28 April 2024 ✶ Fifth Sunday of Easter / B
Whoever remains in Jesus bears much fruit (Jn 15.1)
Lhe first Christian community was crossed by tensions between conservatives and innovators (1st reading); the Jerusalem community tended to preserve traditions. All growth is always accompanied by tensions; even the tensions that affect the Church today can prove fruitful, provided they are lived in charity. For this reason, it is not enough to possess faith, charity is also necessary. LPaul’s entry into the group of believers was neither easy nor painless, as always happens when ordinary structures need to be injected with the dynamism of novelty. The first apostles were all good people, but fundamentalists, ready to band together rather than experiment with pluralism (See Acts chapter 10). Paul had converted, but his ideas were too new, and throughout the history of the Church these two components (Pauline dynamism and Petrine prudence) will be present with alternating events. Hierarchy and prophecy, tradition and innovation, ancient and new: two necessary dimensions, otherwise we either face aging or dangerous escapes forward. It is a simplistic schematization, which also photographs 20 centuries of the history of Christianity. Tensions become illegitimate only when they cause sectarianism and divisions. Pope John was right when he said: “In
necessary things: unity; in optional things: freedom; always charity.”
PTo define our relationship with Jesus well, he could not find a more poetic and realistic image like that of the vine and the branch; the branch is an extension of the vine, the bunch grows on it, but the sap that nourishes it comes from the vine (gospel). It is a problem to distinguish the true vine; we have a world populated by vines, which produce toxic messages; every vine promises fruits of salvation, an intoxicating wine; in the end someone even comes to think that all vines are the same and that all religions are the same. Our life is an infinite search for this “true vine”, for this tree that saves; a humble and honest search, which requires inner freedom. Every man is thus looking for a “Holy Grail”, which reveals itself to those who lovingly seek freedom. The gospel urges us to be united to Jesus, like the branch to the vine. If we do evil, we detach ourselves from Jesus’ true vine.
LThe image of the vine suggests that faith is intimacy, and the verb to remain, to abide, reminds us of this; to the pale religiosity of many Christians, all folklore and exteriority, Jesus asks for a cordial and radical adherence, like the nuptial bond. But faith is also suffering, and the verb prune, cut, reminds us of this, but always because it bears more fruit. God takes away a joy from us because he wants to offer us a greater one. “The hands of God are hands now of grace, now of pain, but always of love”, wrote D. Bonhoeffer, Protestant pastor, who died hanged in the Nazi prison of Flossenbürg.
Pto hate is not to hate the plant: if it is not pruned, its strength is wasted, it puts on more bunches than it should, and does not bring them all to maturity; if it remains for a long time without being pruned, it even ends up becoming wild, like Renzo’s garden described by Manzoni. The same happens in our life. To live is to choose, it is to give up. Those who cultivate many interests, those who do many things… end up dispersing. We need to prune! Holiness resembles sculpture, which Leonardo da Vinci defines “the art of removing” because, while you and the other arts add something (the color on the canvas, the stone on the stone in architecture, the note on the pentagram…), only sculpture consists in removing the superfluous pieces of marble, to make them come out (e-ducere ) the figure. One day Michelangelo saw a block of marble covered with earth and herbs; as if struck, he said to the friends who accompanied him: “An angel is contained in that block of marble, which I must bring out!”. God also wants to educate us: inside each of us he sees his image, and wants to bring it out. As? He takes the chisel of the cross and shapes us; he takes the scissors of pain and shapes us. Generally, these are not crosses and exceptional pains: they are the sufferings of everyday life!
GOOD LIFE!
