Jn 3: 16-18
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God.
New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989, by the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. USCCB approved.
God moving through creation
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son.” Is John’s reference to “the world” just a literary way of referring to the human race, or ought we to take him literally, that he’s also speaking about our physical world, when he says that the Father’s desire is “that the world might be saved through him”? In his encycilcal Laudato Si, Pope Francis reminds us: “God’s love is the fundamental moving force in all created things,” and “every creature is thus the object of the Father’s tenderness, who gives it its place in the world” (no. 77).
Jesus is sent among us to “make all things new”, and calls us to “come together to take charge of this home which has been entrusted to us” (no. 244). He sends his Holy Spirit to “guide this world towards the Father’s love and accompany creation as it groans in travail” (no. 246).
—Fr. Rick McGurn, SJ, is a retreat director at Bellarmine Jesuit Retreat House in Barrington, IL.
Prayer
Triune Lord, wondrous community of infinite love, teach us to contemplate you in the beauty of the universe, for all things speak of you.
—Pope Francis, Laudato Si, no. 246