Gospel of the Sunday (John 16:23–30)
Amen, amen I say to you: if you ask the Father any thing in my name, he will give it you. Hitherto you have not asked any thing in my name. Ask, and you shall receive; that your joy may be full. These things I have spoken to you in proverbs. The hour cometh when I will no more speak to you in proverbs, but will shew you plainly of the Father. In that day you shall ask in my name; and I say not to you, that I will ask the Father for you: For the Father himself loveth you, because you have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God. I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again I leave the world, and I go to the Father.
His disciples say to him: Behold, now thou speakest plainly, and speakest no proverb. Now we know that thou knowest all things, and thou needest not that any man should ask thee. By this we believe that thou camest forth from God.
John 16:23–30
Amen, amen I say to you: if you ask the Father any thing in my name, he will give it you. Hitherto you have not asked any thing in my name. Ask, and you shall receive; that your joy may be full.
Cornelius a Lapide
Cornelius a Lapide (1567–1637) was a Flemish Jesuit and one of the most renowned Catholic commentators of the Counter-Reformation. His extensive commentaries on Holy Scripture constantly draw upon the Fathers of the Church, scholastic theology and the traditional interpretation of the Church. For centuries they were used by priests, seminaries and preachers.
On the words Ask, and you shall receive he writes:
To ask in the Name of Christ means to ask through the merits of Christ. For by His death He has merited for us that we should obtain whatsoever we ask of God. For us this is grace; for Christ it is justice. His Name in Holy Scripture signifies His power, His virtue, His merits, His grace, His dignity and His authority. Therefore to ask in the Name of Christ means to rely upon His merits and trust in them, not in our own; so that God may not look upon our unworthiness and sins, but upon the face of His Anointed, and for the sake of His holiness and merits grant what we do not deserve.
Christ therefore points here not merely to God, but to God made Man, obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross. For He has merited for us that the Father should hear our prayers. Hence the Church concludes all her prayers with the words: through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Lapide further says:
To ask in the Name of Christ also means to ask those things which Christ desires should be given unto us, namely those things which pertain to the salvation of the soul. Therefore such prayer is powerful and is heard by God.
On the words that your joy may be full he writes:
You shall rejoice over My Resurrection; but that your joy may be made perfect, ask the Father in My Name for all the graces which you need, so that by obtaining them from the Father you may possess the fullness of joy and desire nothing further in this life.