3rd Sunday of Lent

March 4th 2018

Gospel: Mark 9,30-40
Homily of the Pontiff Samuel

 

On this third Sunday of Lent, in Mark’s Gospel, Jesus for the second time foretells His Passion (Mk 9:31). But at that moment, the disciples couldn’t fully understand the words of the Master (Mk 9:32). To understand Jesus and the depth of His speech, we are to abandon ourselves to the action of the Holy Spirit and humanity is to make room for spirituality, in totality.

Those who want to probe God’s Mysteries with a human mind, with rationality, will always be taken aback before God. Those who want to understand the Truth of God must become as a child, as Jesus says in today’s Gospel (Mk 9:36-37), and welcome in the typical simplicity of a child, all what the Holy Spirit suggests. Anyone who doesn’t do this, will never be able to welcome the Son of God, the Mystery of His Eucharistic Sacrifice and His manifestation in history.

Jesus has revealed to His Maiden, Maria Giuseppina Norcia, that Here, in this Land of Love, the fulfilment of the history of Salvation will take place. The Father has chosen this Land of Love, by sending His Spirit, to fulfil His promises. In this Cradle of Love, the Father has placed His Tabernacle, in which the Spirit of Jesus is alive.

It cannot be affirmed, as the leaders of the church of Rome say, that the revelation is “closed”, finished, ended two thousand years ago. Saying this, means wanting to annul the action of the Spirit of God who proceeds from the Father and the Son in history (Jn 16:13). Just as Jesus said of John the Baptist, namely that he was animated by the Spirit of the prophet Elijah who proceeds in history (Mt 17,11-13), the same is for the Spirit of the Risen Christ, who proceeds in history and animates the heart of His sons so to reveal them the manifestation of the Project of God. Only by accepting the Spirit of Jesus we can understand the whole and absolute Truth (Jn 16:13). But if one believes that Jesus is not the absolute Truth (Jn 14:6), as the head of the church of Rome affirms, the Spirit of Jesus, which manifests Himself in history, can never be accepted.

In the Gospel today proclaimed, Jesus tells us that anyone who welcomes a little child, the children, welcomes Him (Mk 9:37a). Anyone who welcomes Him, welcomes the Father (Mk 9:37b). The little ones, Jesus tells us, are to be welcomed, not scandalized (Mt 18:6, Mk 9:42). Those who scandalize and abuse the little ones, will never be able to welcome Jesus and the Father. And he who does not welcome Jesus, cannot bring and give Him to others. This cancer has devastated the body of the Church of Rome, which no one has attempted to cure in time. Today, this cancer is everywhere. And beyond the words and the so‑called “commissions”, only formally established, the reality is that they still don’t want to cure that cancer, but they hide it. This is the truth, despite the proclamations and what they would want to make appear. Appearance is one thing, substance is another, as everyone can see and ascertain. This is the time when every single person must be well aware of what is happening around him. Every single person must carefully examine the news disseminated. And every one, in first person, must be concerned with the salvation of his own soul, without listening and blindly trusting him who expects to be considered as a guide, but who in reality is blind; and leads himself and those who follow him into the abyss, as Jesus says (Mt 15:14, Lk 6:39).

The suit doesn’t make the man. The white dress is not always synonymous with sainthood. The heart makes the difference. In these hard and difficult times for Christianity, evil creeps into everywhere and above all hides in places where one would never expect to find it. Everyone should well judge for what he sees and hears and should well judge where he finds consistency between what is said and what is done. Whoever does good, does it every day, in substance and consistently with the teachings of the Gospel, not for pure propaganda. Real reforms are not to be only announced. They are to be made. In concreteness. This is true for every area of ​​life and for every institution, be they civil, military or religious.

God’s Maiden lived the passion of Jesus, enduring endless trials and humiliations at the hands of a hierarchy that made moral judgments on Her but that has never respected the “abc” of the Christian morality, that has condemned the New Jerusalem without the possibility of appeal, and without examining thoroughly the deep of Her revelation, of the mission of salvation that the Father has revealed in this Land of Love. The fruits of Her mission have been many: conversions, along with spiritual and bodily healings. But no one has ever really wanted to deeply examine these fruits. We will do it now, by means of our being Church, genuinely free, in order to manifest to the world, everything for what it is. As Jesus says, every tree is judged by the fruits it produces. If the fruits are good, right and holy, the tree is holy. (Mt 7:17; Lk 6:43) If the fruits are rotten, soaked with indecencies, laden with poison and of all kinds of falsehood and rivalry, the tree is not good, but it is ready to be cut down and thrown into the fire (Mt 7:19). Even now the axe is being laid to the root of the trees, says Jesus (Mt 3:10; Lk 3:9). They will be condemned by their own sins and their actions will turn against them.

Other realities no longer live the spirit of service evoked in today’s Gospel. The spirit of dominance prevails. Each one wants to be bigger than the other. Within the same body, the same deployment, there are argues and contrasts: one against the other.

The Father has wanted this Church to restore Christendom and bring everything and everyone back to His original Thought. In the “catechesis” revealed to His Maiden, Jesus asked everyone to put prayer and fraternal union back to the centre of their lives, so to return to live the spirit of service, which leads to «become servant of all our brothers, and not to be served by them» (Mk 9:35, Mk 10:43-45), and hence to give everyone the opportunity to experience the true peace, the true and not the apparent freedom, that many evoke and invoke, but that few truly want to give God’s people.

In this Church, the Spirit of the risen Christ will accompany the sons of God to understand the Father’s Mystery of Salvation. The live prayer and the true brotherhood will once again become the centre of everyone’s life, so that the Spirit of the Father, the Love of the Father, may return to freely circulate. That Love, pure, alive, true and holy, which in this Land, has again led many to fall in love with Him, believers and non‑believers; which has brought many back to receive the sacraments, and many to open their hearts and ask the Father’s forgiveness and receive His Mercy, wanting to be in communion with Jesus, the living Bread descended from Heaven (Jn 6:51), from Heart to heart, from Spirit to spirit, respecting the Father’s Commandments and putting His teachings into practice. Not for obligation, but for Love.

This is why there will never be room in this Church for the individualists or those who want to be the centre of attention. This Body must remain pure. All the corrupted limbs will be cut off (Mt 18:8-9; Mk 9:43-47). Everyone can accept or not, in complete freedom, the rules of this Church. But when one accepts to be part of this Body, he must respect Its rules, for the good of the body Itself. Otherwise, the errors of other realities will be repeated, where by dint of covering all the rotten and the evil things that entered its inside, instead of early intervening (as God the Father had requested through the revelations of His little messengers), it has been preferred to hide and cover. Now that the body can no longer be cured because evil has invaded most part of the body, starting from its summit, many people cry and are amazed by all this and invoke the Father, and ask the Father: «Father where are you? Father why have you abandoned us?». The Father does not abandon His sons; He hasn’t abandoned them. The Father has taken action, betimes and through time.

In this Church, that mistake will not be repeated. It is better to be clear at the beginning rather than having bigger problems later. Rotten apples must be separated from the good ones. For this reason, in freedom but in awareness, whoever wants to enter, enters; and whoever wants to go out, goes out, in full freedom. The deranged and the exalted ones, unfortunately, are everywhere. But in this Church, there are “sons”: that want to return to live the authentic Christianity, but since 13 March 2013, no longer recognize themselves in the spirit that animates that reality. These sons of God have made their own choice, with consistency, transparency and linearity. Those who agree, will advance; those who disagree, are free to do whatever else, even to criticize. But not to slander, to lie for the sole purpose of tarnishing, destroying and inculcating fear in people’s hearts, creating false news on purpose and spreading false “scoops”. In this regard, we remind everyone of the words uttered by the wise Gamaliel at the time of Jesus, who said: «As for the present case, what I suggest, therefore, is that you leave these men alone and let them go. If this enterprise, this movement of theirs, is of human origin it will break up of its own accord; but if it does in fact come from God you will be unable to destroy them. Take care not to find yourselves fighting against God!» (Acts 5,38-39). This is written in the Acts of the Apostles. As previously said, the history is mother and teacher. But often men forget it.

This is the defence of Christianity that this Church can now freely manifest. «Anyone who is not against us is for us». (Mk 9:40), Jesus says at the conclusion of the passage of the Gospel proclaimed today. All those who truly care about the future of Christianity and wish to unite their efforts for the triumph of the one and only supreme Good, the One and Triune God, will find in this Church, men and women ready to collaborate with loyalty, so to promote the fulfilment of Peace that the Father has promised to His Maiden, putting the Commandment of Love back to the centre (Mk 12, 28-31), which leads to live the prayer and the brotherhood, and to make the common good and the spirit of service triumph even in the social, economic and political life, so that the fundamental freedoms of every individual may be implemented and guaranteed, without discriminations.

This is the hope and the prayer that we, as a Church, formulate also on this day, so that all those who will be called from now on, to represent the people in the various institutional centres of this Nation and of others, may embody the teaching of Jesus, who asks us to «serve our brothers» with honesty and loyalty, and «not to use them». And so be it.