Reflections on the religious sense.

This reflection also stems from a dialogue with a gentleman of about my age.

This well known and respected gentleman in his village met an old acquaintance of his and was rebuked by the latter because he did not attend religious services; according to her, he should have done so for his own good. The gentleman replied that he did not feel this need and that it did not seem to him that his behaviour might offend the generally understood religious sense. 

Discussions like this occur often among human beings, this is nothing new. I report it because it made me reflect on the religious sense in human life. The topic touches on several disciplines and is complex.     

Studies by Fiorenzo Facchini say that various behaviours of prehistoric man are read in a religious sense. Our ancestors gave burials to their dead and painted representations on the walls.      

These caves had something sacred about them. Religious manifestations of antiquity were songs and dances.

In all religions we find a need for reassurance about our lives and also the need to find magical answers to our problems.

Bettelheim argues that on an individual level and especially in childhood, religion can provide that basis of stability and security with which the child can evolve towards autonomy.

The society in which we live forces us to run, to be in step with the times; it wants to give us its values.

Today there is the fashion of the ephemeral, of competitiveness - and so it is psychologically reassuring to believe in a 'mother-environment' that loves us, or to be within a design that gives meaning to our lives.

Unlike Freud who did not have a positive view, or the philosopher Charles Marx who claimed that religion is the opium of the people, Jung in the eleventh volume "Psychology and Religion" says verbatim:

"Since' religion is indisputably one of the first and universal expressions of the human soul [...] it is not only a sociological or historical phenomenon, but an important personal matter" (vol.XI, p.15).

In my long professional practice I have often encountered people who have had to come to terms with this issue.

The therapist's task is not to condition the other, but to clarify the underlying dynamics.

I have met people who described themselves as non-believers but who on an unconscious level had to come to terms with their dreams. Or individuals who belonged to different religions that were so rigid that they inhibited their vital sense.

In all these cases, knowledge of the human soul grew, whether they claimed to be religious or not. We are not discussing each person's philosophical position.

There were differences between the person who called himself religious and one who was not.

I would like to point out that these differences do not constitute value judgements, but only behavioural characteristics.

The religious person believes that there is a reality that is sacred and beyond this world - and that his existence is enhanced according to his belief.

He who called himself a non-believer rejected transcendence, was one who is self-made and believes that he alone constructs his own destiny.

A constant concern was to deny any reference or wisecrack that was made to religious topics.

I have even met someone who was more concerned about what my beliefs were than his personal problems. I always replied that my sphere of action was the psyche in all its manifestations. Beyond any manifestation sacred or not, respect for the person is already a sacred attitude.

"To 'desacralise' oneself completely is not easy either, as it is difficult to deny history altogether - both for those who believe in creation and those who believe in evolution.

Who knows whether evolution includes a creation?

Dr Francesco Giovannozzi Psychologist-psychotherapist 

God bless us and may the Virgin protect us! 

First Sunday in Lent (year C) 9 March 2025 

*First Reading from the Book of Deuteronomy (26:4 - 10)

Moses orders an offering gesture, as is the case in all religions, but for Israel it is a real profession of faith: "He shall take the basket from your hands and place it before the altar of the Lord your God, and you shall speak these words". Then follows a whole discourse on God's work for his people, which could be summed up in a simple sentence: everything we have, everything we are, is a gift from God. This is the great novelty of the entire Bible, especially of the book of Deuteronomy. If in religions the rite of offering is a gesture of asking the deities for benefits that they possess, for Israel there is a reversal of the meaning of the rite because this offering is an act of gratitude. To offer gifts is not to grant God something that belongs to us, but to recognise that everything is His gift and we do not present ourselves to Him with hands full of our own riches; rather, we recognise that without Him our hands would remain empty. In this spirit, bringing one's offerings becomes a gesture of remembrance. The book of Deuteronomy insists on this practice perhaps because the people seemed to have partly forgotten God and His benefits. In the desert, Israel had well understood that its survival depended on God and Him alone. However, having arrived in the Promised Land (the land of Canaan, the Israel of today) they ran the risk of forgetting the true God as there were widespread cults of the local Baal-worshipping peoples and the serious risk of contamination by idolatry posed a threat to the true faith. The prophets always sought to maintain fidelity to the Sinai Covenant (cf. Ex 20:2), repeating that there is only one God, the God of Moses, who delivered his people from the hand of the Egyptians, accompanied them throughout their history and, finally, gave them the promised land. It seems that the concern of our text is to preserve the memory of what God has accomplished and, indeed, the book of Deuteronomy could be called the book of memory. The rite of the offering of the firstfruits is therefore above all a gesture of remembrance, accompanied by the enumeration of the works performed by God on behalf of his people. The word 'firstfruits' contains the idea of 'first', the first fruits of the new harvest, the first sheaves of wheat, the first bunches of grapes, the first born of the new litter. All of this constitutes the beginning and the promise: by weighing the first sheaf, the first bunch, one could tell if the harvest would be abundant, and the ritual of offering already existed in the days of Cain and Abel to obtain the blessings of divinity. Moses had transformed its meaning: from then on, everything was lived in function of the Covenant and that is why one understands the discourse that accompanies the offering. One does not ask God for benefits for the future, but acknowledges the benefits one has had since Abraham's call, and the rite becomes a profession of faith that constitutes a summary of Israel's history: "My father was a wandering Aramean...". It all began with Abraham, the Aramean chosen by God to become the father of the people of the Covenant: a "wandering" nomad in the sense that, before his call by God, he had not yet discovered the one God, wandering therefore in a spiritual sense. The following sentence "My father was a wandering Aramean, who went down to Egypt" no longer refers to Abraham, the progenitor, but to his descendant Jacob: he and his sons settled in Egypt. The whole story follows, up to the entry into the promised land. At this point, the gesture of the offering takes on its full meaning: by offering the first sheaf, the first cluster, it is as if one were presenting the entire harvest to God.  The offertory in the Mass has the same meaning: to recognise that everything is God's gift: "Blessed are you, Lord, God of the universe, from your goodness we have received these gifts: from your goodness we prepare and offer gifts to God that are not ours but his.

 * Responsorial Psalm 90 (91) 1-2, 10-11, 12-13, 14-15

The psalm is presented as a dialogue with three voices.  Israel says: "He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will spend the night in the shadow of the Almighty. I say to the Lord: 'My refuge my fortress, my God in whom I trust'. The priests at the entrance to the Temple proclaim: "No misfortune shall befall you, no blow shall fall on your tent". Finally, God himself intervenes: "I will deliver him, for to me he has bound himself; I will put him in safety, for he has known my name."  In the first verses, if one pays attention, four different names are given to God: the Most High (Elyôn), the Almighty (El Shaddai), the Lord (YHWH) and finally God (Elohim). The deities of other peoples use three of these names: the Most High, the Almighty and Elohim. Israel uses these common terms to designate its God, but is the only people in the world who can call him by the fourth, the famous Name revealed to Moses in the burning bush: YHWH. As God himself says in the book of Exodus: "I revealed myself to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as God Almighty (El Shaddai), but by my name, YHWH, I did not make myself known to them" (Ex 6:3). These first verses develop the theme of the believer's security with the embrace of the Most High in the shadow of the Almighty.  In the language of the psalms, the embrace of the Most High recalls the Temple of Jerusalem and the shadow is that of the wings of the statues of the cherubim above the ark of the covenant. However, there is also an allusion to God's protective presence throughout the Exodus. As exegetes note, the "wings" recall those of the eagle that encourages the first flights of its young (Deut 32:10-11; cf. Ex 19:4). And the angel Gabriel will say to the Virgin of Nazareth: "The power of the Most High will spread its shadow over you" (Lk 1:35). The terms "my refuge, my fortress, my God in whom I trust" express a profession of faith and indicate a resolution against idolatry that always demands a commitment not to abandon the embrace of the Most High. Jesus is the one who never ceases to take refuge in God, as we see today in the gospel of Jesus' temptations. In short, the fight against idolatry is a theme that runs throughout the Bible and is a central point in the preaching of the prophets. Even in our time, there is food for thought because idolatry takes on different and ever new faces. Two stanzas follow in the psalm, which are a kind of catechesis addressed by the priests to every pilgrim in the Temple of Jerusalem: "no misfortune shall befall you, no blow shall fall on your tent" if you remain under the shadow of the Most High, for he will give orders to his angels to guard you in all your ways. Thou shalt tread upon lions and vipers, thou shalt crush lions and dragons. The message is twofold: certain is the victory - you shall trample down lions and dragons - and guaranteeing it is God who will never cease to protect his people who will give orders to his angels to guard all the pilgrim's steps, indeed they will carry him with their hands, so that his foot will not stumble over stones. At the end, in the last verse, God speaks: 'I will deliver him, for to me he has bound himself; I will make him safe, for he has known my name. He shall call upon me, and I will answer him" Note the final verse "in distress I will be with him, I will deliver him and make him glorious" which shows how Israel understood that God does not remove every trial with a magic blow, but is "with" us in difficulty and trial. In distress, 'I will be with him' is exactly the meaning of the name 'Emmanuel', which means God-with-us. Proposed at the beginning of Lent, this psalm invites us to find refuge in the embrace of the Most High, attending the liturgy in our churches where there is no longer the ark of the Covenant, nor the two statues of the cherubim - those winged beings with the head of a man and the body of a lion, whose wings joined together formed a throne for God -, but something much greater: the Presence of the Holy Trinity

* Second reading from the Epistle of Saint Paul the Apostle to the Romans (10:8-13)

St Paul makes an important point: whether you are Jews or pagans there is no difference because what you have in common is that you are Christians and you all invoke the same Lord, generous to those who seek him. The problem existed in Rome as elsewhere and the question was whether Jews and pagans should be treated equally. Although Paul wanted all Jews to accept Jesus as the Messiah, nevertheless only a minority of the Jewish people adhered to Jesus Christ, while it was the pagans who constituted the largest part of the Christian communities. One understands then that the coexistence of Christians of such different origins, Jewish or pagan, posed quite a few difficulties and endless discussions arose on issues such as the Law, circumcision and dietary rules. The problem was deeper as some Jewish converts to Christianity reluctantly accepted the entry of what they called 'the uncircumcised', Israel being the chosen people from whom the Messiah would be born.  The question was: is not accepting the non-Jews a betrayal of the Covenant and the election of the Jewish people? For Paul to prevent the Gentiles from receiving baptism meant that Jesus only saves the Jews, whereas in the Old Testament the prophet Joel had already said of the Messiah: "I will pour out my Spirit on every man. Your sons and your daughters will prophesy, your elders will dream dreams, your young men will have visions. On the servants and maidservants also will I pour out my Spirit in those days... Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." (Gl 3:1-5). Moreover, Paul's contemporaries found it strange that to be saved it was enough to invoke the name of Jesus while they believed one had to be circumcised and scrupulously observe the Law. The Apostle responds that since Jesus Christ is Lord (God), henceforth anyone who invokes him is saved as Christ himself told Nicodemus: "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life," specifying precisely: "God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him." (Jn 3:16-17) and the term "world" clearly means "all mankind". The Apostle does not hesitate to repeat: "If with your mouth you proclaim, "Jesus is Lord!", and with your heart you believe that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes to obtain righteousness, and with the mouth one makes the profession of faith to obtain salvation'.  In the Old Testament, 'to obtain righteousness' and 'to be saved' meant the same thing.  Moreover, the verb 'to believe' does not here have the sense of a personal opinion, and the parallel between 'mouth' and 'heart' on which he insists indicates that faith is a deep and total commitment of the person. Thus, according to Paul, what we read in the book of Deuteronomy is fulfilled: "This word is very near you: it is in your mouth and in your heart." While Deuteronomy speaks of the Law to be observed, now this word is the message of faith in Jesus Christ, and Paul reminds those who have received baptism: salvation is freely given to us by God without any merit of our own; we only have to accept it with faith and freedom: "If with your mouth you proclaim that Jesus is Lord, and if with your heart you believe that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. With the heart one believes to obtain righteousness, with the mouth one makes profession of faith to obtain salvation

* From the Gospel according to Saint Luke (4:1 - 13)

If we read this Gospel page in the light of today's responsorial psalm, we recognise the inner attitude with which Jesus began his public mission: "He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will spend the night in the shadow of the Almighty. I say to the Lord: My refuge and my fortress, my God in whom I trust'.  Jesus places himself in the shadow of the Most High, while temptation drives him to leave this refuge, to doubt his security and to seek shelter and security elsewhere: these are precisely the three temptations that have always marked the history of Israel and also our lives. The devil - in Greek 'diabolos', that is, he who divides - tempts him by instilling doubt and distrust. If you truly are the Son of God, you can do whatever you want and are able to provide for your own happiness. Tell this stone that it may become bread and so satiate your hunger immediately after such a long fast (first temptation); adore me and you will surely be able to realise all your plans and projects (second temptation). Finally, "if thou art the Son of God, cast thyself down; for it is written: "To his angels he will give orders concerning thee that they may guard thee"; and "they will carry thee on their hands that thy foot may not stumble over a stone (third temptation). Jesus, however, does not give in to satanic enticements because he is certain that only God satisfies man's true hunger and he has chosen to trust, in other words, to dwell in the shelter of the Most High, as the psalm says. In more detail in the first temptation, when the Tempter provokes him Jesus replies: "It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone', an expression known to all the Jewish people because it is contained in chapter 8 of Deuteronomy, as a meditation on Israel's experience during the exodus under the leadership of Moses: "Remember all the way that the Lord your God made you walk these forty years in the wilderness...He made you experience hunger, then He fed you with manna that neither you nor your fathers knew, to make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but by everything that comes out of the mouth of the Lord." (Deut 8:2-3). The people know from experience what the blessedness of poverty means: Blessed are those who hunger, for they trust only in God to be filled, and Deuteronomy continues: "Acknowledge therefore in your heart that the Lord your God was educating you as a man educates his son." (Deut 8:5). In this way the Son of God, who now begins to lead his people, relives in his flesh the experience of Israel in the wilderness. In other words, when the Tempter challenges Jesus saying: "If you are the Son of God, prove it!", his answer is clear: My food is to do the will of the One who sent me and to do his works, as he will say to the disciples in the encounter with the Samaritan woman (cf. Jn 4:32-34). In the second temptation, to the Tempter who promises him all the kingdoms of the earth, Jesus replies: "The Lord your God you shall worship: to him alone you shall render worship", quoting this text among the best known of the Old Testament, which follows the Shema Israel, the Jewish profession of faith (Dt 6:10-13). In the third temptation, the devil provokes Jesus to throw himself down being the Son of God, for it is written that angels will come to guard him by carrying him on their hands, but he replies: "It has been said, 'You shall not test the Lord your God (Deut 6:16). Christ knows that he is always in the shelter of the Most High, no matter what happens. Faced with the provocations of the Tempter, Jesus draws from the word of God the strength to resist those who want to separate him from the Father; he never argues with him and his three answers are exclusively quotations from Scripture. In this he shows himself to be the authentic heir of his people and the phrase from Deuteronomy, taken up by St Paul in the Letter to the Romans (see the second reading), applies to him: "The Word is near you, it is on your lips and in your heart." (Deut 30:14). The three answers refer to the book of Deuteronomy, written precisely to remind the Israelites that God is their Father. Jesus, in his life, retraces the experience of his people in the desert, from Baptism, where he is revealed as the Son, to Gethsemane where the Tempter will return for the final attack. We read at the end of our text: "After he had exhausted all temptation, the devil departed from him until the opportune moment, but Jesus will always remain under the shadow of the Most High and, with this episode, Luke shows that Jesus is the only true model to follow.

+Giovanni D'Ercole

God bless us and may the Virgin protect us.

Here is the commentary for the Ash Wednesday readings

5 March 2025  (year C)

The liturgy of Ash Wednesday, which opens Lent, was once marked by the beginning of public penance today and the start of the last stretch of the formation of catechumens, who prepared to receive baptism at the Easter Vigil. Symbolising the call to prayer and conversion of heart, which proclaims the texts of Holy Scripture, is the rite of ashes, a sign of penance and conversion.  It is an 'austere symbol' with which we begin the spiritual journey of Lent, recognising that our body, formed from dust, will return to dust, and therefore we are invited to make our existence a sacrifice God in union with the death of Christ Jesus. What illuminates Ash Wednesday and the whole of Lent is the event of the Resurrection of Jesus, which we will celebrate with renewed hope in this Jubilee year. Ash Wednesday is a day of penance, fasting and almsgiving, which is to be understood as sharing what we are and what we possess with our brothers and sisters for the glory of God. This requires the courage to give up something that costs us in order to live Lent as a time of true inner purification. 

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

Return to the Lord with all your heart! This is the invitation that the prophet Joel issues to us today. His book is very short (it contains a total of seventy-three verses divided into four chapters) and is set around the year 600 BC, i.e. just before the exile in Babylon. There are three constantly intertwining themes: the prospect of terrible scourges, heartfelt appeals to fasting and conversion, and the proclamation of God's salvation. Today it is the second theme that the liturgy proposes to us at the beginning of Lent. The solemn call to conversion urges us to take seriously what follows, namely the invitation: 'Return to me', and the people respond and plead: 'Forgive, Lord, your people and do not expose your inheritance to the mockery and derision of the nations. The prophets always teach not to be satisfied with outward manifestations and Joel also does not fail to emphasise this: 'Tear your hearts and not your garments and return to the Lord your God, for he is merciful'.  This is what Isaiah says: 'Though you multiply your prayers, I do not listen: your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, purify yourselves. Turn away from my eyes your evil deeds, cease to do evil. Learn to do good, seek justice..." (Is 1:14-17). And Psalm 50/51 comments 'The sacrifice that pleases God is a contrite spirit; a sorrowful and humiliated heart, O God, you do not despise it'. The prophet Ezekiel helps us to understand what the psalmist means: that we must break our hearts of stone so that the heart of flesh may emerge, and the prophet Joel follows this line when he calls for tearing hearts and not garments in order to escape a deserved punishment. For he writes: "who knows that God will not change and repent and leave behind him a blessing?" And he concludes by announcing that forgiveness has already been granted. The liturgical translation says: "The Lord shows jealousy for his land" having had pity on his people, but God's mercy is destined for all men, and this is precisely the message we find in the book of Jonah very similar to that of Joel. In fact, Jonah narrates the conversion of Nineveh, the pagan city that had gone a day's journey proclaiming: 'Forty days more and Nineveh will be destroyed', and the inhabitants immediately believed in God. They proclaimed a fast and dressed themselves in sackcloth, great and small. Even the king of Nineveh laid down his royal mantle, covered himself with sackcloth and sat down on the ashes, and then proclaimed a state of alertness and had everyone in Nineveh cover themselves with sackcloth and call upon God mightily. God saw their conversion and lifted the chastisement he had threatened to inflict (Gen 3:4-10). The secret is that God is overflowing with zeal and love, as Joel reminds us, for all men, and St Paul will say: 'God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us' (Rom 5:8).

*Responsorial Psalm (50 (51).  Forgive us, Lord: we have sinned

Let us also join the people of Israel gathered in the Temple of Jerusalem for a great penitential celebration. They know that they are full of sins, but they know from experience that God's mercy is inexhaustible and so they ask for forgiveness with the certainty of being heard. This was precisely King David's discovery after he sinned with Bathsheba, wife of an officer, Uriah, who was at war at the time. Bathsheba let David know that she was pregnant by him, and David arranged for her betrayed husband to die in battle so that he could take the woman and the child she was carrying for himself for good. The prophet Nathan did not immediately try to make David admit his sin, but first reminded him of God's many gifts and announced forgiveness before David even had time to confess his guilt (cf. 2 Samuel 12). In addition to all the gifts and privileges that God had bestowed upon him, he also added that the Lord was ready to grant him whatever he wished. Throughout history, Israel had occasion to record that God is indeed "the merciful and gracious Lord, slow to anger, rich in faithfulness and loyalty", as he had revealed to Moses in the wilderness (Ex 34:6). The prophets also reiterated this message, and the verses of Psalm 50/51 are full of it. Isaiah, for example, says: "I, I alone blot out your sins for my own sake, and I remember your sins no more" (Isaiah 43:25). The announcement of God's free forgiveness always surprises us: it almost seems too good to be true. For some, it may even seem unfair: if everything is forgivable, why strive to live well? But this means forgetting that we all, without exception, need God's mercy and he surprises us, because, as Isaiah says, God's thoughts are not our thoughts. And it is precisely in forgiveness that God surprises us the most. Let us think of the Gospel parable of the labourers of the last hour: "Can I not do with my things what I will? Or are you jealous because I am good?" (cf. Mt 20:15), to that of the prodigal son (Lk 15): when the ungrateful son returns to his father, animated by motives that are anything but noble, Jesus puts a phrase from Psalm 50 on his lips: "Against you, against you alone have I sinned". And with this single phrase, the broken bond is reconnected. Faced with the ever new proclamation of God's mercy, the people of Israel, who in the Psalms speak for us all, recognise themselves as sinners. Its repentance is not detailed, it never is in the penitential Psalms, but expresses everything in a simple plea: 'Have mercy on me, O God, in your love; in your great mercy blot out my iniquity. Wash me all from my guilt, from my sin make me pure". And God, who is all mercy, attracted by man's misery, waits for nothing more than this humble confession of our poverty. And it is useful to remember that 'mercy' has the same root as 'almsgiving' and this reminds us that we are beggars of love and forgiveness before God. What to do then: give thanks and forgive. Give thanks for the forgiveness that God continually offers us. In every penitential celebration, the most important prayer is the recognition of God's gifts and forgiveness. First of all, we must contemplate God himself, and only then can we acknowledge ourselves as sinners. The Rite of Reconciliation clearly states that we confess God's love along with our sin, and praise will spring spontaneously from our lips: "Lord, open my lips and my mouth will proclaim your praise" (this is the phrase that opens the Liturgy of the Hours, every morning and is taken from Psalm 50/51) in which we are reminded that praise and gratitude will only arise in us if God opens our hearts and lips. And the second step that God expects of us and constitutes the ascetic programme of our whole life is the commitment to forgive in our turn, without delay or conditions. 

*Second Reading from St Paul's Second Letter to the Corinthians (5:20-6:2) 

"Be reconciled to God"! Paul speaks of reconciliation well aware of the breaking of the covenant between God and his people. In the Old Testament, the people knew that God is not at odds with mankind, as Psalm 102/103 clearly expresses: 'The Lord is not always quarrelling, he does not retain his wrath forever; he does not treat us according to our sins, he does not repay us according to our faults... As far as the east is from the west, so he turns away from us our faults... He knows of what we are made, he remembers that we are dust.  Similarly, we read in Isaiah: "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, who will have mercy on him, to our God, who forgives abundantly" (Isaiah 55: 7), and in the Book of Wisdom: "You have compassion on all, for you can do all things, and you shut your eyes to the sins of men, waiting for their repentance... Your sovereignty over all makes you forgiving to all" (Wisdom 11: 23; 12: 16). David had this experience when he slew Uriah, Bathsheba's husband, and God sent him the prophet Nathan who, in essence, said to him: All that you have, I have given you; and if it were not yet enough, I would be ready to give you again all that you desire. God was not even unaware that Solomon had obtained the throne by eliminating his rivals, yet he heard his prayer at Gibeon and granted his requests far beyond what the young king had dared to ask for (1 Kings 3). But there is more: God's very Name, 'Merciful', means that he loves us the more miserable we are. Therefore, God is not in dispute with man. Yet Paul speaks of reconciliation, because from the beginning of the world (Paul says 'from Adam', but it is the same thing), it is man who is in conflict with God. The Genesis account (Gen 2-3) attributes the origin of this accusation against God to the serpent because he is jealous of man and does not want his good: "God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil" (Gen 3:4) The Bible implies that this suspicion is not natural in man - it is the voice of the serpent, and therefore can be cured. This is precisely what St Paul says: 'Brothers, we, in the name of Christ, are ambassadors: through us it is God himself who exhorts. We beseech you in the name of Christ: be reconciled to God'. And what has God done to remove this distrust from our hearts? The apostle continues: "He who knew no sin, God made sin for our sake" (2 Cor 5:21). Jesus did not know sin; on the contrary, as we read in the letter to the Philippians, Jesus made himself obedient (Phil 2:8), and always remained confident, even in suffering and death. That is why he teaches men this trust and reveals that Di is all love and forgiveness: he is Mercy. By an unbelievable paradox, because of this revelation Jesus was considered a blasphemer, treated as a sinner and executed as a cursed man (cf. Deut 21:23). The hatred and blindness of men came upon him and the Father let it happen, because this was the only way for us to experience first hand how far "the Lord is jealous for his land and moves with compassion for his people" as the prophet Joel states. Jesus faced the sin of men, violence, hatred, the rejection of a God who is Love, and on the cross he appears how far the horror of human sin reaches and how far the gentleness and forgiveness of God reaches. And it is precisely from this contemplation that our conversion, what Paul calls 'justification', can arise. "They will turn their eyes to him whom they have pierced," we read in the book of the prophet Zechariah (Zech 12:10), taken up by John (Jn 19:37). In the dying Jesus who forgives his executioners, we discover the very face of God ("He who has seen me has seen the Father" Jn 14:9) and, thanks to him, we are reconciled by God. The task of the baptised is to proclaim and bear witness to this love, in the school of Paul who cries out: "We are ambassadors of Christ", a mission that involves each one of us. This short text closes with a quotation from the prophet Isaiah "At the favourable time I have heard you

and on the day of salvation I have succoured you" who spoke to the exiles in Babylon, announcing to them that the hour of salvation had come. While Israel had to announce deliverance, because false images of God imprison the hearts of men, Jesus Christ entrusted his Church with the mission of announcing the remission of sins to the world.

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

Today's Gospel contains two short excerpts from the Sermon on the Mount, which occupies chapters 5-7 of Matthew's Gospel. The whole discourse revolves around a central core that is the Lord's Prayer (Mt 6:9-13), the prayer that gives meaning to everything else. This indicates that the exhortations given here are not mere moral advice, but lead to the heart of faith, and the message is as follows: all our actions must be rooted in the discovery that God is Father. Prayer, almsgiving and fasting are therefore not just religious practices, but paths to bring us closer to God-the-Father: Fasting means learning to shift the centre away from ourselves, and with prayer we centre our lives on God, while almsgiving opens our hearts to our brothers and sisters. Three times Jesus uses expressions that invite us not to be like those who love to show off. Religious practices were certainly of great importance in the Jewish society of the time and the risk was to place too much value on outward displays as some did. Matthew recalls Jesus' rebukes to those who cared more about the length of their fringes than about mercy and faithfulness (Matthew 23:5ff). Here, Jesus invites his disciples to a true inner purification because to be truly righteous one must avoid acting in front of men in order to be admired by them. Righteousness was a fundamental theme for believers and in the Beatitudes, Jesus mentions it twice: "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied." (Mt 5:6) "Blessed are those persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." (Mt 5:10) But in biblical language, true justice does not consist in accumulating religious practices, however noble they may be. True righteousness is to be in harmony with God's plan as we already read in Genesis: "Abraham believed the Lord, and therefore the Lord counted him righteous." (Gen 15:6). Therefore, not a righteousness that is self-righteousness, but a deep harmony and agreement with God.  Prayer, fasting, almsgiving become three ways to live justice: In prayer, we allow God to mould us according to his plan: "Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done. "And precisely for this reason, Jesus recommends: "When you pray, do not waste words as the pagans do; your Father knows what you need even before you ask him. (Mt 6:7-8) Fasting is along the same lines: it frees us from the illusion of what we believe is essential to be happy, but which often ends up imprisoning us. Jesus himself, fasting in the desert, answered Satan: "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God." (Mt 4:4) Almsgiving is the fruit of our walk of righteousness, because it makes us merciful. It is no coincidence that the Greek word for almsgiving comes from the same root as eleison ("have mercy") and to give alms means to open one's heart to compassion. Since God loves all his children, there can be no true justice without social justice. And we see this clearly in the Last Judgement: "Come, ye blessed of my Father... For I was hungry and you gave me food... "And at the end: "The righteous shall go to eternal life. (Mt 25:31-46). Ultimately those who flaunt are at odds with true righteousness because they display a subtle form of spiritual selfishness, a way of remaining self-centred. And the real tragedy is that this attitude closes our hearts to the Spirit's sanctifying action.

+Giovanni D'Ercole