“Turn the other cheek” it means to be humanly and spiritually superior people, certainly does not mean to be cowards
– Homilies to the Gospel –
TURN THE OTHER CHEEK IT MEANS TO BE PEOPLE humanly and spiritually HIGHER, DOES SOME SAY BEING COWARDS
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How to read the phrase of turning the other cheek, place the Holy Gospel offers us no roads impossible to follow, but of the possible ways, purpose of which is to lead us to eternal salvation? The Catechism of the Catholic Church, stating that there is a just war and that "Legitimate defense is a grave duty for whoever is responsible for the lives of others or the common good", Is it contrary to the precepts of the Holy Gospel?
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Author
Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo
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"You have heard that it was said: "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth". But I tell you not to resist evil; rather, if one gives you a slap on the right cheek, turn to him the other […]»
Mt 5, 38-48
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the wisdom of Snoopy
This page of the Holy Gospel Beato Evangelista Matteo must be understood in its depth, because penetrating deeply the Word of the Lord that we understand that the Word of God made man intended to send. And what Christ is not transmits a message addressed twenty centuries ago to a group of disciples, or to the nations of the earth and of that historical period; He sends us a living message. This is the reason why we refer to the Holy Gospel noted as "living word". And more than merely formal, the difference that exists between the Holy Gospel and the word of Homer and Virgil, between the rhymes of ancient Palermo court of Frederick II of Swabia, the word and the rhymes of Dante Alighieri toschi, Giovanni Boccaccio and Francesco Petrarca, It is a whole substantial difference. Those of many ancient authors are dead words that we make lives through their study and their spread. But are we to make live these words finite that tell stories, events, society and men who belong to a dead and buried past lives through these works. The Gospel tells us of finished, but of 'Infinity, It is not a word that lives in history closed, but open a word that opens the story to be our present and our future become. This is because the Holy Gospel word is not enlivened by us, but a word that makes us alive. That's why at the end of the proclamation of the Holy Gospel during the celebration of the Eucharistic Sacrifice of the Mass, The priest or deacon concludes by saying: "Word of the Lord".
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As you may recall, in the Gospel of weeks ago, Christ the Lord reminded us: "You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted?» [cf. Mt 5, 13-16]. And salt is Christ who gives savor and meaning to our lives. And if we lose the flavor of Christ, no one can make this salt salty. The Word of God that gives life to us makes us salt that gives flavor and makes us salt of the earth.
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Christ the Lord, towards the end of the Gospel of the Blessed Evangelista Marco, to clarify the essence of his living word, he claims: «Heaven and earth will pass, but my words will not pass " [cf. MC 24,35]. This is to remind us that He is the living Word that gives us life, It is the spice that gives it flavor and that through us gives flavor to our being and existence, accompanying us until the day that the Lord Christ: "He will return in glory to judge the living and the dead and his kingdom will have no end". And if we do not understand and we do not go into this thinking, here is that when after the proclamation of the Holy Gospel we recite the I believe, we run the risk of reciting a nursery rhyme learned by heart, instead our Profession of Faith; a nursery rhyme that we risk not even understand the meaning.
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In this passage from the Holy Gospel, of expressions that are contained on the one hand they surprise, on the other we tend to interpret as something not feasible. Let's start from the phrase that is difficult to understand: «But I tell you not to resist evil; rather, if one gives you a slap on the right cheek, you turn to him the other ".
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If we enter the false order of ideas that the Holy Gospel offers us ways and lifestyles impractical, then we run the serious risk of reducing it to a set of short stories full of historical truth and the highest ethical values, but on par Odyssey and Iliad, thus making it a "dead word over" and not a "living infinite word".
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With this sentence, Christ the Lord tells us that perhaps before an army that invades us risking our lives, we have to run towards the attackers singing peace and love ? And how do you reconcile, the invitation to turning the other cheek, the fact that the Catechism of the Catholic Church has always admitted the use of defensive war, if there is no other means of defense against unjust aggression? I remind you that in fact the text of the Catechism, where they list the conditions of a "legitimate defense by military force", It is clearly stated: "These are the traditional elements enumerated in the doctrine called the 'just war'. The evaluation of these conditions for moral legitimacy belongs to the prudential judgment of those who have responsibility for the common good " [cf. n. 2309]. Continues the text of the Catechism: "Legitimate defense is a grave duty for whoever is responsible for the lives of others or the common good" [cf. n. 2321]. And here please note that the self-defense through war is called 'a grave duty "on the part of those who" is responsible for the lives of others or the common good ".
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How to read the phrase of turning the other cheek, place the Holy Gospel offers us no roads impossible to follow, but of the possible ways, purpose of which is to lead us to eternal salvation? The doctrine, the magisterium and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, They are perhaps in stark contrast to the precepts of the Holy Gospel, even l'I invite turning the other cheek ?
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Let's see what is the sequence of the words of the Lord Jesus that before inviting to turning the other cheek he claims: "You have heard that it was said: An eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth '. And by "you have heard", Christ the Lord refers to what was known as the Law of retaliation contained in the Book of Exodus [21, 24]. A law that was created when it was useful because it aimed to curb revenge and to avoid vendettas between different tribes went on for generations, with a murderous hatred handed down from father to son. And before the Law of retaliation, which it aimed to this positive action of containment, the Lord Jesus says: "But I tell you not to resist evil; rather, if one gives you a slap on the right cheek, you turn to him the other ".
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If in primitive times the Law of retaliation He is trying to curb the evil, Jesus requires us instead a spirit tended to overcome bitterness and conflict. It does not ask us to succumb to evil powerless, but let it drop, implying, to him who does evil, As his gesture is useless and can not produce anything.
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Some opponents blinded by the wickedness, through their violent gestures challenge and require to receive reactions, so that the evil produces evil and violence more violence. The believer does not respond bowing his head before the arrogant and fearful showing weakness; acts in a superior manner and skilful, giving the evil an entirely different way of looking at things.
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And here I also invite you to reflect that Christ the Lord does not speak of severe beatings to the sound of punches unleashed in full force, or a stick or assaults with weapons in use at the time. He speaks of a slap on the right cheek. And the slap, more than a gesture of violence, was considered - then as today - a gesture of offense, an affront. Until all ancient times, hit on the face with a glove, or throw a glove to the face, was an act of infringement of other people dignity and integrity. In the era of Christ the Lord gloves were not in use, but the gesture of the slap on the cheek was equivalent to the glove challenge, which you can be answered in two ways: with a duel from which will emerge a dead, or by a smile and turning his back to the provocateur with the air of someone suggests: "But you, really you think I'm really willing to risk your life and my life, to generate a bereavement in a family and a feeling of hatred between two families, that dell'ucciso towards that of the man who, for a gesture which does not confer all the capacity that would aim to deprive me of my honor?». The turn the left cheek to this ancient challenge of the glove, It is a lesson and a clever provocative answer to make it clear that I aggressor, as a person prudent and wise, I am aware that evil never leads to any result, while the lack of control of the pride hurt, might it lead to reactions and actions of all proportion.
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It happens quite often that people in distant and hostile to the Christian world up attacking us in the worst way, through verbal violence, falsehoods spread in the press, slanders designed to spread art and then with diabolical malice ... and if any of us dare to react - for example, even with a simple and legitimate lawsuit for defamation -, promptly reply with quote one of the few evangelical phrases that know little about and that consequently cite worse: "Ah, but you have to turn the other cheek, as the Gospel says!».
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Celebrities, There are many other passages of the Gospel that those who attack us in many ways it suits do not know or ignore, for example the fact that Christ the Lord himself resorts to physical violence by taking a whip merchants in the courtyard of the Temple of Jerusalem [cf. MC 11,15-19; Mt 21,12-17; LC 19,45-48]. And what about the aggressive and insulting language Christ the Lord to the scribes, Pharisees and teachers of the Law? Or should perhaps explain that offensive capacity has defined the high notables as "brood of vipers"? [cf. Mt 23, 33]. Say it to someone "You're a viper", is a direct insult to him personally, but to say to a person that it belongs to a generation of vipers, It means not only hits him, but its full stem of belonging, family or religious that. As you can see, there are also these passages in the Holy Gospel, as others in which the Lord Jesus reminds us: «Do not think that I have come to bring peace on Earth; have not come to bring peace, but a sword " [cf. Mt 10, 32], indicating clearly that the sequela Christi, the way back to the Lord to safety, it is also a struggle both with ourselves and with others. That fight to where the Blessed Apostle Paul invites us in precise words: "The whole armor of God, to be able to withstand the wiles of the devil " [cf. Ef 6, 10-20].
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Faced with a slap, before the glove challenge, it acts as Christ the Lord teaches us, using more wisdom than the foolishness dell'attaccabrighe seeking violence at all costs. But before the mystery of evil that seeks to destroy us, there must not only fight, but move their war. And if the dangerous offender says "... but on the Gospel it is written that I can attack and destroy you and that you must turning the other cheek, while I exercise my “sacrosanct” law aimed to make the evil prevail ", in such a case to be answered: "I'm sorry, but you do not know him the Gospel, or you may have misread and, after misread, I've got worse ".
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The turning the other cheek It means showing superiority human and moral, wisdom and sense of measure; It means to give a well-deserved lesson to those who, in exchange for a provocation, receiving as a response would require a disproportionate reaction. The turning the other cheek does not mean, however, give in to evil in any way intending to overwhelm, because Christ, on the cross, He did not die because he refused to fight against evil, but just why “guilty” to have fought evil and launched the call to fight evil, until it became, for this, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world [CF Jn. 1,29].
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From the island of Patmos, 19 February 2017
VII Sunday in Ordinary Time
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To live the resurrection of Christ is necessary to abandon dreams, fables and idols, penetrate the real obedience of faith and do the Father's will
TO LIVE THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST YOU MUST LEAVE DREAMS, TALES AND IDOLS, ENTERING THE ROYAL in obedience OF FAITH AND DO THE WILL OF THE FATHER
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On the upside stone of the risen Christ who has conquered death, it is up to all of us a great task: choose between dreams and fairy tales in which everything collapses, or get in the way along the Via Emmaus. Because only in this second case, God will meet us as a traveling companion, He will call us "friends", visit our vineyard and truly turn into his work, after the man will be able to give up their omocentrismo to enter the size of Christocentrism.
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Author
Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo
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Easter 2016, Easter Vigil [LC 24, 1-12] Easter Morning [GV 20, 1-9], homily at the Mass of the day Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo
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the resurrection of Christ, works of Quirino de Ieso, year 1996, tempera on canvas 50×35
On the scene of the resurrection women are witnesses and protagonists, as recounted in the Gospel of Luke Blessed Apostle read during the Easter Vigil and the Gospel of the Apostle John proclaimed blessed in this day of Easter. Lapidary are the words that the angel to the women in Luke's Gospel: “Why look among the dead for one who is alive?”. These are words from which is built on the rock of the tomb an eternal truth, what prophets they sent to a people who sought the Lord in the places and spaces where he had left yesterday, The Almighty Creator is always on and always goes before, inviting us to an endless journey, as stated in the glorious praise Easter victims: «I hope, has risen / He goes into», Christ my hope is risen, and precedes her in Galilee.
Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo, Easter Vigil
In the religious history the man often tends to move forward and backward to look backwards. While on the other hand God wants man he always looks forward, because starting from the meeting of the Risen Lord to the disciples on the road to Emmaus [cf. LC 24, 13-53], we were thrown forward to eternity. For who is afraid of this and becoming future, He ends up living caught between a past that does not pass and a present still often made of dreams and fantasies.
In certain situations of immobility We tend to live in their small paralyzed masked possessions behind imaginative untouchable traditions castles, oblivious to the warning given of the Lord Jesus warns: "Thus have ye made the commandment of God by your tradition. Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying: This people honors me with their lips but their hearts are far from me. In vain do they worship me, teaching doctrines that are precepts of men» [cf. Mt 15, 7-9].
Jesus Christ is not locked in the tomb of yesterday's truth, because the truth is alive and lives in Jesus Christ Risen One who always brings impressed upon him the indelible marks of passion. Christ is the one who always rises again, which always renews the mystery of his body and his blood I live through the Eucharistic Mystery.
Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo, Easter Vigil
The Holy Spirit, which is divine gift given by the Risen at Pentecost, He pushes us forward, We just do not confuse the Holy Spirit with the spirit of their own; just do not have an imaginative Jesus to our size who happens to say and command certain men exactly what they want to hear, giving life thereby to one of the worst sins: closing the grace of God. Now you understand well that close and leading a neighbor to close the grace of God in the name of God, is terrible ungodliness.
Risen Christ full of grace and blessings their work, those he scrolls and inspired, while the works created by human hands for the glory of man - as the Psalmist says - die with man, just like the idols, He teaches the psalm 114 which recites: "Their idols are silver and gold, Work of human hands. They have mouths but can not speak, they have eyes and do not see, They have ears but can not hear, They have noses and smell not. They have hands and not palpate, they have feet and walk not; from the throat do not have sound. Are like them who make them and who trust in them ". And the works of God - as the Gospel states - are trees that do not recognize or fantasies or illusions in which they lived; God's works are recognized by the life and the fruits of life.
Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo, Easter vigil
And if a dry and does not bear fruit trees, there is little to wonder where they went wrong others, but one wonders: where did we go wrong us? Above all we must ask ourselves to what extent we are closed to the grace of God and the mystery of his works to follow the works of man; works that eventually, even after many years, They prove unsuccessful because of the fruits that do not give, or for patients who produce fruits, thus giving us the death and not to that life which is eternal adoration and communion with the Risen. A communion that always passes through the devout obedience to the universal Church, to the particular Church and its pastors, the bishops; especially when it is not easy to pay their obedience. But when obedience is not easy, if anything because the pastors may be weak, distant, or simply unable to shoulder their responsibilities, it must be 'more than ever given, because otherwise it risks only to obey the whims of ourselves, our reasons and our grudges. And who does not instruct this docility and obedience to the Church and its Pastors, which these days can be very difficult and painful to put into practice; who creates his own world in World, its own church in the Church, It is not a pastor and not a teacher, but a blind guide. And as the Gospel teaches us: "When a blind guide the blind, both will fall into a ditch" [cf. Mt 15,14].
Ariel S. levi Gualdo, Easter Vigil
The mystery on which our faith is built, as he explains the Blessed Apostle Paul, it is not the stone sealed the tomb of Christ, because "if Christ has not been raised, then empty is our preaching is in vain and your faith " [cf. The Cor 15, 14]. The mystery of our faith is thus the inverted stone from the one who is no longer among the dead but among the living, and that we meet along the Way to Emmaus making recognize the breaking of bread [cf. LC 24,13-35], inviting us to the eternal journey and certainly not to a standstill before the idols which are the fruit of human hands.
Inviting the man to be pleased, "the law of the Lord" and "meditate on it day and night", the psalmist, Psalm n. 1, nell'ammonirci is very clear and precise words to tell you the right man, the one who really does the will of God: "It will be as a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither; succeed all his works ". And will, his works, because in truth they are works of the Lord, that man was and is only one faithful instrument.
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Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo, Easter Vigil
On Easter night It took place the resurrection of the body of the Word of God Incarnate, that his flesh was sullied on the tree and is now adored in heaven and on earth. It is no coincidence that Christ God is risen night, because with his resurrection has enlightened our darkness, as the Psalmist sings: "Enlighten my lamp, man; my God, enlighten my darkness " [Shall 17, 29].
Risen Christ calls us to life and it makes us part of life, inviting us to escape from death; He calls us to do the works of the Lord and bless his works before the Lord of life: "Bless the Lord, you all, his troops, his ministers, who do his will!. Bless the Lord, all his works, in all places of his dominion. Bless the Lord, my soul" [Shall 102].
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Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo, Easter Vigil
It is on this that we can accommodate and build our intimate participation in the resurrection of Christ, with which humanity is dead to sin and reborn to life, or hand deliver us to death in the worst way: We laid our human works in the name of God, but giving the inevitable fruits: a dry tree, the desolation, Finally, a death that will come sad after having spent his life in a dimension of possession and closing angry until the last breath of life. And all this in the name of "self" to run through "God's will", while around us everything collapses. And it all breaks down our fault that we do not want to see, not the fault of the other. Around everything collapses because we, locked in our illusory and immovable convictions, although having heard every day the Word of God, in truth we have not heard, because we were too busy to listen to the reasons of our "I" instead of the reasons of God through the Blessed Apostle Paul's voice warns us saying: «The day will come, indeed, in which […] having itching ears they, will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings, refusing to listen to the truth to turn to fairy tales " [II Tm 4,3].
And acting in this way, or seeding tales that then, in the end, They fall to pieces along with the idols made by human hands, You do not reach certain communion of saints to enjoy the beatific vision of the mystery of God the Creator, Christ the Lord of the Incarnate Word, Holy Spirit Comforter.
Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo, Easter Vigil
"Risen Christ has set us free" - warns the Blessed Apostle Paul [Gal, 1] - "free for freedom; so stand firm and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery ". Never and no one, we must allow ourselves to impose slavery, especially by men who would like to make others slaves to their whims and fancies of their own in the name of God, after brazenly proclaimed messengers and voice of God.
Since the Garden of Eden, the choice is up to us: deliver us to everlasting death or follow our natural calling: participate in the resurrection of Christ God who now sits at the right hand of the father and that one day - never forget - "will return in glory to judge the living and the dead". And Christ, place that "every tree is known by its fruit" [cf. LC 6,44], with those who have never given up even for a moment of their existence to themselves to be truly his, they have not really served Christ and his Church, but who used instead of Christ and his Church, It is very severe: leave them in meal to death. Suffice it to recall the parable of the barren fig tree: Jesus, seeing a fig tree along the road, He sought in it the fruits, ma, finding him rich only in leaves, He pronounced the sentence of that tree [cf. LC 13, 6-9]. The Lord Jesus did not say at all: poor thing, It does not bear fruit because of the other. Far from it, the divine Master said that the lack of fruit was whole fault of the barren fig tree.
Was Christ, before an act of perfect repentance, He has saved the good thief opening to him the gates of Paradise [cf. LC 23, 38-43], the same can do with us; the same can do with
those who are in a sterilized vineyard that in truth the Lord, that vineyard, He did not desired, It is the work of men's hands and not the work of God. In this case it is necessary and urgent to take note of reality, follow the wise admonition of the Apostle Paul Blessed, abandon the fairytales and fantasies [cf. II Tm 4,3] open to a truth - which is often bitter and therefore not easy to accept - and pray to the Lord with the words of Psalm 79 which recites: "Man, Look down from heaven and see and visit this vine ". And the Lord visited us, but first you need to be aware of our error and above all the absence of God in the vineyard man wanted for fundamental research of the glory, then pray that, despite our mistake, grace us succor and transform that land in God's vineyard. Otherwise you risk dying incattiviti as one of the two thieves, that instead of asking for grace and forgiveness, despite being battered and pained in her whole body affixed to the pole of the cross, instead manifested closure, I decline, anger and aggressive spirit to the last breath of life. Just as do those who, before the failure of their works, They do not return to where they started even before the destruction, to pain, to sickness and death.
In the Johannine Gospel There is the beautiful image of Mary suffering and lost before the tomb, that says: "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb and we know not where they have laid!» [CF Jn. 20,2].
Ariel S. Levi di Gualdo, Easter Vigil
In Luke's Gospel, women paralyzed by the pain before the empty tomb stone, two angels in shining garments say: "Why do you search among the dead for one who is alive?» [LC 24, 5]. With these words the angels tell the women to look beyond the size of the whole temporary grave that marks only a moment of transition. For Jesus it is no longer in the past, Jesus is not a collection of memories made all of real estate and related to days gone by; Jesus lives in the present and is projected into the future, Jesus is the '' Today 'eternal God who invites us to walk, and the Alpha the A Omega that "recapitulates in himself all things, those in heaven and things on earth " [CF. Ef 1,10], one whom the holy bishop and father Augustine called the Church Christ the whole, which is beginning, center and goal of our entire humanism.
On the upturned stone of Christ risen who has conquered death, it is up to all of us a great task: choose between dreams and fairy tales in which everything collapses, or get in the way along the Via Emmaus. Because only in this second case, God will meet us as a traveling companion, He will call us "friends", visit our vineyard and truly turn into his work, after the man will be able to give up their omocentrismo to enter the size of Christocentrism, why otherwise, you can easily do without acting: "Come your kingdom, your will be done, as in heaven, so on earth ", because it would only be words without any human sense, and Christian.
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Easter Sequence
Master Notre Dame de París – France.
great Organ: Philippe Lefebvre
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The website of this magazine and the editions take name from the Aegean island in which the Blessed Apostle John wrote the Book of the Apocalypse, isola also known as «the place of the last revelation»
«God revealed the secrets of others ALTIUS»
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