“HE LOVED THEM TO THE END” (Jn 13,1)
Dear friends of Gethsemane, may the Lord grant you his Peace!
In these days our gaze is directed here in Jerusalem, where everything began with that "All is accomplished" (Jn 19:30). Jesus in this City manifested his extreme love for all of us, "He loved them to the end" (Jn 13:1). This eternal Love is still fruitful, it is inside history and still smells today! His Word is eternal, it is current!This unconditional and courageous Love fascinates: it reaches our homes, our small/large churches. It has inhabited my heart and ours all... yes, poor hearts, but mysteriously attracted by his Light that goes beyond, full of hope: it is the newness of the Gospel! This Love and this Light started from HERE, from the Holy Land, and I spiritually invite you to come back here, and imagine entering this great "mystical Portal", whose jambs are marked by the Blood of the Immolated Lamb, our Saviour (Ex 12,1ss). I am convinced that this eternal Door opened by the Son of God is the Passover of the Lord, an event that we all are living. It is much greater than we imagine! It is the "greatest and most perfect Tent that welcomes us all. It is the Sanctuary "not built by the hand of man, that is, not belonging to this creation" (cf. Heb 9:11).
In the Easter of the Lord we all are invited, as we are, perhaps wounded, disappointed, in need of everything, indeed it seems to me that it is precisely by recognizing ourselves as small and needy that we are finally taken by the hand of the Good Shepherd, and so we are facilitated to listen to his voice and be able to be close with joy to the Lamb without stain and to let us say once again: "Look how much I love you, I love you to death!".
Let us go together to him and ask him, through the intercession of Mary Most Holy, for the gift of Peace, not as the world gives it, but as he alone gives it.
Still, happy Easter in the Lord
