Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Easter
Life in Peace
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid. You heard me tell you, ‘I am going away and I will come back to you.’ If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father; for the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you this before it happens, so that when it happens you may believe. I will no longer speak much with you, for the ruler of the world is coming. He has no power over me, but the world must know that I love the Father and that I do just as the Father has commanded me. Get up, let us go. Jn 14,27-31
In the previous verses, Jesus promised that, after his departure, he would send the Holy Spirit to the disciples, and, in today’s Gospel, he explains the reasons for what is going to happen. The disciples do not understand, but he does not worry because he knows that the Holy Spirit will explain them the whole matter after his death and resurrection. It is at peace with the Father, since he is about to complete the life plan he had been entrusted, at peace with the disciples, because he can see in them the future church; he is at peace with the world, because, intimately, he has already decided to offer his life for its salvation; he is at peace with himself because, carrying out the plan of salvation, he has given it all. It is in this inner peace of someone who has accomplished his mission that Jesus tells the apostles: “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you”. It will be fundamental for us too, at the end of our life, having this peace, whatever may be the project we were entrusted with; a peace which will allow to our dear ones to pick up the baton of the work to perform and to us to leave peacefully. Even death, when our mission is over, will be a source of joy for everybody: “If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father”. In this spirit, even the last years of our life taste differently: “How sweet is the sunset in the evening which does not darken” Giovanni Pascoli says. At a certain point, even if our plan of life is infinitely less important than Jesus’s, the deeds and words come to an end and you must leave with a few essential luggage. It is the wonderful cycle of life, in which even the mystery that surrounds us finds a meaning, and in it we too find ourselves. Again, however, we have something to do and there is someone waiting for us: “Get up, let us go.” And life goes on, for a long or a short time, as long as the Lord wishes.