“Truly I say to you, whatever you did to one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did it to me” (Mt 25:40). Emmanuele Levinas comments: “I find that there is more transubstantiation in this verse than in the bread and wine.” This affirmation, by the Lithuanian philosopher, is certainly radical but it expresses a profound truth: man it is the visible icon of God. The human face reflects the face of God, God looks at us through the gaze of the other. Here is the key to enter the great fresco of Matthew offered to us in this solemnity of Christ the King. The discovery that the Judge of the End Times is simultaneously the poor person on the street teaches us to see every meeting not in banal or superficial way but as a place of revelation.  The Jews tell the story of an old Rabbi, who asked his disciples by what sign it was possible to recognize the exact moment when night ends and day begins. «Perhaps, said the disciples, when can you easily distinguish a dog from a sheep from afar?”. «No, said the rabbi”. “Is it when you can easily distinguish a date palm from a fig?” “No, said the rabbi.” “But when is it then?” the disciples asked. And the rabbi replied: «It is when, lost among the crowd, anyone’s face becomes equally known to you, as precious as that of a father, a mother, a brother, a sister, a son, a daughter, a husband, a bride. Until then, it’s still dark in your Heart”. Yes, the dawn of the Kingdom of God begins where the unknown, the hungry, the thirsty, the sick, the prisoner… become for us father, mother, brother, sister, son, daughter, husband, wife. This recognition is already reigning with Christ.

Commentary by b. Sandro Carotta, osb
Abbazia di Santa Maria – Praglia (Italy)

Translation by f. Mark Hargreaves,
Prinknash Abbey