(Mt 6:19-23)

«Where your Treasure is, your heart will be there» (v.21). It’s not a tasteless personal or institutional problem; on the contrary, it is indispensable for to find again yourself.

Ignoring it means giving additional breath to it, making grow out of proportion; making it even more out of time and difficult to read - and identify its therapies.

In order to understand and activate different resources, each community must go through the moments of the most severe verification - overcoming the stumbling block ‘forward’, "outgoing".

In the form of Relationship, everything opens up intense life - which integrates and goes beyond self-love, the thirst for domination.

This frees us from the "old", that is, it closes a cycle of paths already developed - to make us return as newborns.

Hope that has weight dismantles the inessential; it expels the noise of thoughts that are no longer in tune with our growth, and introduces dreamy energies, a wealth of possibilities.

There will be initial resistance, but development is predisposed.

Hope sacrifices ballasts and activates us according to the ‘inner divine’. It opens the doors wide to a new phase, brighter and corresponding.

The earth’s treasures quickly blind; likewise they pass: suddenly. The age of global crisis slams it in our face.

Yet, it’s a necessary pain.

We understand: the new paths are not traced by goods, but by the Void that acts as a cavity.

The religiosity good for all seasons gives way to the unprecedent life of Faith.

Here lies the Art of discernment and pastoral care: it should be able to introduce new competitive, different energies - cosmic and personal - that prepare unpublished, open and free synthesises.

We know this; and yet in some intriguing circles and business connections, the lust for possession does not allow them to see clearly.

The dulling of eyes sick with robbery prevailed. First here and there, gradually occupying the soul.

As if to say: there is another experience of the "divine", indifferent.

And the litmus test is precisely that of the petty scrutinizing (vv.22-23) that holds back. With the gaze that closes the horizon of existence.

Instead, in the attempts and paths of Faith that are not satisfied, life becomes bright with creative Love that blooms again, and puts everyone at ease.

Even the old can re-emerge in this new spirit, this time perennial. Because there are other Heights. Because what makes intimate to God is nothing external.

The authentic Church aroused by clear ‘visions’ always reveals something portentous: fruitfulness from nullity, life from its effusion, birth from apparent sterility.

A river of unthinkable harmonies will reconnect the reading of events and the action of believers to the work of the Spirit, without barriers.

Because when someone surrenders their normalized thinking, and settles getting down, the new advances.

The choice is now inexorable: between death and life; between greed and «darkness» (v.23), or Happiness.

The first step is to admit that you have to make a journey.

To internalize and live the message:

Where is your Treasure? Is your heart and eye simple?

Have you ever experienced sides that others judge to be inconclusive [from a material point of view] and instead have prepared your new paths?

[Friday 11th wk. in O.T.  June 20, 2025]

(Mt 6:19-23)

«Where your treasure is, there your heart will be» (v.21). This is not an abused, insipid personal or institutional issue; it is one for easy irony.

To ignore it is to give it further breathing space, making it grow out of all proportion; making it even more out of time and difficult to read - and to identify its treatment.

All this, however, must be done by putting precipitation in brackets... in the spirit of broader understanding. It is understood that in order to grasp itself within and activate different resources, each community must go through moments of the most severe verification.

Even for denominational churches with a wide and prestigious tradition, the awareness of being losers in this respect today is indispensable to find oneself. Overcoming the 'forward', 'outgoing' stumbling block.

We read in the Encyclical Spe Salvi n.2 ["Faith is Hope"]:

"Hope is a central word in biblical faith - to the point that in several passages the words 'faith' and 'hope' seem interchangeable [...].

How decisive it was for the awareness of the early Christians that they had received a reliable hope as a gift, is also shown where Christian existence is compared with life before faith or with the situation of the followers of other religions [...].

Their gods had proved questionable and no hope emanated from their contradictory myths. Despite the gods, they were 'godless' and consequently found themselves in a dark world, facing a dark future. 'In nihil ab nihilo quam cito recidimus' (In nothing from nothing how soon we fall back) says an epitaph from that era [...].

It appears as a distinctive element of Christians that they have a future: it is not that they know in detail what awaits them, but they know on the whole that their life does not end in a vacuum.

Only when the future is certain as a positive reality does the present also become liveable. So we can now say: Christianity was not just 'good news' - a communication of hitherto unknown content.

In our language we would say: the Christian message was not just 'informative', but 'performative'. This means: the gospel is not just a communication of things that can be known, but a communication that produces facts and changes lives.

The dark door of time, of the future, has been thrown wide open. He who has hope lives differently; he has been given a new life'.

In the form of the Relationship, everything opens up intense life - which integrates and overcomes self-love, the thirst for domination.

This liberates from the 'old', that is, it closes a cycle of paths already set - to make us return as newborns.

The Hope that has weight dismantles the inessential; it expels the noise of thoughts that are no longer in tune with our growth, and introduces dreamy energies, a wealth of possibilities.

There will be initial resistance, but development sets in.

Hope sacrifices ballasts and activates us according to the 'divine within'. It opens the door to a new, brighter, corresponding phase.

Earth's treasures quickly blind; likewise they pass away: suddenly. The age of global crisis shoves it in our faces.

Yet, it is a necessary pain.

We understand: the new paths are not traced by goods, nor by devout memories, but by the Void, which acts as a gap to common, taken for granted, reassuring easiness.

Religiosity good for all seasons gives way to the unprecedented life of Faith.

This is where the Art of discernment and pastoral work comes in: it should know how to introduce new competitive, dissimilar energies - cosmic and personal - that prepare unprecedented, open, gratuitous syntheses.

We know this, and yet in some prestigious and already wealthy circles, the greed to possess under the guise of necessity does not allow them to see clearly.

It happens even to long-standing consecrated persons - it is not clear why such greedy, perfunctory duplicity.

Do we still want to emerge, raising more confusions? After all, we are dissatisfied with our mediocre choices.

At the beginning of the Vocation, we felt the need for a Relationship that would bring Meaning and a Centre to our feriality...

Then we deviated, perhaps out of dissatisfaction or for reasons of calculation and convenience - then the dullness of our robbing eyes prevailed. First here and there, gradually occupying the soul.

Even in some church leaders and circles of prominence, the basis of existence has become the volume of ropey business [scheming gangs, Pope Francis would say].

In multiple realities, the vain scene, the bag of commerce, the thrill of getting on the board, have supplanted real hearts - and eyes themselves.

As if to say: there is another experience of the 'divine', which is a doomsday: between one Psalm and another, better than Love becomes feeling powerful, secure, celebrated, respected around.

[God and accumulation give different orders? No problem: let it be understood that one does it for 'his' Glory].

So much for the common good.Not a few people are realising that counting is the most popular sport in various multi-multiple companies, fantastically embellished with events and initiatives (to cover what is really 'worth').

And litmus test is precisely that mean-spirited scrutiny (vv.22-23) that behind dense scenes, holds back, even judges, and keeps a distance from others.

Such is the gaze that closes the horizon of existence: the immediately at hand, and of circumstance, counts.

A seemingly superabundant belief - coincidentally without the prominence of Hope - is condemning us to the world's worst denatality rate.

The panorama of our devoutly empty villages and towns is discouraging.

But one revels in one's own niche, and in the small or grandiose situation.

The important thing is that everything is epidermically adorned.

Under the peculiar bell tower that sets the pace for the usual things, many people keep 'their' too much to themselves. Content to sacralise selfishness with grandiose proclamations, or more modestly, with the display of beautiful statues, customs, banners, colourful costumes and mannerisms.

Instead, according to the Gospels, in attempts and paths of Faith that are not satisfied with an empty spirituality, life becomes bright with creative Love that flourishes, and puts everyone at ease.

Even the old can re-emerge in this new spirit. For there are other Heights. For what makes one intimate with God is nothing external.

The authentic Church aroused by limpid 'visions' - without papier-mache and duplicity - always reveals something portentous: fruitfulness from nullity, life from the outpouring of it, birth from apparent sterility.

A river of unimagined attunements will reconnect the reading of events and the action of believers to the work of the Spirit, without barriers.

For when normalised thinking gives way, and settles down, the new advances.

The choice is now inexorable: between death and life; between longing and "darkness" (v.23), or Happiness.

The first step is to admit that one must make a journey.

To internalise and live the message:

Where is your Treasure? Is your heart and eye simple?

Have you ever experienced sides that others judge to be inconclusive (from a material point of view) and instead have prepared your new paths?

4. We have raised the question: can our encounter with the God who in Christ has shown us his face and opened his heart be for us too not just “informative” but “performative”—that is to say, can it change our lives, so that we know we are redeemed through the hope that it expresses? Before attempting to answer the question, let us return once more to the early Church. It is not difficult to realize that the experience of the African slave-girl Bakhita was also the experience of many in the period of nascent Christianity who were beaten and condemned to slavery. Christianity did not bring a message of social revolution like that of the ill-fated Spartacus, whose struggle led to so much bloodshed. Jesus was not Spartacus, he was not engaged in a fight for political liberation like Barabbas or Bar- Kochba. Jesus, who himself died on the Cross, brought something totally different: an encounter with the Lord of all lords, an encounter with the living God and thus an encounter with a hope stronger than the sufferings of slavery, a hope which therefore transformed life and the world from within. What was new here can be seen with the utmost clarity in Saint Paul's Letter to Philemon. This is a very personal letter, which Paul wrote from prison and entrusted to the runaway slave Onesimus for his master, Philemon. Yes, Paul is sending the slave back to the master from whom he had fled, not ordering but asking: “I appeal to you for my child ... whose father I have become in my imprisonment ... I am sending him back to you, sending my very heart ... perhaps this is why he was parted from you for a while, that you might have him back for ever, no longer as a slave but more than a slave, as a beloved brother ...” (Philem 10-16). Those who, as far as their civil status is concerned, stand in relation to one an other as masters and slaves, inasmuch as they are members of the one Church have become brothers and sisters—this is how Christians addressed one another. By virtue of their Baptism they had been reborn, they had been given to drink of the same Spirit and they received the Body of the Lord together, alongside one another. Even if external structures remained unaltered, this changed society from within. When the Letter to the Hebrews says that Christians here on earth do not have a permanent homeland, but seek one which lies in the future (cf. Heb 11:13-16; Phil 3:20), this does not mean for one moment that they live only for the future: present society is recognized by Christians as an exile; they belong to a new society which is the goal of their common pilgrimage and which is anticipated in the course of that pilgrimage.

[Pope Benedict, Spe Salvi no.4]

Psalm 48:14-21 - Human wealth does not save

1. As it gradually develops, the Liturgy of Vespers presents to us the sapiential Psalm 49[48], whose second part has just been proclaimed (cf. vv. 14-21). This section of the Psalm, like the previous part (cf. vv. 1-13) on which we have already reflected, also condemns the illusion to which idolizing riches gives rise. This is one of humanity's constant temptations: clinging to money as though it were endowed with some invincible power, we allude ourselves that we can even "buy off death" and keep it at bay.

2. In reality, death bursts in with its ability to demolish every illusion, sweeping away every obstacle and humbling our pride (cf. v. 14), ushering into the next world rich and poor, sovereigns and subjects, foolish and wise alike. The Psalmist has sketched a vivid image, showing death as a shepherd firmly driving his flock of corruptible creatures (cf. v. 15). Thus, Psalm 49[48] offers us a realistic and stern meditation on death, the unavoidable and fundamental destination of human existence.

We often seek to ignore this reality in every possible way, distancing the very thought of it from our horizons. This effort, however, apart from being useless, is also inappropriate. Reflection on death is in fact beneficial because it relativizes all the secondary realities that we have unfortunately absolutized, namely, riches, success and power. Consequently, Sirach, an Old Testament sage, warns us: "In all you do, remember the end of your life, and then you will never sin" (7: 36).

3. However, here comes a crucial turning point in our Psalm. If money cannot "ransom" us from death (cf. Ps 49[48]: 8-9), yet there is One who can save us from that dark, traumatic shadow on the horizon. In fact, the Psalmist says: "God will ransom me from death and take my soul to himself" (v. 16).

Thus, a horizon of hope and immortality unfolds before the just. The response to the question asked in the first part of the Psalm, "why should I fear", (v. 6) is: "do not fear when a man grows rich" (v. 17).

4. When the just person, poor and humiliated in history, reaches the ultimate boundary of life, he has no possessions, he has nothing to pay as a "ransom" to stave off death and remove himself from its icy embrace. Here is the great surprise: God himself pays the ransom and snatches his faithful from the hands of death, for he is the only One who can conquer death that human creatures cannot escape.

The Psalmist therefore invites us "not to fear" nor to envy the rich who grow ever more arrogant in their glory (cf. ibid.) since, when death comes, they will be stripped of everything and unable to take with them either gold or silver, fame or success (cf. vv. 18-19). The faithful, instead, will not be abandoned by the Lord, who will point out to him "the path of life, the fullness of joy in your presence, at your right hand happiness for ever" (cf. Ps 16[15]: 11)

5. And then, at the conclusion of the sapiential meditation on Psalm 49[48], we will be able to apply the words of Jesus which describe to us the true treasure that challenges death: "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also" (Mt 6: 19-21).

6. As a corollary to Christ's words, in his Comment on Psalm 49[48], St Ambrose reasserts firmly and clearly the inconsistency of riches: "They are all perishable and go faster than they came. A treasure of this kind is but a dream. On waking, it has disappeared, for the person who rids himself of the intoxication of this world and acquires the sobriety of virtue will despise all these things and attach no importance whatsoever to money" (Commento a Dodici Salmi, n. 23: SAEMO, VIII, Milan-Rome, 1980, p. 275).

7. The Bishop of Milan therefore invites us not to be ingenuously attracted by human wealth and glory: "Do not fear, even when you see the magnification of some powerful family's glory! Know how to look deeply, with attention, and it will appear empty to you unless it contains a crumb of the fullness of faith". Indeed, before Christ's coming, man was decadent and empty: "The ruinous fall of that ancient Adam emptied us, but Christ's grace has filled us. He emptied himself to fill us and make the fullness of virtue dwell in human flesh". St Ambrose concludes that for this very reason, we can now exclaim with St John, "And from his fullness have we all received, grace upon grace" (Jn 1: 16) (cf. ibid.).

[Pope John Paul II, General Audience 27 October 2004]

2. The poor, always and everywhere, evangelize us, because they enable us to discover in new ways the true face of the Father. “They have much to teach us. Besides participating in the sensus fidei, they know the suffering Christ through their own sufferings. It is necessary that we all let ourselves be evangelized by them. The new evangelization is an invitation to recognize the salvific power of their lives and to place them at the centre of the Church’s journey. We are called to discover Christ in them, to lend them our voice in their causes, but also to be their friends, to listen to them, to understand them and to welcome the mysterious wisdom that God wants to communicate to us through them. Our commitment does not consist exclusively of activities or programmes of promotion and assistance; what the Holy Spirit mobilizes is not an unruly activism, but above all an attentiveness that considers the other in a certain sense as one with ourselves. This loving attentiveness is the beginning of a true concern for their person which inspires me effectively to seek their good” (Evangelii Gaudium, 198-199).

[Pope Francis, Message for World Day of the Poor 2021]

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.

[Thursday 11th wk. in O.T.  June 19, 2025]

Sons’ Prayer: Performance or Listening?

(Mt 6:7-15)

In the communities of Mt and Lk the "prayer" of the sons - the "Our Father" - does not originate as prayer, but as a formula of acceptance of the Beatitudes (in its scans: invocation to the Father, human situation and advent of the Kingdom, liberation).

In any case, the full difference between religious prayer and expression animated by Faith lies in the distinction between: Performance or Perception.

[As Pope Francis says: "To pray is not to talk to God like a parrot". "Our God does not need sacrifices to win his favour! He needs nothing'].

In religions - in fact - it is the praying subject who 'prays', making requests, expounding himself, praising, and so on.

Still in Thomism, the virtue of religion was considered to be an aspect of the cardinal virtue of Justice. As if to say: man's rightful position before God is that of one who recognises a duty of worship (worship that is directed from him) towards the Creator; and man - the subject of prayer - would fulfil it.

Conversely, the child of God in Christ is a "hearer" of the Logos: he is the one who tends his ear, perceives, welcomes: in short, the authentic Subject who expresses himself is God himself.

He reveals Himself through the Word, in the reality of events, in the folds of universal and personal history, in the particular Calling He grants us, even in intimate images.

They become plastic expressions of Mystery (and personal Vocation) that wave upon wave even guide the soul.

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

In the Faith we participate in the authentic prayer of Jesus Himself - Person in us - addressed to the Father, first of all "listening" to His providential proposals: as if united to the Friend and Brother we enter into this Dialogue - full of even figurative suggestions.

But it is the Only-begotten who prays; we are not the great protagonists. Only in this sense can the act of praying be defined as 'childlike' or 'Christian'.

Our prayer life is not an ascetic exercise - let alone a duty, nor a shopping list - because God does not need to be informed about something He had not thought of before.

As the Master says, the Father knows what we need (Mt 6:8). So to turn to Him does not require any effort [ lacerating effort to centre oneself and step outside oneself]. Nor does it force us into too many (or the right) words.

Authentic prayer is not a tracing, nor a leap into outer darkness, but an excavation and sifting, given. It is a plunge into our being, where the intimacy of the Understanding aims to understand the Author's signature at the heart of events; even emotions.

The prayer of the man of Faith does not aim to introduce God's will and the reality of situations into narrow horizons and judgments that are already comprehensible, as if pushing it into unnatural attunements.

Prayer is a perceptive leap without repetitive identities, from one's own Core - which clears away mental toxins; and so it becomes an experience of fullness of being, in search of global and personal meaning.

The praying man is not even prey to some excited paroxysmal state (ridiculous or soporific): he is welcoming an Action - a Work of paradoxical suspension, on the path towards his own Bliss.

Prayer is even a gesture of aesthetic order in Christ. Precisely because it tends to rake our everyday imagery so that it is shaped according to the guiding vision it inhabits. It shifts and almost directs the eye of the soul, and the ecclesial experience.

A virtue-event that gradually chisels that very personal image that brings to awareness a goal or a communal reality of praise, that is, an innate narrative Voice of unknown energies, for important changes.

Step by step, this perception and dialogue that emerges induces us to internalise hidden flashes of the pathway that belongs to us: a missionary spirit that seeks harmony, the creation of a living environment, and so on. Even destabilising.

Only in this sense is prayer in order to our benefits.

Nor can it be reduced to a group badge, because although we recognise ourselves in certain knowledge, each one has its own language of the soul, a relevant history and sensitivity, an unprecedented iconic world (also in terms of micro and macro dream relationships), as well as an unrepeatable task of salvation.

For this reason too - albeit in terms of the community of reference - the Symbol of the reborn in Christ turning to the Father has come down to us in different versions: Mt, Lk, Didaché ["Teaching" perhaps contemporary with the last New Testament writings, a kind of early Catechism].To introduce us to specific considerations, it is appropriate to ask: why did Jesus not attend places of worship to recite traditional formulas, but to teach?

And never does it appear that the apostles pray with Him: it seems that they only wanted a formula to distinguish themselves from other rabbinical schools (cf. Lk 11:1).

The Lord only holds fast to the mindset and lifestyle: He proceeds on fundamental options - and insists on the perception of welcoming, rather than our saying and organising (which are not very steeped in well-founded eternity).

Father

The God of religions was named with an overabundance of high-sounding honorary epithets, as if he craved ever-growing ranks of incense-givers.

The Father is not accompanied by prestigious titles. A son does not address his parent as high, eternal or lofty, but as the one who imparts life to him.

And the son does not imagine that he has to give external shout-outs and accolades - otherwise the superior and master would admonish and chastise: the Parent looks at needs, not merits.

The God of religions governs his subjects by enacting laws, as a sovereign does; the Father transmits his Spirit, his own Life, which elevates and perfects both personal listening skills and the noticing (e.g. of brothers).

The only request is to extend our missionary resources and feed on the Father-Person who reshapes us on his own virtues, according to what we should be, and could perhaps already have been.

One reality within our reach is the cancellation of material debts that our neighbour has incurred in need.

There is no witness to God-Love that does not pass through a fraternal community, in which we experience the communion of goods.

The security of being right with God is in the joy of living together and sharing.

In religious belief, material blessings are often confused with divine blessings, which accentuates the competitions, artificial primacy and inconveniences of real life.

Conversely, the spirit of the Beatitudes is made manifest in a people where distinctions between creditors and debtors are abolished.

"Do not induce us": ancient Prayer of the children, in real life

Essence of God is: Love that does not betray or forsake; useless, confusing and blasphemous to ask a Father: 'Do not forsake me' [cf. Greek text]. Although it may be impressive to the outer ear.

The false mysticism of the forsaken Jesus (even by the Father!) does not educate; perhaps it fascinates, certainly confuses - and plagues.

Only the Spirit is guaranteed in prayer: the lucidity to understand the fruitfulness of the Cross, the gain in the loss, the life not in triumph but in death. And the strength to be faithful to one's own Calling, despite persecutions, even "internal" ones.

The community and individual souls, however, ask not to be placed in the extreme conditions of trial, knowing their own limit, their personal invincible precariousness, albeit redeemed.

This is the threshold that distinguishes religiosity and Faith: on the one hand, the 'safe' formula of the convinced and strong; on the other, a resigned and expectant prayer: of the unsteady, redeemed by love.

"Non c'indurre" is precisely (in the Latin and Greek sense: "to introduce to 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, opposed to the bright and 'proper' ones.

But by dint of pushing the former back, the worse ones continually resurface, until they win the game and run rampant.

In the lives of the saints, we see these great men strangely always under temptation - because they disdain evil, therefore they do not know it. Gradually, however, the constant nagging becomes uncontrollable droves.

The woman and man of Faith do not act according to rushed and superficial predetermined models, not even religious ones; they are aware that they are not heroes or paradigm phenomena.

That is why they trust. They let their intimate problems pass them by: they have understood their power!

This is the meaning of the formula of the Lord's Prayer, in its original sense: 'do not carry us through the trial to the end, for we know our weakness'.

Such attention arises so that sin itself - by dint of denying it, then disguising it - does not paradoxically become the hidden protagonist of our path. The pivot of attention, which unfortunately engulfs thoughts, blocking the internal processes of spontaneous growth, perception of Grace and self-healing [in order to one's own unrepeatable Calling].

This would be the opposite of Redemption and Freedom, hence of Love: it is annihilated where there is a superior above - even God.

On the contrary, it is very fruitful to recover its energy, which has put us in contact with our deepest layers, for new horizons. And to take it on by making it our own host, in its own right - to (only then) invest it in an unexpected and wise manner.If, on the other hand, our 'counterpart' becomes a constant afterthought and block, we’re done for.

Sorrows, failures, sadness, frustrations, weaknesses, a thousand anxieties, too many downfalls, accustom us to experiencing evil as part of ourselves: a condition to be evaluated, not a 'fault' to be cut horizontally.

In the process of true salvific transmutation, that signal speaks of us: within a deviation or eccentricity there is a secret or knowledge to be found, to be reborn personally.

By casting our gaze on the discomforts and oppositions, we realise that these critical sides of being become like a malleable magma, which more quickly approaches healing. Like through a conversion, permanent, radical... because it involves and belongs to us; not artificial and peripheral, but fundamental, of Seed and Nature.

Absorbed patterns and convictions do not allow us to realise that passionate life is composed of opposing states, of competitive energies - which we must not disguise 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 opportunities, 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, narrowness and 'crosses' have something to tell us.

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

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

In the virtue of the shaky yet unique exceptionality of each person, the true path opens up.

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

The difference of the Faith, compared to ancient religiosity [in the sense of the cross within]?

It is in the awareness that only the sick heal, only the incomplete grow.

Only the lame regain expression, evolve. And falling, they move forward.

Cf. Jn 16:23-28: Prayer in the Name: comm. quotid. Saturday 6th Easter

Cf. Mt 11,25-27: The only prayer of Jesus ever taught Wednesday 15.a

In the preceding series of Catecheses I have spoken of Jesus’ prayer and I would not like to conclude this reflection without briefly considering the topic of Jesus’ silence, so important in his relationship with God.

In the Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Verbum Domini, I spoke of the role that silence plays in Jesus’ life, especially on Golgotha: “here we find ourselves before ‘the word of the cross’ (cf. 1 Cor 1:18). The word is muted; it becomes mortal silence, for it has ‘spoken’ exhaustively, holding back nothing of what it had to tell us” (n. 12). Before this silence of the Cross, St Maximus the Confessor puts this phrase on the lips of the Mother of God: “Wordless is the Word of the Father, who made every creature which speaks, lifeless are the eyes of the one at whose word and whose nod all living things move!” (Life of Mary, n. 89: Testi mariani del primo millennio, 2, Rome, 1989, p. 253).

The Cross of Christ does not only demonstrate Jesus’ silence as his last word to the Father but reveals that God also speaks through silence: “the silence of God, the experience of the distance of the almighty Father, is a decisive stage in the earthly journey of the Son of God, the Incarnate Word. Hanging from the wood of the cross, he lamented the suffering caused by that silence: ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ (Mk 15:34; Mt 27:46). Advancing in obedience to his very last breath, in the obscurity of death, Jesus called upon the Father. He commended himself to him at the moment of passage, through death, to eternal life: ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit’ (Lk 23:46)” (Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Verbum Domini, n. 21).

Jesus’ experience on the cross profoundly reveals the situation of the person praying and the culmination of his prayer: having heard and recognized the word of God, we must also come to terms with the silence of God, an important expression of the same divine Word.

The dynamic of words and silence which marks Jesus’ prayer throughout his earthly existence, especially on the cross, also touches our own prayer life in two directions.

The first is the one that concerns the acceptance of the word of God. Inward and outward silence are necessary if we are to be able to hear this word. And in our time this point is particularly difficult for us. In fact, ours is an era that does not encourage recollection; indeed, one sometimes gets the impression that people are frightened of being cut off, even for an instant, from the torrent of words and images that mark and fill the day.

It was for this reason that in the above mentioned Exhortation Verbum Domini I recalled our need to learn the value of silence: “Rediscovering the centrality of God’s word in the life of the Church also means rediscovering a sense of recollection and inner repose. The great patristic tradition teaches us that the mysteries of Christ all involve silence. Only in silence can the word of God find a home in us, as it did in Mary, woman of the word and, inseparably, woman of silence” (n. 66). This principle — that without silence one does not hear, does not listen, does not receive a word — applies especially to personal prayer as well as to our liturgies: to facilitate authentic listening, they must also be rich in moments of silence and of non-verbal reception.

St Augustine’s observation is still valid: Verbo crescente, verba deficiunt “when the word of God increases, the words of men fail” (cf. Sermo 288, 5: pl 38, 1307; Sermo 120, 2: pl 38, 677). The Gospels often present Jesus, especially at times of crucial decisions, withdrawing to lonely places, away from the crowds and even from the disciples in order to pray in silence and to live his filial relationship with God. Silence can carve out an inner space in our very depths to enable God to dwell there, so that his word will remain within us and love for him take root in our minds and hearts and inspire our life. Hence the first direction: relearning silence, openness to listening, which opens us to the other, to the word of God.

However, there is also a second important connection between silence and prayer. Indeed it is not only our silence that disposes us to listen to the word of God; in our prayers we often find we are confronted by God’s silence, we feel, as it were, let down, it seems to us that God neither listens nor responds. Yet God’s silence, as happened to Jesus, does not indicate his absence. Christians know well that the Lord is present and listens, even in the darkness of pain, rejection and loneliness.

Jesus reassures his disciples and each one of us that God is well acquainted with our needs at every moment of our life. He teaches the disciples: “In praying do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (Mt 6:7-8): an attentive, silent and open heart is more important than many words. God knows us in our inmost depths, better than we ourselves, and loves us; and knowing this must suffice.

In the Bible Job’s experience is particularly significant in this regard. In a short time this man lost everything: relatives, possessions, friends and health. It truly seems that God’s attitude to him was one of abandonment, of total silence. Yet in his relationship with God, Job speaks to God, cries out to God; in his prayers, in spite of all, he keeps his faith intact, and in the end, discovers the value of his experience and of God’s silence. And thus he can finally conclude, addressing the Creator: “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you” (Job 42:5): almost all of us know God only through hearsay and the more open we are to his silence and to our own silence, the more we truly begin to know him.

This total trust that opens us to the profound encounter with God developed in silence. St Francis Xavier prayed to the Lord saying: I do not love you because you can give me paradise or condemn me to hell, but because you are my God. I love you because You are You.

As we reach the end of the reflections on Jesus’ prayer, certain teachings of the Catechism of the Catholic Church spring to mind: “The drama of prayer is fully revealed to us in the Word who became flesh and dwells among us. To seek to understand his prayer through what his witnesses proclaim to us in the Gospel is to approach the holy Lord Jesus as Moses approached the burning bush: first to contemplate him in prayer, then to hear how he teaches us to pray, in order to know how he hears our prayer” (n. 2598).

So, how does Jesus teach us to pray? We find a clear answer in the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church: “Jesus teaches us to pray not only with the Our Father” — certainly the high point of his instruction on how to pray — “but also when he prays. In this way he teaches us, in addition to the content, the dispositions necessary for every true prayer: purity of heart that seeks the Kingdom and forgives enemies, bold and filial faith that goes beyond what we feel and understand, and watchfulness that protects the disciple from temptation” (n. 544).

In going through the Gospels we have seen that concerning our prayers the Lord is conversation partner, friend, witness and teacher. The newness of our dialogue with God is revealed in Jesus: the filial prayer that the Father expects of his children. And we learn from Jesus that constant prayer helps us to interpret our life, make our decisions, recognize and accept our vocation, discover the talents that God has given us and do his will daily, the only way to fulfil our life.

Jesus’ prayer points out to us, all too often concerned with operational efficacy and the practical results we achieve, that we need to pause, to experience moments of intimacy with God, “detaching ourselves” from the everyday commotion in order to listen, to go to the “root” that sustains and nourishes life.

One of the most beautiful moments of Jesus’ prayer is precisely when — in order to deal with the illnesses, hardships and limitations of those who are conversing with him — he turns to the Father in prayer and thereby teaches those around him where to seek the source of hope and salvation.

I have already recalled as a moving example Jesus’ prayer at the tomb of Lazarus. The Evangelist John recounts: “So they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, ‘Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you hear me always, but I have said this on account of the people standing by, that they may believe that you sent me’. When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, ‘Lazarus, come out’” (Jn 11:41-43).

However Jesus reaches the most profound depths in prayer to the Father at the moment of his Passion and his death when he says the extreme “yes” to God’s plan and shows how the human will finds its fulfilment precisely in full adherence to the divine will rather than in opposition to it.

In Jesus’ prayer, in his cry to the Father on the cross, are summed up “all the troubles, for all time, of humanity enslaved by sin and death, all the petitions and intercessions of salvation history.... Here the Father accepts them and, beyond all hope, answers them by raising his Son. Thus is fulfilled and brought to completion the drama of prayer in the economy of creation and salvation” (Catechism of the Catholic Church n. 2606).

Dear brothers and sisters, let us trustingly ask the Lord to grant that we live the journey of our filial prayer learning daily from the Only-Begotten Son, who became man for our sake, what should be our way of addressing God.

St Paul’s words on Christian life in general also apply to our prayers: “I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8:38-39).

[Pope Benedict, General Audience 7 March 2012]

Our Father, who art in heaven . . .".

We stand at the altar around which the whole Church is gathered in Sarajevo. We utter the words that Christ, Son of the Living God, taught us: Son consubstantial with the Father. He alone calls God "Father" (Abba - Father! My Father!) and He alone can authorise us to address God by calling Him "Father", "Our Father". He teaches us this prayer in which everything is contained. We wish to find in this prayer today what we can and must say to God - our Father, at this moment in history, here in Sarajevo.

"Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven". 

"I, the Bishop of Rome, the first Slavic Pope, kneel before You to cry out: "From plague, famine and war - deliver us!""

2. Our Father! Father of men: Father of peoples. Father of all peoples who dwell in the world. Father of the peoples of Europe. Of the peoples of the Balkans.

Father of the peoples who belong to the family of the South Slavs! Father of the peoples who have written their history here, on this peninsula, for centuries. Father of the peoples, touched unfortunately not for the first time by the cataclysm of war.

"Our Father . . .". I, Bishop of Rome, the first Slavic Pope, kneel before You to cry out: "From plague, famine and war - deliver us!" I know that in this plea many join me. Not only here in Sarajevo, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but in the whole of Europe and beyond. I come here carrying with me the certainty of this prayer uttered by the hearts and lips of countless of my brothers and sisters. For so long they have been waiting for this very "great prayer" of the Church, of the people of God, to be fulfilled in this place. For so long, I myself have invited everyone to join in this prayer.

How can we not recall here the prayer made in Assisi in January last year? And then the one raised in Rome, in St Peter's Basilica, in January of this year? From the beginning of the tragic events in the Balkans, in the countries of former Yugoslavia, the guiding thought of the Church, and in particular of the Apostolic See, has been the prayer for peace.

3. Our Father, "hallowed be thy name; thy kingdom come . . .". May your holy and merciful name shine among men. Thy kingdom come, kingdom of justice and peace, of forgiveness and love.

"Thy will be done . . .".

Thy will be done in the world, and particularly in this troubled land of the Balkans. Thou lovest not violence and hatred. Thou shun injustice and selfishness. Thou wilt that men be brothers to one another and acknowledge Thee as their Father.

Our Father, Father of every human being, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven". Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven!

4. It is Christ "our peace" (Eph 2:14). He who taught us to address God by calling him "Father".

He who by His blood conquered the mystery of iniquity and division, and by His Cross broke down the massive wall that separated men, making them strangers to one another; He who reconciled humanity with God and united men among themselves as brothers.

That is why Christ was able to say one day to the Apostles, before his sacrifice on the Cross: "I leave you peace, I give you my peace. Not as the world gives it, I give it to you" (John 14: 27). It is then that he promised the Spirit of Truth, who is at the same time Spirit of Love, Spirit of Peace!

Come, Holy Spirit! "Veni, creator Spiritus, mentes tuorum visita . . .!" "Come, Creator Spirit, visit our minds, fill with your grace the hearts you have created".

Come, Holy Spirit! We invoke you from this city of Sarajevo, crossroads of tensions between different cultures and nations, where the fuse was lit which, at the beginning of the century, triggered the First World War, and where, at the end of the second millennium, similar tensions are concentrated, capable of destroying peoples called by history to work together in harmonious coexistence.

Come, Spirit of peace! Through you we cry out: "Abba, Father" (Rom 8:15).

5. "Give us this day our daily bread . . .".

Praying for bread means praying for all that is necessary for life. Let us pray that, in the distribution of resources among individuals and peoples, the principle of a universal sharing of mankind in God's created goods may always be realised.

Let us pray that the use of resources in armaments will not damage or even destroy the heritage of culture, which constitutes the highest good of humanity. Let us pray that restrictive measures, deemed necessary to curb the conflict, will not cause inhuman suffering to the defenceless population. Every man, every family has a right to its 'daily bread'.

6. "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us . . .".

With these words we touch upon the crucial issue. Christ himself warned us of this, who, dying on the cross, said of his slayers: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Lk 23:34).

The history of men, peoples and nations is full of mutual resentment and injustice. How important was the historic expression addressed by the Polish Bishops to their German brethren at the end of the Second Vatican Council: 'Let us forgive and ask forgiveness'! If peace has been possible in that region of Europe, it seems to have come about thanks to the attitude effectively expressed by those words.

Today we want to pray for the renewal of a similar gesture: "Let us forgive and ask forgiveness" for our brothers in the Balkans! Without this attitude it is difficult to build peace. The spiral of 'guilt' and 'punishment' will never be closed, if at some point forgiveness is not achieved.

Forgiveness does not mean forgetting. If memory is the law of history, forgiveness is the power of God, the power of Christ acting in the affairs of men and peoples.

7. "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil . . .".

Lead us not into temptation! What are the temptations that we ask the Father to remove today? They are those that make the heart of man a heart of stone, insensitive to the call of forgiveness and concord. They are the temptations of ethnic prejudices, which make one indifferent to the rights of others and their suffering. They are the temptations of exaggerated nationalisms, which lead to the overpowering of one's neighbour and the lust for revenge. They are all the temptations in which the civilisation of death expresses itself.

Faced with the desolating spectacle of human failures, let us pray with the words of Venerable Brother Bartholomew I, Patriarch of the Church of Constantinople: "Lord, make our hearts of stone crumble at the sight of your suffering and become hearts of flesh. Let your Cross dissolve our prejudices. With the vision of your agonising struggle against death, flee our indifference or our rebellion" (Way of the Cross at the Colosseum, Good Friday 1990, Opening Prayer).

Deliver us from evil! Here is another word that belongs completely to Christ and his Gospel. "I did not come to condemn the world, but to save the world" (Jn 12:47). Humanity is called to salvation in Christ and through Christ. To this salvation are also called the nations that the current war has so terribly divided!

Let us pray today for the saving power of the Cross to help overcome the historic temptation of hatred. Enough of the countless destructions! Let us pray - following the rhythm of the Lord's prayer - that the time of reconstruction, the time of peace, may begin.

Pray with us the dead of Sarajevo, whose remains lie in the nearby cemetery. They pray for all the victims of this cruel war, who in the light of God invoke reconciliation and peace for the survivors.

8. "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God" (Mt 5:9). This is what Jesus told us in today's Gospel passage. Yes, dear Brothers and Sisters, we shall be truly blessed, if we make ourselves peacemakers of that peace that only Christ knows how to give (cf. Jn 14:27), indeed Christ himself. "Christ is our peace". We shall become peacemakers, if like him we are willing to forgive.

"Father, forgive them!" (Lk 23:34). Christ from the Cross offers forgiveness and also asks us to follow him on the arduous way of the Cross to obtain his peace. Only by accepting this invitation of his can we prevent selfishness, nationalism and violence from continuing to sow destruction and death.

Evil, in all its manifestations, constitutes a mystery of iniquity, in the face of which the voice of God, which we heard in the First Reading, rises up clear and decisive: "Thus speaks the High and Exalted . . . In high and holy place I dwell, but I am also with the oppressed and the humiliated" (Is 57:15). In these prophetic words is contained for all an invitation to a serious examination of conscience.

God is on the side of the oppressed: he is with the parents who mourn their murdered children, he listens to the helpless cry of the downtrodden, he is in solidarity with women humiliated by violence, he is close to refugees forced to leave their land and homes. He does not forget the suffering of families, the elderly, widows, young people and children. It is his people who are dying.

We must put an end to such barbarity! No more war! No more destructive fury! It is no longer possible to tolerate a situation that produces only fruits of death: killings, destroyed cities, ruined economies, hospitals lacking medicines, sick and elderly abandoned, families in tears and torn apart. A just peace must be achieved as soon as possible. Peace is possible if the priority of moral values over the claims of race or force is recognised.

9. Dear Brothers and Sisters! At this moment, together with you, I raise to the Lord the psalmist's cry: "Help us, God, our salvation, for the glory of your name, save us and forgive us our sins" (Ps 79:9).

Let us entrust this plea of ours to her who "stood" beneath the Cross silent and praying (cf. Jn 19:25). Let us look to the Blessed Virgin, whose Nativity the Church joyfully celebrates today.

It is significant that this visit of mine, long desired, has been able to take place on this Marian feast so dear to you. With Mary's birth there has blossomed in the world the hope of a new humanity no longer oppressed by selfishness, hatred, violence and the many other forms of sin that have stained the paths of history with blood. To Mary Most Holy, we ask that the day of full reconciliation and peace may also dawn for this land of yours. 

Queen of peace, pray for us!

[Pope John Paul II, in connection with Sarajevo, 8 September 1994]

Let us continue the catechesis on the “Lord’s Prayer”, now arriving at the penultimate invocation: “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil” (Mt 6:13). Another version says: “let us not fall into temptation”. The “Our Father” begins in a calm manner: it makes us desire that God’s great plan be fulfilled in our midst. It then casts a gaze on life, and makes us ask ourselves what we need each day: “daily bread”. Then the prayer turns to our interpersonal relationships, often tarnished by selfishness: we request forgiveness and we commit to bestow it. But it is with this penultimate invocation that our dialogue with the heavenly Father gets, so to speak, to the heart of the drama: that is, to the matter of the contrast between our freedom and the pitfalls of evil.

As we know, the original Greek expression contained in the Gospels is difficult to render in an exact manner, and all the modern translations are somewhat weak. But we can agree unanimously on one element: however one understands the text, we have to exclude the possibility that God is the protagonist of the temptations that loom over mankind’s journey. As if God himself were lurking with hidden pitfalls and snares for his children. One such interpretation contrasts first and foremost with the text itself, and is far from the image of God that Jesus revealed to us. Let us not forget: the “Our Father” begins with “Father”. And a father does not lay snares for his children. Christians are not dealing with an envious God, in competition with mankind, or who enjoys putting them to the test. These are the images of many pagan divinities. We read in the Letter of the Apostle James: “let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted with evil and he himself tempts no one” (1:13). If anything, it is the contrary: the Father is not the creator of evil. He does not give a serpent to any child who asks for a fish (cf. Lk 11:11) — as Jesus teaches — and when evil appears in people’s lives, he fights beside them, so they may be freed from it. A God who always fights for us, not against us. He is the Father! It is in this sense that we pray the “Our Father”.

These two moments — trial and temptation — were mysteriously present in the life of Jesus himself. In this experience the Son of God became wholly our brother, in a way that is almost scandalous. And it is precisely these Gospel passages that show us that the most difficult invocations of the “Our Father”, those that conclude the text, have already been granted: God does not leave us on our own, but in Jesus he manifests himself as the “God-with-us” up to utmost consequences. He is with us when he gives life; he is with us throughout life; he is with us in joy; he is with us in trials; he is with us in sorrow; he is with us in defeat when we sin. But he is always with us, because he is Father and cannot abandon us.

If we are tempted to commit evil, by denying our fraternity with others and desiring absolute power over everything and everyone, Jesus has already fought this temptation for us: the first pages of the Gospels attest to it. Right after receiving Baptism from John, amid the multitude of sinners, Jesus withdraws into the desert and is tempted by Satan. Thus begins Jesus’ public life, with the temptation that comes from Satan. Satan was present. Many people say: “But why speak of the devil, which is antiquated? The devil does not exist”. But look at what the Gospel teaches you: Jesus is confronted by the devil; he was tempted by Satan. But Jesus rejects every temptation and emerges victorious. The Gospel of Matthew has an interesting note that concludes the duel between Jesus and the Enemy: “Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and ministered to him” (4:11).

But even at the time of supreme trial God does not leave us on our own. When Jesus withdraws to pray in Gethsemane, his heart is overwhelmed by unspeakable anguish — as he says to the disciples — and he experiences loneliness and abandonment. Alone, with the responsibility of the sins of the world upon his shoulders; alone, with unspeakable anguish. The trial is so excruciating that something unexpected happens. Jesus never begs for love for himself, but that night he feels his soul sorrowful, even to death, and so he asks his friends for closeness: “remain here, and watch with me” (Mt 26:38). As we know, the disciples, weighed down by a lethargy wrought by fear, fall asleep. In a time of agony, God asks man not to abandon him, but instead, man falls asleep. But when man faces times of trial, God is watching. In the most awful moments of our life, in the most painful moments, in the most anguishing moments, God watches with us; God fights alongside us; he is always close to us. Why? Because he is Father. Thus, we began the prayer: “Our Father”. And a father does not abandon his children. That night of Jesus’ suffering and struggle is the ultimate seal of the Incarnation: God descends to find us in our abyss and in the anguish that pervades our history.

He is our comfort at the time of trial: knowing that since Jesus crossed it, that valley is no longer desolate but is blessed by the presence of the Son of God. He will never abandon us!

Deliver us, thus, Oh God, from the time of trial and temptation. But when this time arrives for us, Our Father, show us that we are not alone. You are the Father. Show us that Christ has already taken upon himself the weight of that cross too. Show us that Jesus calls us to carry it with him, abandoning ourselves trustfully to your Fatherly love. Thank you.

[Pope Francis, General Audience 1 May 2019]