Daily Gospel for Tuesday, 26 August 2014

Daily Gospel for Tuesday, 26 August 2014
"Peter replied, 'Master, to whom would we go? You have the words of real life, eternal life. We’ve already committed ourselves, confident that you are the Holy One of God.'" (John 6:68-69)
Tuesday of The Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time
Saints of the Day:
SAINT ZEPHYRINUS 
Pope and Martyr
(† 217)
Zephyrinus, a native of Rome, succeeded Victor in the pontificate, in the year 198, in which Severus raised the fifth most bloody persecution against the Church, which continued not for two years only, but until the death of that emperor in 211.
Under this furious storm this holy pastor was the support and comfort of the distressed flock of Christ, and he suffered by charity and compassion what every confessor underwent. The triumphs of the martyrs were indeed his joy, but his heart received many deep wounds from the fall of apostates and heretics. Neither did this latter affliction cease when peace was restored to the Church.
Our Saint had also the affliction to see the fall of Tertullian, which seems to have been owing partly to his pride. Eusebius tells us that this holy Pope exerted his zeal so strenuously against the blasphemies of the heretics that they treated him in the most contumelious manner; but it was his glory that they called him the principal defender of Christ's divinity.
St. Zephyrinus filled the pontifical chair nineteen years, dying in 217. He was buried in his own cemetery, on the 26th of August. He is, in some Martyrologies, styled a martyr, which title he might deserve by what he suffered in the persecution, though he perhaps did not die by the executioner.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
Tuesday of The Twenty-First Week in Ordinary Time
Second Letter to the Thessalonians 2: The Anarchist
1-3 Now, friends, read these next words carefully. Slow down and don’t go jumping to conclusions regarding the day when our Master, Jesus Christ, will come back and we assemble to welcome him. Don’t let anyone shake you up or get you excited over some breathless report or rumored letter from me that the day of the Master’s arrival has come and gone. Don’t fall for any line like that.
3-5 Before that day comes, a couple of things have to happen. First, the Apostasy. Second, the debut of the Anarchist, a real dog of Satan. He’ll defy and then take over every so-called god or altar. Having cleared away the opposition, he’ll then set himself up in God’s Temple as “God Almighty.” Don’t you remember me going over all this in detail when I was with you? Are your memories that short?
13-14 Meanwhile, we’ve got our hands full continually thanking God for you, our good friends—so loved by God! God picked you out as his from the very start. Think of it: included in God’s original plan of salvation by the bond of faith in the living truth. This is the life of the Spirit he invited you to through the Message we delivered, in which you get in on the glory of our Master, Jesus Christ.
15-17 So, friends, take a firm stand, feet on the ground and head high. Keep a tight grip on what you were taught, whether in personal conversation or by our letter. May Jesus himself and God our Father, who reached out in love and surprised you with gifts of unending help and confidence, put a fresh heart in you, invigorate your work, enliven your speech.
Psalms 96:10 Get out the message—God Rules!
He put the world on a firm foundation;
He treats everyone fair and square.
11 Let’s hear it from Sky,
With Earth joining in,
And a huge round of applause from Sea.
12 Let Wilderness turn cartwheels,
Animals, come dance,
Put every tree of the forest in the choir—
13 An extravaganza before God as he comes,
As he comes to set everything right on earth,
Set everything right, treat everyone fair.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 23:23-24 “You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You keep meticulous account books, tithing on every nickel and dime you get, but on the meat of God’s Law, things like fairness and compassion and commitment—the absolute basics!—you carelessly take it or leave it. Careful bookkeeping is commendable, but the basics are required. Do you have any idea how silly you look, writing a life story that’s wrong from start to finish, nitpicking over commas and semicolons?
25-26 “You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You burnish the surface of your cups and bowls so they sparkle in the sun, while the insides are maggoty with your greed and gluttony. Stupid Pharisee! Scour the insides, and then the gleaming surface will mean something.
Tuesday of The Twenty-First Week in Ordinary Time 
Commentary of the day:
Saint Raphael Arnaiz Baron (1911-1938), a Spanish Trappist monk 
To know how to wait, 25/01/1937 (trans. Mairin Mitchell) 
Christ calls all of us to conversion
We lack virtue not because it's difficult, but be-cause we don't wish for it. We lack patience because we don't want it. We lack moderation and chastity for the same reason. If we were to wish it we would become saints; it's much more difficult to be an engineer than to be a saint. If only we had faith!... 
Interior life, life of spirit, life of prayer. My God that is what must be hard! It isn't so. Remove the im-pediment from your heart and there you will find God. Everything is now done. Many times we go looking for what isn't there, and on the other hand pass by a treasure and don't see it. This happens to us with God, whom we seek… through a jungle of things which, the more complicated they are, the better they appear to us. And yet we carry God within the heart, and don't look for Him there. Retire within yourself, look at your nothingness, at the nothingness of the whole world, place 
yourself at the foot of a Cross, and if you are guileless you will see God… 
If God is not there in our souls sometimes, it's because we don't wish it. We have so many affairs on hand, distractions, predilections, vain desires, presumptions, so much of the world within us, that God withdraws Himself; but it is sufficient to love Him, for God fills the soul in such a way that one must be blind not to see it. Does a soul wish to live according to God? Let it cast out everything that is not Him, and then it is achieved. It is relatively easy. If we were to wish for it, and if we were to ask God with simplicity, we should make great advances in the spiritual life. If we were to wish it we would become saints, but we are so stupid that we don't want it, we would rather waste our time over foolish vanities. 
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