As Saint Augustine puts it: “Your prayer is the word you speak to God. When you read the Bible, God speaks to you; when you pray, you speak to God”. Origen, one of the great masters of this way of reading the Bible, maintains that understanding Scripture demands, even more than study, closeness to Christ and prayer. Origen was convinced, in fact, that the best way to know God is through love, and that there can be no authentic scientia Christi apart from growth in his love. In his Letter to Gregory, the great Alexandrian theologian gave this advice: “Devote yourself to the lectio of the divine Scriptures; apply yourself to this with perseverance. Do your reading with the intent of believing in and pleasing God. If during the lectio you encounter a closed door, knock and it will be opened to you by that guardian of whom Jesus said, ‘The gatekeeper will open it for him’. By applying yourself in this way to lectio divina, search diligently and with unshakable trust in God for the meaning of the divine Scriptures, which is hidden in great fullness within. You ought not, however, to be satisfied merely with knocking and seeking: to understand the things of God, what is absolutely necessary is oratio. For this reason, the Saviour told us not only: ‘Seek and you will find’, and ‘Knock and it shall be opened to you’, but also added, ‘Ask and you shall receive’”.

[Pope Benedict, Verbum Domini n. 86]

1. With the incarnation of the Word of God, the history of prayer knows a decisive turning point. In Jesus Christ, heaven and earth touch each other, God is reconciled with humanity, the dialogue between the creature and his Creator is fully restored. Jesus is the definitive proposal of the Father's love and, at the same time, man's full and irrevocable response to divine expectations. He, the Incarnate Word, is therefore the only Mediator who presents to God the Father every sincere prayer that rises from the human heart. The question, which the first disciples addressed to Jesus, thus also becomes our question: "Lord, teach us to pray!" (Lk 11:1). 

2. As to them, so also to us Jesus "teaches". He does so first of all by example. How can we fail to recall the touching prayer with which He addresses the Father already in the first moment of the incarnation? "Entering the world, he says: You wanted neither sacrifice nor offering, a body instead you have prepared for me . . . Then I said: Behold I come - for of me it is written in the scroll of the book - to do, O God, thy will" (Heb 10:5). Subsequently, there is no important moment in Christ's life that is not accompanied by prayer. At the beginning of his public mission, the Holy Spirit descends upon him while "having received baptism, he stood praying" (Lk 3:21 f). From the evangelist Mark, we know that when he started preaching in Galilee, Jesus "got up in the morning when it was still dark and went out of the house and withdrew to a deserted place and prayed" (Mk 1:35). Before the election of the apostles "he went up on the mountain to pray and spent the night in prayer" (Lk 6:12). Before the promise of the primacy to Peter, Jesus, according to Luke's account, "was in a secluded place praying" (Lk 9:18). Even at the moment of the transfiguration, when on the mountain his glory radiated before darkness fell on Calvary, Jesus prayed (cf. Lk 9:28-29). Particularly revealing is the prayer in which, during the Last Supper, Jesus poured out towards the Father his sentiments of love, praise, supplication, and trusting abandonment (cf. Jn 17). They are the same sentiments that resurface in the Garden of Gethsemane (cf. Mt 26:39. 42) and on the cross (cf. Lk 23:46), from the height of which He offers us the example of that last, touching invocation: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Lk 23:34). 

3. Jesus also teaches us to pray with his word. To emphasise the "need to pray always, without tiring", He tells the parable of the unjust judge and the widow (cf. Lk 18:1-5). He then recommends: "Watch and pray, lest you fall into temptation. The spirit is ready, but the flesh is weak" (Mt 26:41). And he insists: "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you; for whoever asks receives, and whoever seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened" (Mt 7:7-8). 

To the disciples, desirous of concrete guidance, Jesus then teaches the sublime formula of the Our Father (Mt 6:9-13; Lk 11:2-4), which was to become the typical prayer of the Christian community down the centuries. Tertullian already described it as "breviarium totius evangelii", "a compendium of the whole Gospel" (De oratione, 1). In it Jesus delivers the essence of his message. Whoever consciously recites the Our Father "commits himself" to the Gospel: he cannot in fact fail to accept the consequences for his own life deriving from the Gospel message, of which the "Lord's Prayer" is the most authentic expression.

[Pope John Paul II, General Audience 23 September 1992]

"Ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find, knock and it will be opened to you. For whoever asks receives, and whoever seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened". Prompted by the liturgical passage from the Gospel of Luke (11:9-10), in the Mass celebrated at Santa Marta on Thursday morning, 9 October, Pope Francis returned to meditate on the theme of prayer, dwelling on the condition of man who asks and on the love of God who responds and gives in superabundance.

After recalling the text of the Collect pronounced before the Liturgy of the Word - "O God, source of all good, who answers the prayers of your people beyond all desire and all merit, pour out your mercy upon us: forgive what conscience fears and add what prayer dares not hope for" - the Pontiff began his reflection by noting that "it is proper to God's mercy not only to forgive - we all know that - but to be generous and to give more and more...". Dwelling in particular on the invocation "and add what prayer does not dare to hope for", Francis emphasised: "We perhaps in prayer ask for this and this, and he always gives us more! Always, always more'.

Picking up the threads of the Gospel story, the Pope recalled how, a few verses before the passage proposed by the liturgy, the apostles had asked Jesus to teach them to pray as John had done with the disciples. "And the Lord," he said, "taught them the Lord's Prayer". After that, the Gospel moved on to speak of God's "generosity", of that "mercy that always gives more, more than what we believe can be done".

Pope Francis went into the heart of the text: 'If one of you has a friend, at midnight.... There are three words, three key words in this passage: the friend, the Father and the gift'. It is the cue to link up with the daily experience of each person: in our lives, said the Pontiff, there are golden friends, 'who give their lives for their friend', and there are also others who are more or less good, but some are friends in a deeper way. There are not so many: "The Bible tells us 'one, two or three... no more'. Then the others are friends, but not like these'.

Still along the lines of the Lucan passage, the Pope continued: "I go to his house and I ask, I ask, and in the end he feels bothered by the intrusiveness; he gets up and gives what the friend asks". It is precisely 'the bond of friendship that causes us to be given what we ask for'. But, he explained, 'Jesus goes a step further and speaks of the Father', asking his listeners these questions: 'What father among you, if a son asks him for a fish, will give him a snake instead of a fish? Or if he asks him for an egg, will he give him a scorpion?". Hence the subsequent reassurance: "If you therefore who are evil know how to give good things to your children, how much more the Father in heaven!". This means that 'not only does the friend who accompanies us on the journey of life help us and give us what we ask for; also the Father in heaven, this Father who loves us so much', even to the point of caring - Jesus says - to feed the birds in the field.

In this way the Lord, Pope Francis noted, "wants to reawaken trust in prayer". And quoting Luke's Gospel again - "Ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find, knock and it will be opened to you. For whoever asks receives, whoever seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened" (11:9-10) - the Pontiff explained: "This is prayer: to ask, to seek the how and to knock on the heart of God, the friend who accompanies us, the Father" who loves all his creatures.

At the end of the passage, the Pope pointed out, there is a phrase that "seems a bit cryptic: "If you therefore, who are evil, know how to give good things to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give what you ask?" Yes! He will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!". Precisely 'this is the gift, this is the more of God'. Because the Father, he emphasised, 'never gives you a gift, something you ask for, just like that, without wrapping it well, without something more to make it more beautiful'. And 'what the Lord, the Father gives us the most, is the Spirit: the true gift of the Father is what prayer does not dare to hope for'. Man knocks on God's door with prayer to ask for a grace. And 'he, who is Father, gives me that and more: the gift, the Holy Spirit'.

This, the Pope reiterated, is the dynamic of prayer, which 'is done with the friend, who is the companion of life's journey, it is done with the Father and it is done in the Holy Spirit'. The true friend is Jesus: it is he, in fact, 'who accompanies us and teaches us to pray. And our prayer must be like this, Trinitarian'. This is an important underlining for Pope Francis who, drawing to a conclusion, recalled a typical dialogue he had so many times with the faithful: "But do you believe? Yes! Yes! In what do you believe? In God! But what is God for you? God, God!'. A somewhat generic, abstract conception, which for the Bishop of Rome does not correspond to reality. Because, he affirmed, 'the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit exist: they are persons, they are not an idea in the air'. In short, he pointed out, 'this God spray does not exist: there are persons!

This in summary was the Pontiff's final message: "Jesus is the companion who gives us what we ask for; the Father who cares for us and loves us; and the Holy Spirit who is the gift, is that something more that the Father gives, that which our conscience dares not hope for".

[Pope Francis, St. Martha, in L'Osservatore Romano 10/10/2014]

The manifestations of God's power on earth: nothing external

(Lk 11:29-32)

Human correspondence does not grow with the multiplication of dizzying signals. God doesn’t force the unconvinced, nor outclass with proofs; thus He earns a patrimony of love.

His authentic Church, without clamor or persuasive positions - apparently insignificant - is gathered entirely in intimate unity with her Lord.

The Queen of the South was looking for captivating solutions to enigmatic curiosities, but she could know them inside her soul and life.

Incarnation: there are no other valid signs than the events and new relationships with oneself and others - which offer the very and unheard-of Person of the Risen One, without wrappings.

The Eternal is no longer the pure transcendence of the Jews, nor the summit of the wisdom of the ancient world: the moving Sign of God is the story of Jesus alive in us.

We trust in Christ, so no more spiritual drugs that deceive us about happiness.

It’s the meaning of the new Creation: abandonment to the Spirit, but all concrete (not in a manner) and which proceeds by dragging the alternative reality.

He is the Sign unique, who frees from the many substitutes of fears’ religion, of fetters, of consolidated roles that would like to imprison the Lord in an "ally" doer of seductive miracles, immediately resolving.

Some community members seemed to want to frame the Messiah into the pattern of normal sacred and scenic expectations.

They were already getting along with the world, starting to recede, and were proving fed up...

In these "veterans" of Lk there was no sign of conversion to the idea of ​​the Son of God as a Servant, confident in dreams without prestige.

In them? No trace of a new idea - nor change of pace that could mark the end of the blatant, dehumanizing society they were used to.

There are always those who remain tied to an ideology of power. So they don't want to open their eyes except to have their senses captured in a trivial way.

For these, the Lord never reserves impressive confirmations - which would be the paradoxical validation of ancient convictions.

The only «sign» is his living Church and the Risen himself pulsating in all those who take him seriously; eg. in recoveries, healings, and impossible revaluations.

But no shortcut lightning.

Guided by the intimate Friend, we will be a single inventive humanity ‘in the Master’.

Our free and life-giving testimony will nourish an experience of regenerating Faith, singularly incisive.

Far more than miracles, the appeals of our essence and reality will make us recognize the call and action of God in men and in the web of history.

The Father wants his sons to produce far more astonishment and prodigies of divine-human goodness than visions and sentimentality, or magic.

The only «sign» of salvation is Christ in us, without hysterical seams; image and likeness of the new humanity.

For authentic ‘conversion’: native power - and nothing external.

[Wednesday 1st wk. in Lent, February 25, 2026]

Which road leads to the Father?

(Lk 11:29-32)

Jesus comes up against unbelief. It comes from various blinders and parties taken, or (especially in the disciples) arises from carelessness.

The Lord turns away from those who test him and those who reject what is God-given, claiming to fix how he should act.

The Son of Man respects each person who follows him, but makes it clear that decisions and even before that, lack of acute perception prevent the encounter and redemption of life.

In this perspective, believers do not live to "prove". Christ himself does not wait for us in subliminal and miraculous manifestations, but on the shore of an earthly spirituality.

Value does not need applause (a double-edged sword) - the mask of the artificial proposal, and inauthentic life.

Humanising correspondence does not grow with the multiplication of dizzying signals.

God does not coerce the unconvinced, nor does He overpower them with trials; thus He gains a heritage of Love in growth.

His authentic Church, without clamour or persuasive stance - seemingly insignificant - is all gathered in intimate unity with its Firstborn: native, portentous and regenerative power - solid and real.

The Queen of Noon sought captivating solutions to enigmatic curiosities, but she could know them within her soul and in life.

Incarnation: there are no other valid signs than the events and new relationships - with oneself and others - which bring forth the very and unprecedented Person of the Risen One [the one without wrappings].

The Eternal is no longer the pure transcendence of the Jews, nor the summit of wisdom of the ancient world.

The sign of the Most High is the story of Jesus alive in us. It opens the exciting road that leads to the Father.

We trust in Christ, so no spiritual drugs that delude us of happiness.

This is the meaning of the new Creation: in the surrender to the Spirit - but all concrete (not mannered) and proceeding dragging the alternative reality.

His Person is a unique signal, which dissolves the many ersatz religion of fears, fetters, established roles.

Tares that would like to imprison him in 'ally' doer of seductive and immediately resolving miracles.

Some into a simple temple purifier or a white mill character - and so are we, if we allow ourselves to be manipulated.

In fact, the religious leaders Jesus is addressing are those back in his communities!

These were Judaizers who wanted to frame the Messiah in the scheme of normal expectations to which they had always been accustomed.

Or they already had it and were fed up with it....

In these 'veterans' there was no sign of conversion to the idea of the Son of God as Servant, trusting in dreams without prestige.

In them? No trace of any new idea - nor any change of pace that would mark the demise of the blatant, dehumanising, and even sacred society - of the outside.

The popular leaders sometimes miss the meaning of the only living Sign: Jesus the Food of Life.

Because of them, not the distant ones, the Lord "groans in the spirit" [cf. Mk 8:12 Greek text] - even today, saddened by so much blindness.

Life is indeed precluded to those who cannot shift their gaze.

Immediately afterwards Lk (12,1) in fact refers to the danger of the dominant ideology that made the leaders themselves lose their objective perception of events.

A 'leaven' that was coarse but rooted in the painful experience of the people; that stimulated puffery even in the disciples, contaminating them.

To the first of the class it might have seemed that Jesus was a leader like Moses, for he had just fed the starving people in the desert [cf. Mt 15:32-39; Mk 8:1-9].

But the rejection is sharp: especially Mk (8:12) makes it sharp by emphasising the Master's sense of suffering.

Therefore, as also in Mt and Lk in the episode precisely of Jonah - his radical, peremptory denial.

To save the needy people there is no other way but to start from within.

Then proceeding towards a fullness of being that spreads out, approves us, and allows us to break our lives in favour of our brothers.

There is no escape.

Only communion with the concealed source of one's eminent Self and respectful and active dialogue with others saves one from a closed group mentality.

In this way, no club is allowed - claiming monopolistic exclusivity over God and souls (Lk 9:49-50) with an explicit claim to discipline the multitudes.

The community of the Risen One abhors the competitive conception of religious life itself, if it is a sacred reflection of the imperial world and of a society that cramps and embitter the existence of the little ones.

It would be a sick life in the pursuit of even apparent prestige.

Conversely, in fraternal realities "the smallest of all, he is great" (Lk 9:48). 

Therefore, it is imperative to prevent a pyramid mentality and discard mentality from creeping into the faithful.

A spirit of competition that then inexorably ends up seeking refuge in hypocritical miraculism, a substitute for a life of Faith.

The Master does the same to educate Church members who remain [some still do] affected by a sense of superiority towards crowds and outsiders.

A feeling of chosen and privileged people (Lk 9:54-55) that was infiltrating even the primitive communities.

To those who do not want to open their eyes except to have their senses captured by phenomena all to be discerned - because in spite of the official creed they profess, they remain tied to an ideology of power - the Lord never reserves impressive confirmations coming "from heaven" (Lk 11:16) that would be the paradoxical validation.

The only sign is and will be his living Church: the "victory" of the Risen One, pulsating in all those who take him seriously.

Without fixed hierarchies - under the infallible guidance of the Calling and the Word - the children know how to reinterpret, even in an unprecedented way.

Such is the prodigy, embodied in the thousand events of history, of personal and community life; in the impossible recoveries, recoveries and revaluations.

The authentic Messiah bestows no cosmic display.

No festival that compels spectators to bow their heads in the presence of such shocking glory and dignity - as if he were a heavenly dictator.

And no shortcut lightning.

Over the centuries, the Churches have often fallen into this 'apologetic' temptation, all internal to devotions of arid impulse: to look for marvellous signs and flaunt them to silence opponents.

Stratagems for a trivial attempt to shut the mouths of those who ask not for experiences of parapsychology, but rather for testimonies with little withering and without trickery or contrivance: of concrete disalienation.

Not bad, this liberation activity of ours in favour of the last, and one that holds fast; not clinging to the idea of a ruffian with triumphalist or consolatory aspects.

We prefer the wave of Mystery.

We yearn to be guided by an unknown energy, which has a non-artificial goal in store - led by the eminent but intimate and hidden Friend. Exclusive in us.

We will be one humanity in the Master, on the Right Path and belonging to us. Even along paths that are interrupted and incomplete, even of bewilderment.

In commentary on the Tao Tê Ching (i) Master Ho-shang Kung writes:

"The eternal Name wants to be like the infant that has not yet spoken, like the chick that has not yet hatched.

The bright pearl is inside the oyster, the beautiful gem is in the middle of the rock: however resplendent it may be on the inside, on the outside it is foolish and insipid'.

All of this is perhaps rated 'unconsciousness' and 'inconclusiveness'... but it bears what we are - expressing another way of seeing the world.

Within ourselves and within the Call of the Gospels we have a fresh power, approving the path different from the immediately normal and the glaringly obvious.

A Call that is enchantment, delight and splendour, because it activates us by questioning.

A Word that does not reason according to patterns.

A heartfelt plea, which is not impressed by exceptional things, by plays that suffocate the soul in search of meaning and authenticity.

Genuine Wonder, an indomitable impulse nested in the dimension of human fullness, and that does not give up: it wants to express itself in its transparency and become reality.

A kind of intimate Infante: it moves in a way that is judged 'abstruse', but puts things right, inside and out.

The free and life-giving testimony, attentive and always personally ingenious, will be innate and unprecedented, biting, inventive without shrewdness, unpredictable and not at all conformist.

It will unleash and unceasingly re-energise a convinced, singular, incisive experience of Faith - despite the fact that it may appear losing and unsuccessful, unhonourable and senseless.

Far more than miracles, the pleas of our essence and reality will make us recognise the call and action of God in people and in the fabric of history.

Invitations that can germinate other astonishments and prodigies of divine-human goodness, than paroxysmal visions seasoned with neurosis and empty sentimentality or magic.

The only sign of salvation is Christ in us - without seams or grand hysterical gestures.

He is the image and likeness of the new humanity; the manifestation of God's power on earth.

For authentic conversion: nothing external.

To internalise and live the message:

Of what kind is your search for evidence?

How does your sign making believe differ from gimmicks, acts of force, or what others would have you spread?

2) The book of Jonah announces to us the event of Jesus Christ - Jonah is a foreshadowing of the coming of Jesus. The Lord himself tells us this in the Gospel quite clearly.

Asked by the Jews to give them a sign that would openly reveal him as the Messiah, he replies, according to Matthew: "No sign will be given to this generation except the sign of Jonah the prophet. For as Jonah remained three days and three nights in the belly of the fish, so shall the Son of Man remain three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" (Matthew 12:39f).

Luke's version of Jesus' words is simpler: "This generation [...] seeks a sign but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For as Jonah was a sign for those of Nineveh, so also the Son of Man will be a sign for this generation' (Lk 11:29f). We see two elements in both texts: the Son of Man himself, Christ, God's envoy, is the sign. The paschal mystery points to Jesus as the Son of man, he is the sign in and through the paschal mystery.

In the Old Testament account this very mystery of Jesus shines through quite clearly.

The first chapter of the book of Jonah speaks of a threefold descent of the prophet: he goes down to the port of Jaffa; he goes down into the ship; and in the ship he puts himself in the innermost place. In his case, however, this threefold descent is an attempted escape before God. Jesus is the one who descends out of love, not in order to flee, but to reach the Nineveh of the world: he descends from his divinity into the poverty of the flesh, of being a creature with all its miseries and sufferings; he descends into the simplicity of the carpenter's son, and he descends into the night of the cross, and finally even into the night of the Sheòl, the world of the dead. In doing so, he precedes us on the way of descent, away from our false kingly glory; the way of penitence, which is the way to our own truth: the way of conversion, the way that leads us away from Adam's pride, from wanting to be God, towards the humility of Jesus who is God and for us strips himself of his glory (Phil 2:1-10). Like Jonah, Jesus sleeps in the boat while the storm rages. In a certain sense in the experience of the cross he allows himself to be thrown into the sea and thus calms the storm. The rabbis have interpreted Jonah's word "Throw me into the sea" as a self-offering of the prophet who wanted to save Israel with this: he was afraid of the conversion of the pagans and of Israel's rejection of the faith, and for this reason - so they say - he wanted to let himself be thrown into the sea. The prophet saves in that he puts himself in the place of others. The sacrifice saves. This rabbinic exegesis became truth in Jesus.

[Pope Benedict Card. Ratzinger, Lectio in s. Maria in Traspontina, 24 January 2003; in "30Giorni" February 2003]

4. In fact, Jesus invites us to discern the words and deeds which bear witness to the imminent coming of the Father’s kingdom. Indeed, he indicates and concentrates all the signs in the enigmatic “sign of Jonah”. By doing so, he overturns the worldly logic aimed at seeking signs that would confirm the human desire for self-affirmation and power. As the Apostle Paul emphasizes: “Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles” (1 Cor 1:22-23).

As the first-born among many brethren (cf. Rom 8:29), Christ was the first to overcome in himself the diabolic “temptation” to use worldly means to achieve the coming of God’s kingdom. This happened from the time of the messianic testing in the desert to the sarcastic challenge flung at him as he hung upon the cross: “If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross” (Mt 27:40). In the crucified Jesus a kind of transformation and concentration of the signs occurs: he himself is the “sign of God”, especially in the mystery of his Death and Resurrection. To discern the signs of his presence in history, it is necessary to free oneself from every worldly pretense and to welcome the Spirit who “searches everything, even the depths of God” (1 Cor 2:10).

[Pope John Paul II, General Audience 23 September 1998]

Here is the syndrome of Jonah, which "strikes those who do not have the zeal for the conversion of the people, they seek a holiness - allow me the word - a holiness of dyeing, that is, all beautiful, all well done but without the zeal that leads us to preach the Lord". The Pope recalled that the Lord "before this generation, sick with the Jonah syndrome, promises the sign of Jonah". He added: "In the other version, that of Matthew, it says: but Jonah was in the whale three nights and three days... The reference is to Jesus in the tomb, to his death and resurrection. And this is the sign that Jesus promises: against hypocrisy, against this attitude of perfect religiosity, against this attitude of a group of Pharisees'.

To make the concept clearer, the bishop of Rome referred to another parable from the Gospel "that represents well what Jesus wants to say. It is the parable of the Pharisee and the publican praying in the temple (Luke 14:10-14). The Pharisee is so sure before the altar that he says: I thank you God that I am not like all these people from Nineveh, nor like the one who is there! And the one who was there was the publican, who only said: Lord have mercy on me who am a sinner".

The sign that Jesus promises "is his forgiveness," Pope Francis pointed out, "through his death and resurrection. The sign that Jesus promises is his mercy, the one that God had already been asking for some time: mercy I want and not sacrifices". So "the true sign of Jonah is the one that gives us the confidence of being saved by the blood of Christ. There are many Christians who think they are saved only by what they do, by their works. Works are necessary, but they are a consequence, a response to that merciful love that saves us. Works alone, without this merciful love, are not enough.

So "the Jonah syndrome affects those who trust only in their personal righteousness, in their works". And when Jesus says "this wicked generation", he is referring to "all those who have Jonah's syndrome in them". But there is more: "Jonah's syndrome," said the Pope, "leads us to hypocrisy, to that sufficiency that we believe we achieve because we are clean, perfect Christians, because we do these works we keep the commandments, everything. A big disease, the Jonah syndrome!". Whereas "the sign of Jonah" is "the mercy of God in Jesus Christ who died and rose again for us, for our salvation".

"There are two words in the first reading," he added, "that connect with this. Paul says of himself that he is an apostle, not because he has studied, but he is an apostle by calling. And to Christians he says: you are called by Jesus Christ. The sign of Jonah calls us'. Today's liturgy, the Pontiff concluded, helps us to understand and make a choice: "Do we want to follow the syndrome of Jonah or the sign of Jonah?"

[Pope Francis, St. Martha, in L'Osservatore Romano 15.10.13]

Ash Wednesday [18 February 2026]

May God bless us and the Virgin protect us! I am now sending the texts for Ash Wednesday and Wednesday those for Sunday.

*First Reading from the Book of the Prophet Joel (2:12-18)

'Return to the Lord with all your heart'. The book of the prophet Joel is one of the shortest in the Old Testament: it has only seventy-three verses, divided into four chapters, and is generally dated around 600 BC, shortly before the Exile to Babylon. Three major themes are constantly interwoven in this writing: the announcement of terrible scourges, real or symbolic; the urgent call to fasting and conversion; and finally, the proclamation of the salvation that God grants to his people. It is above all the second theme, that of conversion, which the liturgy proposes at the beginning of the Lenten journey. The invitation to conversion opens solemnly with the typical formula of the prophets: "The word of the Lord." It draws attention and asks us to take seriously what follows. And what follows is a decisive word: "Return". It is the fundamental verb of biblical penitential language. God invites his people to return to him, while the people, in turn, implore God to "return", that is, to grant forgiveness and mercy. This return to God must be expressed through fasting, tears and mourning: traditional signs of penance. However, the prophets, and Joel in particular, warn against the risk of stopping at outward appearances. For this reason, the prophet strongly affirms: "Rend your hearts and not your garments". Authentic conversion is not a matter of visible rituals, but a profound change of heart. Joel thus follows in the great prophetic tradition inaugurated by Isaiah, who denounced empty and formal worship, incapable of transforming life: God rejects solemn feasts and multiplied prayers when hands remain stained with injustice. What He asks for is a true purification of the heart and actions, the abandonment of evil and a concrete commitment to good and justice. The same message is expressed in a particularly intense way in Psalm 50/51, which defines true conversion as a "broken and humbled heart". In the light of Ezekiel, this image takes on an even deeper meaning: it is necessary for the heart of stone to be broken so that a heart of flesh may finally be born, capable of listening to God and living according to his will. When Joel calls for hearts to be torn, he means precisely this radical transformation of the human being. Conversion, in Joel's view, aims to obtain God's forgiveness and avert deserved punishment. The prophet reminds us that the Lord is 'tender and merciful, slow to anger and rich in love' and leaves open a hope: perhaps God will retrace his steps, renounce punishment and save his people from humiliation before the nations. But the final announcement exceeds all expectations: forgiveness is not only possible, it has already been granted. The liturgical translation speaks of a God who is 'moved' by his people, but the Hebrew text is even stronger: 'The Lord burns with zeal for his land and has compassion on his people'. This is not a cold or distant pity, but a passionate and faithful love. It remains to be discovered in biblical revelation that this mercy is not reserved for Israel alone. The book of Jonah shows this in a surprising way, recounting the conversion of Nineveh, the pagan city: faced with the fasting and change of life of its inhabitants, God renounces the punishment he had announced. The message is clear: the Lord "burns with zeal" for all people, even those who seem distant or unworthy.

This truth will find its definitive expression in the New Testament, when St Paul affirms that God has manifested his love in a radical way: Christ died for us while we were still sinners (Rom 5:8).

*Responsorial Psalm (50/51)

"Have mercy on me, O God, in your love; in your great mercy blot out my guilt. Wash me clean of my guilt, purify me from my sin." The people of Israel are gathered in the Temple in Jerusalem for a great penitential celebration. They recognise themselves as sinners, but they also know God's inexhaustible mercy. And, after all, if they gather to ask for forgiveness, it is precisely because they know in advance that forgiveness has already been granted. This was the great discovery of King David, who had brought his beautiful neighbour Bathsheba (the wife of an officer, Uriah, who was at war at the time) to his palace and slept with her, and she became pregnant. Some time later, Bathsheba let David know that she was expecting his child. At that point, David arranged for the death of her betrayed husband on the battlefield, so that he could definitively take possession of the woman and the child she was carrying. Now, and this is where God's unexpectedness comes in, when the prophet Nathan went to David, he did not first try to extract a confession of repentance from him; instead, he began by reminding him of all the gifts he had received from God and announcing his forgiveness, even before David had had time to make the slightest admission of guilt (cf. 2 Sam 12). In essence, he said to him, 'Look at all that God has given you... and know that he is ready to give you anything else you want!'. Israel has always been able to verify that God is truly a merciful and compassionate Lord, slow to anger, rich in faithful love, according to the revelation made to Moses in the desert (Ex 34:6). The prophets also reiterated this message, and the verses of the psalm we have heard are imbued with the discoveries of Isaiah and Ezekiel. Isaiah, for example, has God say: "I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins" (Isaiah 43:25). The proclamation of God's gratuitous forgiveness sometimes surprises us: it seems too good to be true; to some it even seems unfair. If everything is forgivable, what is the point of making an effort? It is to forget too quickly that all of us, without exception, need God's mercy: so let us not complain about it! And let us not be surprised if God surprises us, because, as Isaiah says, "God's thoughts are not our thoughts". And in forgiving, Isaiah points out, God surprises us more than anything else. Faced with the ever-renewed proclamation of God's mercy, the people of Israel recognise themselves as sinners. The confession is not detailed, as it never is in the penitential psalms, but the essential is said in this supplication: Have mercy on me, O God, in your love, in your great mercy, blot out my sin... And God, who is all mercy, expects nothing more than this simple recognition of our poverty. After all, the word 'mercy' has the same root as the word 'alms': literally, we are beggars before God. At this point, we have two things left to do.

Simply give thanks for this forgiveness that is continually given. When Israel turns to God, it always acknowledges the goodness with which He has filled it since the beginning of its history, and this shows that the most important prayer in a penitential celebration is the acknowledgement of God's gifts and forgiveness: we must begin by contemplating Him; only then, this contemplation, revealing the gap between Him and us, allows us to recognise ourselves as sinners: we confess God's love together with our sin. Then the song of gratitude will flow spontaneously from our lips when God opens our hearts. "Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall proclaim your praise" (Psalm 50/51). Praise and thanksgiving can only arise in us if God opens our hearts and our lips. The second thing God expects of us is to forgive in turn, without delay or conditions... and that is quite a programme.

*Second reading from the second letter of St Paul to the Corinthians (5:20-6:2)

"Be reconciled to God," says Paul; but reconciliation implies that there is a quarrel: what quarrel is it? The men of the Old Testament discovered that God is not at odds with man. Psalm 102/103, for example, states: The Lord does not always contend, nor does he keep his anger forever; he does not treat us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities... Isaiah also invites the wicked to abandon their ways, the unrighteous to abandon their thoughts; return to the Lord, who will have compassion on you, to our God, who forgives abundantly (Is 55:7). And the book of Wisdom adds: 'You have mercy on all because you can do all things, and you turn away your gaze from the sins of men to lead them to repentance... You spare them all, because they are yours, Lord, who loves life... Your dominion over all makes you use clemency towards all' (Wisdom 11:23; 12:16). The men of the Bible experienced this, beginning with David. God knew that he had blood on his hands (after the killing of Uriah, Bathsheba's husband, 2 Sam 12), yet he sent the prophet Nathan to tell him in essence: "Everything you have, I have given you, and if that is not enough, I am ready to give you everything else you desire." God also knew that Solomon owed his throne to the elimination of his rivals, yet he listened to his prayer at Gibeon and granted it far beyond what the young king had dared to ask (1 Kings 3). Furthermore, God's very name — the Merciful One — means that he loves us even more when we are miserable. God, therefore, is not at odds with man; yet Paul speaks of reconciliation, because man has always been at odds with God. The text of Genesis (Genesis 2-3) attributes the accusatory phrase to the serpent: "God knows that on the day you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods, knowing good and evil" (Gen 3:4). In other words, man suspects that God is jealous and does not want his good. But since that voice is not natural to man (it is the serpent's), he can be healed of this suspicion. This is what Paul says: "It is God himself who calls you; we urge you in the name of Christ: be reconciled to God." And what did God do to remove this quarrel, this suspicion, from our hearts? He who knew no sin, God made him sin for us: Jesus knew no sin even for a moment, he was never at odds with the Father. Paul adds: 'He became obedient' (Phil 2:8), that is, trusting even through suffering and death. He sought to communicate to men this trust and the revelation of a God who is only love, forgiveness, and help for the little ones. Paradoxically, it was precisely for this reason that he was considered blasphemous, placed among sinners and executed as a cursed man (Deut 21:23). The darkness of men fell upon him, and God allowed it because it was the only way to make us realise how far his "zeal for his people" can go, as the prophet Joel says. Jesus suffered in the flesh the sin of men, their violence, their hatred, their rejection of a God of love. On the face of the crucified Christ, we contemplate the horror of human sin, but also God's gentleness and forgiveness. From this contemplation can come our conversion, our 'justification', as Paul says. They will look upon him whom they have pierced (cf. Zechariah 12:10; John 19:37). To discover in Jesus, who forgives his executioners, the very image of God means to enter into the reconciliation offered by God. We are left with the task of proclaiming this to the world: 'We are ambassadors for Christ', says Paul, considering himself sent on mission to his brothers and sisters. It is up to us to continue this mission, and this is probably the meaning of Paul's final quotation: "For it is written in Scripture: 'At the favourable time I answered you, on the day of salvation I helped you.'" Paul here takes up a phrase from Isaiah, who exhorted the Babylonian exiles to proclaim that the hour of God's salvation had come. In turn, Christ entrusted to the Church the task of proclaiming the forgiveness of sins to the world.

*From the Gospel according to Matthew (6:1-6, 16-18)

  Here we have two short excerpts from the Sermon on the Mount, which occupies chapters 5-7 of St Matthew; the entire sermon is built around its central core, the Lord's Prayer (6:9-13), which gives meaning to everything else. The recommendations we read today are not just moral advice: they concern the very meaning of faith. All our actions are rooted in the discovery that God is Father. Thus, prayer, almsgiving and fasting become paths to bring us closer to God the Father: fasting means learning to go out of ourselves, praying means centring ourselves on God, giving alms means centring ourselves on our brothers and sisters. Three times Jesus repeats similar, almost polemical formulations: Do not be like those who flaunt their piety.... It is important to remember how significant religious manifestations were in Jewish society at the time, with the inevitable risk of attributing too much value to outward gestures; and probably even prominent figures did not escape this! Matthew sometimes reports Jesus' rebukes to those who focused more on the length of their fringes than on mercy and faithfulness (Mt 23:5f). Here, however, Jesus invites his disciples to a truth operation: If you want to live as righteous people, avoid acting in front of others to be admired. Righteousness was the great concern of believers: and if Jesus mentions the pursuit of righteousness twice in the Beatitudes, it is because that term, that thirst, was familiar to his listeners: "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied" (5:6); "Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (5:10). True biblical justice consists in harmony with God's plan, not in the accumulation of practices, however noble they may seem. The famous phrase from Genesis — Abraham believed in the Lord, and it was credited to him as righteousness (Gen 15:6) — teaches us that justice is first and foremost righteousness, as in a musical instrument, a deep harmony with God's will.

The three practices — prayer, fasting, almsgiving — are paths to righteousness.

Prayer: let God guide us according to his plan: "Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." We wait for Him to teach us the true needs of the Kingdom. Jesus precedes the teaching of the Our Father with this recommendation: "When you pray, do not do as the pagans do... your Father knows what you need before you ask him (6:7-8).

Fasting: by ceasing to pursue what we believe is necessary for our happiness, which risks absorbing us more and more, we learn freedom and recognise true priorities; Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God (Mt 4:4).

Almsgiving: The word almsgiving comes from the same family as eleison: to give alms means to open one's heart to mercy. God wants the good of all his children; justice, understood as harmony with Him, inevitably includes a dimension of social justice. The parable of the Last Judgement (Mt 25:31-46) confirms this: "Come, blessed of my Father... for I was hungry and you gave me food... and the righteous will enter into eternal life." The behaviours that Jesus condemns — do not be like those who show off — are the opposite: they keep man centred on himself, closing his heart to the transforming action of the Spirit.

+Giovanni D'Ercole

Sons’ Prayer: performance or Listening?

Mt 6:7-15 (v.13)

«When you pray, do not babble like the pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their wordiness» (Mt 6:7; cf. Lk 11:1).

The God of religions was named with an overabundance of high-sounding honorific epithets, as if he craved ever more numerous ranks of incensers.

The «Father» is not accompanied by prestigious titles. A child doesn’t address the parent as a very high, eternal and omnipotent, but the a reliable family Person who transmits life to him.

And the son doesn’t imagine that he has to offer external cries and acknowledgments: the Father looks at needs, not merits.

«Et ne nos inducas in tentationem»: ancient Prayer of the sons.

«Do not induce us [Lead us not into]» is (in the Latin and Greek sense: «until the end») an ancient Symbol of the ‘reborn in Christ’, in the experience of real life.

In religions there are clearly opposed demons and angels: disordered and dark powers, contrary to the bright and "right" ones.

But by dint of relegating the former, the worst continually resurface, until they win the game and spread.

In the lives of the saints we see these great women and men strangely always under temptation - because they disdain evil, therefore they do not know it.

Gradually, however, the little constant naggings becomes overwhelming crowds.

The persons of Faith do not act according to pre-established and superficial models, not even religious ones; they are aware that they are not heroes or paradigm phenomena.

That's why they rely on. They let intimate problems go by: understood its strength!

This is the meaning of the formula of the Our Father, in its original sense: «and lead us not into [the end of] temptation [trial] (because we know our weakness)».

If, on the other hand, our 'counterpart' becomes a protagonist, a one-sided pivot, a constant afterthought, and a block, we’re done for.

Pain, failures, sadness, frustrations, weaknesses, a thousand anxieties, too many falls, accustom us to experience transgressions as part of ourselves: Condition to be evaluated, not "guilt" to be cut horizontally.

In the process of true salvific transmutation, that signal speaks of us: within a deviation or the eccentricity there is a secret or a knowledge to be found, for a ‘new personal birth’.

Looking at the discomforts and oppositions, we realize that these critical sides of being become like a malleable magma, which approaches our healing more quickly. As if through a permanent, radical conversion… because it involves and belongs to us; not in peripheral mode, but basically, of Seed and Nature.

Absorbed patterns and beliefs don’t allow us to understand that the passionate life is composed of opposing states, of competitive energies - which must not be disguised in order to be considered decent people.

Perceiving and integrating such depths, we lay down the idea and atmosphere of impending danger, devoid of further opportunity; only for death.

We become mature, without dissociation or hysterical states resulting from contrived identifications, nor disesteem for an important part of us.

In short, straits and "crosses" have something to tell us.

They shake the soul to the root, sweep away the absorbed masks, ignite the person, and save the life.

In this way, inconveniences and anxieties help us. They hide capabilities and possibilities that we do not yet see.

In the virtue of the shaky yet unique exceptionality for each person, here is the true journey opening up.

Path of the Father and of the heart, Way that wants to guide us to alternative trajectories, new dimensions of existence.

The difference of the Faith, compared to ancient religiosity [in the sense of the ‘Cross-inside’]?

It’s in the consciousness that only the sick heal, only the incomplete grow.

Only the halting women and men regain expression, evolve. And falling, they snap forward.

[Tuesday 1st wk. in Lent, February 24, 2026]