Spirituality – Page 53 – Comboni Lay Missionaries

It’s not power but service

17 October, 2015 by Antonio Villarino

A comentary on Mk 10, 35-45 (XXIX Sunday O. T.; October 18th 2015)

With the help of Mark, we follow the steps of Jesus already approaching Jerusalem. On the way, as members of Jesus’s group of disciples, we take part in an interesting dialogue between Jesus, the sons of the Zebedee and their mother about power and service. On the other side, today we celebrate the International Day for Missions, which is giving us a special reading perspective: the missionary service that all disciples of Jesus are called to do in favour of humanity.
Let us reflect briefly on this story of the sons of the Zebedee and their mother:

– They want to occupy the most important places on the project of Jesus. And who doesn’t? We all wish to be considered as important, to be applauded, and to have authority… And on my view, that’s all right, that’s part of our nature and, surely, a certain ambition is positive for us and the community. What we have to do is to transform that need to be important into a positive energy that pushes us to do good and to do it well.

– They seem unconscious of what that really implies. On one side, they do not know well the project of Jesus, which consists in giving life to the poor an sinners; and on the other, they are not aware of the sacrifices that their wish is leading them to.

-Jesus takes the opportunity to make them progress in their discipleship. Starting from their request and sincerity, Jesus helps them to grow in their awareness and generosity. To be disciple is not to a matter of occupying the first or the last places. It’s a matter of being ready to “drink the chalice”, that is, to assume a service with all the consequences: good and bad, glad and not so glad. It may happen that people recognize your service, but it may happen the contrary and you have to be ready for it, as Jesus was.

-In any case, they and the other disciples learn that in Jesus’ kingdom authority is not power but service. The service of authority (necessary in the family or in the community) is not to be considered as a right to impose one’s views or privileges over the others, but a service to people who are equal to those in authority. Who should have the command over a city, a family, a community? The one who is ready to serve better.

All of us have authority in one or another way. So, once we red this Word as disciples, we are reminded that we are called to do it in Jesus’ style: being servers, not dictators. And this is precisely the missionary vocation of the Church: to serve Humanity with the Word of Truth and Actions of love, made concrete in actions of help to any one in need: charitable help, schools, health centres, brotherly communities… Celebrating the Eucharist, we pray to the Holy Spirit to enable us to be true disciples of Jesus by way of serving our spouses, our brothers and sisters, our neighbours, the members of our community, especially the most needed.
P. Antonio Villarino
Roma

It’s not richness but love that matters

10 October, 2015 by Antonio Villarino

A commentary on Mk 10, 17-30, XXXVIII Sunday O. T. (October 11th 2015)

We go on Reading Mark, who shows Jesus approaching Jerusalem, where there’ s going to be a life or death confrontation between Jesus with his Kingdom of God’s proposal and the Political-Economical-Religious System of that time. Then, as it happens now, the power of the world was in the hands of corrupted people who used to deride any ethical value and, even more, despising may simple people who were exploited and abused in a culture based on the divinization of money and richness.
In this social context, Mark makes us assist to a dialogue between Jesus, one “somebody” and the disciples. Let me make a few comments on this dialogue:
– What to do to reach the fullness of life? (or “eternal life”, as it was put buy the one who knelt down before Jesus). We all make that same question, even if not always use those same words. What shall I do to be happy, to feel “alive” and to enjoy the fullness of sense for my life?
– A basic honesty. On that time, as in ours, there were, among corrupted people, also many honest people, persons that were trying to live their lives with honesty, following the commandments of the Old Testament or those of their own religion that, on my view can be reduced to one: “Be honest to yourself and to others”. And that is not a little matter.
– The call to do a step more and to trust in God. Jesus respects and admires this person who was able to live with honesty, but He discovers in her look and attitude a deeper desire for something else. Is she is coming to see Him, it means that she has had a glimpse of a “pearl of great value” (the Kingdom of God). I think that we go sometimes through a similar experience: We try to live honestly, trying to do as much good as we can. But we are aware of our limitations and, deep in ourselves, we wish something more; in that case, Jesus is telling us: Do not be satisfied with a moral of the minimum, dare to “sell” what you have (it may be an excessive trust in money, or your pride or your image before others), trust in God and “buy” the “pearl of great value”, that is, allow yourself to live fully in God’s love.
– The uneasiness. The person that went to meet Jesus and the disciples remained bewildered by His proposal. They think that they had already done quite enough and that what Jesus is asking, apart from being impossible, is unnecessary. If you allow me, I share briefly a personal witness; I remember that, when I decided to leave my family house to become a missionary, my parents asked me: Why do you have to do that? It’s not enough to be a good person here? … In fact, one can be good enough in many ways and places. But the point is not to be just “good” or to “do enough”, but lo love without measure and to “live fully”.
– A jump into the emptiness. Well, all that we are saying in the previous paragraph seems “too much”, “exaggerated”, “impossible”… And really such it is, till God acts and “makes everything possible”. He has made it possible for a group of fishers to leave behind their fishing nets and go around the world preaching the newness of the Gospel; He has made it possible for Ignatius of Loyola to abandon his military career to become a Christ’s “soldier”; He has made it possible for Daniele Comboni to go far from his little village in Italy and enter into the wild dessert of Africa…
– The fullness of life. The secret of so many disciples that followed Jesus on that journey is that, trusting in the Master and in God, “everything becomes possible”, they were able to reach an unsuspected fullness of life that is not only “religious” but fully human. I think that many of us have mete people like that in our own time.
Today, as we celebrate the Eucharist, I renew my trust in the One who calls me to a higher standard of life, knowing that He will never be won in generosity.

Fr. Antonio Villarino
Roma

Three “sayings” of Jesus

26 September, 2015 by Antonio Villarino

A commentary on Mc 9, 38-48 (XXVI Sunday O.T., September 26th 2015)

The gospels, besides narrating episodes of Jesus’ life and reproducing his parables, contain also collections of “sayings”, small sentences that He surely pronounced in different times and places and the first disciples retained by heart and repeated to the new disciples that were entering the communities. In the verses we read today, we find three of these sayings that I understand as follows:

1.- Goodness has no frontiers. The exact saying of Jesus is “whoever is not against us, is with us” and He pronounces it because somebody wanted to forbid people who did not belong to the group of disciples to act in the name of Jesus. It would be like forbidding someone to help the poor because he or she is not a member of the Church. Any act of goodness belongs to God; it’s a sharing in God’s goodness. We are invited to acknowledge it, be grateful and glad for it.

2.- A glass of water may have an infinite value. Jesus says: “Whoever gives a glass of water in my name, will not lose the reward”. Sometimes, not much is needed to put joy in a persons’ life, to make her or him feel respected, to offer a sign of hope in the middle of difficulties. To give a glass of water is a sign of welcome, respect, availability to “give a hand” if needed. Who gives a glass of water to someone in need, is open to the other and who is open to the other is open to God. What is the “glass of water” that I could offer to the people around me?

3.- Be careful, do not become a stumbling stone for the little ones! Mark puts here three sentences with a common reference to the “scandal”. We know that this word means really “stumbling stone”, trip up somebody who is defenceless, so that he falls down. Jesus, who is full of goodness and tenderness, becomes quite angry when someone lacks respect for the house (temple) of his Father or when somebody wants to trip the little ones, those who have only God to trust. You should not “joke” with the little ones of God. At the same time, Jesus tells us something that to my ears sound like that: “Do not trip up yourself; if something is doing any wrong to you, cut it, do not indulge, choose the way to righteousness with decision and clarity”
Every Sunday, as we celebrate the Eucharist and listen to these words of Jesus, we say to Him: Amen, thank you, I wish these words to illuminate my life. Help me to make them true in me.
Fr. Antonio Villarino
Roma

Jesus’ secret

20 September, 2015 by Antonio Villarino

A commentary on Mk 9, 30-37 (XXV Sunday O.T., September 20th 2015)

Mark, the gospel we continue to read every Sunday of Ordinary Time, presents Jesus as an itinerant prophet who walks from village to village and from town to town preaching to the crowds and performing liberating actions as signs of God’s love towards the poor, the sick and the sinners.
But, from time to time, Mark says that Jesus “did not wish people knew He was there”. In those times of public silence, Jesus would “instruct his disciples”, given them some teachings that many (even the intimate ones) were not able to understand.

In today’s Reading Jesus announces, for the second time, his “secret”, that is, “that the Son of Man is going to be given up in the hands of men, but on the third day He will rise”.

We have heard so many times these words that they no longer impress us, though we do not understand its meaning, as it happened with the apostles: They understood nothing till they passed through the experience of His death and resurrections.
In fact, Jesus is not a brilliant but superficial prophet. Rather, He confronts death and wins over it, thanks to His radical trust in the Father. This is His great Secret. And this is the secret of many of His best disciples, who are able to confront death trusting totally in God’s secure love.

I remember, for example, St. Maximilian Kolbe, who, during the Second World War, offered himself to be assassinated in place of a father with children; Or I remember St Daniel Comboni, who, at the age of fifty, destroyed by sicknesses and enormous difficulties, while he feels he is dying, he says: “I die, but the project (of Africa’s salvation) will not die. Very few really believed that at the time, but he was right.

It’s in this line of thought that we can read the second part of todays’ gospel: “If someone wants to be the first one, let him become the servant of all”. We have read this sentence also many times and we do not really believe in it. Also this is a secret that not many understand. We all wish to be important, to be considered as the best ones; we are afraid to be despised, not taken into consideration. We feel certain “anguish” and a need to be the first ones. But Jesus says that to reach the first place we have to accept to be the last one. In my own words, I understand Jesus message in this way: “Be calm, relax, look at this little child, be grateful, think first of the God’s Kingdom and of its Justice, give out with generosity… and you will receive plenty”. It seems to me that, deep in our heart, we all feel the truthfulness of Jesus’ teaching, but we do not trust enough.
Let ask the Lord, in the Eucharist, to open our hearts, so that we can understand his “secret” and be ready to be the last ones, the servants, ready even to die to ourselves trusting in God as Jesus, Kolbe, Comboni and many others did.
Fr. Antonio Villarino
Roma

Who is Jesus?

13 September, 2015 by Antonio Villarino

A commentary on Mk 8, 27-35 (XXIV Sunday O. T., September 13th 2015)

Today’s Reading places Jesus in a roman town in the north of Israel, far away from Jerusalem. There, precisely before he starts walking towards the Capital, He poses a question about his identity. And to that question three answers are given:

1. The majority of people see in Jesus one of the big prophets of the past. In fact, he teaches, heals sick people, liberates from bad spirits, proposes a conversion, and announces the kingdom of God…

It seems to me that this answer is similar to the one given today by many people: They see in Jesus an interesting teacher and a fascinating personality, one among the big personalities of human history.

2. The disciples see what Peter says: “You are the Christ”, that is, you are the Messiah, the Anointed by God to come and free his people. The disciples were quite happy to see the powerful presence of God in Jesus and hoped to find in Him a powerful leadership, to overcome so many frustrations, humiliations and defeats.

It seems to me that this is our vision. In front of so much abuse of power and so much corruption, in front of so many superficial words shouted from our means of communication… we think that Jesus is the envoy of God and that He is the word the world needs. We would like Jesus to be recognized as master by everybody… and the Church as a recognized power.

3. Jesus’ vision: What the mases say, it’s true: Jesus is a prophet; what de disciples say it’s also true true: Jesus is the Messiah of God. But Jesus adds: Attention! I do not come as a Powerful Messiah who imposes himself to the world or even the Church by force. Rather, I go to Jerusalem, to the centre of Israel, not as conqueror or a winner, but as the Servant of Yavhe, as a brother and as a Son ready to obey the Father and to offer my live out of love.

It seems to me that this is what distinguishes a true faith from a false and superficial one. Peter found it quite difficult to accept that Jesus was going to be tortured and to die. But to become a true disciple we have to pass through this experience of cross, obedience and free love.

Let us pray to the Lord, who is coming to us in today’s Eucharist, to help us to understand his true identity as a Messiah Servant and to grow in our own discipleship, even when in the moments of sacrifice and when the way to Jerusalem becomes steep and difficult.

F. Antonio Villarino
Roma