Acts of the Apostles 3,13-15.17-19. Peter said to the people: "The God of Abraham, (the God) of Isaac, and (the God) of Jacob, the God of our ancestors, has glorified his servant Jesus whom you handed over and denied in Pilate's presence, when he had decided to release him. You denied the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you. The author of life you put to death, but God raised him from the dead; of this we are witnesses. Now I know, brothers, that you acted out of ignorance, just as your leaders did; but God has thus brought to fulfillment what he had announced beforehand through the mouth of all the prophets, that his Messiah would suffer. Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be wiped away."
Psalms 4,2.4.7.9. When I call, answer me, O my just God, you who relieve me when I am in distress; have pity on me, and hear my prayer!
Know that the LORD does wonders for his faithful one; the LORD will hear me when I call upon him. O LORD, let the light of your countenance shine upon us!
As soon as I lie down, I fall peacefully asleep, for you alone, O LORD, bring security to my dwelling.
First Letter of John 2,1-5a. My children, I am writing this to you so that you may not commit sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous one. He is expiation for our sins, and not for our sins only but for those of the whole world. The way we may be sure that we know him is to keep his command ments. Whoever says, "I know him," but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps his word, the love of God is truly perfected in him. This is the way we may know that we are in union with him.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 24,35-48. The disciples of Jesus recounted what had taken place along the way, and how Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of bread. While they were still speaking about this, he stood in their midst and said to them, "Peace be with you." But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost. Then he said to them, "Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have." And as he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, he asked them, "Have you anything here to eat?" They gave him a piece of baked fish; he took it and ate it in front of them. He said to them, "These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled." Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures. And he said to them, "Thus it is written that the Messiah would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things."
POPE FRANCIS REGINA CAELI 18 April 2021 Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Buongiorno!
On this Third Sunday of Easter, we return to Jerusalem, in the Upper Room, as though guided by the two disciples of Emmaus, who had listened with great emotion to Jesus’ words along the way and then had recognized him “in the breaking of the bread” (Lk 24:35). Now, in the Upper Room, the Risen Christ presents himself in the midst of the group of disciples and greets them: “Peace to you!” (v. 36). But they are frightened and believe “that they saw a spirit” (v. 37), the Gospel says. Jesus then shows them the wounds on his body and says: “See my hands and my feet” — the wounds — “that it is I myself; handle me” (v. 39). And to convince them, he asks for food and eats it before their astonished eyes (cf. vv. 41-42).
There is a detail here, in this description. The Gospel says that the Apostles “still disbelieved for joy”. The joy they felt was such that they could not believe that this was true. And a second detail: they were bewildered, astonished; astonished because the encounter with God always leads you to astonishment: it goes beyond enthusiasm, beyond joy; it is another experience. And they were joyful, but a joy that made them think: no, this cannot be true!... It is the astonishment of God’s presence. Do not forget this frame of mind, which is so beautiful.
Three very concrete verbs characterize this Gospel passage. In a certain sense, they reflect our individual and community life: to look, to touch and to eat. Three actions that can give joy from a true encounter with the living Jesus.
To look. “See my hands and my feet”, Jesus says. To look is not only to see, it is more; it also involves intention, will. For this reason, it is one of the verbs of love. A mother and father look at their child; lovers gaze at each other; a good doctor looks at the patient carefully... Looking is a first step against indifference, against the temptation to look the other way before the difficulties and sufferings of others. To look. Do I see or look at Jesus?
The second verb is to touch. By inviting the disciples to touch him, to verify that he is not a ghost — touch me! — Jesus indicates to them and to us that the relationship with him and with our brothers and sisters cannot remain “at a distance”. Christianity does not exist at a distance; Christianity does not exist only at the level of looking. Love requires looking and it also requires closeness; it requires contact, the sharing of life. The Good Samaritan did not limit himself to looking at that man whom he found half dead along the road: he stopped, he bent down, he treated his wounds, he touched him, he loaded him onto his mount and took him to the inn. And it is the same with Jesus himself: loving him means entering into a communion of life, a communion with him.
And thus, we come to the third verb, to eat, which clearly expresses our humanity in its most natural poverty, that is, our need to nourish ourselves in order to live. But eating, when we do so together, among family or friends, also becomes an expression of love, an expression of communion, of celebration... How often the Gospels present us with Jesus experiencing this convivial dimension! Even as the Risen One, with his disciples. To the point that the Eucharistic Banquet has become the emblematic sign of the Christian community. Eating together the Body of Christ: this is the core of Christian life.
Brothers and sisters, this Gospel passage tells us that Jesus is not a “ghost”, but a living Person; that when Jesus draws near to us he fills us with joy, to the point of disbelief, and he leaves us bewildered, with that astonishment that only God’s presence gives, because Jesus is a living Person.
Being Christian is not first of all a doctrine or a moral ideal; it is a living relationship with him, with the Risen Lord: we look at him, we touch him, we are nourished by him and, transformed by his Love, we look at, touch and nourish others as brothers and sisters. May the Virgin Mary help us to live this experience of grace.
FAUSTI- "Blessed are the eyes that see what you see!" It is our holy envy and Luke's envy for the first disciples, who saw Him that they witnessed to us. Here we are told how even though they have seen and touched him, they too must, like us, recognize and believe Him through the memory of His Word and His Banquet. The Word and the Bread are the constant presence of the Risen One in His Church. The first explains the promise of God to us and touches us, warming our hearts, the second opens our eyes to its realization, is seen in the gift of Himself. In this way, we also experience for ourselves the truth of what the eyewitnesses have transmitted to us and we make our own the cry of wonder for the great work of God: "truly the Lord has risen and was seen by Simon". In this passage Luke directly connects our recognition with experience of Simon and that of others with him. The difference between us and them lies in the fact that they contemplated and touched His Flesh also physically, while we contemplate it and touch it only spiritually, through the witness of Word and the Eucharistic memorial. What they touched with their hands, touches our hearts and gives us new eyes. Luke insists very much on the corporeity of the Risen Lord. It is in controversy with the Hellenistic environment, which believed in the immortality of the soul, but not in the resurrection of bodies. With this lies or falls both the promise of God and the very hope of man to overcome the ultimate enemy, death. This victory is the fruit of the tree of the Cross, where God's solidarity with our evil is offered to us. The key to reading and synthesizing the scriptures is the Crucified One, which offers us the vision of a God who is infinite love and mercy. His Resurrection is almost a corollary, which confirms on the one hand His Divinity and on the other hand the gift that has come to bring us. In His name, the conversion and remission of sins is proclaimed to all. In Him we see the Truth of the One from whom the lie made us turn away, and we return to turn to Him, who is our Life. At the foot of the cross our fear of God and our flight from Him ceases, because we see that He has always addressed us and forgives us forever. The disciples will be witnesses of this: they will make known to all the brothers the Lord Jesus as the new Face of God and Salvation of man. The strength of this witness is the Holy Spirit, the power from on high. As he descended upon Mary, He will descend upon them. The incarnation of God in history not only continues, but thus reaches its definitive stage. We are in the last days, when we live what is forever. God has made His solidarity with man perfect: at the time of the ancients He was "before us" as the law to lead us to the promised land; at the time of Jesus He was "with us" to open up and teach us the way to the Father; now, in the time of the Church, He is "in us" as a new life. The Father, in His Love, has given us the Son; the Son, in the same Love, has given us His Spirit; now the Spirit is our full Life in the Son, in whom we love the Father and our brothers and sisters. Jesus has completed His Mission. We continue it in space and time. In Him and like Him, we are close to all our brothers and sisters, sharing the Word and the Bread with them, healing their mortal wounds with oil and wine. From Jerusalem to the ends of the earth, the universe and all it contains, everything will be filled with Glory. Then man will have fully found himself. And he and his history will be saved.
-->-->Peter punctuates in his speech the 'identity of Jesus, the Righteous One and the Holy One, Glorified by God and Crucified by men, after denying and delivering Him . He, the Author of life, had already asked the Father's forgiveness for His slayers : "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do!" (Lk 23:34 ). Peter also justifies them for their ignorance of what they were doing and asks for conversion and change of life, for the forgiveness of sins. S. John consoles us sinners in the announcement that we have "a Paraclete" , an "Expiator" for our sins and those of the whole world. Luke tells of the return toward the eleven of the two disciples of Emmaus, and their enthusiastic recollection of Jesus' recognition in the breaking of the Bread. And behold He stood among them, showing the signs of His Passion and Death on the Cross, and asking, Him this time, for food, to demonstrate His Bodily Presence . And then He explains to them, as to the first fugitives on the road to Emmaus, all that is written about Him and His Victorious Salvation in the Law , the Prophets and the Psalms . Now , in the presence of the Community, He completes the account of His Historical Event with what is said about the Mission of the Church and the Witness of His own in the world. Everything is brought to completion by Him :" All things are accomplished" ( Jn. 19:30) and shall be completed to the ends of the earth and to the end of the world by all His, His Body, His Promise, His Presence! "As the Father has sent Me, so I send you!" ( Jn. 20:21).
We contemplate the birds of the air and the lilies of the field, but the sweet excitement we feel is veiled soon with sadness if we are reminded of the fate that unites us with these beautiful creatures. Man, too "as a flower springs up and withers" (Job 14:2) and his days are like grass (Ps. 103:15). The grain of wheat dies to be born again and the tree "if it is cut down, still it sprouts and its shoots do not cease to grow" (Job 14:7). What will be the outcome of the dramatic duel between death and life in which man is also involved? There is no doubt: death will have the last word. Billions of years from now, life will be extinguished in the universe. Then, will our passage on this earth have been meaningful, or will it have been a meteor of which no will remain a trace? Does the mockery of total nothingness await us? The feeling we have is that we are prisoners, chained in a world destined for death from which we are not allowed to escape. This is the great unsolved riddle to which men have always, desperately, tried to give an answer to. The light of Easter has dissolved forever the darkness and shadows of death: this world is not a tomb, but the womb in which to grow and prepare for life without limits, without boundaries. Creation will blossom into new heavens and new earth (2 Pet. 3:13). To internalize the message, we will repeat: "God will watch our hands and feet" to see in them the stigmata of love.
Acts of the Apostles
RispondiElimina3,13-15.17-19.
Peter said to the people: "The God of Abraham, (the God) of Isaac, and (the God) of Jacob, the God of our ancestors, has glorified his servant Jesus whom you handed over and denied in Pilate's presence, when he had decided to release him.
You denied the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you.
The author of life you put to death, but God raised him from the dead; of this we are witnesses.
Now I know, brothers, that you acted out of ignorance, just as your leaders did;
but God has thus brought to fulfillment what he had announced beforehand through the mouth of all the prophets, that his Messiah would suffer.
Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be wiped away."
Psalms
4,2.4.7.9.
When I call, answer me, O my just God,
you who relieve me when I am in distress;
have pity on me, and hear my prayer!
Know that the LORD does wonders for his faithful one;
the LORD will hear me when I call upon him.
O LORD, let the light of your countenance shine upon us!
As soon as I lie down, I fall peacefully asleep,
for you alone, O LORD,
bring security to my dwelling.
First Letter of John
2,1-5a.
My children, I am writing this to you so that you may not commit sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous one.
He is expiation for our sins, and not for our sins only but for those of the whole world.
The way we may be sure that we know him is to keep his command ments.
Whoever says, "I know him," but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
But whoever keeps his word, the love of God is truly perfected in him. This is the way we may know that we are in union with him.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
according to Saint Luke 24,35-48.
The disciples of Jesus recounted what had taken place along the way, and how Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of bread.
While they were still speaking about this, he stood in their midst and said to them, "Peace be with you."
But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost.
Then he said to them, "Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts?
Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have."
And as he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet.
While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, he asked them, "Have you anything here to eat?"
They gave him a piece of baked fish;
he took it and ate it in front of them.
He said to them, "These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled."
Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures.
And he said to them, "Thus it is written that the Messiah would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day
and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.
You are witnesses of these things."
POPE FRANCIS REGINA CAELI
RispondiElimina18 April 2021
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Buongiorno!
On this Third Sunday of Easter, we return to Jerusalem, in the Upper Room, as though guided by the two disciples of Emmaus, who had listened with great emotion to Jesus’ words along the way and then had recognized him “in the breaking of the bread” (Lk 24:35). Now, in the Upper Room, the Risen Christ presents himself in the midst of the group of disciples and greets them: “Peace to you!” (v. 36). But they are frightened and believe “that they saw a spirit” (v. 37), the Gospel says. Jesus then shows them the wounds on his body and says: “See my hands and my feet” — the wounds — “that it is I myself; handle me” (v. 39). And to convince them, he asks for food and eats it before their astonished eyes (cf. vv. 41-42).
There is a detail here, in this description. The Gospel says that the Apostles “still disbelieved for joy”. The joy they felt was such that they could not believe that this was true. And a second detail: they were bewildered, astonished; astonished because the encounter with God always leads you to astonishment: it goes beyond enthusiasm, beyond joy; it is another experience. And they were joyful, but a joy that made them think: no, this cannot be true!... It is the astonishment of God’s presence. Do not forget this frame of mind, which is so beautiful.
Three very concrete verbs characterize this Gospel passage. In a certain sense, they reflect our individual and community life: to look, to touch and to eat. Three actions that can give joy from a true encounter with the living Jesus.
To look. “See my hands and my feet”, Jesus says. To look is not only to see, it is more; it also involves intention, will. For this reason, it is one of the verbs of love. A mother and father look at their child; lovers gaze at each other; a good doctor looks at the patient carefully... Looking is a first step against indifference, against the temptation to look the other way before the difficulties and sufferings of others. To look. Do I see or look at Jesus?
The second verb is to touch. By inviting the disciples to touch him, to verify that he is not a ghost — touch me! — Jesus indicates to them and to us that the relationship with him and with our brothers and sisters cannot remain “at a distance”. Christianity does not exist at a distance; Christianity does not exist only at the level of looking. Love requires looking and it also requires closeness; it requires contact, the sharing of life. The Good Samaritan did not limit himself to looking at that man whom he found half dead along the road: he stopped, he bent down, he treated his wounds, he touched him, he loaded him onto his mount and took him to the inn. And it is the same with Jesus himself: loving him means entering into a communion of life, a communion with him.
And thus, we come to the third verb, to eat, which clearly expresses our humanity in its most natural poverty, that is, our need to nourish ourselves in order to live. But eating, when we do so together, among family or friends, also becomes an expression of love, an expression of communion, of celebration... How often the Gospels present us with Jesus experiencing this convivial dimension! Even as the Risen One, with his disciples. To the point that the Eucharistic Banquet has become the emblematic sign of the Christian community. Eating together the Body of Christ: this is the core of Christian life.
Brothers and sisters, this Gospel passage tells us that Jesus is not a “ghost”, but a living Person; that when Jesus draws near to us he fills us with joy, to the point of disbelief, and he leaves us bewildered, with that astonishment that only God’s presence gives, because Jesus is a living Person.
Being Christian is not first of all a doctrine or a moral ideal; it is a living relationship with him, with the Risen Lord: we look at him, we touch him, we are nourished by him and, transformed by his Love, we look at, touch and nourish others as brothers and sisters. May the Virgin Mary help us to live this experience of grace.
FAUSTI- "Blessed are the eyes that see what you see!" It is our holy envy and Luke's envy for the first disciples, who saw Him that they witnessed to us. Here we are told how even though they have seen and touched him, they too must, like us, recognize and believe Him through the memory of His Word and His Banquet.
RispondiEliminaThe Word and the Bread are the constant presence of the Risen One in His Church.
The first explains the promise of God to us and touches us, warming our hearts, the second opens our eyes to its realization, is seen in the gift of Himself.
In this way, we also experience for ourselves the truth of what the eyewitnesses have transmitted to us and we make our own the cry of wonder for the great work of God: "truly the Lord has risen and was seen by Simon".
In this passage Luke directly connects our recognition with experience of Simon and that of others with him. The difference between us and them lies in the fact that they contemplated and touched His Flesh also physically, while we contemplate it and touch it only spiritually, through the witness of Word and the Eucharistic memorial. What they touched with their hands, touches our hearts and gives us new eyes.
Luke insists very much on the corporeity of the Risen Lord. It is in controversy with the Hellenistic environment, which believed in the immortality of the soul, but not in the resurrection of bodies.
With this lies or falls both the promise of God and the very hope of man to overcome the ultimate enemy, death.
This victory is the fruit of the tree of the Cross, where God's solidarity with our evil is offered to us.
The key to reading and synthesizing the scriptures is the Crucified One, which offers us the vision of a God who is infinite love and mercy.
His Resurrection is almost a corollary, which confirms on the one hand His Divinity and on the other hand the gift that has come to bring us.
In His name, the conversion and remission of sins is proclaimed to all.
In Him we see the Truth of the One from whom the lie made us turn away, and we return to turn to Him, who is our Life. At the foot of the cross our fear of God and our flight from Him ceases, because we see that He has always addressed us and forgives us forever.
The disciples will be witnesses of this: they will make known to all the brothers the Lord Jesus as the new Face of God and Salvation of man.
The strength of this witness is the Holy Spirit, the power from on high. As he descended upon Mary, He will descend upon them. The incarnation of God in history not only continues, but thus reaches its definitive stage. We are in the last days, when we live what is forever.
God has made His solidarity with man perfect: at the time of the ancients He was "before us" as the law to lead us to the promised land; at the time of Jesus He was "with us" to open up and teach us the way to the Father; now, in the time of the Church, He is "in us" as a new life.
The Father, in His Love, has given us the Son; the Son, in the same Love, has given us His Spirit; now the Spirit is our full Life in the Son, in whom we love the Father and our brothers and sisters.
Jesus has completed His Mission.
We continue it in space and time.
In Him and like Him, we are close to all our brothers and sisters, sharing the Word and the Bread with them, healing their mortal wounds with oil and wine.
From Jerusalem to the ends of the earth, the universe and all it contains, everything will be filled with Glory.
Then man will have fully found himself. And he and his history will be saved.
-->-->Peter punctuates in his speech the 'identity of Jesus, the Righteous One and the Holy One, Glorified by God and Crucified by men, after denying and delivering Him .
RispondiEliminaHe, the Author of life, had already asked the Father's forgiveness for His slayers : "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do!" (Lk 23:34 ). Peter also justifies them for their ignorance of what they were doing and asks for conversion and change of life, for the forgiveness of sins.
S. John consoles us sinners in the announcement that we have "a Paraclete" , an "Expiator" for our sins and those of the whole world. Luke tells of the return toward the eleven of the two disciples of Emmaus, and their enthusiastic recollection of Jesus' recognition in the breaking of the Bread. And behold He stood among them, showing the signs of His Passion and Death on the Cross, and asking, Him this time, for food, to demonstrate His Bodily Presence .
And then He explains to them, as to the first fugitives on the road to Emmaus, all that is written about Him and His Victorious Salvation in the Law , the Prophets and the Psalms . Now , in the presence of the Community, He completes the account of His Historical Event with what is said about the Mission of the Church and the Witness of His own in the world.
Everything is brought to completion by Him :" All things are accomplished" ( Jn. 19:30) and shall be completed to the ends of the earth and to the end of the world by all His, His Body, His Promise, His Presence! "As the Father has sent Me, so I send you!" ( Jn. 20:21).
ARMELLINI
RispondiEliminaGod will ask us
To show him our hands
We contemplate the birds of the air and the lilies of the field, but the sweet excitement we feel is veiled
soon with sadness if we are reminded of the fate that unites us with these beautiful creatures. Man, too
"as a flower springs up and withers" (Job 14:2) and his days are like grass (Ps. 103:15). The grain of wheat dies to be born again and the tree "if it is cut down, still it sprouts and its shoots do not cease to grow"
(Job 14:7). What will be the outcome of the dramatic duel between death and life in which man is also involved?
There is no doubt: death will have the last word. Billions of years from now, life will be extinguished in the universe.
Then, will our passage on this earth have been meaningful, or will it have been a meteor of which no will remain a trace? Does the mockery of total nothingness await us? The feeling we have is that we are prisoners,
chained in a world destined for death from which we are not allowed to escape.
This is the great unsolved riddle to which men have always, desperately, tried to
give an answer to.
The light of Easter has dissolved forever the darkness and shadows of death: this world is not
a tomb, but the womb in which to grow and prepare for life without limits, without boundaries. Creation will blossom
into new heavens and new earth (2 Pet. 3:13). To internalize the message, we will repeat:
"God will watch our hands and feet"
to see in them the stigmata of love.