Meditation

—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.”
 

Today, God's word deals with the outstanding matter of the resurrection from the dead. It is peculiar that, as the Sadducees did, we keep on asking useless and pointless questions. We try to explain the substance of afterlife with world criteria, when in the world to come everything is different...

Today, Jesus' gesture is prophetic. As the old prophets used to do, He makes a symbolic action, full of future implications. By casting out of the temple the merchants who were selling their offerings to their victims and evoking that “my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples” (Is 56, 7)...
 

Today, the image presented by the Gospel is that of Jesus who “wept over” (Lk 19, 41) for the fate of the chosen city that did not recognize the time and visitation of its Savior. Knowing, as we do, the latest news about this city, it would be easy to apply this lamentation to the city which —is both— holy and a source of separation.
 

spel proposes to us the parable of the pounds: an amount of money that a noble man gives out to his servants, before leaving for a far country. First, let us pay attention to the occasion provoking Jesus' parable. He was “getting near” Jerusalem, where He was to face his Passion and his subsequent resurrection.

Today, I'll be Zacchaeus. This personage was a wealthy man and the chief of the Publicans; I have more than I need and, perhaps too often, I behave like a Publican and forget about Jesus Christ. Amidst the crowd, Jesus seeks Zacchaeus; today, amidst our world, He is precisely looking for me: “come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house” (Lk 19, 5).
 

Today, the blind beggar Bartimaeus (cf. Mk 10, 46) gives us a complete lesson about faith, expressed with total simplicity in front of Christ. It would be good for us to repeat, every now and then, Bartimaeus' prayer: “Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!” (Lk 18, 37). 
 

Today, Jesus tells us another parable of judgment. We are approaching the Advent season, and therefore, the end of the liturgical year is near.
 

Today, when the last days of the liturgical year are getting near, Jesus exhorts us to pray, to open ourselves to God. We may think as the family parents who —every day!— are expecting to receive from their sons some words showing their loving affection.
 

Today, in the Gospel text, the end times as well as the uncertainty of life is highlighted, not to frighten us, but to keep us fore-armed and focused, ready to meet our Creator. The sacrificial nature of the Gospel is seen in its Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as He leads us by example, to be ever ready to seek and do the Will of God. 
 

Today, the Pharisees ask Jesus, with a mixture of interest, curiosity, fear... something that has always been of interest for all of us: when will the Kingdom of God come? When will it be the last day, the end of the world, Christ's return to judge the living and the dead in the day of the Last Judgment?
 

Today, Jesus passes by close to us so that we can actually relive the above mentioned passage in the shape of so many people relegated to an outer edge by our society, and who look at us Christians as their only possibility to find Jesus' love and goodness.

For those who believe, everything is a sign, for those who love, everything is a gift. Working for God's Kingdom is already a great reward; hence, the expression “We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do” (Lk 17, 10) should not be interpreted with dejection or sadness, but with the joy of one who knows that he has been called to spread the knowledge of the Gospel.
 

Faith: more than mind wealth (in a strictly human meaning), is a “mood”, the outcome of God's experience, is to be able to act by leaning on his confidence. St. Ignatius of Antioch says: “Faith is the beginning of true life”. 

Today, we are invited to mull over the purpose of our existence; it is a warning from the Good God about our ultimate end; let's not, therefore, play with life. "The kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom” (Mt 25, 1).