Matthew 9:13
‘Go and learn what this means, “I
desire mercy, and not sacrifice” ’ (Mt 9:13).
Caravaggio, when he
painted the call of Levi, had a great intuition:
he identified the gaze of Jesus with the ray of light that
illuminates the faces of Levi and his tax collector friends.
Mercy needs to meet
with misery, in order to manifest itself. The Son of Man came not for
the righteous, but sinners. “I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.”
To make ourselves known
to the Lord means to undress ourselves of the fig
leaves with which we want to hide our nakedness and to let ourselves
to be dressed by His embrace. If we allow ourselves to love, then we
too will be able to love: we will sell everything to possess the
hidden treasure, the precious pearl.
Levi, whose name still
suggests those living with obsession for
money, became Matthew, evangelist and evangelizer, martyr, all of
God, to the point of the gift of life.
- - - - - - -
An Experience of Life:
When my husband
abandoned us, Luke was four years old and for him I found
the strength to continue to live.
One day I heard
it said, for the first time, that God is love and sustains those who
suffer ... I realized that I had to make a decisive change in my
life. For Luke I had to be mother and father, without tarnishing with
my deep resentment his relationship with his father.
Trying to live the
Gospel step by step, caused in me a change;
the great love for only one man was being poured out on those who
passed by me: relatives, friends, colleagues, students ...
After a silence of
almost ten years, Luke met his father and, not having grown up in
resentment, it seemed normal for him to get
back in touch with him.
Last
year Frank was in the hospital and I recommended to Luke to visit
him. When we had huge financial problems Luke spontaneously asked for
help from his father who offered to him total willingness to help.
He, who once had stripped us of everything, even taking away the
spoons, now began to give back to us not that which he had deprived
us, but the love that we had given to him.
E.F.,
Italy
