John, Apostle and Evangelist

Correggio. John the Evangelist (detail).

For John, as for everyone else, his vocation gave a new meaning even to the most ordinary things. The whole of life is affected by Our Lord's plans for each one of us ...

John's whole life was centred on His Lord and Master; in his faithfulness to Jesus he found the meaning of his life. He put up no resistance of any kind to His call; he was found on Calvary when all the others had disappeared. This is what our life, too, has to be like, because even though Our Lord calls some people in a special way, all his preaching comprises a vocation, an invitation to follow him into a new life whose secret he possesses: if any man would come after me ... (Matt 16:24)

Our Lord has chosen all of us -- some of us with a specific vocation -- to follow him, to imitate him and to carry on in the world the work of his Redemption. And from all of us he expects a joyful and unshakeable faithfulness like St. John's -- even in the most difficult moments.

In Conversation with God: Advent and Christmastide