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Contemplative Reflection in Holy Week

Theme: The Cross, Path to Holiness; A treasure and source of strength for our Founding Generation

Setting: The Cross; the paintings of Arnoldo Janssen and the Founding Generation; Suffering faces of our current reality.

Introduction: The purpose of this time of prayer is to be with Jesus in the total surrender of him. Accompany Jesus, let us be moved by the passion and death of our Lord; but with a confident, hopeful look, glimpsing the resurrection. We invoke the presence of the Holy Spirit; may the Spirit enlighten us as we begin this time of prayer; may he envelop us with his light, with his grace, with his love.

Entering into prayer:

We contemplate, we observe for a moment the image of Jesus delivered for love to us on the Cross, while we listen to a song of surrender, to Jesus on the Cross, to God the Father, etc.

Contemplating the image of Jesus on the Cross, does not stop moving us by the attitude of Jesus, and his way of facing death. The evangelist Luke highlights the confident abandonment of Jesus in the hands of the Father (23,46), in a surrender out of love: “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him should not perish.” but have eternal life” (Jn 3:16).

When contemplating Jesus on the Cross, we are contemplating his death – his surrender in connection with the founding reality: his experience of experiencing God as his Father, the Abba and, consequently, knowing and feeling himself a much loved Son, the chosen one, the very darling.

Considering God as Dad reveals the type of relationship of trust, of simplicity, like that of a child whom he knows, loves and trusts, who loves him unconditionally.

The abandonment for love of Jesus is a consequence of his way of life, which was only confident that God is the one who guides and sustains him in the mission. “My food is to do the will of the Father.” The Father is his guarantee.

Arnold Janssen and the Cross.

We now contemplate the Cross in the light of the experiences of Father Arnoldo. The Cross, weakness, pain are essential elements on the “path of holiness. “…the weakness of God is stronger than the strength of men…” (1 Cor 1, 25). This phrase of Saint Paul became flesh in the life of Arnold Janssen.

Arnoldo himself remembers the days before the foundation: “I realized very soon, no matter where I went, that they looked at me with a lot of compassion as a person who suffered under the weight of an exalted mind”. And it was not his subjective opinion, but that others really considered him unsuitable for this project, since according to them he would be “a singular character with no sense of order or organizing talent.” “The crazy Janssen passed by here I gave him ten marks to get rid of him.” And his own brother, who at first was enthusiastic about spreading the idea of founding the missionary seminary, gave up in the face of so many negative comments regarding these plans and the lack of suitability of his brother. He wrote his resignation so as not to lose face.

Crazy, incapable, impractical, insignificant, little eloquent was the man whose work has lasted for more than a hundred years, which has spread to the five continents, because the only thing this man wanted is for the Love of God to be known by all. And that is why he was tenacious to the point of madness in following the will of God. Incapable in human eyes, however, an expert in recognizing the will of God in his heart and in the circumstances of each day. Impractical according to those around him, but:

  • the enormous construction of Steyl was carried out without financial security…
  • the great printing press that spread the love and mercy of the Sacred Heart of Jesus was a sign of his spirit ahead of his time.

Where is the secret? His writings reveal it to us: “In a bad state of mind and sick I arrived at my house where I had to face the strong temptation to throw everything overboard…. I had my time of heavy struggles; It seemed to me that I should let myself be crucified in case I did the work.”

Both, Arnold Janssen, as well as Mothers María Elena, Josepha, and the other members of the founding generation, in the face of pain, suffering, in front of the personal Cross, invited trust, courage, bravery. They knew in whom they had placed their trust. They had that experience of God as the Good Father who also supported them in those difficult and challenging moments.

WE – TODAY.

As missionary disciples, we share in the life and mission of Jesus. Like Jesus, we know that our lives, in our apostolates, we find situations not only of joy or success, but also difficulties, disappointments, misunderstandings, persecution, loneliness and failures; in those situations, our relationship with the Trinity is what sustains us.

The God who is with us, our Father, never abandons us. Sometimes, experiences of pain or situations of sin can reveal that God is with us, accompanying the pain, loving us totally, unconditionally, mercifully. Other times being in solidarity with those who need us most.

As we grow in the awareness that we are loved from all eternity with a love that cannot be broken; a love even when we are sinners, our identity is also strengthened and therefore makes us capable of expanding towards others, being people of dialogue, of communion. This sustains us in moments of loneliness, personal vulnerability and mission.

Like the disciples when they feel called or summoned to be with Jesus, we are also invited to walk the path that leads to the cross; a follow-up in Galilee, but also making the way to Jerusalem.

And it will end in a Cross. This idea of passion does not fit in modernity. It didn’t work out for the disciples either. For this reason, Jesus makes a second call to follow from freedom: “if one wants to follow me, that…” (8,34-9,1).

  • It is an invitation to adhere to his person, denying himself, leaving personal desires and thoughts, and deciding for him.
  • Take up the cross, in the reality that we have to live, with those who are on the existential peripheries, pain.

Giving up one’s life for the sake of Jesus and his oppressed people, means earning it (saving it). “If the grain of wheat dies, it bears many fruits…”. Those who insist on maintaining the idea of a glorious Messiah without the cross understand nothing and will never acquire the attitude of a true disciple, because without the cross it is impossible to understand who Jesus is and what it means to follow him.

 

With death, with the cross, we are also urged to speak of life, of resurrection.

In the apparitions after the Resurrection, the Lord does nothing other than rebuke the disciples because they are foolish, they are slow, they are slow… the path of resurrection cannot be walked by dragging your feet, nor by looking up at the sky.

His Resurrection is a matter of life for us too, because we participate in his victory.

We too are alive thanks to the living being with a capital letter. “Why do they search among the dead for the one who is alive. He is not here, he has risen ”. He connects us with humanity, he connects us with the existential peripheries. The peripheries of not knowing God, of injustice, of pain, of loneliness, of the meaninglessness of life, that we have to evangelize with our joy. “We announce a crucified Christ, a scandal for the Jews and madness for the pagans, but strength and wisdom from God for those who have been called…” (1 Cor1:23-25).

In this time of prayer and recollection: let us be moved by the Passion of the Lord, let us contemplate Jesus through our own passions and the passion of the world, but having an Easter gaze, a gaze with the heart.

In light of the testimony of his radical commitment to the cause of the Kingdom, we ask ourselves:

  • Are we willing to embrace the Cross as a source of strength and wisdom in our missionary life?
EN

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