February 26th 2023. First Sunday of Lent

GOSPEL: Mt 4:1-11

Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini broadcast on Vatican Radio

 

Don Fabio’s homily follows the Gospel

GOSPEL: Mt 4:1-11

At that time Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert
to be tempted by the devil.
He fasted for forty days and forty nights,
and afterwards he was hungry.
The tempter approached and said to him,
“If you are the Son of God,
command that these stones become loaves of bread.”
He said in reply,
“It is written: One does not live on bread alone,
but on every word that comes forth
from the mouth of God.”

Then the devil took him to the holy city,
and made him stand on the parapet of the temple,
and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down.
For it is written: He will command his angels concerning you
and with their hands they will support you,
lest you dash your foot against a stone.”
Jesus answered him,
“Again it is written, You shall not put the Lord, your God, to the test.”
Then the devil took him up to a very high mountain,
and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in their magnificence,
and he said to him, "All these I shall give to you,
if you will prostrate yourself and worship me.”
At this, Jesus said to him,
“Get away, Satan!
It is written: The Lord, your God, shall you worship
and him alone shall you serve.”

Then the devil left him and, behold,
angels came and ministered to him.

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ

 

1. Lent is not a journey of perfectionism, but a journey towards divine sonship

As always, Lent is a long, profound and useful preparation for Easter. Easter is new life, entrance into the Kingdom, the gift of the resurrection, eternal life according to divine sonship. However, Easter is not just at the end of the journey. Along the way, in texts like the one we read on Sunday, we already experience the entrance into new life and the leaving behind of the old. Lent is not about individual perfectionism, but a journey of liberation towards union with God. Ash Wednesday shows us that our point of departure is our weakness and poverty and from this we are invited into the new life of grace that is only possible with God. Traditionally we read the Gospel passage of the three temptations. This is prepared by the first reading telling of the original Fall and humanity’s propulsion of itself along a self-destructive path. Man starts out attempting to be like God but ends up in a state of shame, in a bad relationship with his own body.

 

2.The three temptations are all temptations to reject the fatherhood of God. They take three forms: temptations of the appetites, temptations of the mind, and temptations for material possessions. They correspond to the admonition to love God with heart (appetite), mind and actions (material things).

Why do these temptations have to occur? There is a happy ambiguity in Greek, Latin, Hebrew and English with the term “to prove”. The word means two things at the same time. On the one hand it means to have certainty – proof – of something. On the other hand, it refers to the process of being tested, of being put to the proof. In order to prove something, that something must be proven, tested. Moments of being tested, of being challenged, are important and useful because they cause those things that are inconsistent in our lives to collapse. This fourth chapter of Matthew cannot be understood apart from the baptism of Christ that is described beforehand. Indeed, the verse immediately preceding Sunday’s Gospel recounts the voice of the Father: “Here is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased”. In the desert, Satan puts this assertion up for discussion, “If you are really the Son of God. . .” This is the form of every temptation. It always calls our sonship into question. “Is God really a father to me?” The three temptations recall the first and greatest of the commandments: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind and strength”. There is that which we desire, that which we think, and that which we do. This is where our sonship plays itself out. This is where the meaning and quality of our lives is located.

 

3. The appetites are at the root of our passions. To live according to bodily desires is infantile and degenerate. God calls us to live according to higher and more noble desires, the desires of children of the Father.

The first temptation concerns the appetites, which are always at the root of our passions according to the great Evagrio Pontico. Our nobility is in great measure based on our appetites. Whoever becomes a slave of his appetites becomes degenerate, infantile. To live (as many do) in order to satisfy the appetites is a complete absurdity. In reality we ought to eat in order to live – the exact opposite. Satan tempts us to transform everything into bread, into compensation, gratification. The true Son of God, however, shows us the way to Easter: we cannot live for such little things. It is not by bread alone that man lives. The word “alone” is very important. In the story of the Prodigal Son, the son realizes that he has a much greater dignity. He sees that eating the food of pigs is so much beneath eating in the house of the father. Lent is not a question of fasting for fasting’s sake, but fasting in order to eat better. It is a question of moving from infantile desires for satisfaction to adult desires, the desires of children of God for true greatness. Children too, and young people, have noble desires, not just desires for entertainment. They long for the heroic, the meaningful, to give themselves in sacrifice. Let us pass to these desires that are typical of the children of God, to turn to God to be nurtured and satisfied! In the Our Father we say, “Give us this day our daily bread”. To live according to God’s providence today and to reject a life lived according to an infantile and immature flitting from one moment of satisfaction to the next.

 

4. The second temptation is that of relying on our mental illusions instead of on the providence of God. The final temptation is to seek our security in material things instead of in the sovereignty of God.

In the second temptation, Christ is taken to a great pinnacle and tempted to force the hand of God. This temptation corresponds to the admonition to love God with our entire mind. How often we are enamoured by an idea or a hypothesis, and we wish to force God to comply with our way of thinking. How often we think that one of our projects will resolve everything, but it was in the end nothing more than our own idea, fatally reliant on our limited perspective. Jesus responds to Satan saying that we do not put God to the test. Instead, we trust him. Too often we intervene in things when what we really need to do is trust and wait for the Lord to act in his own time. The final temptation concerns our fixation with material things, living for our possessions (this corresponds to the admonition to love the Lord with our entire strength, in everything that we do). We enslave ourselves, bowing down to the things of this world. The temptation is to abandon the greatness of our relationship with God in favour of more material security. Jesus replies, “To one only should we bow down. One only merits our adoration and service”. This is an adult act of liberation from the servitudes of this world. What a beautiful time! Through fasting, through prayer (which is our self-opening to the plan of God), and through almsgiving (which subtracts us from the threat of possessiveness), this period transforms itself into the great time of Easter. By means of these three battles, we can become free, free from the dependency on our appetites, free from mental delusions, free from the powers of this world.

 

Alternative homily

 When Adam and Eve were tempted in the garden, Satan was using the same strategy that he would use once again with Jesus in the desert. One of the traps hidden in every temptation is the false idea that fidelity to God is incompatible with fidelity to ourselves. In other words, the idea that obeying God means hurting yourself, curtailing yourself, diminishing yourself. The reality is the exact opposite: sin is the tragic road to self-destruction. Temptation makes us pursue an idolatrous image of ourselves which is at odds with the true dignity and beauty that God has given us. In order to follow that image, we are encouraged to make ourselves the focal point of our lives and the masters of our own destiny. The three temptations of Jesus in the desert share similar characteristics to the temptation in the garden. Through these temptations, Satan tries to tell Jesus that it is ok for the Son of God to exploit objects to satisfy his own needs; he is told that God ought to be ready to facilitate and support his most frivolous decisions; he is assured that possessions and worldly power are a worthy goal in themselves. Temptations such as these alienate us from our true identity as children of God. They make us feel inadequate and dissatisfied with who we are and with what we possess. They make us lose sight of our deepest identity. In place of that identity, they set up a deceitful image of the human being as an absolute in himself, absolute in his individual rights, and in the way he can manipulate things for his own ends. Satan encourages us not to accept our condition as creatures of God. His temptations proceed by making us feel ashamed and inadequate for who we are. The Lenten practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving help restore us to the right relationship with God that can be destroyed through temptation. The sobriety, generosity and walking in right relationship with God that are typical of Lent restore us to our proper place in creation. They fill us with the peace, freedom and beauty that are integral to our true identity as God’s children.

February 19th 2023.

Seventh Sunday of Ordinary Time

GOSPEL: Mt 5:38-48

Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini broadcast on Vatican Radio

 

Don Fabio’s homily follows the Gospel

GOSPEL: Mt 5:38-48

Jesus said to his disciples:
“You have heard that it was said,
An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
But I say to you, offer no resistance to one who does evil.
When someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other one as well.
If anyone wants to go to law with you over your tunic, hand over your cloak as well.
Should anyone press you into service for one mile, go for two miles.
Give to the one who asks of you,
and do not turn your back on one who wants to borrow.

“You have heard that it was said,
You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.
But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
that you may be children of your heavenly Father,
for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good,
and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.
For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have?
Do not the tax collectors do the same?
And if you greet your brothers only, what is unusual about that?
Do not the pagans do the same?
So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ

 

1. Is this Gospel speaking of something extraordinary? An impossible ideal? No! We each need this extraordinary love if our relationships are to survive!

On this seventh Sunday of ordinary time, we arrive at a radical and paradoxical part of the Sermon on the Mount. “I say to you, offer no resistance to one who does evil. When someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other one as well. If anyone wants to go to law with you over your tunic, hand over your cloak as well. Should anyone press you into service for one mile, go for two miles.” We really need to de-mystify this discourse, for if we try to measure up to such a call for radical love with our own impoverished capacities, we will not succeed. This is not human love but the divine love that Christ brought to earth. I might think that this kind of love is for a saint but is not possible for me. It is a Gospel that speaks of the extraordinary. It is natural to think that it is not something that I can aspire to, but this would be wrong! We need to live this kind of greatness. Young people cannot live according to mediocre ideals. A married couple cannot stay together if their love does not rise to this level. This kind of love is not an impossible dream. We absolutely need to be able to love someone who doesn’t deserve it at that moment. This is not something strange or abnormal. It is normal that in every relationship we will at some point bring out the sin, the evil, that we have inside. If other people cannot have mercy on us at these times, then how can the relationship survive? Every relationship arrives at a point of fracture where it is necessary to love the other person when they wound us, disappoint us, treat us badly.  Without this love, enduring relationships are impossible.

 

2. This Gospel is not an ethical system but a revelation of the nature of the fatherhood of God

This Gospel is not just sublime hyperbole but is a concrete necessity for our lives. It ends with the words, “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect”. Thus, it is not a question of being strong and morally upright, but a question of being children of the Father. He is the backbone of our lives. He loved us and forgave us even when we did not deserve it. From him we gain the strength to welcome others in their poverty because we ourselves have been accepted in our poverty. This Gospel is not so much a description of a sublime ethical system as it is a description of our heavenly Father, for this is exactly how he has behaved towards us. This passage describes Christ, who has borne the burden of our sin and turned the other cheek to us. We treated him badly but he stripped himself of everything for our sake. From the contemplation of this love, from the memory of this love, by living this love from within, it becomes possible for us to show mercy towards others.

 

3. We are the ones who slapped Christ, who forced him to walk an extra mile. It is we who need this merciful love from him!

We might be inclined to place ourselves among the victims when we read this Gospel, but it is we who slap on the other cheek, we who constrain the Lord to walk another mile. Above all, it is we ourselves who need this love to be real! Otherwise, we will drown in the swamp of our own sins. This Gospel is a manifestation of the nature of God, which is revealed in the lives of the children of God. By virtue of our baptism, through the operation of the Holy Spirit, we too have the possibility to live this love. Already, the desire to live according to this love dispels many deceptions that we could fall prey to, for it teaches us that what we must do is live a life of mercy, not a life of being recompensed for the wrongs done to us by others.

 

ALTERNATIVE HOMILY

In Sunday’s Gospel, Jesus asks us to love our enemies. Does he really mean that? Maybe this text needs to be interpreted in a less radical way? How can we hope to forgive others the hurt they have done us? How can we learn to love unconditionally? But, if we think about it, each one of us longs to be loved, forgiven and accepted completely in just this way! The human heart needs to encounter exactly this kind of love. Also, we need to be able to give this type of love and forgiveness. It is only when we forgive others that we are able to let go of the hurt they have inflicted upon us. How can we achieve this kind of love, however? Surely it is impossible?  Too often, we fail to achieve this level of “perfection” or completion because we rely on our own efforts. If my love is the fruit of my own efforts, my own discipline, my own commitment, then I will fail miserably! It is my Father in heaven that is the origin of unconditional love! We are only creatures and cannot love by our own efforts. Our love is a love of response, a love that replicates the love we have been shown by our heavenly Father. He loves us unconditionally and forgives all our faults. When I remember how many times God has loved and forgiven me, then I become capable of loving and forgiving others. The evil and unjust people that Jesus speaks of in the Gospel are us! God makes his sun shine upon us despite our faults. He makes the rain fall upon us despite our sins. We are the ones who stripped Jesus of his tunic before his crucifixion. We are the ones who made Jesus walk the extra mile that he refers to in this Gospel passage. Yet he is holy and full of love and has forgiven us completely. If our image of God is one of a cold and distant judge, then we will not find it in us to be loving and merciful. But if we contemplate that our God is loving and merciful, then we will discover the strength to do likewise. If we wish to be perfect, if we wish to be complete, then let us meditate on the holiness, mercy and paternity of God.

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February 12th 2023. Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time

GOSPEL: Mt 5:17-37

Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini broadcast on Vatican Radio

 

Don Fabio’s homily follows the Gospel

GOSPEL: Mt 5:17-37

Jesus said to his disciples:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I have come not to abolish but to fulfil.
Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away,
not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter
will pass from the law,
until all things have taken place.
Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments
and teaches others to do so
will be called least in the kingdom of heaven.
But whoever obeys and teaches these commandments
will be called greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses
that of the scribes and Pharisees,
you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

“You have heard that it was said to your ancestors,
You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment.
But I say to you,
whoever is angry with his brother
will be liable to judgment;
and whoever says to his brother, ‘Raqa,’
will be answerable to the Sanhedrin;
and whoever says, ‘You fool,’
will be liable to fiery Gehenna.
Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar,
and there recall that your brother
has anything against you,
leave your gift there at the altar,
go first and be reconciled with your brother,
and then come and offer your gift.
Settle with your opponent quickly while on the way to court.
Otherwise your opponent will hand you over to the judge,
and the judge will hand you over to the guard,
and you will be thrown into prison.
Amen, I say to you,
you will not be released until you have paid the last penny.

“You have heard that it was said,
You shall not commit adultery.
But I say to you,
everyone who looks at a woman with lust
has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
If your right eye causes you to sin,
tear it out and throw it away.
It is better for you to lose one of your members
than to have your whole body thrown into Gehenna.
And if your right hand causes you to sin,
cut it off and throw it away.
It is better for you to lose one of your members
than to have your whole body go into Gehenna.

“It was also said,
Whoever divorces his wife must give her a bill of divorce.
But I say to you,
whoever divorces his wife -  unless the marriage is unlawful -
causes her to commit adultery,
and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

“Again you have heard that it was said to your ancestors,
Do not take a false oath,
but make good to the Lord all that you vow.
But I say to you, do not swear at all;
not by heaven, for it is God’s throne;
nor by the earth, for it is his footstool;
nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King.
Do not swear by your head,
for you cannot make a single hair white or black.
Let your ‘Yes’ mean ‘Yes,' and your ‘No’ mean ‘No.’
Anything more is from the evil one.”

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ

 

 

1. Jesus makes the prescriptions of the Law much more radical and tells us that if our righteousness remains at the minimal level of the religious leaders, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven

The readings on Sunday open by telling us that the commandments of the Lord are the way to life. In the second reading, we hear that the wisdom of God is not the wisdom of the masters of this world. Then, in the Gospel, we read one of the most radical passages of the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus tells us that he hasn’t come to abolish the Law but to fulfil it. Then he speaks of a righteousness that is greater than that of the Scribes and Pharisees. We might be inclined to think that these religious leaders were unpleasant characters, but in reality they were very serious and very faithful to the commandments of the Law. If our righteousness does not surpass theirs, however, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven! Jesus is radicalizing the meaning of the commandments. In fact, the fifth, sixth and seventh commandments are made more radical by Jesus in a wonderful manner. For example, it is not sufficient not to kill someone. Rather, we must take care of the lives of others and make peace with our enemies, being attentive not to approach the altar unless we are in communion with our brother. In the case of adultery, Jesus is not content just to proscribe it but to insist that we not look lustfully on other people. All true relationships – marriage, paternity, friendship – are indissoluble. The relationship between a husband and a wife cannot admit a rupture of any sort. In the case of the vows and oaths we swear, Jesus is again very clear. How many useless words we utter, things without substance or sense!

 

2. Entering the Kingdom is not something we do at the end of our lives. We must enter it now, and start living according to the eternal. Then our actions take on a completely different level of righteousness

Jesus is asking for true communication between us. He is demanding a life of affectivity between people that is authentic. In this sense, we are called to a righteousness that exceeds the Scribes and Pharisees. To do otherwise is to fail to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Is this a real possibility for us?  Or to put it another way, can one live the Christian life without entering the Kingdom of Heaven? Without entering into something that is heavenly, eternal? Is it possible to live in an authentic way without eternity? Can I be a father, friend or priest without eternity? No! Without eternity, our lives become senseless. We must live according to things that have endurance, meaning, substance. This involves crossing a certain threshold. In Christ, we see someone who is willing to lose his life for us. This is the life of the Christian: to be willing to lose one’s life for another, and then to rediscover it, greater and more beautiful than before. In our relationships, our communications with others, if we are willing to lose our life, to be faithful onto death, to endure onto that which limits us, this is to live according to eternity.

 

3. God goes beyond the letter of the law to love us and pardon us. We must do likewise. Our actions must have within them this dying to self, which always leads to greater life.

If our lives are not lived in this substantial way, without meaning, without investment of self, what kind of lives are we leading? What kind of father, friend or colleague does things only insofar as they suit him or interest him? Life demands that we enter into the Kingdom of Heaven! We must cross that threshold and surpass that level of righteousness! The righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees was the righteousness of the regulations. We need to go beyond the minimal prescriptions of the law in order to love. How many times have we needed others to do just that in order to have patience with us after we mess up or make a mistake? How many times God has gone beyond the rules in order to love us! If Christ had merely obeyed the laws, then we all would have deserved death but he became the just one for the unjust, bore on his shoulders our disorders to love us and to save us. Can we do otherwise? Can we love others just by sticking to protocols, bureaucratic procedures, pharisaic attitudes? No, we must go beyond if we wish to love. Christ went beyond. The Lord has gone beyond countless times.

 

ALTERNATIVE HOMILY

Sometimes people think that Christianity involves the abandonment of the laws of the Old Testament and the taking up of a new life of following the “heart”, a life without rules and regulations. But Jesus tells us in this Gospel that he has come, not to abolish the law, but to bring it to fulfilment. The old rules about adultery, murder, etc., are not to be abolished, but to made even more rigorous! Adultery is prohibited, but so is even an impure glance at another person. Murder is banned, but so are angry thoughts towards others. Maybe Jesus is exaggerating here? Or maybe the translation is bad? But, when we think about it, isn’t this exactly the level of fidelity and nobility that we long to see in others? We want a spouse that is faithful to this degree. We want our friends to be ready to cut off their hands rather than betray us. If a father only did the minimum due to his children, then he would be a very cold and distant father! True love requires that we go beyond the external observance of the rules and that we are faithful to these rules from the heart. But this is not just difficult for us, it is impossible! That is why Jesus opens his discourse by saying, “I have come not to abolish the law, but to bring it to fulfilment”. It is Jesus who makes our fidelity in love possible! It is not that we have to be strong enough to live this fidelity, but that we have to be humble enough, to abandon ourselves into the arms of Jesus and allow ourselves to be led by him.

February 5th 2023. Fifth Sunday of Ordinary Time

GOSPEL: Matthew 5, 13-16

Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini broadcast on Vatican Radio

 

Don Fabio’s homily follows the Gospel

GOSPEL: Matthew 5, 13-16

Jesus said to his disciples:
“You are the salt of the earth.
But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned?
It is no longer good for anything
but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.
You are the light of the world.
A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden.
Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket;
it is set on a lampstand,
where it gives light to all in the house.
Just so, your light must shine before others,
that they may see your good deeds
and glorify your heavenly Father.”

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ

 

1. The disciples are not told that they have to become light and salt, but that they ARE light and salt.

Last week we listened to the proclamation of the Beatitudes, which are in the third person plural – “Blessed are those . . .”. In the continuation of Jesus’ discourse that we read this week, the tense switches to second person plural – “You are the light of the world. You are the salt of the earth.” Light is associated with joy and happiness, whilst darkness is associated with pain and suffering. To be light is not so much a question of human qualities or attributes. Rather it is a question of identity – to be light. Salt is associated with flavour and also with wisdom. Things without flavour are not worth doing because they lack substance or content. The Christian therefore is someone who carries joy and flavour to the world. The disciples are not told that they have to become salt, they are already salt. Joes does not use the imperative but the indicative – “You are the light of the world”. If they follow Christ, people will see the light emanating from them.

 

2. We all emit “light” but is our light true light or is it darkness? When we reflect Jesus’ light, it is the light of one hanging in his lampstand, which is the cross.

Every person emanates “light” in a sense. But what light do they emit? Is it something negative or is it something joyful that communicates wisdom? If the disciples of Christ are not light then the world is in darkness. Jesus is the source of light because he is the echo of the light of the Father. In John’s Gospel we are told that we see the Father when we look upon Jesus. In fact, when Jesus is placed in his lampstand, namely, when he is hung upon the cross, there is an eclipse of the sun. The world is cast into darkness because he is the true source of light. At that moment, the centurion, who is the one officially responsible for his execution, recognizes in Jesus the eternal light. Jesus lives to his last breath as Son, pointing continually to someone else, the One who created the world saying, “Let there be light!”

 

3. The light of a Christian is not simply the light of their own honesty or integrity. Rather, it is the light of someone who has entrusted himself to the Father with childlike abandonment.

We are light, but what kind of light are we? We irradiate around us that which is in the depths of our hearts. As the great Fr Oreste Benzi said, “Who we are shouts louder that what we say”. Is the light emanated by Christians a matter of their integrity, their honesty, their moral coherence? Not exactly. Such a light would be of little interest because it would be dependent on our poor human qualities. Jesus says, rather, that when people see the good works of Christians, they end up giving glory to the Father in heaven. It might seem a bit curious that someone sees my good works and ends of glorifying someone else! The problem is that we have tried to construct a Christianity that is composed of our works, and we have failed because we have concentrated on things that give glory to us, not to God. This is a vainglory, a self-referential glory, something that is focussed on building up ourselves. What is really needed are works done with an attitude of trust in the Lord, so that people who observe will realize that only the Lord could sustain such works. This is the character of Christian works, the character of one who behaves as a child of God, pointing not to one’s own ego but to the Father. This text is telling us to exploit the occasions we have for abandoning ourselves to God and then our mission will be accomplished.

 

4. When we start behaving like children of God, we emanate light.

We don’t have to try to be sons, we are sons! And when we start behaving like sons, we emanate light. There is no more honest person than one who entrusts himself to the Lord. At that moment, the best in him comes out and he becomes truly himself. By contrast, when one is self-referential, he is deceiving himself. None of us can truly stand without abandoning himself to the Father. None of us can affront the cross without placing himself in the hands of the Lord. When that moment comes when we have the opportunity to manifest our faith, when we are placed in the candelabra of Christ, hung upon the cross. Our candelabras are our tribulations, small and great, those daily things in which we make an act of self-abandonment, that act of children of God, that act of openness to the Lord that makes shine through the light of the Father and his glory.

 

 

ALTERNATIVE HOMILY

In the Gospel, Jesus asks us to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth. Without this light, the world be in darkness. Without this salt, life will have no flavour. But what are we to do so that we can become salt and light for others? We must look to Jesus! He became the light of the world during an eclipse of the sun on Good Friday. He is the light of the world because he allow his relationship with his Father to sine forth and reveal that God is love: he loves each one of us. People are very critical of the Church nowadays. Maybe it is because they expect us to be the light of the world but they see that we are not! If I live a life of egoism, then I am living in darkness. I might think that my life of fun, entertainment, security, good company and success is very illuminated, but it is a life of darkness if it is not lived with reference to Christ. A father who lives this sort of self-referential life leaves emptiness in the hearts of his children. A priest who lives an existence of this sort does not bring life to his parishioners. We can be salt and light for our families and the world only if we do the kind of works that Jesus asks us to do. He says, “Your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father”. It is very important that these words of Jesus be understood properly! What kinds of works do we need to do? Works that show my great talents and heroism? No, these works do not bring glory to the Father! The works that light up the world are works that shed light on God, that show my relationship to God, that cause people to praise God, not me! By trusting in God, by abandoning myself to God, I show the world the love and power of the Father. When people see works of this sort, they say: I see the power of the Father in you: what you are doing cannot originate in you but must originate in the goodness and glory of God.