Thoughts on parishes, especially those that are Camillian, by Fr. Rosario Messina

My previous thoughts necessarily lead us to conclude that for we Christians Sunday is a day that is too important to be dispensed with. Only if we go back to loving it and to living it as a weekly Easter will we be convinced that we cannot reduce it to a simple duty to be dealt with in an hour. The living and joyous encounter with the Risen Jesus, indeed, must necessarily revive faith, strengthen hope and nurture the charity to be borne witness to  over the subsequent six days. We are nourished by the Word of God and the Eucharist every Sunday, specifically to charge ourselves anew at the spring, and to be able, in this way, during the week, to discover and visit ‘very many tabernacles in homes’. Indeed, how many disabled people, elderly people, mentally ill people, and terminally ill people await a caress, a word of courage, of comfort and of hope, a glass of water to placate their burning thirst or enjoy a moment of relief, given that they cannot get out of bed and walk supported by the arm of a friend! Therefore celebrating every Sunday the Easter of the Lord, exercising ourselves to believe in the words of Jesus, who in a little consecrated bread is present in body, blood, soul and divinity, will help us much more easily to discover and worship the Jesus who is in every man who suffers. ‘To raise up a poor man, a sick man’, wrote St. John Chrysostom, ‘is to raise up Jesus Christ; at any hour the lay faithful can become priests of Jesus Christ, clothed in the splendour of a new priesthood. What is our altar? The poor, the sick. And the victim? Charity, whose scent goes up to heaven’.  Equally joyous and comforting are the Beatitudes which St. Camillus, the patron saint of the sick and those who look after them, addressed to his sons with their hands immersed in the ‘dough of charity’.  ‘Blessed are you who have such a good opportunity to serve God at the bedside of the sick! Blessed are you if you can be accompanied to the tribunal of God by a tear, by a sigh, of one of these sick poor people!’ Mother Teresa, today Saint Mother Teresa, suggested to us in a sublime way which acts to perform every day so that the Sunday Eucharist or daily Eucharist could produce small but precious gestures of love: ‘We must give immediate and effective service to the poorest of the poor, for all the time that nobody has to help them. Giving to the hungry: not only food but also the Word of God. Giving drink to the thirsty: not only water but also knowledge, pace, truth, justice and love. Clothing the naked not only with clothes but also with human dignity. Giving lodging to the homeless: not only a refuge made up of bricks but a heart that understands, protects and loves. Looking after the sick and the dying: not only their bodies but also their spirits and their minds. To children and the poor, to all those who suffer and are alone, always offer a beautiful smile: do not give them only care – give them your heart as well’. This is a simple and sublime way of living the works of mercy, nourished by a secret evangelical joy that is drawn on every Sunday from the meeting with Jesus the Eucharist.