12th Sunday in Ordinary Time B (23.06.2024)

1. The Lord began to speak to Job in the midst of the hurricane. This is how the first reading begins, taken from the book of Job, which does not pretend to tell the real story of a man, but is rather a sapiential reflection on the great dramas and tragedies of man and humanity. The Jewish people knew that the universal flood destroyed everything and later experienced drought, the harshness of the desert, and therefore knew what it means to suffer hunger, thirst and disease. Presenting God as the one who rules the waters, the winds and nature becomes a symbolic way of proclaiming Israel's faith in divine omnipotence. We even read here that God speaks in the midst of the hurricane, an even more incisive way of saying that the Lord alone is the being who dominates the storm to such an extent that he becomes its spokesman. Job's troubled story invites us to consider that in the life of every person all kinds of upheavals can occur; in one way or another we all have to come to terms with the problem of evil in its various forms: physical, moral, social and spiritual suffering, loneliness, failure of every dream and project, injustice and exploitation, despair and death. The temptation of mistrust led people, as it does us too, to hold God guilty of evil because it is not enough to be a good and religious person, like Job a righteous man and faithful to God, to be spared of it. Experience shows that everyone can suddenly experience disasters and misfortunes of all kinds, just as happened to Job: the tragic end of his children, the blackest misery and the sudden loss of everything he owned, and, as if that were not enough, the illness that reduced him to a revolting human larva. It is in the midst of this existential travail that Job questions God as to the reason for the suffering that befalls a good person like him. And he receives an articulate answer from the Lord, of which today's biblical text relates to us only the beginning: an answer that takes the form of a long discourse that is well worth rereading in its entirety in the book of Job. God, in a gentle and quiet, but firm and decisive manner puts man in his place: you are not the creator of the world, nor are you the ruler of every natural phenomenon, nor are you the one who ensures food for the animals and their reproduction. Do not forget, then, that the life of every human being is in God's hands, but this absolute power of his over everything does not serve to prove and exalt his omnipotence, but rather tends to arouse man's confidence because nothing escapes God even when we find ourselves in the midst of misfortune. In short, those who wrote this Old Testament book want to encourage us not to despair when we feel powerless in the face of tragic unforeseen events because even when everything collapses, we always remain in the arms of a God who is Father. No matter how violent the storms may become, he will never let us succumb to evil. Job's lesson is an invitation to put our trust in God at all times, with patience and perseverance.

2. The theme of the first reading is taken up by the gospel page that closes with this question: "Who is this then, that even the wind and the sea obey him?". The evangelist Mark shows the contrast between the violence of the storm that threatens to submerge the boat, the fright of the disciples who wake up the Master worried, and the calmness of Jesus who, awakened from sleep, with a simple intervention resolves everything. In fact, he commands the sea and the wind: "Be quiet, calm down!" and immediately restores calm. If it is true that the entire gospel of Mark tends to offer the answer to the question: "Who is the Christ?", in today's passage we find the answer because it invites us to reflect that the reason why Jesus has power over creation by calming the fury of the waters and the wind, lies in the fact that he is God, the same God who, as we read in the first reading, limited the space of the waters, made the clouds his garment and blocked the arrogance of the waves of the sea by placing the forces of nature at the service of his people. At the same time that the disciples ask themselves the question of who this man is who dominates the violence of the waters, they also give themselves the answer: he is God's envoy and, precisely for this reason, as the evangelist emphasises, from being terrified by the storm they are then filled with wonder at the calm miraculously restored. What is most surprising in this text, however, is not the disciples' fear of the storm's fury and then the fear they feel before the one they recognise as God's envoy, but rather the question Jesus asks them: "Do you still have no faith?" We are surprised that Jesus asks the disciples this question. Realising our helplessness before certain trials and difficulties that surprise us and being afraid is quite normal. Jesus' question invites us to go further: when we are overwhelmed by something absolutely shocking that puts our life in crisis, how do we react? What is our attitude in the face of storms that suddenly turn the world upside down? Like the apostles, it is natural to cry out: Master we are lost and what are you doing, you are asleep and do not care about us? The evangelist Mark wants to warn us against the risk of falling into the temptation of interpreting God's frequent silence before what makes us suffer as a sign of his indifference and abandonment. On the contrary, the gospel wants to warn us against the risk of discouragement and invites us not to be afraid because God, in spite of everything, can do everything and bring us back to calm. He also reveals the secret to us: he assures us that everything is possible if, like him, we trust in our heavenly Father, the only one who can make us able to command the stormy sea and calm the raging wind. 

Let us try to reflect: "is not our feeling of helplessness in the face of difficulties already the sign of a lack of faith"? We certainly should not take our dreams as reality and believe ourselves omnipotent in God's way because everyday reality leads us back to our human limitation. However, it is a matter of growing in faith, that is, maintaining the trust that in Jesus all things are possible to us, including dominating the power of nature and the violence of evil. Such trust pacifies the heart and opens it to new horizons of hope even when we remain in the darkness of problems.

3. Here is the good news: with the advent of Jesus, a new world is born and nothing remains as before. In the Garden of Eden God commanded Adam and Eve to work and subdue the earth, and it was not a mere figure of speech, but God's plan that will be fully realised in Jesus. And Christ before his ascension says to the apostles: "All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations": he entrusts the entire planet to his disciples (Mt 28:19). Now, as St Paul states in today's second reading, the love of Christ possesses us and nothing more can separate us from this love in which we were immersed on the day of our baptism. St Paul goes on to explain: "If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; old things have passed away; behold, new things have come into being" (2 Cor 5:14-17). With Christ the new world is born: we are no longer in the world of the first creation, but must enter the world of Christ's resurrection. Baptism makes us new humanity called to live in the risen Christ an existence of solidarity, justice and sharing in the service of our brothers and sisters, imitating the Master who came not to be served but to serve. This newness of life, however, demands that we remain grafted into Christ in order to become 'new' persons, that is, renewed, and ready to face the battles against violence, injustice and hatred, which disfigure the face of humanity, counting on the power of divine love. May the Lord help us to consistently realise this Christian vocation of ours, so that, like St Paul, we may be able to affirm that it is no longer we who live, but Christ who lives in us, and consequently be ready to run "with perseverance in the race that lies ahead, keeping our gaze fixed on Jesus, the one who gives origin to faith and brings it to fulfilment" (Heb.: 12, 2). Ultimately, if we want to be consistent with our faith to the end, the word impossible is not part of the vocabulary of Christians, because everything is possible to God: is this not the real challenge for our faith?

+Giovanni D'Ercole

XI Sunday in Ordinary Time B (16 June 2024)

1. The first reading, taken from the book of the prophet Ezekiel, could be read as a parable of hope for the Jewish people. In order to understand it well, it is necessary to keep in mind the historical context marked by the occupation of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, who had deported the king and a good part of the inhabitants to Babylon, including the prophet Ezekiel himself, and, as if this were not enough, after a short time Jerusalem was completely destroyed and stripped of all its inhabitants who had been enslaved in Babylon. At that moment, Israel was in the grip of total discouragement because it had lost everything: the land, the concrete sign of God's blessing, its mediator king between God and the people, the temple, the place of God's presence, and it perceived its situation as a tree that had been cut down and was destined to be sterile, that is, without certainty or hope for the future. The recurring question was whether God had therefore abandoned his people and everyone's trust was put to the test. 

A kind of miracle took place, because in the midst of such a dramatic situation as the Babylonian deportation, the faith of Israel was purified to become more steadfast: an extraordinary jolt of faith of the chosen people took place, and Ezekiel was one of the architects of it. In the past he had tried to warn them by foreseeing what later occurred, but now that the catastrophe has fallen upon the people, his mission is to revive confidence and so he speaks a word of hope. He uses for this purpose the parable of the gigantic cedar we encountered in the first reading. Why the cedar tree? The cedar tree was the symbol of the dynasty of kings and thus an image of the exiled king who had become a dead tree from which, however, the Lord plucked off a twig in order to transplant it "upon a high mountain of Israel", which points to Jerusalem. Two victorious events are heralded here: the return of the Jewish people to their homeland and the restoration of the kingdom of Jerusalem, which will later see people flock to Jerusalem from all parts of the world and will then be the triumph of the one God. 

This proves that nothing is impossible for God who confirms: "I am the Lord, who humbles the high tree and raises up the low tree". And again: "I, the Lord, have spoken and I will do it". 

We see two aspects of the Jewish faith highlighted here: firstly, God is all-powerful and brings to fulfilment all that he promises; secondly, Israel preserves hope because it nurtures certainty in the divine intervention that brings to fulfilment all his promises. And indeed, here we are dealing with the announcement of the future Messiah, a promise that has sustained Israel's hope over the centuries, especially in the dramatic moments of its history, and the mission of the prophets, of which Ezekiel offers us a great example, contributes to nourishing this trust.

2. The Gospel text, as is often the case, recalls the first reading. Today it is St Matthew who tells us the parable of the mustard seed, the smallest of all seeds, which buried in the earth "sprouts and grows" until it becomes "greater than all the plants in the garden".  The twig plucked from the top of the barren cedar tree in the first reading and "the smallest of seeds" of which we read in the gospel bring to mind the life of every Christian. Thanks to the seed of God placed in us on the day of baptism, we have become potential trees of new life called to produce and scatter fruits of love and goodness. In particular, the Gospel parable emphasises two aspects of the Christian life: The seed placed by the Trinity in the heart of man grows every day silently in the earth, indicating that only God can ensure the total growth and fulfilment of our existence. The mention of the smallness of the mustard seed, even the smallest of all, comes to emphasise that we too, with our smallness and fragility, are in some way participants and indispensable collaborators in this surprising growth. And so it is good to let ourselves be guided by divine Providence, which has placed at our disposal two wings to fly towards heaven: God's intervention and man's action. The Christian tradition has translated this human-divine synergy into contemplation and action, highlighting the interconnection between praying understood as listening to God and acting as a response to the divine will. St Ignatius of Loyola writes in this regard: 'Act as if everything depended on you, knowing then that in reality everything depends on God' (cf. Pedro de Ribadeneira, Life of St Ignatius of Loyola, Milan 1998) and Gilbert Keith Chesterton summarises this human-divine project as follows: 'Pray as if everything depended on God; act as if everything depended on us'. 

If God sometimes seems absent from the horizon of our existence, we believe that He is always at work. Indeed, where the darkness becomes thicker, its light shines even more brightly. An example of this is the life of St John of the Cross, the great reforming saint of the Carmelite order, who had an untroubled but absurdly difficult existence. Yet it was precisely in his darkest moments, such as the time he spent in a prison isolated and abandoned by all, indeed betrayed even by his fellow brothers, that he wrote one of his most beautiful works of spirituality, from which many continue to draw inspiration in their journey of sanctification. And so one understands that the Christian life is a journey towards God. If, then, one bears within oneself a great love, this love almost gives one wings to bear more easily all the harassments, contrasts and injustices of this world, because one bears within oneself the great light of faith that consists in feeling loved by God and letting oneself be loved by him in Christ Jesus. Great temptation, however, is fear the mother of discouragement and pride the father of mistrust.

3. In short, the satanic trap of suspicion, which deceived the progenitors in the Garden of Eden, is always at work and we must remain on our guard, without ever losing the certainty that "the Lord my rock is righteous: in him is no evil" as the responsorial psalm taken from Psalm 91/92 makes us pray today. Israel is guilty of having accused its Lord on several occasions. Remember well when in the Sinai desert in days of great thirst, the people rebelled against Moses, accusing him and the Lord of having brought them out of Egypt and then leaving them to die of thirst in the desert. It is the famous episode of Massa et Meriba (Ex. 17:1-7). Yet even on that occasion, despite their rebellion, God showed himself greater than the resentment and wailing of the people out of anger, and caused water to gush forth for all from the rock. In memory of this event, Israel will call God 'his rock', a way of recalling the divine faithfulness that is stronger than any suspicion of his people. From this rock Israel throughout the centuries will continue to draw the water of its survival: it will be the source of its faith and trust. 

In the face of Israel's ingratitude God proclaims His faithfulness because He is infinite Mercy ready to make covenant with His own, He who is God of love and faithfulness, slow to anger and full of love.  From the word of God today we receive an invitation to keep a close watch on our existence because the trap of suspicion often returns in the course of life: when we are thirsty, when the water is not good, when we are hungry for happiness and everything seems to be going not as we would like but in the wrong direction, we are tempted to accuse God of having deceived and abandoned us. Be careful not to forget the lesson of the Garden of Eden when the cunning satanic serpent managed to make the man and woman believe that God was not sincere towards them and they fell into the trap of suspicion: they found themselves naked, that is, stripped of everything that constituted their rich divine inheritance.  

How to guard against the temptation of deception? How to protect oneself from the trap of suspicion is indicated to us by the psalm that the liturgy makes us meditate on today: it is necessary to remain firmly planted in God's temple like a cedar tree and not tire of repeating, even in the darkness of certain dark nights, that 'it is good to give thanks to the Lord and to sing to your name, O Most High' because to turn to God with confidence does good to ourselves. St Augustine says: 'Everything that man does for God profits man and not God'. Praying then and singing for God, "proclaiming his love in the morning and his faithfulness in the night" helps protect us from Satan's deception, fear and mistrust. The experience of so many saints shows that only truth and invincible trust in his love can enlighten us in every situation in life, while distrust and suspicion distort our view of reality. Suspecting that God wants to deceive us or abandon us to our fate is the trap we must not fall into, because it can become a deadly trap. Rather, let us follow the Apostle Paul's invitation in the second reading: "as long as we dwell in the body - for we walk in faith and not in vision - we are full of confidence and prefer to go into exile from the body and dwell with the Lord". (2 Cor 5:6-10).  While we are pilgrims to heaven, let us walk with our feet firmly planted on this earth, but let our heart find its reason for hope and commitment in Christ who already opens wide for us the door to eternal happiness.  Happy Sunday!

+ Giovanni D'Ercole

Commentary Liturgy 10th Sunday in O.T. (9 June 2024)

1. There are two fundamental choices possible in life: to live according to God or to choose to do without God. This is the fundamental option, a decision that originates in the very centre of the person, from the heart, seen as the nucleus of his personality. Fundamental decision that conditions all other choices because it is the basic orientation that concerns the whole of existence. The book of Genesis (chapters 2-3) speaks of this, presenting Adam and Eve in symbolic language in the garden of Eden entrusted to them by God with the task of cultivating and guarding it. At the centre of this garden is the tree of life and "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil", that is, the secret of the knowledge of what makes man happy or deprives him of happiness. And here is God's delivery: 'you may eat of all the trees in the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you must not eat, for on the day you eat of it you will surely have to die'.  The truth expressed here is that God created the human person, enriched him with intelligence and free will, and fixed what is good and vital for him. Wanting to define for ourselves in a radical way what is good or bad for us means making ourselves creators of ourselves and in other words wanting to make ourselves similar to God. In the divine plan, the reason for human happiness is God himself adhering to his will, because we are created to live in harmony with him. In his book 'Recognising God at the Centre of Life', a meditation text for the entire liturgical year, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Protestant theologian and pastor who died by hanging on 9 April 1945 in the Flossenbürg concentration camp in Germany, writes that 'to understand each morning in a new way the ancient faithfulness of God, to be able to begin a new life in the company of God every day: this is the gift that God gives us at the dawning of each day'.  

God's original plan was, however, undermined by the tempter serpent who, with deceitful cunning, provoked Eve by insinuating that God had forbidden her to eat of every tree in the garden. The woman rightly replied that according to the Creator's delivery, the fruit of every tree can be eaten, except that of the knowledge of good and evil. She is saying something right, but without realising it she came into contact with the serpent, bewitched by the prospect of becoming like God without needing God and with a simple magic gesture, and allowed herself to be convinced: she took the fruit and ate it, sharing it with Adam, later acknowledging: 'The serpent deceived me and I ate'.  

Beyond the symbolic language, a fundamental truth is spoken here: by detaching himself from God, man runs the risk of no longer even understanding himself and others. The consequence was indeed dramatic: the eyes of both opened and they realised that they were naked and ashamed of each other, compromising the harmonious transparency of their relationship. Satan succeeded in deceiving human beings and ruining the original harmony of creation.

2. From this biblical episode we can draw some useful considerations: human life will now be subject to the temptations of the Evil One, who will try in every way to separate man from his Creator. However perverse human nature may become, the Bible teaches that evil is not intrinsic to man; rather, it is external to him, and only when he allows himself to be seduced and deceived does it open up dangerous paths of sadness and unhappiness for him. After original sin, life is a struggle for everyone and throughout the entire history of salvation, the prophets have always warned the chosen people against Satan's deceptive seductions. But God does not abandon the human creature to himself: where there is sin, divine mercy shines even more brightly. God condemns the serpent: "Because thou hast done this, cursed art thou among all cattle and among all wild beasts". He curses evil, and his wrath in the Bible is always against that which destroys man, since evil does not come from God, nor is it essentially part of human nature. Adam and Eve's aspiration to be like God was quite right and it is also ours, since the Creator has structured us in his image and likeness and the divine breath is our breath. Under Satanic deception, however, our progenitors believed it to be their own achievement to be like God and not a free gift to be cultivated in trusting harmony with him. The adherence of the progenitors to the serpent's temptation has made us all susceptible to evil. But all is not lost, for God addressing the serpent assures him: 'I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your seed and her seed: she shall crush your head and you shall bruise her heel'.  A struggle is therefore envisaged, the outcome of which is already known: it will ultimately be Christ who will win and evil will never have the last word.  Christian theology defines this text from Genesis (3:15) with the term proto-gospel and considers it a prophecy of the future Messiah, called here 'the offspring of the woman', who would redeem humanity itself, snatching it from the condemnation it deserved because of the sin it had committed. God, who never abandons the human creature that has come out of his hands, manifests in this way his infinite mercy, just as he, in condemning humanity, had manifested his justice.

3. "O Father, who sent your Son to deliver man from the power of Satan, increase in us faith and true freedom". So we pray at the beginning of Mass on this Tenth Sunday of Ordinary Time. Jesus Christ came into the world to redeem humanity from the bondage of evil. Let us better understand this message of hope by analysing today's page of Mark's gospel. Strangely enough, the behaviour and miracles performed by Jesus appear to some as surprising, even shocking, and everyone tries to come up with an explanation: Jesus is mad for his relatives, whereas for the religious authorities he has even made a pact with the devil. Jesus does not argue with those who think he is a madman, but takes seriously the accusation that he is possessed by the devil. And so we reason: if unity is strength, a family or a group divided within itself will be easy prey for enemies. If, therefore, you say that I cast out demons through their leader Beelzebul, it means that Satan is working against himself, and then he will easily go to ruin. Then follows a short parable that we find more common in Luke's gospel (11:14-26): "No one can enter the house of a strong man and plunder his possessions unless he first binds him. Only then can he plunder his house'.  The strong man in this case is Satan, and if Jesus becomes master of the house having expelled the demons, it means that he is stronger than Satan: he is the triumphant over evil. In the first reading, victory was foretold, and here Jesus presents himself as the one who achieves it. But then follows a warning: "Verily I say unto you, all things shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, sins, and also all blasphemies that they shall utter: but whosoever shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven for ever: he is guilty of eternal guilt. Once again, we are reassured that God's mercy is infinite, and the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart that we celebrated last Friday reminded us of this well.

4. There is, however, an unforgivable sin that Jesus calls blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. At the beginning of the gospel Mark recounts that Jesus' fame had spread throughout the region, reaching as far as Jerusalem: he healed the sick and those possessed by the devil were set free. Healings and especially expulsion of demons were signs that the kingdom of God had come (cf. Luke 11:20).  However, some scribes and doctors of the law were so far from God that they did not recognise the Lord's work in these wonders. And it is precisely this attitude that is targeted by the Lord because it is that of Satan, the serpent who insinuated to Adam and Eve that God was cheating them because he did not love them. Jesus is not far from treating the scribes as poisonous snakes, he condemns their attitude because they do not recognise God's work. Attributing evil and deceitful intentions to God, that is what Jesus calls "blasphemy against the Holy Spirit". In fact, the very moment Jesus heals or expels a demon, the scribes treat him as a demon himself, instead of recognising him as the victor over Satan. It is the rejection of love, and love can only give itself if it is accepted. Jesus defines this sin as unforgivable: not because it is God who refuses his love and forgiveness, but because it is the hearts of the hermetically closed scribes that become refractory, that is, indifferent, insensitive, unwilling, deaf, to God's love.  And the conclusion of today's gospel makes us realise who the true friends and family of Christ are: 'He who does the will of God, this one is brother and sister and mother to me'.  In the background, these words from the prologue of the Fourth Gospel sound like a warning: "He came among his own, and his own did not receive him. To those who received him, however, he gave power to become children of God" (Jn 1:12). 

A question to close: how many today, by welcoming Christ into their lives, are sincerely willing to fight against the satanic serpent that continues to deceive humanity in so many ways? 

+ Giovanni D'Ercole

P.S. "My dear Malacoda, I note with deep regret that your patient has become a Christian. Do not entertain any hope of escaping the punishments that are usually inflicted in such cases'. Here is a passage from the book I recommend: "The Letters of Berlicche (original title The Screwtape Letters), an epistolary tale written by C.S. Lewis and first published in 1942.

An experienced and highly efficient Satan's official, Berlicche sends his young nephew Malacoda, a devil's apprentice, a series of letters to instruct him in the art of conquering (and damning) his 'patient'. Every manifestation of life, from thought to prayer, from love to friendship, from amusement to social life, from pleasure to work and war: everything is distorted for devilish purposes and becomes an expedient to lose men. The book is very short - just over a hundred pages - and is presented as an epistolary of Berlicche, a long-time devil, in dialogue with his young nephew Malacoda. Of the exchange, as the title suggests, we have only the part of Berlicche. Lewis, in order not to make the reader lose his bearings, opens each of the letters of Berlicche by having the devil give a small summary of what he received from his nephew Malacoda. A good device to make the narrative thread more linear. Before the letters we find a preface in which the author declares that he does not wish to narrate the circumstances in which he received the epistolary and takes the opportunity to remind readers that the Devil is a liar and invites them not to believe Berlicche. Finally, he states that the letters were not put in chronological order so there may be some temporal inconsistencies. Despite the brevity of the book, The Letters of Berlicche are not easy to digest. The pages are filled with elements of philosophy, morality, ethics and religion. God - or The Enemy, as he is called - is the villain of the story. He is a deity who does not really care about mankind but who, because of the way he has constructed his 'marketing', has passed off messages such as charity and mercy. Berlicche's goal is to raise Malacoda as a skilled devil capable of perpetrating the art of temptation and leading his victims astray (good from their point of view). It does so by giving advice and delving into the mechanisms not only of the human mind but also of how temptation itself works. Taking into account the complex themes, the Letters of Berlicche offer a reflection on man, sin and the Christian-Catholic religion. It is a small treatise hidden beneath an apparently light narrative mode but concealing a depth of content difficult to find in other works by Clive Staples Lewis.

*Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast, Ireland, on 29 November 1898. His career began by teaching English Language and Literature at Oxford University, where he became a close friend of the writer J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Lord of the Rings. With Tolkien and others (including Charles Williams) he founded the informal literary circle of the 'Inklings'. C.S. Lewis is not only known for The Chronicles of Narnia series (consisting of 7 books), but also for his books of religious reflection: Christianity As It Is and Surprised by Joy. Also in the wake of fantasy, C.S. Lewis produced a trilogy, written between 1938 and 1945, consisting of the volumes Far from the Silent Planet, Perelandra and That Hideous Force. Clive Staples Lewis died in Oxford on 22 November 1963.

Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ (2 June 2024)

1. Today's celebration of the Body and Blood of Christ sums up the entire mystery of our salvation and we can well say that the Eucharist is the heart of the Church, the face on Earth of the Most Holy Trinity. With today's solemnity, Christians proclaim that Christ, the only-begotten Son of God made man is truly present under the signs of the consecrated bread and wine. So true is this, that even the greatest mystical gifts, the experience of visionaries and the miracles performed by the saints are worth far less than communion received with devotion and sincere faith. Jesus in the Eucharist is the one great and extraordinary miracle that unfortunately often goes unnoticed because of the habit and ease with which we can approach communion and participate in the celebration of holy mass. Precisely in order to help us not to forget that the whole of life must be oriented towards Christ, the Church wanted today's solemnity of Corpus Christi, which takes us back to the Upper Room where the Eucharist was instituted on Holy Thursday, the Bread that, as Origen writes, "is the salvation of the world" (panis pro mundi salute). The bread and wine, the basic elements of our nourishment, were chosen by the Lord for this mystery of communion between heaven and earth. Pope Benedict XVI, on the feast of Corpus Christi (15 June 2006), invited us to see in the sign of bread the pilgrimage of Israel during the forty years in the desert. The Host is our manna with which the Lord nourishes us and is the true bread from heaven, through which He gives Himself.  First great truth: "With each of the two signs (the bread and the wine)," notes Benedict XVI, "Jesus gives himself entirely, not just a part of himself. The Risen One is not divided. He is a person who, through signs, draws near to us and unites with us. The signs, however, each represent, in their own way, a particular aspect of the mystery of Him and, by their typical manifestation, they want to speak to us, so that we may learn to understand a little more of the mystery of Jesus Christ".

2. First of all, the bread! In many parishes today, if it has not already taken place last Thursday, the solemn Eucharistic procession parades through the streets of cities and towns, showing everyone the true treasure of the Church: the Blessed Sacrament. In other processions, statues of Mary and saints are carried according to popular devotions, but today everyone looks and tends to the consecrated Host, solemnly carried by the bishop or priest. The procession thus becomes a time of adoration and itinerant praise contemplating the Host, which is the simplest kind of bread and nourishment, made only of a little flour and water. Bread, said Pope Benedict, "is the fruit of the earth and at the same time of heaven... bread of the poor, which appears to us as a synthesis of creation. Heaven and earth as well as man's activity and spirit come together. We thus begin to understand why the Lord chooses this piece of bread as his sign. But to truly enter into the mystery of Christ, we must return with our minds to the request that some Greeks made: that of being able to see him, to meet him. On that occasion, a few days before his passion and death, Jesus said: "Truly, truly, I say to you, if the grain of wheat that falls into the earth does not die, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit" (Jn 12:24). In the bread made of ground wheat grains lies the mystery of the Passion. "The flour, the ground grain," notes Pope Benedict, "presupposes the dying and rising of the grain. In being ground and baked, it then carries within itself once again the same mystery of the Passion... Through his suffering and dying freely, Jesus became bread for us all, and... accompanies us in all our suffering until death. There is more: the ground grains together form one bread, and this is a sign for every community. "We ourselves, from the many that we are, must become one bread, one body", says St Paul (1 Cor 10:17). Thus, the sign of bread becomes both hope and a task of fidelity for every baptised person, called to live from the Eucharist and to bear witness to the joy of being part of the people who feed on Christ. "Behold the bread of angels, the bread of pilgrims, the true bread of children: it must not be thrown away" (From today's Sequence before the Gospel).

3. Then there is the sign of wine, which is also very eloquent for our life. Benedict XVI notes: "While bread recalls everyday life, simplicity and pilgrimage, wine expresses the exquisiteness of creation: the feast of joy that God wants to offer us at the end of time and that he already now always anticipates in the manner of a hint through this sign".  However, wine also recalls the Passion and the meaning and value of suffering. Every vine must be pruned repeatedly to be purified so that it can produce abundant fruit. The grape harvest represents a destiny similar to that of the harvest: to be crushed in order to satiate man and intoxicate him. The vine suffers under the vinedresser's hand, it feels its shoots, which are growing luxuriantly, mutilated, but only then will it be able to offer rich and tasty bunches of grapes. By participating in the Eucharist we also learn to remain patient and trusting in the hands of God who mysteriously prunes us through the difficulties, sufferings, events and every occasion of existence. We learn the docility of the grapes that ripen under the sun and rain, are then picked and pressed, that is, crushed so that they become wine. Only in this way, by joining Christ in his passion, can we be transformed into "fine wine that gladdens the heart of man" (cf. Psalm 104:15). In the Bible, the vine symbolises prosperity and fruitfulness to which wine is closely linked, as a symbol of joy, of feasting, of banqueting. And it is the evangelist John who gives new meaning to the vine, identifying it with Jesus, when in the Upper Room he speaks of the "cup of my blood". In the gospel we read that Jesus took a cup of red wine and said: "This cup is the new covenant in my blood" (1 Cor 11:25), in my shed blood. When blood is spilled in an accident, for surgery or in a crime, it has no value because it is lost and must be discarded. When it is taken from a donor, it is carefully collected and preserved because it can serve to save another person's life. Blood can also be poured out in religious sacrifice, in which case it is chosen because one sacrifices the best one has: blood poured out and collected so that it can be offered. The 'chalice' makes us understand what blood is involved in the Eucharist: precious blood, gathered to be offered in a chalice and shared with all so that each one may drink from it. "The blood of the new covenant poured into a cup" therefore means the gift of the life and blood of Christ, offered to the Father as a sacrifice of infinite value and given to Christians in a communion of salvation. It is "the cup of blessing" (1 Cor 10:16) that replaces definitively "the cup of wrath" (Jer 25:15ff) and fills the believer's soul with joy and peace. "O Blood of life, of unity and peace, mystery of love and source of grace, inebriate our hearts with the Holy Spirit" (From the prayer of the Missionaries of the Precious Blood). I conclude with this invocation of Benedict XVI: 'In the procession we follow this sign (the consecrated Host) and so we follow Him. And we pray to him: Guide us on the paths of this our history! Show the Church and her Pastors the right path again and again! Look at humanity that suffers, that wanders insecurely among so many questions; look at the physical and psychic hunger that torments it! He gives men bread for body and soul! Give them work! Give them light! Give them yourself! Purify and sanctify us all! Make us realise that only through participation in your Passion, through "yes" to the cross, to renunciation, to the purifications you impose on us, can our life mature and reach its true fulfilment. Gather us from all ends of the earth! Unite your Church, unite torn humanity! Give us your salvation! Amen!

+ Giovanni D'Ercole

N.B. Which bread and wine should be used for the Mass? In 2017, the then Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments in a circular letter to bishops on bread and wine for the Eucharist specified that: a) "The bread used in the celebration of the Holy Eucharistic Sacrifice must be unleavened, exclusively of wheat and freshly prepared so that there is no risk of decomposition. It follows, therefore, that that which is prepared with other matter, even if cereal, or that to which matter other than wheat has been mixed, in such a quantity that it cannot be said, according to common estimation, to be wheat bread, does not constitute valid matter for the celebration of the sacrifice and the Eucharistic sacrament. It is a grave abuse to introduce other substances, such as fruit, sugar or honey, into the bread of the Eucharist. It goes without saying that the wafers must be made by people who are not only distinguished by their honesty, but who are also expert in preparing them and equipped with suitable instruments" (n. 48). b) "The wine used in the celebration of the Holy Eucharistic Sacrifice must be natural, from the fruit of the vine, genuine, unadulterated and not mixed with foreign substances. [...] The greatest care must be taken to ensure that the wine intended for the Eucharist is kept in perfect condition and does not become vinegar. It is absolutely forbidden to use wine about whose genuineness and provenance there is any doubt: the Church demands, in fact, certainty regarding the conditions necessary for the validity of the sacraments. Let no pretext be admitted, then, in favour of other drinks of any kind, which do not constitute valid matter" (n. 50).  Those who make the bread and produce the wine for the celebration must nourish the consciousness that their work is oriented towards the Eucharistic Sacrifice and this demands honesty, responsibility and competence from them".

Solemnity of the Holy Trinity - Sunday 26 May 2024

1. Who is God? Mankind has always asked this question and there are various paths to seek an answer. Two especially: to struggle alone, but this presupposes that the mystery of God is within our grasp, which seems highly unlikely, or to let God Himself manifest Himself.  In the Old Testament, the Lord creates man through the 'ruah', the breath that gives life, the divine breath that little by little reveals who God is in a gradual process that reaches, at the culmination of the journey, the mystery of the Trinity: God One and Trinity.  Israel, chosen to be God's people, had to walk the long road of the Old Testament, thanks to the unceasing work of the prophets, to free itself from polytheism and come to believe in the one God. However, pure monotheism was not achieved in one fell swoop and an intermediate stage was that of henotheism: that is, a single God of Israel was professed, meaning that other peoples had their own gods. It was probably during the Babylonian exile that the God of Abraham and Moses was discovered as the only God of the entire universe. The profession of faith 'Shema Israel, Hear Israel, our God is Lord One' has then taken on its full value. But this oneness of God appears completely incompatible with the recognition of the Spirit 'ruah' as a person. This will happen with Pentecost and will mark the experience of the first Christian communities. As for the Son of God, this title usually given to each king on the day of his coronation in no way signified a generational link. It was Jesus himself who revealed this, but even his words were only understood in the light of Pentecost.

2. The understanding of the mystery of the Trinity, despite every human effort, is still not totally perceptible with the intelligence, but is only accepted in the adherence of faith. The Holy Trinity - One God is thus the final stage of God's self-revelation and helps to understand at the same time the Trinitarian structure of our own personal existence: we have been created in the image and likeness of God, body, soul and spirit. 

In the first reading from the book of Deuteronomy, composed late in the Bible, the divine plan of his revelation is presented: He is both the God of the chosen people and the God of all peoples because he is the one and only true God. For Israel, freed from polytheism, it was impossible to conceive of a One and Three Persons God, and the first stage of divine pedagogy, which marks the entire Old Testament, was the self-revelation of God as the One God.  The passage from Deuteronomy (the first reading) summarises in a few words the catechism of the people of Israel, that is, the first stage of divine pedagogy: "Know therefore this day and meditate well in your heart that the Lord is God up there in heaven and down here on earth: there is no other.  In other words: there are not many gods, but God alone is God, without giving a definition or description of God. On the other hand, the wonders and marvellous works performed by him are recounted: "Question the ancient times when God created man on earth, and from one end of the heavens to the other was there ever such a thing as this, and was there ever heard such a thing as this? ". God will give his people the promised land and the commandments as a code of happiness: "Observe therefore his laws and his commands that you and your children may be happy". The people react to this unexpected revelation of God with wonder and surprise. One could think of a creator and powerful God, but how can one imagine a God who reveals himself, who speaks of himself, who chooses a people and takes an interest in them, intervenes on their behalf in many ways? Yet God did not make himself known as the distant God and the God of power the Elohim, but as the Lord, that is, the God of presence who reveals to Moses his name made up of four consonants: "YHVH". It will remain to be understood that his presence is not only for Israel, but for all peoples, and the chosen people will have to understand that they have been chosen not to conquer others, but to place themselves at the service of all mankind.  As a covenant people Israel is destined - notes André Chouraqui - to become the future instrument of the covenant of peoples.

3. The concluding page of Matthew's gospel, which we meditate on today, presents Jesus at the end of his stay on earth, as he entrusts the apostles with the task of continuing his own mission: "Go and make disciples of all nations" and reassures them: "I am with you always, until the end of the world". The Master trusts to send them to all parts of the world for a mission that will last until the end of time, a mission full of risks to witness Jesus Christ, the Son of God made man. In fact, announcing Jesus Christ dead and risen as God was a scandal and blasphemy for the Jews, while the pagans considered it human foolishness, as St Paul notes in the First Letter to the Corinthians: "Christ crucified is a scandal to the Jews, foolishness to the Gentiles, but to those who believe he is power, the wisdom of God!  

The Master closes his earthly mission by entrusting his followers with the task of setting the world on fire with the fire of his love: "Go and baptise all peoples in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit". Here we have the first presentation of the mystery of the Holy Trinity. By using the expression in the name of the Father, which recurs frequently in the Bible, it is clearly evident that we are dealing with one and the same God; at the same time the three Persons are named distinctly: in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. In biblical language, the noun indicates the person and the verb to baptise means to immerse: it is therefore understood that baptism immerses us forever, as in a bath of eternal salvation, in the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity. Moreover, Jesus' command is precise and peremptory: "Go!". For how can we not be caught up in the rush when we understand such an important and exciting mission that constitutes the secret of human happiness and that is for every person of different cultures and races, until the end of time?

4. Through baptism each of us has been immersed in God, the Holy Trinity: Father and Son and Holy Spirit, and we are reborn to immortal life to bear witness that Christ is alive. From the very beginning, the Trinitarian formula of baptism represented a real revolution for the first Christian communities, which, as we read in the Acts of the Apostles, had to suffer misunderstandings and persecutions by the Jews, persecutions that even seemed inevitable precisely to defend the oneness of God. Jesus predicted it well: they will drive you out of the synagogues and persecute you; worse still, they will kill you, imagining that they are thus truly worshipping God. And they will do all this because they have known neither me nor the Father (cf. Jn 16:2-3). Then, as now, the mission that the Master entrusts to Christians is humanly insane and it remains impossible to explain with human reasoning how God is One and Triune. So what? Every true conversion occurs when, although one considers it necessary to search for God with the human intelligence, one humbly recognises that it is inadequate to grasp the mystery of the One and Triune God, and with trust one surrenders oneself into the heart of God, allowing oneself to be transformed by His love: Holy Trinity, life of love and path of the saints. St Anselm of Aosta, in the year 1000, making his own an expression of St Augustine, concludes his research in this way: 'I believe in order to understand, I do not understand in order to believe'. And he adds, praying: "Lord, teach me to seek you and to show you that I seek you. I cannot seek you if you do not teach me, nor find you if you do not show yourself. May I seek you by desiring you, may I desire you by seeking you, may I find you by loving you, and may I love you by finding you."

 + Giovanni D'Ercole 

P.S. I conclude with an episode from the life of St John XXIII. A few days after his election as pope - we are in October 1958 - he receives a visit from a friend who says to him: 'Your Holiness how heavy is the load you have accepted to carry!'  The Pope replied: "It's true, in the evening when I go to sleep I think "Angelo you are the pope" and I struggle to sleep; but after a few minutes I say to myself "Angelo, how stupid you are, the person in charge of the Church is not you, but the Holy Spirit, and a little later I turn away and fall asleep". Even if we do not come to understand the mystery of the Holy Trinity, we can sleep peacefully without anxiety. Evangelisation is our mission, but Jesus made it very clear that all power was given to him in heaven and on earth. He adds to reassure us: I am with you all days until the end of the world. The God who revealed his presence to Moses in the burning fiery furnace and Emmanuel, the God with us, promised in the prophecies of Isaiah are none other than the Spirit of Love that unites them, the Spirit that guides the Church and the mission of every believer. The commitment is to make visible with life this loving presence of God-Trinity.

(Gal 5:16-25)

Galatians 5:16 Therefore I say to you, walk by the Spirit, and you will not be led to satisfy the desires of the flesh;

"Walk. Life is a journey; we have not arrived. Man is not simply what he is, but what he becomes, and he becomes according to the end he sets out to do, and if you take away his end and his walk, you take away the meaning of his life, that is, he does not know what to do, he does not know what the meaning of life is. So it is important to walk and to have an end to walk towards. Jesus Christ sets himself up as a shepherd, and man, likened to a sheep, always follows someone. Man inevitably follows someone, he seeks something outside himself; and walking is a discipline, it is a toil, it is a leaving behind of things, and going towards others - it is a growing up.

"Walk according to the Spirit" means to follow the truth of the gospel, to put the law of the New Covenant into practice. Walking according to the Spirit also has another meaning. It means to follow the motion of the Holy Spirit, to allow oneself to be led by Him, to be moved by Him in the fulfilment of God's will. He moves so that we obey God, so that our every action is a perfect fulfilment of God's will. There is a walking according to the Spirit and a walking according to the flesh; if one walks according to the Spirit, he does not fulfil the 'desires of the flesh'.

The 'flesh' is the man who walks without God, decides without God, wants to be without God; works without God, deals with himself and others without God, in total ignorance of Him. Without God means without God's will, without God's wisdom, without God's truth, without the comfort of His love and grace. For without God man can do no good, he walks in the flesh and follows the passions and lusts of the flesh. This is the reality of man walking without the Spirit.

Here are two antithetical models of existence, that according to the Spirit of God and that based on the 'flesh', which in St Paul's language does not mean the physical body, but the unregenerate, unbelieving man who lives according to the principle of sin.

One can satisfy his desires through possession: the flesh tells me what I lack and I take it; food I lack, I am hungry and I take it; people I lack and I take them; God I lack and I take Him. This is living the relationship according to the flesh, that is, living it according to the selfishness of the old man, where at the centre is me and my needs, and others are all according to my needs. To live according to the Spirit, on the other hand, is to live myself, things and others, as a gift from God, therefore as a relationship, which is something else entirely, because the gift of God is a gift, not a possession.

What was the mistake of the first man, Adam? That what was given to him, instead of living it as a gift - his divine likeness - he abducted it as a possession; and living in possession - of things, of persons, of God - is exactly living according to the flesh, that is, putting one's self, egoism, as the principle of life.

Man is essentially lack, he is need: the problem is how he satisfies his needs. The same realities can be experienced in two opposite ways. There are not two different realities, reality is one, and we can live the same thing selfishly according to the desires of the flesh, or according to the Spirit. Clearly, the desire of the flesh and the desire of the Spirit are always intertwined in us, but we must learn to distinguish between them, even if we often pretend not to.

It is not a matter of submitting to a law, but to the Spirit, in the freedom in which Christ has placed us. It is not a question of laying down rules to be conformed to in one's conduct, but, instructed by the word of God, letting God guide our lives, by the Spirit, because the Spirit does not act automatically in the heart of a believer, but waits for the believer to depend on him.

It is by the Spirit of God that we can overcome our passions and lusts. He who wants to gain perfect freedom from his flesh knows that he must live and walk in the Spirit. Where there is no Spirit of God, there is no supernatural life. There is an animal life, that is, life according to the flesh, where there is no truth but concupiscence, no love but instinct, no hope but immersion in the immediate and in that moment in which we make our whole life consist. This is the situation of every man who is without the Spirit of the Lord. This is also the situation of that Church that has thought and thinks that one no longer needs the Holy Spirit, because everything has become and must become a matter between men.

If the Spirit is necessary for man to walk according to God and not follow the flesh in its desires, it is evident that the Church must do everything possible to teach how to follow and walk according to the Holy Spirit. But the individual believer must also make every effort to invoke the Holy Spirit through prayer, committing all of himself to grow in virtue.

Let me add one thing: man becomes what he desires, desires what he takes into consideration, and takes into consideration what he proposes or is proposed to him. Now, among the many proposals that there may be, and that there are in fact in daily life, that come to us from society and the mass media, I believe that it is necessary, that is, indispensable, to propose a word that shows God's project: man becomes what he desires, desires what he takes into consideration, takes into consideration what is proposed or is proposed to him; well, then, let the word of God be proposed: that man will consider, that he will desire and that he will become.

 Argentino Quintavalle, author of the books 

- Revelation - exegetical commentary 

- The Apostle Paul and the Judaizers - Law or Gospel?

Jesus Christ true God and true Man in the Trinitarian mystery

The prophetic discourse of Jesus (Matthew 24-25)

All generations will call me blessed

 Catholics and Protestants compared - In defence of the faith

(Buyable on Amazon)