In this section you can find a daily commentary on the Gospel of the Day.

Monday 27 February 2023

First Week of Lent

Word for today
The Gospel of Matthew 25:31-46

He will come

He will come and all nations will be gathered before Him. He will come and He will not ask. He will come and He will not ask questions. He will come and He will not make any claims or demands. He will come and He will not express judgements, He will not present requests, considerations, instances, motions. He will come and He will not ask for evidence, He will not inspect, verify, examine. He will come and He will not  control for religious affiliations, He will not check merits gained or ritual sacrifices practiced. He will come and He will not measure the percentage of precepts observed or the morals respected, the quantity of legitimate or illegitimate behaviours, or ethical or corrupt actions. He will come and He will not even mention virtue, mistic asceticism, clergy, religious hierachies, celebrations, devotions, immorality, participation at liturgical celebrations, the number of prayers,  the devotions, sacrileges, heresies, dogmas, precepts, blasphemies. He will come and He will not ask questions, He will not take part in discussions, He will not preside over trials, He will not check labels, successes, failures, profits or losses. When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit upon his glorious throne, He will not ask questions, but He will make a statement, only one photographic statement of what has already happened. He will come and He will make a statement that will seem absurd and, if He hadn't already revealed ahead of time, it would have been absolutely unpredictable for us. He will come and He will make a statement the effects of which no one will ever be able to change. He will come and He will make an ineluctable statement, I was hungry, this is what God Jesus will quietly say in front of us, after millions of years of human history, I was hungry, thirsty, cold in each one of God's children who was hungry, thirsty, cold. If there are persons who are still hungry and thirsty on earth, what is the meaning of our progress, of our civilization, what is the value of our governments, democracies, parliaments, constitutions?  If every three seconds someone dies of hunger and every five seconds someone dies of thirst, what is the meaning and the value, in God's eyes, of our liturgies, rituals, confessional beliefs, religious hierachies? He will come and He will say simply  to this humanity so full of success, art, power, fashion, armies, museums, empires, schools, temples, banks, academies, cultures, hospitals, prisons, ideologies, freedom of thought, human rights, political and humanitarian organizations, sciences: I was hungry. He will come and say to this humanity so arrogant that it goes against natural laws, so proud that it denies the evidence of  mortal choices, so bossy and thirsty for power that it subdues its children, so greedy that it forces them into slavery and misery; to this humanity He will simply say: I was hungry, I kept on being hungry. He will come, and this is what He will say. He will say something to which we will not be able to reply with our political programs, economical speculations, moral principles, religious precepts. He will speak an absolute truth: in all of history for the entire time that was given to us for our evolution toward God's light and beauty, we have not managed to love one another enough to feed and to give water to one another in a dignified way. This is what He will say.
He will come and say: For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me. He will come andmake another ineluctable statement: For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, a stranger and you gave me no welcome, naked and you gave me no clothing, ill and in prison, and you did not care for me. That is all. Nothing more. Everything else, pious or violent, is only and solely an illusion.