Sunday 5
- Acts 10, 25-26. 34–35. 44–48
- Salt 97
- 1 Jn 4, 7–10
- Jn 15, 9–17
§ In Acts of the Apostles Peter, upon entering the house of the officer Cornelius, saw himself unmasked from his religious stereotype, from his exclusivist belief, that God only gave his Spirit to the Jews: «Now I realize that God “He makes no distinction between persons, but accepts those who fear him and practice justice, regardless of their nation.” This is an experience of liberation from an exclusive and unjust mentality, an experience of conversion, lucidity, maturation and letting God be God, which the Christians of the first communities live.
§ The First Letter of John, at this point, reaches its summit. God is love and we (created in the image and likeness of Him, and born of Him) participate in that love of God; We are also love: we come from Love, we are called to live in love and we always tend towards Love. In the love of one another we know God, and the Son reveals that love to us in his excess, to the cross and in victory over death and sin.
§ This week’s Gospel of John is an immediate continuation of last week’s chapter 15 of “the true vine.” This part of the chapter focuses on the love that Jesus Christ has for us: love of Friend to friends. A love that is like that which the Father has for Him.
The Good News is that we can live in that love; However, it is necessary to always be attentive to the call, the invitation, the exhortation to remain in that great, excess and overflowing love. The fruit of remaining in love is joy, a complete joy in the Lord Jesus. To remain in the love of the Lord Jesus is to be a pilgrim in fidelity to the Gospel, to the commandments and to the way in which He manifests it to us in his own life and paschal mysteries.
