Darkness and light, an eloquent opposition that is recognized in all cultures and all religions. Light symbolizes life, goodness, perfection, happiness, immortality. Darkness stands for the cold, the negative, evil, fear, death.
The apostle Paul reminds the faithful of Rome that a Christian no longer has anything to do with a \u201cdark\u201d past made up of impurity, injustice, wickedness, greed, malice, envy, rivalry, treachery and spite (see Rom 1:24-31). <\/p>\n
\u00abLet us then throw off the works of darkness…<\/p>\n
What are the \u201cworks of darkness\u201d? According to Paul they are: \u201cdrunkenness\u2026 promiscuity and licentiousness\u2026 rivalry, and jealousy\u201d (Rom 13:13) . They also include forgetting God, betrayal, theft, murder, pride, wrath, contempt for others, and even more: materialism, consumerism, hedonism, and vanity.
Works of darkness also include the frequently found easy-going attitude in choosing to watch all types of television programs when we browse the internet, read certain magazines, see certain films, or dress in certain fashions.
When we were baptized, we chose, through our godparents, to die to sin, with Christ, declaring three times that we wanted to renounce Satan and his temptations. Today, people do not like to speak about the devil; they prefer to forget about him, even to say that he doesn\u2019t exist. And yet he does exist and he continues to foment wars, massacres, and all kinds of violence.
\u201cThrow off\u201d suggests a decisive, even violent action, something that makes demands on us, that requires consistency, determination, and courage, which are all required if we want to live in the world of light. Moreover, the Word of Life continues:<\/p>\n
… [and] put on the armor of light\u00bb<\/p>\n
It is not enough simply to renounce, to rid ourselves of evil; we need to \u201cput on the armor of light,\u201d which Paul then explains is to \u201cput on the Lord Jesus Christ\u201d (Rom 13:14), allowing him to live in us. Peter, the apostle, also invites us to \u201carm\u201d ourselves \u201cwith the same attitude\u201d Jesus had when he suffered (see 1 Pt 4:1).
Forceful images, yes, because we know that it is not easy to allow Christ to live in us. It means reflecting his feelings, his way of thinking and acting; it means loving as he loved, and love is demanding. It means that we must constantly wage a battle against our innate selfishness.<\/p>\n
Yet there is no other way to reach the light. John clearly reminds us of this in his first letter: \u201cWhoever loves his brother remains in the light, and there is nothing in him to cause a fall. Whoever hates his brother is in darkness; he walks in darkness and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes\u201d (1 Jn 2: 10-11).<\/p>\n
\u00abLet us then throw off the works of darkness [and] put on the armor of light\u00bb<\/p>\n
This Word of Life is an invitation to conversion, to move continually from the world of darkness to the world of light. Let\u2019s repeat our \u201cno\u201d to Satan and to all his enticements and say our \u201cyes\u201d to God, as we did on the day we were baptized.
It doesn\u2019t mean we have to accomplish extraordinary actions. All we have to do is to take everything we are already doing and motivate and animate it with true love.
In this way we will radiate around us a culture of light, of what is positive, of real happiness. We will prepare for paradise while still here on earth so that we will possess it eternally in heaven. This is so because paradise is a reality that Jesus promised us. It\u2019s like a house that we build here and live in there. Paradise will be his gift: full joy, harmony, beauty, dance, and unending happiness, because paradise is love.<\/p>\n
The experience of Mary from Peru bears witness to this. She is the mother of three young daughters. When she discovered the Word of Life, she learned more about God. It was a source of light for her and she plunged in. Her life changed completely.
Shortly afterwards Mary was diagnosed with a grave illness. While she was in the hospital she learned that she had a little more than a month to live. The new relationship she now had with Jesus made it easier for her to ask him to allow her to live five more years in order to solidify her conversion and make a difference in the lives of those around her.
The doctors were unable to explain how Mary\u2019s health improved. She was discharged from the hospital. She returned home and began to make plans to marry her companion in church and to have her girls baptized.
Five years later, Mary\u2019s illness suddenly worsened and in just two week\u2019s time she concluded her earthly life.
Before dying, she was able to arrange every detail for the care of her daughters and to give hope to her husband. \u201cNow I am going to the Father who is waiting for me. Everything has been wonderful. He gave me the five most beautiful years of my life, ever since I came to know him in his Word that gives Life!\u201d <\/p>\n
Chiara Lubich<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00abLet us then throw off the works of darkness [and] put on the armor of light\u00bb (Rom 13:12).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,92],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-290908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-non-categorizzato","category-word-of"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=290908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290908\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=290908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=290908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=290908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}