The Daily Gospel

«Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.» John 6,68 Wednesday, 07 May 2008 Wednesday of the Seventh week of Easter Today the Church celebrates : St. John of Beverley Saint Augustine : "I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely" Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 17,11-19. And now I will no longer be in the world, but they are in the world, while I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one just as we are. When I was with them I protected them in your name that you gave me, and I guarded them, and none of them was lost except the son of destruction, in order that the scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you. I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely. I gave them your word, and the world hated them, because they do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world but that you keep them from the evil one. They do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world. Consecrate them in the truth. Your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world. And I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth. Commentary of the day : Saint Augustine (354-430), Bishop of Hippo (North Africa) and Doctor of the Church Sermons on St John's Gospel, no.107 "I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely" When he had said to his Father: «And now I will no longer be in the world...; I am coming to you» (Jn 17,11), our Lord recommended to his Father those who were about to be deprived of his physical presence: «Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given to me.» As man, Jesus prays to God for the disciples he has received from God. But note what follows: «So that they may be one just as we are.» He does not say: That they may be one with us, or: So that they and we together may be one thing just as we are one, but he says: «That they may be one just as we are.» That they may be one in their nature just as we are one in ours. The truth is that these words imply that Jesus spoke as having the same divine nature as his Father, as he says elsewhere: «The Father and I are one,» (Jn 10,30). According to his human nature he had said: «My Father is greater than I, « (Jn 14,28), but since God and man form one and the same person in him, we understand that he is man because he prays and understand him to be God because he is one thing with the one to whom he prays... «But now I am coming to you. I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely.» As yet he has not left the world; he is still there; but since he is shortly going to leave it, he is no longer in it, so to speak. But what is that joy with which he wants his disciples to be filled? This he has already explained a little before, when he said: «That they may be one as we are.» Concerning this joy, which belongs to him and which he has given to them, he foretells to them the perfect fulfillment and that is why he speaks about it «in the world». This joy is the peace and happiness of the world to come and, to gain it, we must live in the present world with self-restraint, justice and devotion.