

So much so that shadow sides become resources and amazement. All without depersonalising; on the contrary, emphasising uniqueness.

This is the 'new' commandment.

"Kainòs" is a Greek term that marks difference, eclipses the rest - in the sense that it sums up, surpasses and replaces. It supersedes all commandments: obvious and conditional.

And there will not be a better one, because our hope is not Heaven (ready), but Heaven on earth.

More than the too far of the old final Paradise with invariable fare and predictable fulfilment. Modic, conformist, sectoral; even there articulated according to roles.

And pyramidal.

To deepen the evangelical theme of Glory:

Give your life and quickly betray

(Jn 13:21-33.36-38)

"I will lay down my life for you" - in order to lead.

The apostles would give everything to win, not to lose; to triumph, not to be mocked or fed, and to heal the world.

Better to negotiate. Rather than wash each other's feet!

That is why the Lord wants each of us diners to ask the question whether we are not involved in some betrayal.

Not to blame and plant ourselves there, but to meet each other: each is an admirer and an adversary of the Master.

We are splendour and darkness - coexisting sides, more or less integrated, even competitive.

It is the Resurrection that lurks in the effervescence of life, redeeming then the selfish motivations, and transfiguring into collimating energies elsewhere the dark and frictional sides.

Aspects that become like baby food, for each new genesis - which once they have emerged [planted in the earth and pulled up by the roots] can become strengths.

The road is only blocked in front of the person who continues to have his soul conditioned by old or à la page opinions and evils.

Nothing is revealed there; the miracle of the transmutation of our abyss will not take place.

The liturgy of the Word brings us into contact with a Jesus pervaded by a sense of weakness; his loneliness becomes acute.

In mission, we too are sometimes at the mercy of despondency: perhaps God has deceived us, dragging us into an absurd enterprise?

No, we are not deceived and abandoned to an ignoble logic, to a perverse generation: the power of life itself is strewn with tombstones and has various faces. Beneficial influences.

The favourable path is devoid of prestige, recognised tasks and majesty: they tend to placate us, and not dig in.

It is often disturbances that improve judgement.

The dripping can arouse the voice of the most authentic part of ourselves, become an incisive echo to find ourselves, and complete ourselves - bringing forward the pioneering heart, instead of holding it back.

The road of trial and imbalance awakens us from the harmful ageing of the spirit.It recovers the opposing energies, the opposing sides, and the incompatible desires, the (allied) passions to which we have not given space.

Even in the torturing experience of limitation, God wants to reach out to our variegated seed, so that it does not allow itself to be despoiled - not even by the dismay of having drawn the morsel together and having been the traitor.

Nothing is crippling.

There is only one toxic, chronic sphere of death, which annihilates everything and has no active germs in it: that which obscures and detests primary change.

There the horizon narrows and all that remains is a chasm - or the blandness that infects to make us give up, and relentlessly retreat, deny and regress again.

All that remains are the fears, the half-choices, the neuroses silenced by the compromise that attempts to fill the precious sense of emptiness.

We are faced with a Lord reduced to nothing, so that we too can understand ourselves in our defections; in the episodes in which we camp useless and deviant contrivances, all measured, that fatigue in vain.

The story of the incomprehensible loneliness of Christ beside the traitor and the renegade is written in our hearts.

It is all reality, but for salvation, for renewed intimacy and conviction.

The missionary vocation is extinguished and stagnates only by ballast of calculation and common mentality - where the naked poverty of the discordant being that we are does not shake (nor tinkle).

Without the abandonment undergone, man does not become universal, rather he tends to attenuate the best instruments of God's power.

On that steppe terrain He is giving us the friendship of a shift in our gaze.

Without the restlessness of deep and humiliating upheaval - without the surrender of one's humanity in extreme weakness - our unsatisfied puppet lingers, content.

Despite its admiration for values, it too becomes a residual larva. A caricature of the being we could be: women and men with a contemplative eye.

Completed from within, like Jesus.

To internalise and live the message:

What do I draw when the Lord asks me to risk?

What do unfriendly gestures and rejection mean to you, in the paradoxical outcomes?

Glory to one another: the Seed within and the entourage without

The Greatest Witness

(Jn 5:31-47)

"Christians are a priestly people for the world. Christians should make the living God visible to the world, bear witness to Him and lead it to Him".

"Jesus loved men in the Father, from the Father - and so loved them in their true being, in their reality."

[Pope Benedict].

Jesus does not love catwalks. The Son remains immersed in the Father: he does not receive support and glory from fashionable men or ancient perimeters, because he is not imbued with normal human cultural religious expectations.

They prevent the perception of what we do not know, therefore they conceal the exceptional nature of the particular name; they drench the head and the gaze with current and pedestrian normality, which condition, dissociate, plagiarise, make external.

Predictable expectations delay the germination of the Kingdom of God and its alternative character - in the living experience of further exchanges; of other interpersonal qualities, in the completeness of being that belongs to us.

The specific weight of this unprecedented present and future, which corresponds because it is part of our intimate essence, otherwise remains in the hands of obvious opinions and the usual cheap dragging, which does not expose.

The pathology of reputation, of accredited convictions and the concordant praxis on the side, precludes winging it. But every short and rigid hope rejects God for God's sake.

Only that which is not petrified and conventional bears witness to Christ the Lord, the likeness of the Father who does not reject our eccentricities: he wants to make them grow - recovering their flourishing opposites.

The same 'no moments' that crumble prestige are also a spring to activate us and not stagnate in the same old situations; regenerating, moving forward elsewhere.

Failures that put fame in the balance serve to make us realise what we had not noticed, thus deviating from a conformist destiny.

In short, our Heaven is intertwined with our transmuting flesh, our earth and our dust: it lies within and below, not behind the clouds or in the manners.

In the paradoxical deification of the coming God, the all-worldly mentality of every purist or conformist circle experiences a reversal. Cipher of the great Wisdom of nature.

This is how Master Lü Hui-ch'ing comments on a famous passage from the Tao Tê Ching (LXXVI): "Heaven is on high for ch'ì, Earth is on low for form: ch'ì is soft and weak, form is hard and strong".

The trial-religious aspect to which the story of Jesus [even his intimates] was subjected often appears in John.

The aspirations of the pious men of old are strangely hinged on the need to make a body and recognise one another. Hence always 'those from before'.Their world, centred on the honour one receives: the theme is Glory - which, however, becomes a dialogue between the deaf. 'Doxa' in the Greek world means manifestation of prestige, honour, esteem.

In Hebrew, the term Glory [Kabôd] means specific, qualitative weight (and manifestation) of the transcendent.

So the glory that man gives to God - so to speak - is the opposite of the Hellenist criterion: the principle and evaluation typical of the strutting, 'free', independent and self-confident hero [because of the prestige around].

Conversely, here is 'glory' as humble and grateful recognition, but weighty in the Christian sense: familiar and humanising.

The woman and man called to a particular mission discover in themselves and in reality the conditions of perfection and imperfection.

They guide us to innate fulfilment - not volatile - and the common good, according to specific, personal contribution.

No one is called to artificial prestige and strength, adding something to the honour of what is already in one's vocational essence - sometimes in paradoxical completeness, for a conviviality of differences.

The Glory of Jesus himself was only the awareness and confession of being the Father's Envoy.

That is all we are entitled to - even in the sense of growth, of importance in itself, more than 'those who realise'.

The devout groups unfortunately not infrequently moved to a level of worldly aspirations - just with a strange mixture of criteria.

So they ended up appreciating each other in circles, patting each other on the back.

Thus - content to be confirmed - they still tend to accentuate the characteristics of what is normally identified as the spiritual dimension, and that easily becomes contaminated with the compromise of the artificial external look.

Instead, the inner balance of the Called by Name is re-established through dreams and the congenital character - rather than through weighing and the raw influences of conscious life, which distract and level the soul.

In fact, on such a slope, one tends to adopt attitudes that do not fit the very original vocation; on the contrary, they expose the consciousness to dissociations and conditionings that distort it.

The Way in the Spirit of Freedom, Love, Newness, is inspired by a dimension of Mystery and spontaneity all to be discovered: Exodus.

Such a character proceeds beyond compartments, denominations filled with established solutions, with conformist thinking hooked on an univocal way of reading the Scriptures and testimonies.

Cages, even 'spiritual' ones, guilt every different, inculcate brooding, curb the most fruitful eccentricities.

In order to ensure 'ecclesial' compactness, the various stigmas everywhere play on the inadequacy of the majority interpretation - and guilt typical of the particular 'container'.

Such framings do not reawaken creativity, rather they anaesthetise it according to internal clichés: where precisely they take "glory from one another" (v.44).

Frames do not teach one to launch oneself personally and at the right time.

The rhythm, too, does not descend on dissimilar inclinations, on their atypicality - a unique richness that prepares the unrepeatable and extravagant New that we do not already know.

Instruction booklets harass us with other people's progressions and goals to reach, all of which turn out to be yet to be surpassed - and outside our own taste and intimate sense; projected into the future, impersonal.

The 'spiritual' path of the pack reflects the life, judgement or idea of the leader and his 'magic' circle; the forma mentis of a generation or a class.

In this way, established trajectories do not announce changes and authentic encounters, which take place in the propulsive, transversal simplicity of the concrete unpredictable. 

Stubborn models do not make us aware of a God Person: He calls to life through impulses that would be new blood for transmutation.

The Eternal One communicates Himself in what He speaks within.

Precisely in the needs - not obsessing energies known only to the soul, of conflicts over useless duties, which neither solve anything nor transmit happiness.

The 'egocentric' religious ideology and all directed thought brand crises as inadequacies to collective purposeful actions - thus condemning instincts.

But instincts manifest themselves as escapes of the individual heart that seeks new listening, desires to surface and realise; it wants to integrate in its own way, or to chart paths that prepare for the future.

Not infrequently, the evocation of the usual delimited rituals - e.g. of 'charisma' - as well as the concatenation of normative constitutions, deaden the character in a levelled atmosphere, which drinks of recollected attunements.

They are not our land.

The barnyard of the 'system' operates according to directives and roles.

But compartments limit the range of action, although they seemingly dilute it.Trivial inclusions 'teach' us to be content with half-steps already chiselled into the little and not over the top.

This is so as not to allow for the regenerations that count.

The self-referential clan often takes away space from any possibility that moves from there.

This makes one dependent on applause. It slows down, when conversely we could dare.... 

Lest we continue to perceive healthy restlessness. Differences that would redeem us from subordination.

In fact, the one-sided imprint does not respect nature, so it reinforces what it says it wants to banish.

A disaster for a life of meaning and witness in Christ.

The Lord had as his only daily worship - precisely - the emptiness of social support (which did not accept his deviations) and the fullness of beginnings in the Father.

"But I have a greater witness than John, for the works that the Father has given me to do, the very works that I do, testify of me that the Father has sent me" (John 5:36).

To internalise and live the message:

How do you safeguard community living and your transpositions of Faith in Christ?

What is the point of homologation in satisfaction, and where do you place your Preciousness?

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

In today’s Catechesis let us focus our attention on the prayer that Jesus raises to the Father in the “Hour” of his exaltation and glorification (cf. Jn 17:1-26). As the Catechism of the Catholic Church says: “Christian Tradition rightly calls this prayer the ‘priestly’ prayer of Jesus. It is the prayer of our High Priest, inseparable from his sacrifice, from his “passing over” (Passover) to the Father to whom he is wholly ‘consecrated’” (n. 2747). 

The extreme richness of Jesus’ prayer can be understood especially if we set it against the backdrop of the Jewish feast of expiation, Yom Kippur. On that day the High Priest makes expiation first for himself and then for the category of priests, and, lastly, for the whole community of the people. The purpose is to restore to the People of Israel, after a year’s transgressions, the awareness of their reconciliation with God, the awareness that they are the Chosen People, a “holy people”, among the other peoples. The prayer of Jesus, presented in Chapter 17 of the Gospel according to John, returns to the structure of this feast. On that night Jesus addresses the Father at the moment when he is offering himself. He, priest and victim, prays for himself, for the Apostles and for all those who will believe in him and for the Church of all the time (cf. Jn 17:20).

The prayer that Jesus prays for himself is the request for his glorification, for his “exaltation” in his “Hour”. In fact, it is more than a prayer of petition, more than the declaration of his full willingness to enter, freely and generously, into the plan of God the Father, which is fulfilled in his being consigned and in his death and resurrection. This “Hour” began with Judas’ betrayal (cf. 13:31) and was to end in the ascension of the Risen Jesus to the Father (Jn 20:17). 

Jesus comments on Judas’ departure from the Upper Room with these words: “Now is the Son of man glorified, and in him God is glorified” (Jn 13:31). It is not by chance that he begins his priestly prayer saying: “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you” (Jn 17:1). 

The glorification that Jesus asks for himself as High Priest, is the entry into full obedience to the Father, an obedience that leads to his fullest filial condition: “And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory which I had with you before the world was made” (Jn 17:5). This readiness and this request are the first act of the new priesthood of Jesus, which is a total gift of himself on the Cross and on the Cross itself — the supreme act of love — he is glorified because love is the true glory, the divine glory.

The second moment of this prayer is the intercession that Jesus makes for the disciples who have been with him. They are those of whom Jesus can say to the Father: “I have manifested your name to the men whom you gave me out of the world; yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word” (Jn 17:6). This “manifesting God’s name to m en” is the fulfilment of a new presence of the Father among the people, for humanity. This “manifesting” is not only a word, but is reality in Jesus; God is with us, and so his name — his presence with us, his being one of us — is “fulfilled”. This manifestation is thus realized in the Incarnation of the Word. In Jesus God enters human flesh, he becomes close in a new and unique way. And this presence culminates in the sacrifice that Jesus makes in his Pasch of death and Resurrection.

At the centre of this prayer of intercession and of expiation in favour of the disciples is the request for consecration; Jesus says to the Father: “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you did send me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be consecrated in truth” (Jn 17:16-19). 

I ask: what does “consecrate” mean in this case? First of all it must be said that really only God is “consecrated” or “holy”. “To consecrate” therefore means “to transfer” a reality – a person or a thing – to become the property of God. And two complementary aspects are present in this: on the one hand, removing them from ordinary things, segregating, “setting them apart” from the context of personal human life so that they may be totally given to God; and on the other, this segregation, this transferal into God’s sphere, has the very meaning of “sending”, of mission: precisely because he or she is given to God, the reality, the consecrated person, exists “for” others, is given to others. Giving to God means no longer existing for oneself, but for everyone. Whoever, like Jesus, is segregated from the world and set apart for God with a view to a task is for this very reason, fully available to all. For the disciples the task will be to continue Jesus’ mission, to be given to God and thereby to be on mission for all. The Risen One, appearing to his disciples on Easter evening, was to say to them: “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you” (Jn 20:21).

The third part of this priestly prayer extends to the end of time. In it Jesus turns to the Father in order to intercede for all those who will be brought to the faith through the mission inaugurated by the Apostles and continued in history: “I do not pray for these only, but also for those who believe in me through their world”. Jesus prays for the Church of all time, he also prays for us (Jn 17:20).

The  Catechism of the Catholic Church comments: “Jesus fulfilled the work of the Father completely; his prayer, like his sacrifice, extends until the end of time. The prayer of this hour fills the end-times and carries them toward their consummation” (n. 2749).

The central request of the priestly prayer of Jesus dedicated to his disciples of all epochs is that of the future unity of those who will believe in him. This unity is not a worldly product. It comes exclusively from the divine unity and reaches us from the Father, through the Son and in the Holy Spirit. Jesus invokes a gift that comes from Heaven and has its effect — real and perceptible — on earth. He prays “that they may all be one; even as you, Father are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (Jn 17:21). 

Christian unity, on the one hand, is a secret reality that is in the heart of believers. But, at the same time, it must appear with full clarity in history, it must appear so that the world may believe, it has a very practical and concrete purpose, it must appear so that all may really be one. The unity of future disciples, in being united with Jesus— whom the Father sent into the world — is also the original source of the efficacy of the Christian mission in the world.

“We can say that the founding of the Church takes place” in the priestly prayer of Jesus... In this very place, in the act of the Last Supper, Jesus creates the Church. “For what else is the Church, if not the community of disciples who through faith in Jesus Christ as the one sent by the Father”, receives his unity and is involved in Jesus’ mission to save the world, leading it to knowledge of God? Here we really find a true definition of the Church. “The Church is born from Jesus’ prayer. But this prayer is more than words; it is the act by which he ‘sanctifies’ himself, that is to say, he ‘sacrifices’ himself for the life of the world” (cf. Jesus of Nazareth, II, p. 101).

Jesus prays that his disciples may be one. By virtue of this unity, received and preserved, the Church can walk “in the world” without being “of the world” (cf. Jn 17:16) and can live the mission entrusted to her so that the world may believe in the Son and in the Father who sent him. Therefore the Church becomes the place in which the mission of Christ itself continues: to lead the “world” out of man’s alienation from God and out of himself, out of sin, so that it may return to being the world of God. 

Dear brothers and sisters, we have grasped a few elements of the great richness of the priestly prayer of Jesus, which I invite you to read and to meditate on so that it may guide us in dialogue with the Lord and teach us to pray. Let us too, therefore, in our prayers, ask God to help us to enter, more fully, into the design he has for each one of us. Let us ask him to be “consecrated” to him, to belong to him more and more, to be able to love others more and more, those who are near and far; let us ask him to be able always to open our prayer to the dimensions of the world, not closing it to the request for help with our problems but remembering our neighbour before the Lord, learning the beauty of interceding for others; let us ask him for the gift of visible unity among all believers in Christ — we have invoked it forcefully in this Week of Prayer for Christian Unity — let us pray to be ever ready to answer anyone who asks us to account for the hope that is in us (cf. 1 Pt 3:15). Many thanks.

[Pope Benedict, General Audience 25 January 2012]

It is Jesus in fact that you seek when you dream of happiness; he is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies you; he is the beauty to which you are so attracted; it is he who provokes you with that thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise; it is he who urges you to shed the masks of a false life; it is he who reads in your hearts your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle. It is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be grounded down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal. 

Dear young people, in these noble undertakings you are not alone. With you there are your families, there are your communities, there are your priests and teachers, there are so many of you who in the depths of your hearts never weary of loving Christ and believing in him. In the struggle against sin you are not alone: so many like you are struggling and through the Lord’s grace are winning! 

6. Dear friends, at the dawn of the Third Millennium I see in you the “morning watchmen” (cf. Is21:11-12). In the course of the century now past young people like you were summoned to huge gatherings to learn the ways of hatred; they were sent to fight against one another. The various godless messianic systems which tried to take the place of Christian hope have shown themselves to be truly horrendous. Today you have come together to declare that in the new century you will not let yourselves be made into tools of violence and destruction; you will defend peace, paying the price in your person if need be. You will not resign yourselves to a world where other human beings die of hunger, remain illiterate and have no work. You will defend life at every moment of its development; you will strive with all your strength to make this earth ever more livable for all people. 

Dear young people of the century now beginning, in saying “yes” to Christ, you say “yes” to all your noblest ideals. I pray that he will reign in your hearts and in all of humanity in the new century and the new millennium. Have no fear of entrusting yourselves to him! He will guide you, he will grant you the strength to follow him every day and in every situation.

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

After the Last Supper, the Lord, “lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, ‘Father, the hour has come; glorify thy Son’” — and then — “glorify thou me in thy own presence with the glory which I had with thee before the world was made” (Jn 17:1-5). Jesus asks for glory, a request which seems a paradox as his Passion is imminent. What glory is he referring to? In the Bible, glory refers to God’s self-revelation. It is the distinctive sign of his saving presence among mankind. Now, Jesus is the One who definitively manifests God’s presence and salvation. And he does this at Easter: lifted up on the Cross, he is glorified (cf. Jn 12:23-33). There, God finally reveals his glory: he removes the last veil and astonishes us as never before. Indeed, we discover that the Glory of God is entirely love: pure, unbridled and inconceivable love, beyond every limit and measure.

Brothers and sisters, let us make Jesus’ prayer our own: let us ask the Father to remove the veil from our eyes, so that in looking at the Crucifix over these days, we may understand that God is love. How often do we imagine him as master and not as Father; how often do we think of him as an austere judge rather than a merciful Saviour! But at Easter, God voids the distances, revealing himself in the humility of a love that seeks our love. Thus, we give him glory when we live whatever we do with love, when we do everything from our heart, as if for him (Col 3:17).

True glory is the glory of love because it is the only kind that gives life to the world. This glory is certainly the opposite of worldly glory, which comes from being admired, praised, acclaimed: when the ‘I’ is at the centre of attention. The Glory of God, on the other hand, is paradoxical: no applause, no audience. At the centre is not the ‘I’, but rather the other. Indeed, at Easter we see that the Father glorifies the Son as the Son glorifies the Father. No one glorifies him- or herself. We can ask ourselves today: “which glory do I live for? Mine or God’s? Do I wish only to receive from others or also to give to others?”.

[Pope Francis, General Audience 17 April 2019]