Sunday Vigil

Reading of the Word of God

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Whoever lives and believes in me
will never die.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Hebrews 11,1-2.8-19

Only faith can guarantee the blessings that we hope for, or prove the existence of realities that are unseen. It is for their faith that our ancestors are acknowledged. It was by faith that Abraham obeyed the call to set out for a country that was the inheritance given to him and his descendants, and that he set out without knowing where he was going. By faith he sojourned in the Promised Land as though it were not his, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. He looked forward to the well-founded city, designed and built by God. It was equally by faith that Sarah, in spite of being past the age, was made able to conceive, because she believed that he who had made the promise was faithful to it. Because of this, there came from one man, and one who already had the mark of death on him, descendants as numerous as the stars of heaven and the grains of sand on the seashore which cannot be counted. All these died in faith, before receiving any of the things that had been promised, but they saw them in the far distance and welcomed them, recognising that they were only strangers and nomads on earth. People who use such terms about themselves make it quite plain that they are in search of a homeland. If they had meant the country they came from, they would have had the opportunity to return to it; but in fact they were longing for a better homeland, their heavenly homeland. That is why God is not ashamed to be called their God, since he has founded the city for them. It was by faith that Abraham, when put to the test, offered up Isaac. He offered to sacrifice his only son even though he had yet to receive what had been promised, and he had been told: Isaac is the one through whom your name will be carried on. He was confident that God had the power even to raise the dead; and so, figuratively speaking, he was given back Isaac from the dead.

 

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

If you believe, you will see the glory of God,
thus says the Lord.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

The Letter to the Hebrews immerses readers in the long history of faith, which began in ancient times, so that they feel part of it. The long list helps the reader to grasp the richness of this history and not to abandon it. Faith is not an abstract exercise, but "the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." Faith is the certainty of possessing as of now that 'better country' towards which we are heading (11:13.16). Indeed, faith makes one possess to such an extent what one hopes for that it is itself the proof of what we do not see. Moreover, the author notes, "By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible" (v. 3). Visible things, creation and the events of this world, are created by the Word, which, although invisible, nevertheless has the power to generate visible and invisible things, that is, the whole of history in its wealth of events and emotions. The history of believers was initiated by faith, starting with that of Abel, who offered God a sacrifice more precious than that of Cain. Enoch, Noah and Abraham are then mentioned, on whom the letter dwells at greater length. For he is the man of faith, indeed the father of believers: he promptly obeyed God's call and left his own land to go to the land God had promised him. It was not a choice made with eyes closed, but founded on the steadfastness of God's Word. From Abraham's faith came an offspring 'as many as the stars of heaven and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore," that is, the host of believers who trust in God and who await the homeland that he has promised them but which they already foretaste. For them the Lord has prepared a steadfast city. This is why Christians, as the letter to Diognetus says, "live in their homeland, but as foreigners; they participate in everything as citizens and are detached from everything as strangers. Every foreign homeland is their homeland, and every homeland is foreign."