Meditation

Today, the Savior has been born. This is the good news of this Christmas Eve. Like in every Christmas, Jesus is born again in the world, in each home, in our heart.
 

This message tells us that Christmas is near. Mary will open the door for us with her cooperation the Work of God. The humble girl of Nazareth listens in surprise to the angel's announcement. She was earnestly praying that God would soon send the Anointed One to save the world. Little did she imagine, in her modest understanding, that God had chosen her specifically to fulfill His plans.
 

“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, [then] I will enter his house and dine with him, and he with me” (Rev 3, 20), we read in the Communion antiphone. It is necessary to examine ourselves to see how we are preparing ourselves to receive Jesus this Christmas: God, more than anything, wants to be born in our hearts.
 

We are now reaching the end of the season of Advent, a time of conversion and purification. Today it is Mary who teaches us the best way. Meditating on the prayer of our Mother —wanting to make it our own— will help us to be more humble. Holy Mary will help us if we truly ask her.
 

Joy is indivisible from faith. “And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Lk 1, 43). The joy of God and Mary has spread all over the world. To allow it within us, we need only to open ourselves through our faith to God's constant influence in our life...
 

Today, once more, we contemplate the impressive scene of the Annunciation. God, always true to His promises, lets Mary know through the Angel Gabriel that she is the one chosen to bear the Savior of the world. 
 

Today, the angel Gabriel announces the “supernatural” birth of John the Baptist, the man who will prepare the mission of the Messiah to the priest Zechariah. God, in His loving providence, prepares Jesus' birth along with John's. Isabel's sterility is not a problem. God wants to perform such a miracle because of His love for us, His creatures.
 

Today, the liturgy of the Word invites us to think of the wonderful example St. Joseph gives us. He was extremely sensitive towards Mary, his betrothed.
 

The Gospel has presented us with the figure of John the Baptist, the precursor. John enjoyed great popularity among the simple people; but when asked, he responds with humility: "I am not the Messiah..." (cf. Jn 1, 21); “I baptize with water; but there is one among you whom you do not recognize, the one who is coming after me” (Jn 1,26-27). 

A new way of looking and a new heart are necessary if the ways of God are to be recognized, and if we are to respond with cheerfulness and generosity to the demanding calls of those He has sent. Not everybody is willing to understand it, let alone live it. 
 

God comes to our encounter, but man —especially the present-day man— hides out from Him. Some, as Herod, are really afraid of Him. Others are even disturbed by His simple presence, as we read in John’s Gospel: “Take him away, take him away! Crucify him!” (Jn 19, 15). 

Today, the Gospel speaks of John the Baptist, the Messiah's Precursor, he who has come to prepare the paths of the Lord. He will stay with us until the sixteenth day, when the first part of Advent comes to an end.
 

Today, Jesus leads us to rest in God. He certainly is a demanding Father, because He loves us and invites us to give Him everything; but He is not an executioner. When He requires something of us it is to help us grow in His love. His only commandment is to love. We can suffer for love, but we can also rejoice in love and rest in love...
 

Today, Jesus challenges us: “What do you think of this?” (Mt 18, 12): what kind of mercy do you practice? Perhaps, we, “practicing Catholics”, having drunk copiously of God's mercy in his sacraments, could come to a point to think that we are already justified in the eyes of God. 

—My sins are always the deepest source of that which is bad in me “As for you, your sins are forgiven” (Lk 5, 20). Very often, our prayer and our interest are purely materialistic, but the Lord knows what we really need. 

Today, as the curtain of the divine drama rises, we can already hear someone shouting: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths” (Mk 1, 3). Today we meet John the Baptist as he sets the stage for Jesus' coming.
 

Today, a week into our preparation for the celebration of Christmas, we see that one of the virtues, which we have to work on during Advent, is hope. Not in a passive way, like that of someone waiting for a train, but active hope, hope which gets us ready to give all that is needed for Jesus to be born again in our hearts.
 

Mary, a young woman “betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David” (Lk 1, 28) has a plan, of human proportions, evidently. However, God comes into her life to bestow on her another project... of divine proportions. 
 

Today, the Lord pronounced these words at the end of His "Sermon on the Mount" where He bestows a new and deeper meaning to the Commandments of the Old Testament, the "words" of God to men. He talks as the Son of God, and as such, He demands us “to receive what I say to you”, as very significant words. 

Today we reflect on the multiplication of the bread and fish in the Gospel. Many people —Matthew states— “came to him” (Mt 15, 30). Men and women who were in need of Christ: blind people, cripples and sick people of every kind, together with those who accompanied them...

Today, we are reading an excerpt of Chapter 10, of the Gospel after St. Luke. The Lord had sent seventy-two disciples to the towns He intended to visit. And they came back exultant. While listening to the accounts of their doings and exploits, “At that very moment he rejoiced [in] the Holy Spirit and said, ‘I give you praise, Father, Lord of heaven and earth’” (Lk 10, 21).
 

We can only approach Jesus with a humble attitude, like that of the centurion. That way we can live the hope of Advent: the hope of salvation and life, of reconciliation and peace. Only he, who acknowledges his poverty and realizes that the meaning of life is not to be found in himself, but in God, in turning his life over to Him, can really have hope. 
 

Today the universal Church begins a new Liturgical Year with the first Sunday of Advent. This is a time of hope —a time in which the memory of the first coming of the Lord is renewed in our hearts, in humility and concealment— and the longing for the return of Christ in glory and majesty is renewed.
 

Today, the last day of Ordinary Time, Jesus clearly warns us about the fate of our pass through life. Should we stubbornly insist on living imbued by the immediacy of our worldly cares, the last day of our earthly existence will come upon us so suddenly that the very blindness of our own greediness will prevent us from recognizing God Himself,...
 

Today, Jesus invites us to read the signs of our times and era, and to acknowledge in them the closeness of the Kingdom of God. He invites us "Look at the fig tree and all the trees" (Lk 21, 29) paying attention to what is happening with them: when you look at them, you “know that summer is now near” (Lk 21, 30).

Today, is St. Andrew's Day, apostle, a festivity celebrated in a solemn way amongst Eastern Orthodox Christians. He was one of the two young men that met Jesus by the river Jordan and had a long conversation with Him. He first found his own brother Simon, and told him “We have found the Messiah” and he brought him to Jesus (cf. Jn 1,41-42). 
 

Today, we pay attention to this short but sharp sentence of our Lord, which sticks into our soul and makes us wonder: why is perseverance so important? why does Jesus tell us our salvation depends upon the exercise of this virtue?
 

Today, we listen astounded to the Lord's severe warning: “The days will come when there will not be left a stone upon another stone that will not be thrown down.” (Lk 21, 6). Jesus' words can be placed in the antipodes of the so called “indefinite human progress culture” or, if preferred, of the unstoppable evolution of some techno/scientific and political/military leaders of the human species.
 

Today, as it happens so often, small things go by unnoticed: small alms, small sacrifices, small ejaculatory prayers; but what, at times, may look small and unimportant, frequently represents the warp and also the culmination of master works: be it great works of art, be it the maximum good deeds of personal saintliness.
 

Today, Jesus speaks to us about the final judgment. And with that metaphorical image of sheep and goats, He shows us that it will be a judgment of love. Saint John of the Cross tells us: “In the evening of life, we will be judged on love alone.”