Jesus Master, the Perfect Communicator

Only constant contact with the person of Jesus through contemplation will allow us to appropriate his "criteria of communication." It is in him that the concepts of "Master" and "communication" are best revealed: communication is not the primarily verbal transmission of abstract truths. Jesus Master communicated through words, attitudes, gestures (silence, his gaze), symbols, movements (setting out "decisively" for Jerusalem was a great act of communication), and the sharing of life experiences. "Communication" is genuine self-offering, motivated by love.

"To give," "to hand over," "to love"--these are the verbs that best express the communication between the Father and Son, manifested in total self-offering: "God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son" (Jn 3:16); "God gave us his own Son" (cf. Rm 8:22); "the Son of God loved me and sacrificed himself for my sake" (cf. Gal 2:21).

Fr. Alberione urged us to make the same act of self-offering: "Your ardor must burn like a lamp and consume itself in the same way: consume your physical strength and all your energies for the Lord, in order that humanity might come to know God."

(Excerpt from In Communion, by Sr. Giovanna Maria Carrara, Superior General)

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