"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore, let us not fear though the earth should shake, though the mountains fall into the heart of the sea. Though the waters of the sea roar and rage, though the mountains tremble at their fury: Yahweh of Hosts is with us, our refuge is the God of Jacob!" (Ps 46:2-4)

Church tradition calls the psalms the ritual of our life. In liturgical language, a "ritual" (or "rite") means the prescribed or described course of a particular official prayer of the Church. Thus we distinguish the rite of baptism, of marriage… My whole life is described, rooted, in the psalms. When I read them, I find myself, my own experience of joy and longing, sorrow and anxiety. Jesus Christ prayed the psalms, and in his Person they find their fulfilment. This passage from Psalm 46 speaks of a shaken earth. The earth of our life. We live in a time of shaken relationships. Relationships are lived out on the earth. The earth is the place of relationship. Man is a being of relationship, because he is created in the image of God, who is the relationship of love of the three Divine Persons. Relationships open us to the other. We cannot live without the other, even if he is entirely different from us, even if he goes against us. We find ourselves in the other.

The psalmist says that the earth of our relationships is shaking. Everything around us is shaken. Panicked. Modern man experiences upheaval. Many people today suffer from anxiety and panic attacks. Whoever has experienced this knows that it is a feeling in which it is as though the earth is shaking, the waters of the sea are roaring and raging. A terrible feeling. Extreme insecurity. The edge of death. Where does it come from? From a lack of genuine relationships. The earth, as the place of my life, of my securities, is shaken. Our society is living through a deep crisis in every area of life, because the fundamental relationship - the relationship with God - has been shaken. Various worries and thoughts arising from our relationship with ourselves present reality to us as a land of darkness without hope for the future. The endless race for money, traumas that time does not heal, create within us the roar of the waves of the sea, and we lose our relationship with the Other. We allow God to wander out of our lives. God is relationship, and I have lost God. I no longer possess within myself the capacity for a genuine relationship. Panic sets in. Panic is noise, instability, insecurity, despair.

God gives a powerful answer to this human torment: Do not be afraid when the earth shakes, when the mountains (of our relationships) fall into the sea… If I lose God, I also lose my relationship with myself; I despise myself and do not know myself. I am afraid of myself. As a consequence of the loss of this relationship, the fundamental relationship also disappears: the relationship between husband and wife. Sacrament. Mystery. Wonder. Source of life. Divorces come, discord, endless quarrels and accusations. In the sea of panic and the fury of the raging waves of our pride, we are shaken in sin. Love vanishes, life is extinguished. Fewer and fewer children are born, panic chokes trust. We shut ourselves in on ourselves.

But do not be afraid! Yahweh of Hosts is with us. He is a helper ready in time of trouble!! Wonderful news. He is stability, he is our refuge; let us lean on him. He heals. Confess, lean on the stone that the builders rejected. He, Jesus Christ, becomes the cornerstone that restores the gift of relationship! Christ is a bridge stretched from heaven to earth, so that through Him you can rise above your problems and reach out to the other. If you are a husband, do not look only at her negative sides. She surely has many positive, good ones too. Approach her as if crossing a bridge, through Christ, to the other shore, to her. Love can be renewed. Wife, look at your husband. He too has good sides. You are both a gift to one another. Forgive! Look to God and return to a life of relationship. Take possession of your land! The psalms are wonderful. Read them! Feed on them, and do not be afraid. All is calm. God is with us! Emmanuel! Steadfastness. Forgiveness. Life.