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INTENTION : |
That all peoples may grow in harmony and peace through mutual understanding and respect.
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The Holy Father asks us this month to pray for peace and harmony between the peoples of the earth. He suggests to us two ways of reaching this: knowledge of one another and mutual respect. This will lay the foundations for authentic personal, national and international reconciliation. So we share with you a reflection by Fr. Elias L?pez SJ, an expert on the subject, who is working in Rome at the moment on the central team of the Jesuit Refugee Service.
There is no relationship of love and concord (con-cordia, which means literally 'oneness of heart') without mutual knowledge and respect. What is not truly known is not truly loved. That is not truly known which is not respected in equality and in difference, in a way that gives life to everyone. Reconciliation is needed when this mutual relationship of deep knowledge and discerned respect is broken. Reconciliation is one of the tasks that presents itself always as a challenge in the heart of every Christian, every family and social group, between peoples and nations.
We all receive a vocation to be big, strong arms to embrace the broken world and 'reconcile' it. The meaning of this word is to 'call to come back together' those who are divided by violence and injustice. John Paul II expressed clearly how we Christians understand the way of reconciliation in building peace; he says 'There is no peace without justice, nor justice without forgiveness.' The reconciliation process, which sometimes involves several generations, implies healing the discriminatory and unjust relations which violate human rights and the dignity of children of the God who makes us all equal, creatures of God with absolute value.
This healing reconciliation of relationships is grounded in the radical love of Jesus who said on the cross 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.' To heal the evil radically it is necessary to 'give excessively' (that is what 'pardon' means). This is the love to the end that Jesus showed on the cross. Therefore Benedict XVI says that radical evil is conquered by pardon, as God in Jesus pardoned the radical evil of the cross, which represents so many crosses which are still killing humanity today: ethnic, ecological, religious discrimination, wars, and the degradation of the environment.
Prayer is putting oneself into direct contact with the source of divine love, which is able to pardon the unpardonable, and so to heal every wound of division and injustice. In the unfathomable love of God, mysteriously, complete reconciliation is possible. This is our faith and hope, this is our joy. It is not hate that has the last word, but Love and Peace.
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