Meditation

Romano Guardini wrote: "The source of joy is to be found in a person's deeper intimacy (...). It is there where God resides. Then, joy widens and makes us glitter. And all that is beautiful can be perceived by us in all its brilliance". 

We again contemplate the Word of God with the help of Evangelist John. In these final days of Easter we feel an especial uneasiness to make God's Word ours and be able to understand it. The very uneasiness shared by the first disciples. 

Once again, our Lord, wants to open our eyes for us to realize that more often than not we make things completely wrong. "The Spirit of truth comes, will guide you into the whole truth" (Jn 16, 13), what the Father made known to the Son.

 In today's Gospel Jesus notes that the disciples "are overcome with grief because of what I have said", but that "it is better for you that I go away" (Jn 16,6-7). Jesus must ascend to the Father. Yet, He still remains with us.

"Paraclete" literally means "one called to the side of another", and is usually translated as "Comforter". In this way, Jesus reminds us of the goodness of God, for the Holy Spirit being God's love, He infuses into our hearts peace, equanimity in adversity and joy for the things of God. He makes us look at things above and join God.
 

If our life does not reflect the joy of believing, if we are overwhelmed by our own frustrations and do not realize the Lord is also next to us, consoling us, it is because we do not know Jesus sufficiently well.

Jesus is the light of men, the light that illuminates the world's darkness. Karol Wojtyla exhorts us "so that this light makes us strong and capable to accept and love the entire Truth of Christ, and love it even more when opposed by our world".

Jesus speaks to you as a friend, for He has told you that his Father calls you, that He wants you to become an apostle, and that He expects you to bear fruit, a fruit that is manifested through love. St. John Crysostom affirms: "If love would be spread all over, an infinite goodness would be born out of it".

We hear again the intimate confidence Jesus made last Holy Thursday: "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you" (Jn 15, 9). The Father's love for the Son is immense, tender, dear. 

Once more, we may see Jesus surrounded by the Apostles in an atmosphere of especial intimacy. He is giving them what we could consider as his final recommendations: what is normally said in the last moment, in the last farewell; that which has an especial force, as if it would be the last will.

Jesus speaks to us indirectly of the cross: He will give us the peace, but at the cost of his painful “departure” of this world. Today, we read those words He said before the sacrifice on the Cross but that were written after his Resurrection. With his death on the Cross, He defeats both death and fear. 

We celebrate the feast of Philip and James, Apostles. The Gospel refers to those chats Jesus used to have with the Apostles only, with the purpose of giving them a clear idea about himself and his Mission on Earth.

The Father wants us all to bear abundant fruit. It is quite logical. The vine grower plants his vine so that it bears much fruit. If we set up a company, we want it to be profitable. Jesus insists: "It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain" (Jn 15, 16).
 

The Lord of the Gospel assures us: "Everything you ask in my name, I will do" (Jn 14, 13). —God is my Father and, as a loving Father, He looks after me: He does not want anything to hurt me. Everything that happens —everything that happens to me— is meant for my sanctification.

In the middle of it all, Jesus, the Prince of Peace, repeats to all men of good will, with his infinite gentleness: "Do not be troubled; trust in God and trust in me" (Jn 14, 1). To the right of the Father, He cherish, as a hopeful dream of his mercy, the moment when He shall have us by his side "so that where I am, you also may be" (Jn 14, 3). 

In the Eucharist, Jesus resurrected becomes our servant, He washes our feet. But the physical presence is not enough. We have to learn in the Eucharist and get the necessary strength from so that it may become a reality that "having received the gift of love, we die to sin and we live for God" (Saint Fulgence, Bishop of Ruspe).

Jesus cries out; He cries out just as someone who is saying words everybody should clearly listen to. His clamor synthesizes his saving mission, as He has come "to save the world" (Jn 12, 47), but not on his own but in the name of "the Father who sent me and has instructed me in what to say and how to speak" (Jn 12, 49).

Only through Faith man is able to recognize Jesus Christ as the Son of God. When The Holy Father John Paul II addressed the young people on occasion of the 15th World Youth Day at Tor Vergata, in the year 2000, he spoke about the “school of faith”. To the question "Who do the crowds say that I am?" (Lk 9, 18), there are many answers... 

We keep mulling over one of the most beautiful and well known images of Jesus' preaching: the Good Shepherd, his sheep and the gate. We all keep in our memory the figure of that good Shepherd we were able to look at, as children. 
 

We celebrate Good Shepherd Sunday. In the first place, the attitude of the sheep must be to listen to the voice of the shepherd and follow Him. Listen carefully, be docile to His word, follow Him with a decision that commits all of existence: the understanding, the heart, all the forces and all the action, following in His footsteps.

We have just read in the Gospel Jesus' allocution about the Bread of Life, which is Himself, offering us his body as nurture for our souls and for our Christian life. And, as it usually happens, we have to contemplate two different —if not opposite— reactions, from those who are listening to him.
 

Today, Jesus makes three key avowals, such as: that we are to eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood; that if we do not take the Holy Communion we cannot have life; and that this life is the eternal life and the condition for resurrection. 

The Eucharist is an anticipation of the heavenly glory: "We divide the bread, the medicine of immortality, the antidote we take in order not to die but to live forever in Jesus Christ" (Saint Ignatius of Antioch). Our communion with the flesh of Christ risen must get us used to all that comes down from Heaven...

Pope Francis, the then Cardinal Bergoglio, said in a Corpus Christi homily: "How beautiful it is, after receiving Holy Communion, to think of our lives as a prolonged Mass in which we bring the fruit of the presence of the Lord to the world of families, to the housing estates, to our study and work...

Today in Jesus' words we can see both the differentiation and counterpart existing between the Old and the New Testaments: the Old Testament was an expectation of the New Testament and in the New Testament, God's promises to the fathers of the Old Testament are being fulfilled.

We understand why the Pope encourages us to work on a re-evangelization of our world, which often does not come to God for the good reasons. The Fathers of the Vatican II Council, in the constitution "Gaudium et Spes" ("The Church in the Modern World")...
 

"Lord, show us the light of your face!", sings the psalm of today's liturgy. Yes, for Jesus "then opened their minds to understand the Scriptures" (Lk 24, 45). It is quite urgent. It is absolutely necessary the disciples have a clear and profound understanding of the Scriptures, for as St. Jerome tells us, "Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ".
 

“Do not be afraid.” (Jn 6, 20), Jesus told them on that occasion. "But take heart! I have overcome the world" (Jn 16, 33), He will tell them after the Last Supper. Lastly, it is Jesus who, that Paschal morning, told the women after He rose from the tomb: “Do not be afraid.” 

In today's reading, a message of hope is fluttering: lack of means does not matter; supernatural resources do; let us not be “realistic”, but “full of trust” in God. Thus, when Jesus asks Philip where could they buy some bread for all those people "He said this to test Philip, for He himself knew what He was going to do" (Jn 6,5-6). The Lord expects us to trust Him.

“Believing in the Son” means to have eternal life; it also means that Judgement day is not hanging over believers because they have already been judged and received a favorable sentence; on the other hand, "he who will not believe in the Son will never know life and always faces the justice of God" (Jn 3, 36)... until he believes.