Prophetic ardour, Salvation that does not repeat

(Lk 1:57-66.80)

The new Creation announced in the periphery invests the territory that still hesitates over what is certified, proven and reassuring - because it is considered (around) pure and quoted.

Salvation - the cue for a full existence - travels ever wider spaces and breaks through in a peremptory manner, without ever repeating itself.

It does not ask for authoritative permission, nor does it wait for a beautifully swept and adorned dwelling.

It even enters the House (Israel) in which it did nothing but commemorate, with no possibility of renewal and progress.

He transforms it, albeit already perfumed with incense and purity.

In that sphere, unfortunately, the Waiting had turned into a habit [of waiting] that was no longer waiting for anything. One just held back, without much expectation.

On the contrary, the announcement of the new times arouses contagious joy, a desire to do and break the old habitual enclosure - in all aspects of mentality, suddenly no longer conforming.

The change ushers in an era of redemption: concretely, a life of the saved.

A trajectory now able to open up gaps in the great wall of conventions that bridle the freedom to be and to do.

Zechariah ["God makes memory": the usual God and memory] generates a Promise that is being fulfilled before our eyes.

Word-event that really visits the people - here and now, every dawn - imposing the "none of your kinship" (v.61) i.e. the custom - even priestly: here is Johanan ["God made Grace"].

The merciful Living One is no longer exactly that of the bloody and propitiatory cults in the Temple, but of perspectives, of unfolding horizons.

One finds lightness. No conditioning blocks, no guilt for deviating. In His proposals of expanded life, He is and remains "Favourable".

The Name to be imposed by ancient custom conveyed a culture and a role (even) with sacred, reassuring veins.

Changing it changes destiny. One does not cast oneself in a robe, in a part to be played; one grasps the essence of the expected Face.

The Eternal One is not the One who invites a series of pious and archaic ritual customs identified, to be followed without respite. His unconditional initiatives provide a decisive opening of the field every day.

The Most High creates and calls for development, for the best and the further super-eminent: the categories of possibility are surpassed!

The ancient barriers between Heaven and Earth, between Tradition and Manifestation, are about to fall, in favour of a world inclined to life.

Redemption begins to spark with textbook choices.

Writes the Tao Tê Ching (xix), which deems the most celebrated virtues external:

"Teach that there is more to stick to: show yourself simple and keep yourself raw".

Master Wang Pi comments: 'Formal qualities are totally insufficient'.

And Master Ho-shang Kung adds: "Forget the regularity and creation of the saints, return to what was at the Beginning".

Even on our path, by accepting horizons other than the expected, we allow the divine soul of salvation history to visit us.

This is so that the essence of our deepest states can detach itself from common judgement, and re-tune to what is still Unknown instead of useful - but we feel belongs to us.

In each shift of gaze we find another cosmos, a discreet, reserved Beauty.

It leads back to our natural Core, to the Calling by Name in which lurks the Secret for each one, and a stage of full realisation for all.

The Fulfillment is now "fortified in Spirit and in deserts" instead of according to custom, measured - in the deputed places of the priestly liturgy (v.80) from which one must push oneself out, even irregularly.

To internalise and live the message:

How many times have you heard that you are not doing well?

How do you realise the timing of God's change?

What astonishment have you experienced in your spiritual journey?

What difference have you measured against your expectations and intentions?

How do you plan to build your dignity as an outrider?

What principle of discernment is used in your community? Do you start from your unrepeatable Vocation or is there an addictive and homologising cliché, other names that you have to repeat and copy?

"What do you think he will become, this son of mine?" [by Teresa Girolami].

Today's Gospel presents us with the birth of John, the prophet of Christ, and the amazement of onlookers:

"What shall this child be? And indeed the hand of the Lord was with him" (Lk 1:66).

In the life of Francis, from his birth, a visible sign of God's predilection was manifested on him and his mother Mona Pica.

The Sources make this clear:

"In fact, she was made to share, as a privilege, a certain likeness to the ancient Saint Elizabeth, both because of the name she imposed on her son and also because of her prophetic spirit. 

When neighbours expressed their admiration for Francis' generosity of spirit and moral integrity he would repeat, almost divinely inspired:

"What do you think he will become, this son of mine? Know, that by his merits he will become a son of God'.

Indeed, this was also the opinion of others, who appreciated Francis as already grown up for some of his very good inclinations.

He shunned anything that might sound offensive to anyone and, growing up with a gentle spirit, he did not appear to be the son of those who were called his parents.

Therefore the name of John is appropriate to the mission he then carried out, that of Francis to his fame, which soon spread everywhere after his full conversion to God.

Above the feast of any other saint, he held that of John the Baptist to be most solemn, whose distinguished name had imprinted in his soul a sign of arcane power.

Among those born of women there arose none greater than this, and none more perfect than this among the founders of religious orders. It is a coincidence worthy of note' (FF 583).

[Teresa Girolami].

According to which image and likeness?

Our gaze goes to Giulio Romano's painting above the high altar of this church: it shows the Holy Family, with John the Baptist still small, the Apostle James and the Evangelist Mark, the latter already adults.

The Baptist briskly points with his left hand to the Child Jesus, depicted in his infantile weakness. To the question of the relatives and neighbours of Elizabeth and Zechariah: "What is to become of this child?" the painting seems to give us this answer: John the Baptist points with all his attitude to Jesus to the visitor James who is close to him; he bows deeply in the awareness of his littleness: I am not worthy to untie the strap of the sandal to him who comes after me, but who is before me. This word has nothing to do with false humility. The Baptist is too upright, too sober for that. He certainly recognised human helplessness better than most men.

The preacher of penitence who questions men in their innermost being, who shakes them out of their certainties and transforms them, who snatches them from the superficiality of a purely earthly materialistic attitude, still belongs to the Old Covenant, he is just the one who points the way to the Kingdom of God; and this Kingdom of God is near, one hears the voice of the one who calls in the wilderness. The Baptist's humility is authentic. But God exalted the littleness of the Baptist with the greatness of the task entrusted to him; indeed, he had already exalted him in his mother's womb: before he was even born, he was in fact already 'reborn' by the Spirit of Christ. Human greatness is nothing compared to the smallness that is called to participate in the greatness and holiness of God.

For us priests, John is a model. He seeks nothing for himself, but everything for the one he now points to. The child already represents in a certain way the word transmitted to us in the fourth Gospel: "He must increase and I must decrease" (John 3: 30). John was to lead men to Jesus and bear witness [...].

John and the story of his life are like a slide on which a name and a truth are indicated. It remains dark until a source of light is lit behind it. Thus says the Gospel of John: 'He was not the light, but he was to bear witness to the light' (John 1: 8). The light of God is decisive in his life and mission. By its light we become seers, to recognise God's will. This is often contrary to our desires and our own will. When it came to naming the newborn John at his circumcision, tradition was decisive: he would receive his father's name. But Elisabeth decided otherwise. She knew God's will and gave the child the name 'John', which means 'God is merciful'.

Why should it have been so only then?

We can all experience the power and goodness of God in our lives when we trust in him and strive earnestly to do his will. But this requires from us humility and the realisation that man does not possess the measure of all things. We cannot see ourselves as the yardstick of every thought, every morality and every right. We too easily succumb to the belief that everything can be made, heaven as well as earth, indeed man himself, according to our own image and likeness.

[Pope John Paul II, S. Maria dell'Anima homily 24 June 1990].