OMELIE / Omelie EN

26/6/2016

15/01/2017 – 2nd Sunday of Ordinary Time Year A

15/01/2017 – 2nd Sunday of Ordinary Time  Year A 

1st reading Is 49,3.5-6 * from Psalm  39 * 2^nd reading 1Cor 1,1-3 * Gospel John 1,29-34

"It is too small a thing for you to be my servant to restore the tribes of Jacob and bring back those of Israel I have kept. I will also make you a light for the Gentiles, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth." The prophet refers the intention of God: his “servant” is not a gift only to the people of Israel, but he is for all people, thus he is even for those who now are his enemies, for those who live in other religions. They too must be saved, and the “servant” of God will be savior even for them. It is a promotion, we can say, a recognition, but above all a task which is very demanding, with universal effects.

To this revelation of Isaiah, the Liturgy adds the new and and solemn declaration of John the Baptist who indicates Jesus with the title never used before till now: “Behold the lamb of God, the one who takes away the sins of the world!”: they are words which leave one with the intuition of greater realities. “Lamb of God” makes reference to the various biblical passages. It is the sacrificial lamb of Abel, accepted by God. The animals which were sacrificed by the people in Egypt were lambs which were slaughtered the night of the escape from exile: their blood which was gushed on the doors was a signal that will save them from the dead of the firstborn, and the meat nourishes them after they have been gathered in groups. This lamb, from now onwards, will be at the center of the annual paschal banquet. The lamb is already the image used by the prophets to indicate the “Servant of God”, “as a lamb conducted to be slaughtered”, who does not open his mouth neither to accuse nor to lament and does not oppose the evil one. It is for the fact that the lamb does not have no defense, no horns, no front teeth, no nails, neither the ability to escape, has became the symbol of the the humble man, of the person who one can rid off without fear. And Jesus is “lowly and humble:, as he himself told us.

He is the lamb which God gives so that it is offered like Isaac. He is the lamb through which we come closer to the altar of God, the lamb which is the gift received and offered, but also the model which we have to take as example for our human relationships with men! He is the lamb of God on which we can free our sins so that he can take them to the desert, where it does as a consequence. He is not only the “lamb”, but “lamb of God”, “who takes away the sins of the world”: the world lives in sin. There are the sins of every single person, my sins and your sins, but there is a greater sin which is more serious than this, more extended, in which we move without being aware. Do you want an example? I drink a coffee in the morning, I do it with joy and with pleasure. How do I do not think that, in order for me to have that coffee, someone has taken advantage and stole the land and the work of the poor people, in a way that they reduced it to misery? And can we not say the same thing for the chocolates and telephones, shoes and signature clothes? These are small examples: there are others, more serious. The sin of the world is present and it creates serious sufferings. John tells us: he is the one who “takes it away”, he puts it on himself so that we can be less burdened. The prophet testimonies us that it is Jesus who must be known to the people, known and loved: our love for God is true love when we accept and listen and love the Lamb! The Baptist thus affirms solemnly that he is “The Son of God”, who baptizes in the Holy Spirit”. From Him we are not only forgiven, but sanctified, more, divinized: he immerses us in the Holy Spirit, in a way that our life acquires the taste and the tenderness and the security of the love of the father. To him we do not ask more: this is his work and this is the greatest gift with which we can enrich ourselves, which makes us similar to the Father in love. This is the significance why John saw the descending of the Holy sprit and it remaining on Jesus. And we continue to remain near him so that we are influenced, to mature our own with the divine warmth which comes out of him. The apostle Paul, writing to the Corinthians, recognize this to his Christians: they are “holy” because “they are sanctified in Jesus Christ”, and they continue to keep on their lips his name: they invoke it, they praise it. They are people accepted by God, not because they are Hebrews or because they make extraordinary thins, but because they have in their hearts and on their lips the name of the Son, Jesus! In this way they show that the old prophecy is taking place in Jesus: Jesus is the light of the nation, to bring the salvation to all men. Thanks to these “saints” in the world reigns the Kingdom of god, kingdom of peace, justice and fidelity and joy.