Automatic translation from Italian, under review.
Jesus died on the cross out of love for us; the measure of his love was ‘without measure’; it is not for nothing that he made this statement: “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (Jn 15:13).
We are therefore invited to give our life for those we love, without half measures, like Jesus, who died for us. Yet we are not always in a position to give our physical life. What does it mean to give our life for others in the concrete reality of each of our days?
Sometimes it can consist in giving our things, or our idea, at the moment when it seems to us more right than that of others, without stubbornness. It is not a matter of yielding for the sake of a quiet life, but of loving.
There is certainly no lack of occasions when we are asked to do something that costs us: knowing how to give up a walk in order to stay with a sick friend, going to watch the football match without quarreling with someone who supports the other team, giving a poor person something we are attached to…; these are the various concrete ways in which we too give our life for others.
It is not a matter of doing extraordinary things, but of loving sincerely.
If we set out on this road, God will be able to guide us inwardly until he makes us capable, at the right moment, of courageous and bold choices in the service of others and of the cause of the Gospel.