LET US TEST HIM WITH CRUELTY

PRAYER MOMENT  

Friday 4 April 2014

LET US TEST HIM WITH CRUELTY

Pause. Be still before God.

Reading: “Let us test him with cruelty and with torture, and thus explore this gentleness of his.” (Wis. 2:1, 12-22, John 7: 1-30)

Reflection. Two weeks remain before Good Friday but we are already right into the Passion in these readings. It is astonishing how the Book of Wisdom, written about 50 years before the birth of Jesus, describes the Passion so vividly. It evokes sentiments that we can easily associated with the suffering and death of Jesus. The gospel reading from John too speaks of his death and the mounting tension. We need to transpose this energy, an energy that engages with the evil in our world today, into our lives and put the “trouble everywhere you look” into the context of the passion which we face every day. We may not talk about the Passion very much. We don’t like talking about pain. But if we ignore and avoid the reality of suffering and what it means “for me” we are in danger of avoiding the truth of our life altogether and living superficial lives.

Prayer. Lord, help me during these days to meditate on your Passion. Help me to understand that your Passion is my passion. You could not avoid it. Neither can I. Amen.

David Harold-Barry SJ