Thursday, March 28, 2013

Example


I just read this morning that our new Holy Father told those present at his Mass Tuesday that he had decided to continue living in the Vatican guesthouse instead of moving into the papal apartments in the Apostolic Palace.  He wants to live more simply and also to live with other people.  He takes his meals in the common dining room with the Vatican employees and celebrates Mass with them in the mornings.  It will be the first time in 110 years that the bishop of Rome has not lived in the Palace.
Instead of celebrating this evening's Holy Thursday Mass in St. Peter's Basilica, our Holy Father celebrated in a prison for young men.  After the Gospel he washed their feet.  When he was archbishop of Buenos Aires it was his custom to celebrate the Holy Thursday Mass in prisons and hospitals and shelters for the poor and marginal.  In those places too he washed the people's feet, including those of AIDS victims.
With Jesus in John's Gospel (13:1-15) he can ask us, "Do you understand what I have done for you?  You call me "teacher" and "master"--- and you are right, for that is what I am.  So, if I your master and teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.  I have given you an example, that you also should do as I have done for you."
We ask ourselves who needs me to wash their feet and how do I do that?  For me, I think, it means giving my time to visit my cousin in a nursing home or to someone who just wants to talk.

No comments: