Footnotes

1. John 14:1 Facing the death of Jesus, or facing our death, we might be shaken by fear. After all, without God is not existence for us a flight from the useless to nothingness? We have, then, to meditate on this chapter 14, where the themes are intermingled too numerously to discern the whole universe of meaning each verse opens to us. Yes, there is fulfillment, but it comes from God; it is abiding in God, truth in God, life from God. The symbols tell us that the fulfillment comes about in the communication of life from the Father, from Jesus, and from the Spirit.
2. John 14:1 The departure of Jesus ought not to become a time of discouragement amid hostility or uncertainty. The departure opens to all people the possibility of being in communion with God. Jesus gives the disciples the light and the life to enter this communion: he is the way not only through his teaching but also through his presence and his being—but what do we call the way and the goal of life for us?
3. John 14:1 You place your trust in God: this could also be translated as an imperative: “Place your trust in God!”
4. John 14:6 We can reflect upon the mystery of God to struggle to develop a better understanding of our life and the meaning of the world. But our power to discern cannot establish any certainties on our own. To know the Father, to discover what he wants for us, and to enter into his communion, we first have to look on Jesus, on his work, and on his love. Only the gift of the Son reveals the love of the Father in its fullness.
5. John 14:12 Here is a beautiful hymn on what it means to be Christians. They are not nostalgic survivors of a great experience that is past. In daily life, with its insults and interrogations, they remain in true communion with Christ and continue his work—i.e., they bear in his name the testimony of salvation and the testimony of truth. This communion, unceasingly renewed, gives them strength to cope with attacks of despair, falsehood, incomprehension, and nothingness—what John often calls “the world.”
   In this effort, which is never finished, they are uplifted by a new and constant presence of God: the Spirit. It is the Spirit who gives Christians the power to experience the divine presence in their inmost being, because the Spirit makes them live in the participation of God. It is the Spirit who gives Christians the courage to obey, as Christ did, the will of God, who is love, truth, testimony. It is the Spirit who makes them penetrate the heart of the words and acts of Jesus in the questions and debates of life.
   The Spirit is the consoler of Jn 16:5-13. The Greek word Parakletos means an advocate, one who aids by his power and advice. In the situations and struggles of living as a Christian, the Spirit supports us so that we may remain united with God and bear witness to him before the world.
6. John 14:22 Judas (not Judas Iscariot): Jude Thaddeus (see Mt 13:15).
7. John 14:27 Christ’s departure is imminent. Is the triumph over evil that the Passion effects merely a spectacle? No, this departure expresses Christ’s free decision to do the will of the Father and to be at the Father’s side, which is his true state of being. Such is God’s peace, whose way and meaning are opened for believers. Yes, there is a fulfillment and a happiness for us—it is this that the word “peace” evokes in the Bible. It is not found in the satisfaction of the passions. True peace is a divine gift, to which Christ gives us access in our communion with God.
8. John 14:28 The Father is greater than I: this does not refer to the trinitarian relation between the Father and the Son. It probably refers to the fact that Jesus was sent by the Father and that the messenger (in the Hebrew mentality) is inferior to the one who sends him.