7th Sunday of Easter year ’A’
“He then lifted up his face to heaven and said: ‘Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you. Just as you gave power over all human flesh, he will give eternal Life to all those whom you gave Him. Now, eternal Life is that they may come to know you, you the One True God, and the One whom you sent, Jesus Christ.” Jesus’ prayer is revealed to us: ’The hour has come’. He is entering into the most solemn moment of his life, it is the time where he reveals his greatest Love towards us through his death and Resurrection. This is how he shows the greatest Love for his Father, he brings about the plan of saving humanity be giving us all his forgiveness. In this dialogue of Love between Jesus and the Father we draw close to their happiness. Jesus True man, is the Son of the Father, the tenderly cherished Son of humanity, woven by Mary in her womb where the Holy Spirit brings life. As Jesus returns to the Father his being of ’true man and true God’ is glorified: ’Glorify your Son’ Jesus is the High priest and the One we were in need of, He gives us Eternal life flowing from the source of Love within Himself, his humanity is glorified in this Love. So we are able to understand from now on the beauty of our calling and also the joy that awaits us, this knowledge we shall have of our Heavenly Father. “I glorified you on earth by accomplishing the work you gave me to do. And so now glorify me close to you, Father, with the glory I had with you before the world was created. I revealed your name to those whom you took from the world to give to me. They belong to you, you gave them to me, and they have kept your Word. Now they have recognised that everything you have given to me comes from you, for I gave them the words you gave to me: they received them, they really did recognise that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me.” On the night of Maunday Thursday Jesus confided to his disciples:’ The world must know that I love my Father and that I act as he expects me to.’ Jesus shares with his Father his great preoccupation his disciples are in the world he has to keep them safe. It was the Person of the Holy Spirit who had been the One to intervene, coming to Mary so that the Word of God would come into human flesh, and this is what happened. Mary had woven Jesus the Son of God within her own flesh! It was this same unity that we find between the Father and the Son which we find between the mother and child, it was the unity of the Holy Spirit. This unity will never end even when there are hard times during the Passion of Jesus: ’I want them to be where I am also!’ Jesus, the New Adam and Mary the New Eve are reunited in Passion and Compassion. We are waiting to join them in heaven, this is what we hope for, after having continued Jesus’ way in the Holy Spirit. “I pray for them; not for the world do I pray but for those you gave to me, for they belong to you. Everything that is mine is yours, and everything that is yours is mine; and I am glorified in them. From now on I am no longer in the world.” Jesus’ prayer is completely marked by expressions of love He has for the Father and also with what he begs for his disciples. He asks that they come to know perfect unity and in this way the world may recognise that it is He the Father who sent Him and that he had loved them with this same Love. Jesus ahs a powerful prayer and in Him our joy is to have God’s infinite Love. The world remains outside of this infinite Love as long as it doesn’t open up its heart to welcome it. The mystery of grace is brought about, not through natural means but by the free gift of God’s Love for us. The glory Jesus asks for is there right at the beginning of the world: ’You have loved me even before the creation of the world.’ Jesus went even as far as those places of hell within us, by putting on the human condition. ’Father, give me the glory I had with you before the Creation of the world.’ As Jesus returns to the Father he brings us along with him in his Love.