John 16,20-23
«When a woman gives birth, she is in pain, because his hour has come; but, when she has given birth to the child, she no longer remembers the suffering for the joy that a man has come into the world.”
It is one of the most powerful images that Jesus uses in today’s Gospel. Life is like childbirth: it goes through pain, but it doesn’t end in it.
There is a portion of suffering, real and inevitable, but it is oriented towards a greater joy that overcomes and transforms it.
Faith is precisely this gaze capable of seeing the whole. If we stop only at one part, especially the painful part, we risk falling into despair. But if we learn to read life in its entirety, then even what hurts makes sense.
Christianity is not the cult of suffering. Pain, taken alone, does not save, it can actually destroy and dehumanize. But when it is linked to a meaning, when it is inserted into a path, then it becomes like the pangs of childbirth: not the final destiny, but a passage.
Jesus says it clearly: «So you too, now, are in pain; but I will see you again and your heart will rejoice and no one will be able to take away your joy.”
The promise is not the absence of pain, but a joy that no one can take away. A joy that is born from the encounter with Him and that endures even through trials. And he concludes: “On that day you will no longer ask me anything.”
It’s like saying that, in the face of this fullness, all questions are answered. Today’s Gospel therefore invites us to look beyond our noses. That is, to believe that within every experience, even the most difficult, a promise of life can be hidden.
Friday 15 May 2026 – (Friday of the VI Week of Easter)
