Saturday of the Fourth Week of Easter
Master, show us the Father
If you know me, then you will also know my Father. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” Philip said to him, “Master, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you for so long a time and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on my own. The Father who dwells in me is doing his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else, believe because of the works themselves. Jn 14,7-11
In the morning, during the prayer, it often happens to us to meet readings that would require a longer time for meditation than what available; so we must make do with some starting points for reflection to bring about during the day, waiting for it to bear fruit, as the grain of wheat which, sown in the earth, becomes a spike. Today’s reading is one of those ones. “Whoever has seen me – Jesus tells us – has seen the Father”. Jesus’s love for men, his clarity in showing us the mysteries of the kingdom, frankness, freedom, healing, miracles, his faith, his communion of prayer with the Father, living on Providence, his washing the feet of his apostles and his giving his life for the salvation of the world, allow to us to get to know much about the reality of the Father. Jesus of Nazareth and the Father are reflected in each other at all times, in all circumstances, in any event. And before this mirroring one another in all, that funny guy Philip today says: “Master, show us the Father and that will be enough for us”. This is what happens to us too when we read the Holy Scriptures or listen to the teaching of the church and, in the real facts of our everyday life, we do not consider them sufficiently convincing in order to believe wholeheartedly that Jesus is the Lord. Consider, then, the gifts we have received and are renewed every day, consider the miracles and healing that we have seen, the Providence that reaches us, the job we have never been without, the protections we enjoy, the communion between one another, the serenity of our days even amid thousands commitments, the gift of the Eucharist, this morning prayer, our Sunday lunches full of in children, the friends we have got and our peaceful falling asleep at night. We must admit that the Lord is present in our lives in every moment. With this certainty, we then leave to face our daily duties, asking the Lord for the grace to recognize him in today’s people and situations, and through him we will know the Father too.