The Lamb

John sees Jesus and suddenly says: “Behold, the Lamb of God! He who takes away the sin of the world!” These words, accompanied by a look and a gesture of the hand, pointing to Him, Jesus.

He will see Him a second time and say the same words losing two of his disciples. Jesus turns to them and ask: “What do you want?” Nothing! They looked at him and followed him.

John calls him Lamb, a name popular among the Jews because it was the name of a gentle animal used in Temple for sacrifices and during the Rites of the Passover.

It was as if John had somehow intuited that Jesus, the Messiah, would die on a sort of sacrificial altar to save the world, creation. But he doesn’t say so in his Gospel.

It was, in any case, a thought rejected by the Jews of that time, who instead expected a “conquering, warrior, and armed Messiah.”

On the contrary, here he appears as a docile Messiah who does not show his claws, but endures and suffers, capable, however, of removing, absorbing, and purifying the enormous mass of evil spread throughout the world. But only he could do this.

“This is my beloved Son; in him I have placed my pride.” “Pride” is a word that, when associated with God, has something great yet small on earth, living among millions of living beings: I send him among you to redeem with his humanity “men of every tribe and language and people and nation” and thus generate a new, widespread and free humanity turned toward good and God.

A New Jerusalem, square with twelve gates, descending from heaven. Timeless because the Temple: “Almighty God and the Lamb.” The sun and moon will disappear, and there will always be light. But this was written in the Apocalypse, discovered after nearly four centuries of silence, in the 4th century by a seer.

The Heavenly Jerusalem, of course, depicts an eternal Church, which, however here in our world, in expectation, cannot look only at itself. Although powerful, it must feel small, rejecting all triumphalism because it must humbly point, with a finger, a hand, the gaze of its eyes, and that of Faith, to Jesus alone. Alone: ​​”Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” He is the only one who saves!

These are also the words we recite during Mass, when, at communion, the Body and Blood of Christ are presented to us.

A liturgical gesture that, with “Behold! Behold Christ, the Lamb!”, invites us to never take our gaze from him, dead on the cross and not to forget other lambs who shed innocent blood for the good of all in a world that is often brutal, dark, and selfish.

This is why the Lamb is depicted immaculate, immobile, with an impossible but catching gaze and a hole in his chest, as if it had been made by a bullet, from which blood continually gushes. We must somehow curb its flow before the end of time.

The beauty of the newborn face

The Star of Bethlehem – Edward Burne-Jones

Many rulers, in Jesus’ time, behaved as if they were “stars,” because they felt important, powerful, famous, and imperial. But their splendour was artificial, the fruit of cold calculations and power plays, and they were almost never able to respond to the people’s need for peace and hope.

But it was not King Herod’s ostentatious visibility that revealed the miracle of Christmas to the Magi, because the light of our comet was meant to illuminate the tiny face of a newborn baby, born in a small, forgotten village. And the warm light of that star revealed “the beauty of the face of the Father” (Isaiah 60:2), Emmanuel, the God among us, compassionate, tender, and a light to enlighten the people.

Herod did not see the star, but as we know, this star does not reveal itself to the powerful with their eyes fixed on the earth, to the lands to be occupied, the riches to be possessed, and the weapons to be amassed. The Epiphany comet is high above, guiding the eyes of everyone around the world who sincerely seeks the author of life. Indeed, she often comes seeking us before we even ask.

Precisely for this reason, in the nativity scene, we depict the Magi with different faces, different races, with the physical features of the various peoples of the earth, of people with many professions, to remind us that God invites everyone, always. God seeks everyone.

Today, in a time when people and nations have increasingly powerful means of communication, we seem less willing to take action to help the most vulnerable, to accept and embrace diversity! We are more attracted by the prevailing visibility of rulers who look elsewhere, not at men, but at things!

Our comet, the Wisdom, once it has passed, invites us to close our eyes, memorize it, and begin an inner journey typical of those seeking the meaning of life, as expressed in the words of the Gospel and witnessed by the works of Jesus.

The Magi had decided to see Him “who was born King of the Jews”; and they did not stop until they saw Him. Jesus never became King of the Jews, but they felt immense joy, and on their return, they meditated on what they had witnessed, becoming stars themselves, like the apostles after the resurrection of their Master, guides and lights of the world.

Christmas ends with light, so let us renew, after the Jubilee of Hope, our “stellar” journey to proclaim what many hope and pray for, but have never seen: a world without darkness.