Daily Gospel for Thursday, 17 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Feast of the Church: Solemnity of St Patrick - proper readings
Solemnity of St Patrick - proper readings | |
Readings for the Solemnity
Book of Revelation 7:9 After this, I looked; and there before me was a huge crowd, too large for anyone to count, from every nation, tribe, people and language. They were standing in front of the throne and in front of the Lamb, dressed in white robes and holding palm branches in their hands; 10 and they shouted,
“Victory to our God,
who sits on the throne,
and to the Lamb!”
11 All the angels stood around the throne, the elders and the four living beings; they fell face down before the throne and worshipped God, saying,
12 “Amen!
“Praise and glory, wisdom and thanks,
honor and power and strength
belong to our God forever and ever!
“Amen!”
13 One of the elders asked me, “These people dressed in white robes — who are they, and where are they from?” 14 “Sir,” I answered, “you know.” Then he told me, “These are the people who have come out of the Great Persecution. They have washed their robes and made them white with the blood of the Lamb. 15 That is why they are before God’s throne.
“Day and night they serve him in his Temple;
and the One who sits on the throne
will put his Sh’khinah upon them.
16 “They will never again be hungry,
they will never again be thirsty,
the sun will not beat down on them,
nor will any burning heat.[Revelation 7:16 Isaiah 49:10]
17 “For the Lamb at the center of the throne
will shepherd them, will lead them
to springs of living water,[Revelation 7:17 Isaiah 49:10; Jeremiah 2:13; Ezekiel 34:23; Psalm 23:1–2]
and God will wipe every tear from their eyes.”[Revelation 7:17 Isaiah 25:8]
Psalm 115:12 Adonai has kept us in mind,
and he will bless.
He will bless the house of Isra’el;
he will bless the house of Aharon;
13 he will bless those who fear Adonai,
great and small alike.
14 May Adonai increase your numbers,
both yours and those of your children.
15 May you be blessed by Adonai,
the maker of heaven and earth.
16 Heaven belongs to Adonai,
but the earth he has given to humankind.
17 The dead can’t praise Adonai,
not those who sink down into silence.
18 But we will bless Adonai
from now on and forever.
Halleluyah!
Second letter of St Paul to Timothy 4:1 I solemnly charge you before God and the Messiah Yeshua, who will judge the living and the dead when he appears and establishes his Kingdom: 2 proclaim the Word! Be on hand with it whether the time seems right or not. Convict, censure and exhort with unfailing patience and with teaching.
3 For the time is coming when people will not have patience for sound teaching, but will cater to their passions and gather around themselves teachers who say whatever their ears itch to hear. 4 Yes, they will stop listening to the truth, but will turn aside to follow myths.
5 But you, remain steady in every situation, endure suffering, do the work that a proclaimer of the Good News should, and do everything your service to God requires.
6 For as for me, I am already being poured out on the altar; yes, the time for my departure has arrived. 7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. 8 All that awaits me now is the crown of righteousness which the Lord, “the Righteous Judge,” will award to me on that Day — and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for him to appear.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according St. Matthew 13:24 Yeshua put before them another parable. “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field; 25 but while people were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, then went away. 26 When the wheat sprouted and formed heads of grain, the weeds also appeared. 27 The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where have the weeds come from?’ 28 He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The servants asked him, ‘Then do you want us to go and pull them up?’ 29 But he said, ‘No, because if you pull up the weeds, you might uproot some of the wheat at the same time. 30 Let them both grow together until the harvest; and at harvest-time I will tell the reapers to collect the weeds first and tie them in bundles to be burned, but to gather the wheat into my barn.’”31 Yeshua put before them another parable. “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed which a man takes and sows in his field. 32 It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it grows up it is larger than any garden plant and becomes a tree, so that the birds flying about come and nest in its branches.” |
Saints of the day: St. Patrick, Bishop (c. 385-461)
SAINT PATRICK
Bishop, Apostle of Ireland
(c. 385-461)
If the virtue of children reflects an honor on their parents, much more justly is the name of St. Patrick rendered illustrious by the innumerable lights of sanctity with which the Church of Ireland shone during many ages, and by the colonies of Saints with which it peopled many foreign countries; for, under God, its inhabitants derived from their glorious apostle the streams of that eminent sanctity by which they were long conspicuous to the whole world. St. Patrick was born towards the close of the fourth century, in a village called Bonaven Taberniæ, which seems to be the town of Kilpatrick, on the mouth of the river Clyde, in Scotland, between Dumbarton and Glasgow. He calls himself both a Briton and a Roman, or of a mixed extraction, and says his father was of a good family named Calphurnius, and a denizen of a neighboring city of the Romans, who not long after abandoned Britain, in 409. Some writers call his mother Conchessa, and say she was niece to St. Martin of Tours.In his sixteenth year he was carried into captivity by certain barbarians, who took him into Ireland, where he was obliged to keep cattle on the mountains and in the forests, in hunger and nakedness, amidst snow, rain, and ice. Whilst he lived in this suffering condition, God had pity on his soul, and quickened him to a sense of his duty by the impulse of a strong interior grace. The young man had recourse to Him with his whole heart in fervent prayer and fasting; and from that time faith and the love of God acquired continually new strength in his tender soul. After six years spent in slavery under the same master, St. Patrick was admonished by God in a dream to return to his own country, and informed that a ship was then ready to sail thither. He went at once to the sea-coast, though at a great distance, and found the vessel; but could not obtain his passage, probably for want of money. The Saint returned towards his hut, praying as he went; but the sailors, though pagans, called him back and took him on board. After three days’ sail they made land, but wandered twenty-seven days through deserts, and were a long while distressed for want of provisions, finding nothing to eat. Patrick had often spoken to the company on the infinite power of God; they therefore asked him why he did not pray for relief. Animated by a strong faith, he assured them that if they would address themselves with their whole hearts to the true God He would hear and succor them. They did so, and on the same day met with a herd of swine. From that time provisions never failed them, till on the twenty-seventh day they came info a country that was cultivated and inhabited.
Some years afterwards he was again led captive, but recovered his liberty after two months. When he was at home with his parents, God manifested to him, by divers visions, that He destined him to the great work of the conversion of Ireland. The writers of his life say that after his second captivity he travelled into Gaul and Italy, and saw St. Martin, St. Germanus of Auxerre, and Pope Celestine, and that he received his mission and the apostolical benediction from this Pope, who died in 432. It is certain that he spent many years in preparing himself for his sacred calling. Great opposition was made against his episcopal consecration and mission, both by his own relatives and by the clergy. These made him great offers in order to detain him among them, and endeavored to affright him by exaggerating the dangers to which he exposed himself amidst the enemies of the Romans and Britons, who did not know God. All these temptations threw the Saint into great perplexities; but the Lord, Whose will he consulted by earnest prayer, supported him, and he persevered in his resolution. He forsook his family, sold his birthright and dignity, to serve strangers, and consecrated his soul to God, to carry His name to the ends of the earth. In this disposition he passed into Ireland, to preach the Gospel, where the worship of idols still generally reigned. He devoted himself entirely to the salvation of these barbarians. He travelled over the whole island, penetrating into the remotest corners, and_ such was the fruit of his preachings and sufferings that he baptized an infinite number of people. He ordained everywhere clergymen, induced women to live in holy widowhood and continence, consecrated virgins to Christ, and instituted monks. He took nothing from the many thousands whom he baptized, and often gave back the little presents which some laid on the altar, choosing rather to mortify the fervent than to scandalize the weak or the infidels. He gave freely of his own, however, both to pagans and Christians, distributed large alms to the poor in the provinces where he passed, made presents to the kings, judging that necessary for the progress of the Gospel, and maintained and educated many children, whom he trained up to serve at the altar. The happy success of his labors cost him many persecutions.
A certain prince named Corotick, a Christian in name only, disturbed the peace of his flock. This tyrant, having made a descent into Ireland, plundered the country where St. Patrick had been just conferring confirmation on a great number of neophytes, who were yet in their white garments after Baptism. Corotick massacred many, and carried away others, whom he sold to the infidel Picts or Scots. The next day the Saint sent the barbarian a letter entreating him to restore the Christian captives, and at least part of the booty he had taken, that the poor people might not perish for want, but was only answered by railleries. The Saint, therefore, wrote with his own hand a letter. In it he styles himself a sinner and an ignorant man; he declares, nevertheless, that he is established Bishop of Ireland, and pronounces Corotick and the other parricides and accomplices separated from him and from Jesus Christ, Whose place he holds, forbidding any to eat with them, or to receive their alms, till they should have satisfied God by the tears of sincere penance, and restored the servants of Jesus Christ to their liberty. This letter expresses his most tender love for his flock, and his grief for those who had been slain, yet mingled with joy because they reign with the prophets, apostles, and martyrs. Jocelin assures us that Corotick was overtaken by the divine vengeance.
St. Patrick held several councils to settle the discipline of the Church which he had planted. St. Bernard and the tradition of the country testify that St. Patrick fixed his metropolitan see at Armagh. He established some other bishops, as appears by his Council and other monuments. He not only converted the whole country by his preaching and wonderful miracles, but also cultivated this vineyard with so fruitful a benediction and increase from heaven as to render Ireland a most flourishing garden in the Church of God, and a country of Saints.
Many particulars are related of the labors of St. Patrick, which we pass over. 'in the first year of his mission he attempted to preach Christ in the general assembly of the kings and states of all Ireland, held yearly at Tara, the residence of the chief king, styled the monarch of the whole island, and the principal seat of the Druids, or priests, and their paganish rites. The son of Neill, the chief monarch, declared himself against the preacher; however, Patrick converted several, and, on his road to that place, the father of St. Benignus, his immediate successor in the see of Armagh. He afterwards converted and baptized the Icings of Dublin and Munster, and the seven sons of the king of Connaught, with the greatest part of their subjects, and before his death almost the whole island. He founded a monastery at Armagh; another called Domnach-Padraig, or Patrick's Church; also a third, named Sabhal-Padraig; and filled the country with churches and schools of piety and learning, the reputation of which, for the three succeeding centuries, drew many foreigners into Ireland. He died and was buried at Down in Ulster. His body was found there in a church of his name in 1185, and translated to another part of the same church.
Ireland is the nursery whence St. Patrick sent forth his missionaries and teachers. Glastonbury and Lindisfarne, Ripon and Malmesbury, bear testimony to the labors of Irish priests and bishops for the conversion of England. Iona is to this day the most venerated spot in Scotland. Columban, Fiacre, Gall, and many others evangelized the "rough places" of France and Switzerland. America and Australia, in modern times, owe their Christianity to the faith and zeal of the sons and daughters of St. Patrick.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Book of Genesis 17:
Psalms 105:
Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Ambrose (c.340-397), Bishop of Milan and Doctor of the Church
On Abraham, I, 67-68
“Abraham saw my day”
“God called to Abraham: Take your son whom you love, Isaac whom you have treasured; go to the heights and you shall offer him up as a holocaust.” (cf. Gen 22:2) Isaac prefigures Christ who will suffer. He comes on a donkey… When the Lord came to suffer his passion for us, he untied the foal of a donkey and sat on it… Abraham said to his servants: “We will come back to you.” He prophesied that which he did not know… Isaac carried the wood; Christ carried the gibbet of the cross. Abraham went with his son; the Father went with Christ. For he said: “You will leave me quite alone. Yet I can never be alone; the Father is with me.” (Jn 16:32) Isaac said to his father…: “Here is the wood, but where is the sheep for the holocaust?” He spoke prophetic words but he did not know it. For the Lord was preparing a lamb for the sacrifice. Abraham also prophesied when he answered: “God himself will provide the sheep for the holocaust, my son.”…
Daily Gospel for Wednesday, 16 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Heribert, Archbishop (c. 970-1021)
In the same year Otto III appointed him chancellor for Italy and four years later also for Germany, a position which he held until Otto's death on 23 January 1002. Heribert was made an archbishop of Cologne on 998. Then, he also served Emperor St. Henry.
Heribert built the monastery of Deutz, on the Rhine and performed miracles, including ending a drought. He is thus invoked for rains.
He died in Cologne on March 16, 1021 and was buried at Deutz.
He was already honoured as a saint during his lifetime and was canonized by Pope St. Gregory VII about 1074.
St. Abraham, Hermit & St. Mary (4th century)
As many sought him for advice and consolation, the Bishop of Edessa, in spite of his humility, ordained him priest. St. Abraham was sent, soon after his ordination, to an idolatrous city which had hitherto been deaf to every messenger. He was insulted, beaten, and three times banished, but he returned each time with fresh zeal. For three years he pleaded with God for those souls, and in the end prevailed. Every citizen came to him for Baptism.
After providing for their spiritual needs he went back to his cell more than ever convinced of the power of prayer. His brother died, leaving an only daughter, Mary, to the Saint's care. He placed her in a cell near his own, and devoted himself to training her in perfection. After twenty years of innocence she fell, and fled in despair to a distant city, where she drowned the voice of conscience in sin. The Saint and his friend St. Ephrem prayed earnestly for her during two years. Then he went disguised to seek the lost sheep, and had the joy of bringing her back to the desert a true penitent. She received the gift of miracles, and her countenance after death shone as the sun.
St. Abraham died five years before her, about 360. All Edessa came for his last blessing and to secure his relics.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
St. Finnian Lobhar, Abbot (+ c. 560)
Finnian's holiness and the miracles wrought through his prayers drew many of the faithful to seek his assistance. When the mother of a leprous boy came to Finnian in the hope of a cure, the priest prayed intently for him. He then experienced a revelation that he could only obtain the child's healing by consenting to take the leprosy upon himself. Finnian readily accepted this sacrifice, and the boy was cured, while he himself became leprous from head to foot. Then, he was called Lobhar, "the Leper".
Tradition credits him with founding a church at Innisfallen and a monastery there as well. After a stay in Clonmore, Finnian Lobhar became abbot of Swords Abbey near Dublin. He may have returned to Clonmore in his later years.
He fell asleep in the Lord about the year 560.
St. Agapito
Agapitus of Palestrina
Saint Agapitus (Italian: Agapito) is venerated as a martyr saint, who died on August 18, perhaps in 274,[2] a date that the latest editions of the Roman Martyrology say is uncertain.[3]
According to his legend, 15-year-old Agapitus, who may have been a member of the noble Anicia family of Palestrina,[2] was condemned to death, under the prefect Antiochus and the emperor Aurelian, for being a Christian.[2] He was thrown to the wild animals in the local arena at Palestrina. The beasts refused to harm him, and he was beheaded.
Veneration
Saint Agapitus is mentioned in the ancient martyrologies, including the Martyrologium Hieronymianum of Saint Jerome, the Fulda Martyrology. On account of the doubtful historicity of the legend of his martyrdom, some details of which were related in earlier editions of the Roman Martyrology,[2] editions from the end of the 20th century onward give only: "In Palestrina, Lazio, Saint Agapitus, martyr."[4] Around the 5th century, Pope Felix III built a basilica in his honour on the supposed site of his martyrdom.[2][5] His relics were kept in the basilica, and a cemetery grew around it.[2] At some uncertain date, his relics were transferred to the present cathedral of Palestrina.[2] Some of them were transferred to Besançon.[1]
Saint Agapitus is honoured in the Tridentine Calendar by a commemoration added to the Mass and canonical hours in the liturgy of the day within the Octave of the Assumption. Pope Pius XII abolished all octaves apart from those of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost, including that of the Assumption. Accordingly, in the General Roman Calendar of 1960 the celebration of Saint Agapitus appears as a commemoration in the ordinary weekday Mass.[6][7]
Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Book of Daniel 3:14 Nebuchadnezzar said to them, “Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, that you do not serve my gods and you do not worship the golden statue that I have set up? 15 Now if you are ready when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, drum, and entire musical ensemble to fall down and worship the statue that I have made, well and good.[Daniel 3:15 Aram lacks well and good] But if you do not worship, you shall immediately be thrown into a furnace of blazing fire, and who is the god that will deliver you out of my hands?”
16 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to present a defense to you in this matter. 17 If our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire and out of your hand, O king, let him deliver us.[17 Or If our God whom we serve is able to deliver us, he will deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire and out of your hand, O king.] 18 But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods and we will not worship the golden statue that you have set up.”
The Fiery Furnace
19 Then Nebuchadnezzar was so filled with rage against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego that his face was distorted. He ordered the furnace heated up seven times more than was customary, 20 and ordered some of the strongest guards in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego and to throw them into the furnace of blazing fire.
91 Hearing them sing, and amazed at seeing them alive, King Nebuchadnezzar rose up quickly. He said to his counselors, “Was it not three men that we threw bound into the fire?” They answered the king, “True, O king.” 92 He replied, “But I see four men unbound, walking in the middle of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the fourth has the appearance of a god.”[Daniel 3:92 Aram a son of the gods]
95 Nebuchadnezzar said, “Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants who trusted in him. They disobeyed the king’s command and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any god except their own God.
Book of Daniel 3:52 “Blessed are you, O Lord, God of our ancestors,
and to be praised and highly exalted forever;
And blessed is your glorious, holy name,
and to be highly praised and highly exalted forever.
53 Blessed are you in the temple of your holy glory,
and to be extolled and highly glorified forever.
54 Blessed are you who look into the depths from your throne on the cherubim,
and to be praised and highly exalted forever.
55 Blessed are you on the throne of your kingdom,
and to be extolled and highly exalted forever.
56 Blessed are you in the firmament of heaven,
and to be sung and glorified forever.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:31 So Yeshua said to the Judeans who had trusted him, “If you obey what I say, then you are really my talmidim, 32 you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” 33 They answered, “We are the seed of Avraham and have never been slaves to anyone; so what do you mean by saying, ‘You will be set free’?” 34 Yeshua answered them, “Yes, indeed! I tell you that everyone who practices sin is a slave of sin. 35 Now a slave does not remain with a family forever, but a son does remain with it forever. 36 So if the Son frees you, you will really be free! 37 I know you are the seed of Avraham. Yet you are out to kill me, because what I am saying makes no headway in you. 38 I say what my Father has shown me; you do what your father has told you!”
39 They answered him, “Our father is Avraham.” Yeshua replied, “If you are children of Avraham, then do the things Avraham did! 40 As it is, you are out to kill me, a man who has told you the truth which I heard from God. Avraham did nothing like that! 41 You are doing the things your father does.” “We’re not illegitimate children!” they said to him. “We have only one Father — God!” 42 Yeshua replied to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me; because I came out from God; and now I have arrived here. I did not come on my own; he sent me.
Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Pacian of Barcelona (?-c.390), Bishop
Homily concerning baptism, 6-7, PL 13, 1093-94 (trans. breviary 19th Saturday alt.)
"If the Son has set you free, then you are free indeed"
My brothers, we have been born anew by baptism… “If with this life only in view we have had hope in Christ, we are of all people the most to be pitied” (1Cor 15:19). Earthly life, as you yourselves see, for beasts, domestic animals, and the birds of the air is of the same span or longer than ours. What is special to humans is what Christ has given them through his Spirit—that is, life everlasting, but on condition, however, that we sin no more… “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is life everlasting in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 6:23).
Daily Gospel for Tuesday, 15 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Louise of Marcillac (1591-1660)
After Antony's death in 1625, she met St. Vincent de Paul, who became her spiritual adviser. She devoted the rest of her life to working with him. She helped direct his Ladies of Charity in their work of caring for the sick, the poor, and the neglected. In 1633 she set up a training center, of which she was Directress in her own home, for candidates seeking to help in her work. This was the beginning of the Sisters (or Daughters, as Vincent preferred) of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul (though it was not formally approved until 1655). She took her vows in 1634 and attracted great numbers of candidates. She wrote a rule for the community, and in 1642, Vincent allowed four of the members to take vows. Formal approval placed the community under Vincent and his Congregation of the Missions, with Louise as Superior.
She traveled all over France establishing her Sisters in hospitals, orphanages, and other institutions.
She expired in 1660. Since then the Congregation has spread all over the world.
She was canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1934, and was declared Patroness of Social Workers by Pope John XXIII in 1960.
3 Avram fell on his face, and God continued speaking with him: 4 “As for me, this is my covenant with you: you will be the father of many nations. 5 Your name will no longer be Avram [exalted father], but your name will be Avraham [father of many], because I have made you the father of many nations. 6 I will cause you to be very fruitful. I will make nations of you, kings will descend from you.
(vii) 7 “I am establishing my covenant between me and you, along with your descendants after you, generation after generation, as an everlasting covenant, to be God for you and for your descendants after you. 8 I will give you and your descendants after you the land in which you are now foreigners, all the land of Kena‘an, as a permanent possession; and I will be their God.”
9 God said to Avraham, “As for you, you are to keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you, generation after generation.
4 Seek Adonai and his strength;
always seek his presence.
5 Remember the wonders he has done,
his signs and his spoken rulings.
6 You descendants of Avraham his servant,
you offspring of Ya‘akov, his chosen ones,
7 he is Adonai our God!
His rulings are everywhere on earth.
8 He remembers his covenant forever,
the word he commanded to a thousand generations,
9 the covenant he made with Avraham,
the oath he swore to Yitz’chak,
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:
51 Yes, indeed! I tell you that whoever obeys my teaching will never see death.”
52 The Judeans said to him, “Now we know for sure that you have a demon! Avraham died, and so did the prophets; yet you say, ‘Whoever obeys my teaching will never taste death.’ 53 Avraham avinu died; you aren’t greater than he, are you? And the prophets also died. Who do you think you are?” 54 Yeshua answered, “If I praise myself, my praise counts for nothing. The One who is praising me is my Father, the very one about whom you keep saying, ‘He is our God.’ 55 Now you have not known him, but I do know him; indeed, if I were to say that I don’t know him, I would be a liar like you! But I do know him, and I obey his word. 56 Avraham, your father, was glad that he would see my day; then he saw it and was overjoyed.”
57 “Why, you’re not yet fifty years old,” the Judeans replied, “and you have seen Avraham?” 58 Yeshua said to them, “Yes, indeed! Before Avraham came into being, I AM!” 59 At this, they picked up stones to throw at him; but Yeshua was hidden and left the Temple grounds.
Commentary of the day:
Saint Ambrose (c.340-397), Bishop of Milan and Doctor of the Church
On Abraham, I, 67-68
“The angel said: ‘Abraham, Abraham… Do not lay your hand on the boy, do not do the least thing to him. I know now how devoted you are to God, since you did not withhold from me your own beloved son.’ (cf. Rom 8:32)… Abraham looked about and spied a ram hanging by its horns in the thicket.” Why a ram? He is the most valuable in the flock. Why hanging? To show you that it was no earthly victim... Our horn, our strength is Christ (Lk 1:69), who is superior to every human being, as we read: “Fairer in beauty are you than the sons of men.” (Ps 45:3) He alone was raised up from the earth and exalted, as he teaches us by his words: “I do not belong to this world; I belong to what is above.” (Jn 8:23) Abraham saw him in this sacrifice, he glimpsed his passion. That is why the Lord said of him: “Abraham saw my day and was glad.” He appeared to Abraham and revealed to him that his body would suffer the passion by means of which he redeemed the world. He even indicated what kind of passion he would undergo by showing the ram hanging. The bush is the gibbet of the cross. And raised up on this wood, the flock’s incomparable guide drew everything to himself so as to make himself known to everyone.
---------------------Daily Gospel for Wednesday, 16 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Heribert, Archbishop (c. 970-1021)
Saint Heribert
Archbishop
(c. 970-1021)
Heribert was born in Worms and he was the son of Hugo, count of Worms. He was educated in the school of Worms Cathedral and at the Benedictine Gorze Abbey in Lorraine, France. He returned to Worms Cathedral to be provost and was ordained a priest in 994.Archbishop
(c. 970-1021)
In the same year Otto III appointed him chancellor for Italy and four years later also for Germany, a position which he held until Otto's death on 23 January 1002. Heribert was made an archbishop of Cologne on 998. Then, he also served Emperor St. Henry.
Heribert built the monastery of Deutz, on the Rhine and performed miracles, including ending a drought. He is thus invoked for rains.
He died in Cologne on March 16, 1021 and was buried at Deutz.
He was already honoured as a saint during his lifetime and was canonized by Pope St. Gregory VII about 1074.
St. Abraham, Hermit & St. Mary (4th century)
SAINT ABRAHAM, Hermit
(+ c. 360)
and SAINT MARY
(+ c. 355)
Abraham was a rich nobleman of Edessa. At his parents' desire he married, but escaped to a cell near the city as soon as the feast was over. He walled up the cell-door, leaving only a small window through which he received his food. There for fifty years he sang God's praises and implored mercy for himself and for all men. The wealth which fell to him on his parents' death he gave to the poor.(+ c. 360)
and SAINT MARY
(+ c. 355)
As many sought him for advice and consolation, the Bishop of Edessa, in spite of his humility, ordained him priest. St. Abraham was sent, soon after his ordination, to an idolatrous city which had hitherto been deaf to every messenger. He was insulted, beaten, and three times banished, but he returned each time with fresh zeal. For three years he pleaded with God for those souls, and in the end prevailed. Every citizen came to him for Baptism.
After providing for their spiritual needs he went back to his cell more than ever convinced of the power of prayer. His brother died, leaving an only daughter, Mary, to the Saint's care. He placed her in a cell near his own, and devoted himself to training her in perfection. After twenty years of innocence she fell, and fled in despair to a distant city, where she drowned the voice of conscience in sin. The Saint and his friend St. Ephrem prayed earnestly for her during two years. Then he went disguised to seek the lost sheep, and had the joy of bringing her back to the desert a true penitent. She received the gift of miracles, and her countenance after death shone as the sun.
St. Abraham died five years before her, about 360. All Edessa came for his last blessing and to secure his relics.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
St. Finnian Lobhar, Abbot (+ c. 560)
Saint Finnian Lobhar
Abbot
(+ c. 560)
Finnian was born in Bregia, Leinster, Ireland. He was ordained to the priesthood by the bishop Fathlad.Abbot
(+ c. 560)
Finnian's holiness and the miracles wrought through his prayers drew many of the faithful to seek his assistance. When the mother of a leprous boy came to Finnian in the hope of a cure, the priest prayed intently for him. He then experienced a revelation that he could only obtain the child's healing by consenting to take the leprosy upon himself. Finnian readily accepted this sacrifice, and the boy was cured, while he himself became leprous from head to foot. Then, he was called Lobhar, "the Leper".
Tradition credits him with founding a church at Innisfallen and a monastery there as well. After a stay in Clonmore, Finnian Lobhar became abbot of Swords Abbey near Dublin. He may have returned to Clonmore in his later years.
He fell asleep in the Lord about the year 560.
St. Agapito
Agapitus of Palestrina
Saint Agapitus (Italian: Agapito) is venerated as a martyr saint, who died on August 18, perhaps in 274,[2] a date that the latest editions of the Roman Martyrology say is uncertain.[3]
According to his legend, 15-year-old Agapitus, who may have been a member of the noble Anicia family of Palestrina,[2] was condemned to death, under the prefect Antiochus and the emperor Aurelian, for being a Christian.[2] He was thrown to the wild animals in the local arena at Palestrina. The beasts refused to harm him, and he was beheaded.
Veneration
Saint Agapitus is mentioned in the ancient martyrologies, including the Martyrologium Hieronymianum of Saint Jerome, the Fulda Martyrology. On account of the doubtful historicity of the legend of his martyrdom, some details of which were related in earlier editions of the Roman Martyrology,[2] editions from the end of the 20th century onward give only: "In Palestrina, Lazio, Saint Agapitus, martyr."[4] Around the 5th century, Pope Felix III built a basilica in his honour on the supposed site of his martyrdom.[2][5] His relics were kept in the basilica, and a cemetery grew around it.[2] At some uncertain date, his relics were transferred to the present cathedral of Palestrina.[2] Some of them were transferred to Besançon.[1]
Saint Agapitus is honoured in the Tridentine Calendar by a commemoration added to the Mass and canonical hours in the liturgy of the day within the Octave of the Assumption. Pope Pius XII abolished all octaves apart from those of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost, including that of the Assumption. Accordingly, in the General Roman Calendar of 1960 the celebration of Saint Agapitus appears as a commemoration in the ordinary weekday Mass.[6][7]
Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Book of Daniel 3:14 Nebuchadnezzar said to them, “Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, that you do not serve my gods and you do not worship the golden statue that I have set up? 15 Now if you are ready when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, drum, and entire musical ensemble to fall down and worship the statue that I have made, well and good.[Daniel 3:15 Aram lacks well and good] But if you do not worship, you shall immediately be thrown into a furnace of blazing fire, and who is the god that will deliver you out of my hands?”
16 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to present a defense to you in this matter. 17 If our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire and out of your hand, O king, let him deliver us.[17 Or If our God whom we serve is able to deliver us, he will deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire and out of your hand, O king.] 18 But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods and we will not worship the golden statue that you have set up.”
The Fiery Furnace
19 Then Nebuchadnezzar was so filled with rage against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego that his face was distorted. He ordered the furnace heated up seven times more than was customary, 20 and ordered some of the strongest guards in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego and to throw them into the furnace of blazing fire.
91 Hearing them sing, and amazed at seeing them alive, King Nebuchadnezzar rose up quickly. He said to his counselors, “Was it not three men that we threw bound into the fire?” They answered the king, “True, O king.” 92 He replied, “But I see four men unbound, walking in the middle of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the fourth has the appearance of a god.”[Daniel 3:92 Aram a son of the gods]
95 Nebuchadnezzar said, “Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants who trusted in him. They disobeyed the king’s command and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any god except their own God.
Book of Daniel 3:52 “Blessed are you, O Lord, God of our ancestors,
and to be praised and highly exalted forever;
And blessed is your glorious, holy name,
and to be highly praised and highly exalted forever.
53 Blessed are you in the temple of your holy glory,
and to be extolled and highly glorified forever.
54 Blessed are you who look into the depths from your throne on the cherubim,
and to be praised and highly exalted forever.
55 Blessed are you on the throne of your kingdom,
and to be extolled and highly exalted forever.
56 Blessed are you in the firmament of heaven,
and to be sung and glorified forever.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:31 So Yeshua said to the Judeans who had trusted him, “If you obey what I say, then you are really my talmidim, 32 you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” 33 They answered, “We are the seed of Avraham and have never been slaves to anyone; so what do you mean by saying, ‘You will be set free’?” 34 Yeshua answered them, “Yes, indeed! I tell you that everyone who practices sin is a slave of sin. 35 Now a slave does not remain with a family forever, but a son does remain with it forever. 36 So if the Son frees you, you will really be free! 37 I know you are the seed of Avraham. Yet you are out to kill me, because what I am saying makes no headway in you. 38 I say what my Father has shown me; you do what your father has told you!”
39 They answered him, “Our father is Avraham.” Yeshua replied, “If you are children of Avraham, then do the things Avraham did! 40 As it is, you are out to kill me, a man who has told you the truth which I heard from God. Avraham did nothing like that! 41 You are doing the things your father does.” “We’re not illegitimate children!” they said to him. “We have only one Father — God!” 42 Yeshua replied to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me; because I came out from God; and now I have arrived here. I did not come on my own; he sent me.
Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Pacian of Barcelona (?-c.390), Bishop
Homily concerning baptism, 6-7, PL 13, 1093-94 (trans. breviary 19th Saturday alt.)
My little ones, above all hold fast to this: formerly the nations were delivered up to the powers of darkness; now we have been set free thanks to the victory of Jesus Christ our Lord. It is he who has redeemed us… He released the captives and broke our bonds, as David had said: “The Lord sets captives free; the Lord gives sight to the blind” (Ps 145[146]:7). And in another place he says: “You have loosened my bonds. I will offer to you the thank-offering of praise” (Ps 115[116]:16). Yes, freed from our chains, when we rally round the standard of the Lord through the sacrament of baptism, we are delivered by the blood and the name of Christ…
Therefore, my dearly beloved brethren, we are washed but once; we are only liberated once; we are only received once into the immortal kingdom. It is only once that “Happy are those whose fault is taken away, whose sin is covered” (Ps 31[32]]:1) Hold firm, then, to the gift received, safeguard your joy, and do not commit further sin. Preserve yourselves pure and innocent for the day of the Lord.
---------------------Therefore, my dearly beloved brethren, we are washed but once; we are only liberated once; we are only received once into the immortal kingdom. It is only once that “Happy are those whose fault is taken away, whose sin is covered” (Ps 31[32]]:1) Hold firm, then, to the gift received, safeguard your joy, and do not commit further sin. Preserve yourselves pure and innocent for the day of the Lord.
Daily Gospel for Tuesday, 15 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Louise of Marcillac (1591-1660)
Saint Louise of Marillac
(1591-1660)
Louise de Marillac was born in France, on August 12th, 1591. She was educated by the Dominican nuns at Poissy. She desired to become a nun but on the advice of her confessor, she married Antony LeGras, an official in the Queen's service, in 1613.(1591-1660)
After Antony's death in 1625, she met St. Vincent de Paul, who became her spiritual adviser. She devoted the rest of her life to working with him. She helped direct his Ladies of Charity in their work of caring for the sick, the poor, and the neglected. In 1633 she set up a training center, of which she was Directress in her own home, for candidates seeking to help in her work. This was the beginning of the Sisters (or Daughters, as Vincent preferred) of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul (though it was not formally approved until 1655). She took her vows in 1634 and attracted great numbers of candidates. She wrote a rule for the community, and in 1642, Vincent allowed four of the members to take vows. Formal approval placed the community under Vincent and his Congregation of the Missions, with Louise as Superior.
She traveled all over France establishing her Sisters in hospitals, orphanages, and other institutions.
She expired in 1660. Since then the Congregation has spread all over the world.
She was canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1934, and was declared Patroness of Social Workers by Pope John XXIII in 1960.
St. Zachary, Pope (+ 752)
The Lombards were moved to tears at the devotion with which they heard him perform the divine service. The zeal and prudence of this holy Pope appeared in many wholesome regulations which he had made to reform or settle the discipline and peace of several churches.
St. Boniface, the Apostle of Germany, wrote to him against a certain priest named Virgilius, which he labored to sow the seeds of discord between him and Odilo, Duke of Bavaria, and taught, besides, many errors. Zachary ordered that Virgilius should be sent to Rome, that his doctrine might be examined. It seems that he cleared himself; for we find this same Virgilius soon after made Bishop of Salzburg.
Certain Venetian merchants having bought at Rome many slaves to sell to the Moors in Africa, St. Zachary forbade such an iniquitous traffic, and, paying the merchants their price, gave the slaves their liberty.
He adorned Rome with sacred buildings, and with great foundations in favor of the poor and pilgrims, and gave every year a considerable sum to furnish oil for the lamps in St. Peter's Church.
He died in 752, in the month of March.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Book of Numbers 21:4 Then they traveled from Mount Hor on the road toward the Sea of Suf in order to go around the land of Edom; but the people’s tempers grew short because of the detour. 5 The people spoke against God and against Moshe: “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt? To die in the desert? There’s no real food, there’s no water, and we’re sick of this miserable stuff we’re eating!”
(LY: vi) 6 In response, Adonai sent poisonous snakes among the people; they bit the people, and many of Isra’el’s people died. 7 The people came to Moshe and said, “We sinned by speaking against Adonai and against you. Pray to Adonai that he rid us of these snakes.” Moshe prayed for the people, 8 and Adonai answered Moshe: “Make a poisonous snake and put it on a pole. When anyone who has been bitten sees it, he will live.” 9 Moshe made a bronze snake and put it on the pole; if a snake had bitten someone, then, when he looked toward the bronze snake, he stayed alive.
Psalms 102:2 (1) Adonai, hear my prayer!
Let my cry for help reach you!
3 (2) Don’t hide your face from me
when I am in such distress!
Turn your ear toward me;
when I call, be quick to reply!
16 (15) The nations will fear the name of Adonai
and all the kings on earth your glory,
17 (16) when Adonai has rebuilt Tziyon,
and shows himself in his glory,
18 (17) when he has heeded the plea of the poor
and not despised their prayer.
19 (18) May this be put on record for a future generation;
may a people yet to be created praise Adonai.
20 (19) For he has looked down from the height of his sanctuary;
from heaven Adonai surveys the earth
21 (20) to listen to the sighing of the prisoner,
to set free those who are sentenced to death,
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:21 Again he told them, “I am going away, and you will look for me, but you will die in your sin — where I am going, you cannot come.” 22 The Judeans said, “Is he going to commit suicide? Is that what he means when he says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?” 23 Yeshua said to them, “You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. 24 This is why I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not trust that I AM [who I say I am], you will die in your sins.”
25 At this, they said to him, “You? Who are you?” Yeshua answered, “Just what I’ve been telling you from the start. 26 There are many things I could say about you, and many judgments I could make. However, the One who sent me is true; so I say in the world only what I have heard from him.” 27 They did not understand that he was talking to them about the Father. 28 So Yeshua said, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I AM [who I say I am], and that of myself I do nothing, but say only what the Father has taught me. 29 Also, the One who sent me is still with me; he did not leave me to myself, because I always do what pleases him.”
30 Many people who heard him say these things trusted in him.
Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Leo the Great (?-c.461), Pope and Doctor of the Church
15th Sermon on the Passion, 3-4
“When you lift up the Son of Man, you will come to realize that I AM”
The person who truly venerates the Lord’s passion must look so hard at Jesus crucified with the eyes of his heart that he recognizes his own flesh in that of Jesus… No sick person can imagine himself refusing the triumph of the cross and there is no one who does not find help in Christ’s prayer. If this prayer benefited many of his torturers, how much more will it help those who turn to him!
Daily Gospel for Monday, 14 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Maud (or Matilde), Queen (c. 875-968)
Whilst by his arms he checked the insolence of the Hungarians and Danes, and enlarged his dominions by adding to them Bavaria, Maud gained domestic victories over her spiritual enemies more worthy of a Christian and far greater in the eyes of Heaven. She nourished the precious seeds of devotion and humility in her heart by assiduous prayer and meditation. It was her delight to visit, comfort, and exhort the sick and the afflicted; to serve and instruct the poor, and to afford her charitable succor to prisoners. Her husband, edified by her example, concurred with her in every pious undertaking which she projected.
After twenty-three years' marriage God was pleased to call the king to himself, in 936. Maud, during his sickness, went to the church to pour forth her soul in prayer for him at the foot of the altar. As soon as she understood, by the tears and cries of the people, that he had expired, she called for a priest that was fasting to offer the holy sacrifice for his soul.
She had three sons: Otho, afterwards emperor; Henry, Duke of Bavaria; and St. Brunn, Archbishop of Cologne. Otho was crowned king of Germany in 937, and emperor at Rome in 962, after his victories over the Bohemians and Lombards.
The two oldest sons conspired to strip Maud of her dowry, on the unjust pretence that she had squandered the revenues of the state on the poor. The unnatural princes at length repented of their injustice, and restored to her all that had been taken from her.
She then became more liberal in her alms than ever, and founded many churches, with five monasteries.
In her last sickness she made her confession to her grandson William, the Archbishop of Mentz, who yet died twelve days before her, on his road home. She again made a public confession before the priests and monks of the place, received a second time the last sacraments, and, lying on a sack-cloth, with ashes on her head, died on the 14th of March in 968.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
St. Leobinus
St. Leobinus
Feastday: September 15
Death: 556
Bishop of Chartres, France. He was a hermit priest and abbot before his consecration. When raiders attacked his monastery near Lyons, Leobinus was tortured and left for dead. He is sometimes called Lubin.
Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Book of Daniel 13: Susanna’s Beauty Attracts Two Elders
1 There was a man living in Babylon whose name was Joakim. 2 He married the daughter of Hilkiah, named Susanna, a very beautiful woman and one who feared the Lord. 3 Her parents were righteous, and had trained their daughter according to the law of Moses. 4 Joakim was very rich, and had a fine garden adjoining his house; the Jews used to come to him because he was the most honoured of them all.
5 That year two elders from the people were appointed as judges. Concerning them the Lord had said: ‘Wickedness came forth from Babylon, from elders who were judges, who were supposed to govern the people.’ 6 These men were frequently at Joakim’s house, and all who had a case to be tried came to them there.
7 When the people left at noon, Susanna would go into her husband’s garden to walk. 8 Every day the two elders used to see her, going in and walking about, and they began to lust for her. 9 They suppressed their consciences and turned away their eyes from looking to Heaven or remembering their duty to administer justice.
The Elders Attempt to Seduce Susanna
15 Once, while they were watching for an opportune day, she went in as before with only two maids, and wished to bathe in the garden, for it was a hot day. 16 No one was there except the two elders, who had hidden themselves and were watching her. 17 She said to her maids, ‘Bring me olive oil and ointments, and shut the garden doors so that I can bathe.’
19 When the maids had gone out, the two elders got up and ran to her. 20 They said, ‘Look, the garden doors are shut, and no one can see us. We are burning with desire for you; so give your consent, and lie with us. 21 If you refuse, we will testify against you that a young man was with you, and this was why you sent your maids away.’
22 Susanna groaned and said, ‘I am completely trapped. For if I do this, it will mean death for me; if I do not, I cannot escape your hands. 23 I choose not to do it; I will fall into your hands, rather than sin in the sight of the Lord.’
24 Then Susanna cried out with a loud voice, and the two elders shouted against her. 25 And one of them ran and opened the garden doors. 26 When the people in the house heard the shouting in the garden, they rushed in at the side door to see what had happened to her. 27 And when the elders told their story, the servants felt very much ashamed, for nothing like this had ever been said about Susanna.
The Elders Testify against Susanna
28 The next day, when the people gathered at the house of her husband Joakim, the two elders came, full of their wicked plot to have Susanna put to death. In the presence of the people they said, 29 ‘Send for Susanna daughter of Hilkiah, the wife of Joakim.’ 30 So they sent for her. And she came with her parents, her children, and all her relatives.
33 Those who were with her and all who saw her were weeping.
34 Then the two elders stood up before the people and laid their hands on her head. 35 Through her tears she looked up towards Heaven, for her heart trusted in the Lord. 36 The elders said, ‘While we were walking in the garden alone, this woman came in with two maids, shut the garden doors, and dismissed the maids. 37 Then a young man, who was hiding there, came to her and lay with her. 38 We were in a corner of the garden, and when we saw this wickedness we ran to them. 39 Although we saw them embracing, we could not hold the man, because he was stronger than we are, and he opened the doors and got away. 40 We did, however, seize this woman and asked who the young man was, 41 but she would not tell us. These things we testify.’
Because they were elders of the people and judges, the assembly believed them and condemned her to death.
42 Then Susanna cried out with a loud voice, and said, ‘O eternal God, you know what is secret and are aware of all things before they come to be; 43 you know that these men have given false evidence against me. And now I am to die, though I have done none of the wicked things that they have charged against me!’
44 The Lord heard her cry. 45 Just as she was being led off to execution, God stirred up the holy spirit of a young lad named Daniel, 46 and he shouted with a loud voice, ‘I want no part in shedding this woman’s blood!’
Daniel Rescues Susanna
47 All the people turned to him and asked, ‘What is this you are saying?’ 48 Taking his stand among them he said, ‘Are you such fools, O Israelites, as to condemn a daughter of Israel without examination and without learning the facts? 49 Return to court, for these men have given false evidence against her.’
50 So all the people hurried back. And the rest of the[Daniel 13:50 Gk lacks rest of the] elders said to him, ‘Come, sit among us and inform us, for God has given you the standing of an elder.’ 51 Daniel said to them, ‘Separate them far from each other, and I will examine them.’
52 When they were separated from each other, he summoned one of them and said to him, ‘You old relic of wicked days, your sins have now come home, which you have committed in the past, 53 pronouncing unjust judgements, condemning the innocent and acquitting the guilty, though the Lord said, “You shall not put an innocent and righteous person to death.” 54 Now then, if you really saw this woman, tell me this: Under what tree did you see them being intimate with each other?’ He answered, ‘Under a mastic tree.’[Daniel 13:54 The Greek words for mastic tree and cut are similar, thus forming an ironic wordplay] 55 And Daniel said, ‘Very well! This lie has cost you your head, for the angel of God has received the sentence from God and will immediately cut[Daniel 13:55 The Greek words for mastic tree and cut are similar, thus forming an ironic wordplay] you in two.’
56 Then, putting him to one side, he ordered them to bring the other. And he said to him, ‘You offspring of Canaan and not of Judah, beauty has beguiled you and lust has perverted your heart. 57 This is how you have been treating the daughters of Israel, and they were intimate with you through fear; but a daughter of Judah would not tolerate your wickedness. 58 Now then, tell me: Under what tree did you catch them being intimate with each other?’ He answered, ‘Under an evergreen oak.’[Daniel 13:58 The Greek words for evergreen oak and split are similar, thus forming an ironic wordplay] 59 Daniel said to him, ‘Very well! This lie has cost you also your head, for the angel of God is waiting with his sword to split[Daniel 13:59 The Greek words for evergreen oak and split are similar, thus forming an ironic wordplay] you in two, so as to destroy you both.’
60 Then the whole assembly raised a great shout and blessed God, who saves those who hope in him. 61 And they took action against the two elders, because out of their own mouths Daniel had convicted them of bearing false witness; they did to them as they had wickedly planned to do to their neighbour. 62 Acting in accordance with the law of Moses, they put them to death. Thus innocent blood was spared that day.
Psalms 23:(0) A psalm of David:
(1) Adonai is my shepherd; I lack nothing.
2 He has me lie down in grassy pastures,
he leads me by quiet water,
3 he restores my inner person.
He guides me in right paths
for the sake of his own name.
4 Even if I pass through death-dark ravines,
I will fear no disaster; for you are with me;
your rod and staff reassure me.
5 You prepare a table for me,
even as my enemies watch;
you anoint my head with oil
from an overflowing cup.
6 Goodness and grace will pursue me
every day of my life;
and I will live in the house of Adonai
for years and years to come.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:12 Yeshua spoke to them again: “I am the light of the world; whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light which gives life.” 13 So the P’rushim said to him, “Now you’re testifying on your own behalf; your testimony is not valid.” 14 Yeshua answered them, “Even if I do testify on my own behalf, my testimony is indeed valid; because I know where I came from and where I’m going; but you do not know where I came from or where I’m going. 15 You judge by merely human standards. As for me, I pass judgment on no one; 16 but if I were indeed to pass judgment, my judgment would be valid; because it is not I alone who judge, but I and the One who sent me. 17 And even in your Torah it is written that the testimony of two people is valid. 18 I myself testify on my own behalf, and so does the Father who sent me.”
19 They said to him, “Where is this ‘father’ of yours?” Yeshua answered, “You know neither me nor my Father; if you knew me, you would know my Father too.” 20 He said these things when he was teaching in the Temple treasury room; yet no one arrested him, because his time had not yet come.
Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Clement of Alexandria (150- c.215), theologian
Stromata
"I am the light of the world"
When you yourself lead me to the light, Lord Jesus Christ, and it is thanks to you I find God and receive the Father, I become co-heir with you (Rm 8:17) since you were not ashamed to have me as your brother (Heb 2:11). So let us remove forgetfulness of the truth, let us take away ignorance and, when we have dispersed the darkness surrounding us like mist over the eyes, let us behold the true God, crying: “Hail, thou true light!”
Daily Gospel for Sunday, 13 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Fifth Sunday of Lent - Year C
Saints of the day: St. Euphrasia, Virgin and Martyr (+ 303)
The barbarian agreed to let her go into the garden, where she broke off a sprig. She showed it to him, and he asked, “How will I know if you are telling the truth?”
Euphrasia held the sprout against her neck and said: “Strike my neck with a two-handed sword as hard as you can. You will not harm me at all.” The barbarian fetched a sword and brought it down with all his might, decapitating her. Too late, the imbecile realized he had been outwitted, and gnashed his teeth furiously. The wise virgin, who preferred to die rather than be sullied, departed to her Bridegroom Christ, providing us a wondrous example of chastity.[The Great Collection of the Lives of the Saints by St. Dimitry of Rostov]
Fifth Sunday of Lent - Year C
Book of Isaiah 43:16 Here is what Adonai says,
who made a way in the sea,
a path through the raging waves;
17 who led out chariot and horse,
the army in its strength —
they lay down, never to rise again,
snuffed out and quenched like a wick:
18 “Stop dwelling on past events
and brooding over times gone by;
19 I am doing something new;
it’s springing up — can’t you see it?
I am making a road in the desert,
rivers in the wasteland.
20 The wild animals will honor me,
the jackals and the ostriches;
because I put water in the desert,
rivers in the wasteland,
for my chosen people to drink,
21 the people I formed for myself,
so that they would proclaim my praise.
Psalms 126:(0) A song of ascents:
(1) When Adonai restored Tziyon’s fortunes,
we thought we were dreaming.
2 Our mouths were full of laughter,
and our tongues shouted for joy.
Among the nations it was said,
“Adonai has done great things for them!”
3 Adonai did do great things with us;
and we are overjoyed.
4 Return our people from exile, Adonai,
as streams fill vadis in the Negev.
5 Those who sow in tears
will reap with cries of joy.
6 He who goes out weeping
as he carries his sack of seed
will come home with cries of joy
as he carries his sheaves of grain.
Letter to the Philippians 3:8 Not only that, but I consider everything a disadvantage in comparison with the supreme value of knowing the Messiah Yeshua as my Lord. It was because of him that I gave up everything and regard it all as garbage, in order to gain the Messiah 9 and be found in union with him, not having any righteousness of my own based on legalism, but having that righteousness which comes through the Messiah’s faithfulness, the righteousness from God based on trust. 10 Yes, I gave it all up in order to know him, that is, to know the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings as I am being conformed to his death, 11 so that somehow I might arrive at being resurrected from the dead. 12 It is not that I have already obtained it or already reached the goal — no, I keep pursuing it in the hope of taking hold of that for which the Messiah Yeshua took hold of me. 13 Brothers, I, for my part, do not think of myself as having yet gotten hold of it; but one thing I do: forgetting what is behind me and straining forward toward what lies ahead, 14 I keep pursuing the goal in order to win the prize offered by God’s upward calling in the Messiah Yeshua.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:1 But Yeshua went to the Mount of Olives. 2 At daybreak, he appeared again in the Temple Court, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. 3 The Torah-teachers and the P’rushim brought in a woman who had been caught committing adultery and made her stand in the center of the group. 4 Then they said to him, “Rabbi, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. 5 Now in our Torah, Moshe commanded that such a woman be stoned to death. What do you say about it?” 6 They said this to trap him, so that they might have ground for bringing charges against him; but Yeshua bent down and began writing in the dust with his finger. 7 When they kept questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “The one of you who is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Then he bent down and wrote in the dust again. 9 On hearing this, they began to leave, one by one, the older ones first, until he was left alone, with the woman still there. 10 Standing up, Yeshua said to her, “Where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 She said, “No one, sir.” Yeshua said, “Neither do I condemn you. Now go, and don’t sin any more.”Fifth Sunday of Lent - Year C
Commentary of the day:
Symeon the New Theologian (c.949-1022), Greek monk, saint of the Orthodox churches
Hymn 45; SC 196
“Neither do I condemn you... I am the light of the world” (Jn 8,11-12)
O my God, my Creator, who love to forgive,
Daily Gospel for Saturday, 12 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Maximilian
St. Maximilian
Feastday: March 12
Death: 296
St. Maximilian of Theveste, Martyr (Also known as Maximilian of Tebessa) Died 296. In the African churches of the late Roman Empire, it was not uncommon for liturgies to include readings from the acta and passios of martyrs. The one often included for Saint Maximilian is the authentic record of his trial in Numidia (now Algeria) and execution for refusing to be conscripted into the Roman army.
Maximilian resisted because he didn't want to be tainted by the idolatry of wearing the emperor's image around his neck. Maximilian also refused because he was a pacifist, perhaps one of the earliest conscientious objectors. There has long been a debate within the Church concerning the radical pacifism advocated by Our Lord and the less stringent, but more practical, position allowing self-defense and just war.
Prior to the Edict of Milan and the toleration of Christianity, Christians believed that bearing arms contradicted the Gospel. Tertullian, for example, prohibited military service. Saint Hippolytus said that it was impossible to be a soldier and a catechumen-as contradictory as being a prostitute and catechumen (at least part of his reasoning dealt with the association of soldiers with pagan gods and sacrifices).
The Church moderated its position. The Council of Arles (314) said that soldiers who left the army during peacetime would be excommunicated. About 295, the proconsul Dion went to Theveste to recruit soldiers for the third Augustan legion stationed there. At this time the Roman army was mainly volunteers, but sons of veterans were obliged to serve. Maximilian, the 21-year-old son of the Roman army veteran Fabius Victor, was presented to the recruiting agent. The advocatus Pompeianus, seeing that Maximilian would make an excellent recruit, asked for him to be measured: he was 5'10" tall.
The ensuing dialogue between the proconsul Dion and Maximilian has been preserved to this day. When asked his name, Maximilian replied, "Why do you wish to know my name? I cannot serve because I am a Christian." Nevertheless, orders were given for him to be given the military seal. He answered, "I cannot do it: I cannot be a soldier." When told he must serve or die, he said, "You may cut off my head, but I will not serve. My army is the army of God, and I cannot fight for this world," it was pointed out to him that there were Christians serving as bodyguards for the emperors Diocletian and Maximian.
To this he replied, "That is their business. I am a Christian, too, and I cannot serve." Dion then told Victor to correct his son. Victor, who had become a Christian like his son, said, "He knows what he believes, and he won't change his mind." Dion insisted, "Agree to serve and receive the military seal." "I already have the seal of Christ, my God . . . I will not accept the seal of this world; if you give it to me, I will break it for it is worthless. I cannot wear a piece of lead around my neck after I have received the saving sign of Jesus Christ, my Lord, the son of the living God. You do not know Him; yet He suffered for our salvation: God delivered Him up for our sins. He is the one whom all Christians serve; we follow Him as the Prince of Life and Author of Salvation."
Again Dion stated that there are other Christians who are soldiers. Maximilian answered, "They know what is best for them. I am a Christian and I cannot do what is wrong." Dion continued, "What wrong do those commit who serve in the army?" Maximilian answered, "You know very well what they do." Threatened with death if he remained obstinate, Maximilian answered, "This is the greatest thing that I desire. Dispatch me quickly. Therein lies my glory." Then he added, "I shall not die. When I leave this earth, I shall live with Christ, my Lord."
He was sentenced accordingly: "Whereas Maximilian has disloyally refused the military oath, he is sentenced to die by the sword." Just before his execution, Maximilian encouraged his companions to persevere and asked his father to give his new clothes to the executioner. We are told that Fabius Victor "went home happily, thanking God for having allowed him to send such a gift to heaven."
The place of Maximilian's death is given as Theveste (Tebessa) in Numidia, but it may have been nearer Carthage, where his body was taken for burial by a devout woman named Pompeiana. It was buried close to the relics of Saint Cyprian.
St. Luigi Orione, Priest (1872-1940)
On 16 October 1889, he joined the diocesan seminary of Tortona. As a young seminarian he devoted himself to the care of others by becoming a member of both the San Marziano Society for Mutual Help and the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul. On 3 July 1892 he opened the first Oratory in Tortona to provide for the Christian training of boys. The following year, on 15 October 1893, Luigi Orione, then a seminarian of twenty-one, started a boarding school for poor boys, in the Saint Bernardine estate.
On 13 April 1895, Luigi Orione was ordained priest and, on that occasion, the Bishop gave the clerical habit to six pupils of the boarding school. Within a brief span of time, Don Orione opened new houses at Mornico Losana (Pavia), Noto - in Sicily, Sanremo and Rome.
Around the young Founder there grew up seminarians and priests who made up the first core group of the Little Work of Divine Providence. In 1899, he founded the branch of the Hermits of Divine Providence. The Bishop of Tortona, Mgr Igino Bandi, by a Decree of 21 March 1903, issued the canonical approval of the Sons of Divine Providence (priests, lay brothers and hermits) - the male congregation of the Little Work of Divine Providence. It aims to "co-operate to bring the little ones, the poor and the people to the Church and to the Pope, by means of the works of charity", and professes a fourth vow of special "faithfulness to the Pope". In the first Constitutions of 1904, among the aims of the new Congregation, there appears that of working to "achieve the union of the separated Churches".
Inspired by a profound love for the Church and for the salvation of Souls, he was actively interested in the new problems of his time, such as the freedom and unity of the Church, the Roman question, modernism, socialism and the Christian evangelisation of industrial workers.
He rushed to assist the victims of the earthquakes of Reggio and Messina (1908) and the Marsica region (1915). By appointment of Saint Pius X, he was made Vicar General of the diocese of Messina for three years.
On 29 June 1915, twenty years after the foundation of the Sons of Divine Providence, he added to the "single tree of many branches" the Congregation of the Little Missionary Sisters of Charity who are inspired by the same founding charism. Alongside them, he placed the Blind Sisters, Adorers of the Blessed Sacrament. Later, the Contemplative Sisters of Jesus Crucified were also founded.
For lay people he set up the associations of the "Ladies of Divine Providence", the "Former Pupils", and the "Friends". More recently, the Don Orione Secular Institute and the Don Orione Lay People's Movement have come into being.
Following the First World War (1914-1918), the number of schools, boarding houses, agricultural schools, charitable and welfare works increased. Among his most enterprising and original works, he set up the "Little Cottolengos", for the care of the suffering and abandoned, which were usually built in the outskirts of large cities to act as "new pulpits" from which to speak of Christ and of the Church - "true beacons of faith and of civilisation".
Don Orione's missionary zeal, which had already manifested itself in 1913 when he sent his first religious to Brazil, expanded subsequently to Argentina and Uruguay (1921), Palestine (1921), Poland (1923), Rhodes (1925), the USA (1934), England (1935), Albania (1936). From 1921-1922 and from 1934-1937, he himself made two missionary journeys to Latin America: to Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, going as far as Chile.
He enjoyed the personal respect of the Popes and the Holy See's Authorities, who entrusted him with confidential tasks of sorting out problems and healing wounds both inside the Church as well as in the relations with society. He was a preacher, a confessor and a tireless organiser of pilgrimages, missions, processions, live cribs and other popular manifestations and celebrations of the faith. He loved Our Lady deeply and fostered devotion to her by every means possible and, through the manual labour of his seminarians, built the shrines of Our Lady of Safe Keeping in Tortona and Our Lady of Caravaggio at Fumo. In the winter of 1940, with the intention of easing the heart and lung complaints that were troubling him, he went to the Sanremo house, even though, as he said, "it is not among the palm trees that I would like to die, but among the poor who are Jesus Christ". Only three days later, on 12 March 1940, surrounded by the love of his confreres, Don Orione died, while sighing "Jesus, Jesus! I am going".
His body was found to be intact at its first exhumation in 1965. It has been exposed to the veneration of the faithful in the shrine of Our Lady of Safe Keeping in Tortona ever since 26 October 1980 - the day in which Pope John Paul II inscribed Don Luigi Orione in the Book of the Blessed. He was canonized on 16 May 2004.[Copyright © Libreria Editrice Vaticana]
Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Book of Jeremiah 11:18 Adonai made this known to me, and then I knew —
you showed me what they were doing.
19 But I was like a tame lamb
led to be slaughtered;
I did not know that they were plotting
schemes against me —
“Let’s destroy the tree with its fruit,
we’ll cut him off from the land of the living,
so that his name will be forgotten.”
20 Adonai-Tzva’ot, righteous judge,
tester of motives and thoughts,
I have committed my cause to you;
so let me see your vengeance on them.
Psalms 7:2 (1) Adonai my God, in you I take refuge.
Save me from all my pursuers, and rescue me;
3 (2) otherwise, they will maul me like a lion
and tear me apart, with no rescuer present.
9 (8) Adonai, who dispenses judgment to the peoples,
judge me, Adonai, according to my righteousness
and as my integrity deserves.
10 (9) Let the evil of the wicked come to an end,
and establish the righteous;
since you, righteous God,
test hearts and minds.
11 (10) My shield is God,
who saves the upright in heart.
12 (11) God is a righteous judge,
a God whose anger is present every day.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 7:40 On hearing his words, some people in the crowd said, “Surely this man is ‘the prophet’”; 41 others said, “This is the Messiah.” But others said, “How can the Messiah come from the Galil? 42 Doesn’t the Tanakh say that the Messiah is from the seed of David[John 7:42 2 Samuel 7:12] and comes from Beit-Lechem,[John 7:42 Micah 5:1(2)] the village where David lived?” 43 So the people were divided because of him. 44 Some wanted to arrest him, but no one laid a hand on him.
45 The guards came back to the head cohanim and the P’rushim, who asked them, “Why didn’t you bring him in?” 46 The guards replied, “No one ever spoke the way this man speaks!” 47 “You mean you’ve been taken in as well?” the P’rushim retorted. 48 “Has any of the authorities trusted him? Or any of the P’rushim? No! 49 True, these ‘am-ha’aretz do, but they know nothing about the Torah, they are under a curse!”
50 Nakdimon, the man who had gone to Yeshua before and was one of them, said to them, 51 “Our Torah doesn’t condemn a man — does it? — until after hearing from him and finding out what he’s doing.” 52 They replied, “You aren’t from the Galil too, are you? Study the Tanakh, and see for yourself that no prophet comes from the Galil!” [John 7:52 Most scholars believe that 7:53–8:11 is not from the pen of Yochanan. Many are of the opinion that it is a true story about Yeshua written by another of his talmidim.] 53 Then they all left, each one to his own home.
Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Blessed Titus Brandsma, a Dutch carmelite, martyr (1881-1942)
Invitation to heroism in faith and love
"Have you also been deceived?"
We live in a world where love itself is condemned: people call it weakness, something to grow out of. Some are saying: «Love is of no importance, we should rather develop our strength; let each one become as strong as he can and let the weak perish!» Again, they say that the christian religion with its preaching about love is a thing of the past... This is how it is: they come to you with such teaching and even find people who take it up willingly. Love is unknown; «Love is not loved,» as saint Francis of Assisi said in his own day; and, centuries later in Florence, saint Mary-Magdalene de Pazzi rang the monastery bells of her Carmel to make everyone know how beautiful Love is! I, too, would like to ring the bells to tell the world how beautiful it is to love!
Daily Gospel for Friday, 11 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Eulogius, Martyr (+ 859)
During the persecution raised against the Christians in the year 850, St. Eulogius was thrown into prison and there wrote his Exhortation to Martyrdom, addressed to the virgins Flora and Mary, who were beheaded the 24th of November, 851. Six days after their death Eulogius was set at liberty. In the year 852 several others suffered the like martyrdom. St. Eulogius encouraged all these martyrs to their triumphs, and was the support of that distressed flock.
The Archbishop of Toledo dying in 858. St. Eulogius was elected to succeed him; but there was some obstacle that hindered him from being consecrated, though he did not outlive his election two months.
A virgin, by name Leocritia, of a noble family among the Moors, had been instructed from her infancy in the Christian religion by one of her relatives, and privately baptized. Her father and mother used her very ill, and scourged her day and night to compel her to renounce the Faith. Having made her condition known to St. Eulogius and his sister Anulona, intimating that she desired to go where she might freely exercise her religion, they secretly procured her the means of getting away, and concealed her for some time among faithful friends.
But the matter was at length discovered, and they were all brought before the cadi, who threatened to have Eulogius scourged to death. The Saint told him that his torments would be of no avail, for he would never change his religion. Whereupon the cadi gave orders that he should be carried to the palace and be presented before the king's council. Eulogius began boldly to propose the truths of the Gospel to them. But, to prevent their hearing him, the council condemned him immediately to lose his head. As they were leading him to execution, one of the guards gave him a blow on the face, for having spoken against Mahomet; he turned the other cheek, and patiently received a second.
He received the stroke of death with great cheerfulness, on the 11th of March, 859. St. Leocritia was beheaded four days after him, and her body thrown into the river Guadalquivir, but taken out by the Christians.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
St. Oengus
St. Aengus
Feastday: March 11
Death: 824
Called Dengus and "the Culdee," a hermit and author of the Festlology of the Saints of Ireland, The Felire. The term Culdee refers to Aengus' love of solitude: Ceile De was a name given to the hermits of the time. Aengus, born in Clonengh, Ireland, became a solitary monk on the banks of the river Nore, where he communed with angels. In time he sought a more remote site near Maryborough, erecting a small hermitage there. Visitors drawn by his reputation for holiness drove Aengus to the monastery of Tallaght, near Dublin, then under the control of St. Maelruain. He tried to enter as a simple lay brother, not telling anyone who he was. Aengus, along with Maelruain (who had discovered the Culdee's real identity), wrote the Martyrology of Tallaght together in 790. Aengus completed his Felire in 805 in his Maryborough hermitage, having returned there when Maelruain died. Aengus passed away on March 11, 824, and was buried in Clonenagh.
Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Book of Wisdom 2:1 For they reasoned unsoundly, saying to themselves,
‘Short and sorrowful is our life,
and there is no remedy when a life comes to its end,
and no one has been known to return from Hades.
12 ‘Let us lie in wait for the righteous man,
because he is inconvenient to us and opposes our actions;
he reproaches us for sins against the law,
and accuses us of sins against our training.
13 He professes to have knowledge of God,
and calls himself a child[Wisdom 2:13 Or servant] of the Lord.
14 He became to us a reproof of our thoughts;
15 the very sight of him is a burden to us,
because his manner of life is unlike that of others,
and his ways are strange.
16 We are considered by him as something base,
and he avoids our ways as unclean;
he calls the last end of the righteous happy,
and boasts that God is his father.
17 Let us see if his words are true,
and let us test what will happen at the end of his life;
18 for if the righteous man is God’s child, he will help him,
and will deliver him from the hand of his adversaries.
19 Let us test him with insult and torture,
so that we may find out how gentle he is,
and make trial of his forbearance.
20 Let us condemn him to a shameful death,
for, according to what he says, he will be protected.’
Error of the Wicked
21 Thus they reasoned, but they were led astray,
for their wickedness blinded them,
22 and they did not know the secret purposes of God,
nor hoped for the wages of holiness,
nor discerned the prize for blameless souls;
Psalms 34:17 (16) But the face of Adonai opposes those who do evil,
10 But after his brothers had gone up to the festival, he too went up, not publicly but in secret.
25 Some of the Yerushalayim people said, “Isn’t this the man they’re out to kill? 26 Yet here he is, speaking openly; and they don’t say anything to him. It couldn’t be, could it, that the authorities have actually concluded he’s the Messiah? 27 Surely not — we know where this man comes from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he comes from.” 28 Whereupon Yeshua, continuing to teach in the Temple courts, cried out, “Indeed you do know me! And you know where I’m from! And I have not come on my own! The One who sent me is real. But him you don’t know! 29 I do know him, because I am with him, and he sent me!”
30 At this, they tried to arrest him; but no one laid a hand on him; because his time had not yet come.
Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
John Tauler (c.1300-1361), Dominican
Sermon 12, for the Tuesday before Palm Sunday
"Jesus himself also went up... but ... in secret"
Jesus said: “My time is not yet here, but the time is always right for you... You go up to the feast. I am not going up to this feast because my time has not yet been fulfilled” (Jn 7,6-8). Now what is this feast to which our Lord tells us to go up and whose time is always ready? The highest, truest feast, the supreme feast, is the feast of eternal life, which is to say the everlasting happiness where we shall always be face to face indeed with God. This we cannot have here below; but the feast that we can have is that of a foretaste of the one there: an experience in spirit of God's presence through an interior rejoicing, giving us a secret intimation of it. The time that is always ours is that of seeking God and pursuing this sense of his presence in all our works, life, willing and loving. This is how we are to rise up above ourselves and all that is not God, in all purity wanting and loving him alone and nothing else. This time is ready at every moment.
Daily Gospel for Thursday, 10 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Marie Eugenie of Jesus, foundress of the Religious of the Assumption (1817-1898)
Her father, follower of Voltaire and a liberal, was making his fortune in the banking world and in politics. Eugenie's mother provided the sensitive Eugenie with an education, which strengthened her character and gave her a strong sense of duty. Family life developed her intellectual curiosity and a romantic spirit, an interest in social questions and a broad world view.
Like her contemporary, George Sand, Anne Eugenie went to Mass on feast days and received the Sacraments of initiation, as was the custom but without any real commitment. However, her First Communion was a great mystical experience that foretold the secret of her future. She did not grasp its prophetic meaning until much later when she recognized it as her path towards total belonging to Jesus Christ and the Church.
Her youth was happy but not without suffering. She was affected when still a child by the death of an elder brother and a baby sister. Her health was delicate and a fall from a horse left serious consequences. Eugenie was mature for her age and learnt how to hide her feelings and to face up to events. Later, after a prosperous period for her father, she experienced the failure of his banks, the misunderstanding and eventual separation of her parents and the loss of all security. She had to leave her family home and go to Paris while Louis, closest to her in age and faithful companion went to live with their father. Eugenie went to Paris with the mother she adored, only to see her die from cholera after a few hours of illness, leaving her alone at the age of fifteen in a society that was worldly and superficial. Searching in anguish and almost desperate for the truth, she arrived at her conversion thirsty for the Absolute and open to the Transcendent.
When she was nineteen, Anne Eugenie attended the Lenten Conferences at Notre Dame in Paris, preached by the young Abbe Lacordaire, already well-known for his talent as orator. Lacordaire was a former disciple of Lamennais - haunted by the vision of a renewed Church with a special place in the world. He understood his time and wanted to change it. He understood young people, their questions and their desires, their idealism and their ignorance of both Christ and the Church. His words touched Eugenie's heart, answered her many questions, and aroused her generosity. Eugenie envisaged Christ as the universal liberator and his kingdom on earth established as a peaceful and just society. I was truly converted, she wrote, and I was seized by a longing to devote all my strength or rather all my weakness to the Church which, from that moment, I saw as alone holding the key to the knowledge and achievement of all that is good.
Just at this time, another preacher, also a former disciple of Lamennais, appeared on the scene. In the confessional, Father Combalot recognized that he had encountered a chosen soul who was designated to be the foundress of the Congregation he had dreamt of for a long time. He persuaded Eugenie to undertake his work by insisting that this Congregation was willed by God who had chosen her to establish it. He convinced her that only by education could she evangelize minds, make families truly Christian and thus transform the society of her time. Anne Eugenie accepted the project as God's will for her and allowed herself to be guided by the Abbe Combalot.
At twenty-two, Marie Eugenie became foundress of the Religious of the Assumption, dedicated to consecrate their whole life and strength to extending the Kingdom of Christ in themselves and in the world. In 1839, Mademoiselle Eugenie Milleret, with two other young women, began a life of prayer and study in a flat at rue Ferou near the church of St. Sulpice in Paris. In 1841, under the patronage of Madame de Chateaubriand, Lacordaire, Montalembert and their friends, the sisters opened their first school. In a relatively short time there were sixteen sisters of four nationalities in the community.
Marie Eugenie and the first sisters wanted to link the ancient and the new - to unite the past treasures of the Church's spirituality and wisdom with a type of religious life and education able to satisfy the demands of modern minds. It was a matter of respecting the values of the period and at the same time, making the Gospel values penetrate the rising culture of a new industrial and scientific era. The spirituality of the Congregation, centered on Christ and the Incarnation, was both deeply contemplative and dedicated to apostolic action. It was a life given to the search for God and the love and service of others.
Marie Eugenie's long life covered almost the whole of the 19th century. She loved her times passionately and took an active part in their history. Progressively, she channeled all her energy and gifts in tending and extending the Congregation, which became her life work. God gave her sisters and many friends. One of the first sisters was Irish, a mystic and her intimate friend whom she called at the end of her life, "half of myself." Kate O'Neill, called Mother Therese Emmanuel in religion, is considered as a co-foundress. Father Emmanuel d'Alzon, became Marie Eugenie's spiritual director soon after the foundation, was a father, brother or friend according to the seasons. In 1845, he founded the Augustinians of the Assumption and the two founders helped each other in a multitude of ways over a period of forty years. Both had a gift for friendship and they inspired many lay people to work with them and the Church. Together, as they followed Christ and labored with him, the religious and laity traced the path of the Assumption and took their place in the great cloud of witnesses.
In the last years of her life, Mother Marie Eugenie experienced a progressive physical weakening, which she lived in silence and humility - a life totally centered on Christ. She received the Eucharist for the last time on March 9, 1898 and on the 10th, she gently passed over to the Lord. She was beatified by Pope Paul VI on February 9, 1975 and canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on June 3, 2007 in Rome.[Copyright © Libreria Editrice Vaticana]
The Forty Martyrs of Sebaste († c. 320)
It was a cruel winter, and they were condemned to lie naked on the icy surface of a pond in the open air till they were frozen to death. But they ran undismayed to the place of their combat, joyfully stripped off their garments, and with one voice besought God to keep their Tanks unbroken. "Forty," they cried, "we have come to combat: grant that forty may be crowned." There were warm baths hard by, ready for any one amongst them who would deny Christ.
The soldiers who watched saw angels descending with thirty-nine crowns, and, while he wondered at the deficiency in the number, one of the confessors lost heart, renounced his faith, and, crawling to the fire, died body and soul at the spot where he expected relief. But the soldier was inspired to confess Christ and take his place, and again the number of forty was complete.
They remained steadfast while their limbs grew stiff and frozen, and died one by one. Among the Forty there was a young soldier who held nut longest against the cold, and when the officers came to cart away the dead bodies they found him still breathing. They were moved with pity, and wanted to leave him alive in the hope that he would still change his mind. But his mother stood by, and 'this valiant woman could not bear to see her son separated from the band of martyrs. She exhorted him to persevere, and lifted his frozen body into the cart. He was just able to make a sign of recognition, and was borne away, to be thrown into the flames with the dead bodies of his brethren.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
St. Macarius
St. Macarius of Jerusalem
Feastday: March 10
Death: 335
Bishop of Jerusalem, Israel, who aided St. Helena in identifying the True Cross. He became the bishop of Jerusalem in 314 and was a foe of the Arian heresy. He was also one of the signers at the Council of Nicaea. When St. Helena discovered the True Cross in Jerusalem, Macanus suggested that a seriously ill woman be touched with each of the crosses to identify the real one. One cured the woman instantly. At the command of Emperor Constantine. Macanus built a church over Christ's sepulcher which was consecrated as a basilica on September 13.
Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Book of Exodus 32:7 Adonai said to Moshe, “Go down! Hurry! Your people, whom you brought up from the land of Egypt, have become corrupt! 8 So quickly they have turned aside from the way I ordered them to follow! They have cast a metal statue of a calf, worshipped it, sacrificed to it and said, ‘Isra’el! Here is your god, who brought you up from the land of Egypt!’” 9 Adonai continued speaking to Moshe: “I have been watching these people; and you can see how stiffnecked they are. 10 Now leave me alone, so that my anger can blaze against them, and I can put an end to them! I will make a great nation out of you instead.”
11 Moshe pleaded with Adonai his God. He said, “Adonai, why must your anger blaze against your own people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and a strong hand? 12 Why let the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intentions that he led them out, to slaughter them in the hills and wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce anger! Relent! Don’t bring such disaster on your people! 13 Remember Avraham, Yitz’chak and Isra’el, your servants, to whom you swore by your very self. You promised them, ‘I will make your descendants as many as the stars in the sky; and I will give all this land I have spoken about to your descendants; and they will possess it forever.’” 14 Adonai then changed his mind about the disaster he had planned for his people.
Psalms 106:19 In Horev they fashioned a calf,
they worshipped a cast metal image.
20 Thus they exchanged their Glory
for the image of an ox that eats grass!
21 They forgot God, who had saved them,
who had done great things in Egypt,
22 wonders in the land of Ham,
fearsome deeds by the Sea of Suf.
23 Therefore he said that he would destroy them,
[and he would have,] had not Moshe his chosen one
stood before him in the breach
to turn back his destroying fury.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 5:31 “If I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is not valid. 32 But there is someone else testifying on my behalf, and I know that the testimony he is making is valid — 33 you have sent to Yochanan, and he has testified to the truth. 34 Not that I collect human testimony; rather, I say these things so that you might be saved. 35 He was a lamp burning and shining, and for a little while you were willing to bask in his light.
36 “But I have a testimony that is greater than Yochanan’s. For the things the Father has given me to do, the very things I am doing now, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me.
37 “In addition, the Father who sent me has himself testified on my behalf. But you have never heard his voice or seen his shape; 38 moreover, his word does not stay in you, because you don’t trust the one he sent. 39 You keep examining the Tanakh because you think that in it you have eternal life. Those very Scriptures bear witness to me, 40 but you won’t come to me in order to have life!
41 “I don’t collect praise from men, 42 but I do know you people — I know that you have no love for God in you! 43 I have come in my Father’s name, and you don’t accept me; if someone else comes in his own name, him you will accept. 44 How can you trust? You’re busy collecting praise from each other, instead of seeking praise from God only.
45 “But don’t think that it is I who will be your accuser before the Father. Do you know who will accuse you? Moshe, the very one you have counted on! 46 For if you really believed Moshe, you would believe me; because it was about me that he wrote. 47 But if you don’t believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say?”
Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Jerome (347-420), priest, translator of the Bible, Doctor of the Church
Letter 53 to Saint Paulinus, Bishop of Nola
“If you believed in Moses you would then believe me, for it was about me that he wrote.”
There is a “wisdom of God, mysterious and hidden, which God decided in advance, before the ages.” This wisdom of God is Christ. He is “the power of God and the wisdom of God”… For in the Son “all treasures of wisdom and of knowledge are hidden.” Hidden in mystery, decided in advance, before the ages, he was predestined and prefigured in the Law and the Prophets.
SAINT ZACHARY
Pope
(+ 752)
St. Zachary succeeded Gregory III in 741 and was a man of singular meekness and goodness. He loved the clergy and people of Rome to that degree that he hazarded his life for them on occasion of the troubles which Italy fell into by the rebellion of the Dukes of Spoleto and Benevento against King Luitprand. Out of respect to his sanctity and dignity, that king restored to the Church of Rome all the places which belonged to it, and sent back the captives without ransom.Pope
(+ 752)
The Lombards were moved to tears at the devotion with which they heard him perform the divine service. The zeal and prudence of this holy Pope appeared in many wholesome regulations which he had made to reform or settle the discipline and peace of several churches.
St. Boniface, the Apostle of Germany, wrote to him against a certain priest named Virgilius, which he labored to sow the seeds of discord between him and Odilo, Duke of Bavaria, and taught, besides, many errors. Zachary ordered that Virgilius should be sent to Rome, that his doctrine might be examined. It seems that he cleared himself; for we find this same Virgilius soon after made Bishop of Salzburg.
Certain Venetian merchants having bought at Rome many slaves to sell to the Moors in Africa, St. Zachary forbade such an iniquitous traffic, and, paying the merchants their price, gave the slaves their liberty.
He adorned Rome with sacred buildings, and with great foundations in favor of the poor and pilgrims, and gave every year a considerable sum to furnish oil for the lamps in St. Peter's Church.
He died in 752, in the month of March.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Book of Numbers 21:4 Then they traveled from Mount Hor on the road toward the Sea of Suf in order to go around the land of Edom; but the people’s tempers grew short because of the detour. 5 The people spoke against God and against Moshe: “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt? To die in the desert? There’s no real food, there’s no water, and we’re sick of this miserable stuff we’re eating!”
(LY: vi) 6 In response, Adonai sent poisonous snakes among the people; they bit the people, and many of Isra’el’s people died. 7 The people came to Moshe and said, “We sinned by speaking against Adonai and against you. Pray to Adonai that he rid us of these snakes.” Moshe prayed for the people, 8 and Adonai answered Moshe: “Make a poisonous snake and put it on a pole. When anyone who has been bitten sees it, he will live.” 9 Moshe made a bronze snake and put it on the pole; if a snake had bitten someone, then, when he looked toward the bronze snake, he stayed alive.
Psalms 102:2 (1) Adonai, hear my prayer!
Let my cry for help reach you!
3 (2) Don’t hide your face from me
when I am in such distress!
Turn your ear toward me;
when I call, be quick to reply!
16 (15) The nations will fear the name of Adonai
and all the kings on earth your glory,
17 (16) when Adonai has rebuilt Tziyon,
and shows himself in his glory,
18 (17) when he has heeded the plea of the poor
and not despised their prayer.
19 (18) May this be put on record for a future generation;
may a people yet to be created praise Adonai.
20 (19) For he has looked down from the height of his sanctuary;
from heaven Adonai surveys the earth
21 (20) to listen to the sighing of the prisoner,
to set free those who are sentenced to death,
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:21 Again he told them, “I am going away, and you will look for me, but you will die in your sin — where I am going, you cannot come.” 22 The Judeans said, “Is he going to commit suicide? Is that what he means when he says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?” 23 Yeshua said to them, “You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. 24 This is why I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not trust that I AM [who I say I am], you will die in your sins.”
25 At this, they said to him, “You? Who are you?” Yeshua answered, “Just what I’ve been telling you from the start. 26 There are many things I could say about you, and many judgments I could make. However, the One who sent me is true; so I say in the world only what I have heard from him.” 27 They did not understand that he was talking to them about the Father. 28 So Yeshua said, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I AM [who I say I am], and that of myself I do nothing, but say only what the Father has taught me. 29 Also, the One who sent me is still with me; he did not leave me to myself, because I always do what pleases him.”
30 Many people who heard him say these things trusted in him.
Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Leo the Great (?-c.461), Pope and Doctor of the Church
15th Sermon on the Passion, 3-4
By the fact that the divinity adopted our nature, because of which “the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us,” (Jn 1:14) was any person excluded from his mercy unless he refused to believe? If we welcome him who assumed it and are regenerated by the Spirit who begot him, do we not have a nature that we share with Christ? In addition, who would not recognize their own weaknesses in him… who “took the form of a slave” (Phil 2:7)? …
This lifeless body that lay in the tomb but rose on the third day and ascended up above all the heavenly heights to the right hand of the Father’s majesty, this body is ours. If we walk in the way of his commandments and are not ashamed to profess all he did for our salvation in emptying himself in the flesh, then we also shall be lifted up to share in his glory. For what he announced will be radiantly fulfilled: “Whoever acknowledges me before men I will acknowledge before my father in heaven.” (Mt10:32)
---------------------This lifeless body that lay in the tomb but rose on the third day and ascended up above all the heavenly heights to the right hand of the Father’s majesty, this body is ours. If we walk in the way of his commandments and are not ashamed to profess all he did for our salvation in emptying himself in the flesh, then we also shall be lifted up to share in his glory. For what he announced will be radiantly fulfilled: “Whoever acknowledges me before men I will acknowledge before my father in heaven.” (Mt10:32)
Daily Gospel for Monday, 14 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Maud (or Matilde), Queen (c. 875-968)
SAINT MAUD (or MATILDE)
Queen
(c. 875-968)
This princess was daughter of Theodoric, a powerful Saxon count. Her parents placed her very young in the monastery of Erford, of which her grandmother Maud was then abbess. Our Saint remained in that house, an accomplished model of all virtues, till her parents married her to Henry, son of Otho, Duke of Saxony, in 913, who was afterwards chosen king of Germany. He was s pious and victorious prince, and very tender of his subjects.Queen
(c. 875-968)
Whilst by his arms he checked the insolence of the Hungarians and Danes, and enlarged his dominions by adding to them Bavaria, Maud gained domestic victories over her spiritual enemies more worthy of a Christian and far greater in the eyes of Heaven. She nourished the precious seeds of devotion and humility in her heart by assiduous prayer and meditation. It was her delight to visit, comfort, and exhort the sick and the afflicted; to serve and instruct the poor, and to afford her charitable succor to prisoners. Her husband, edified by her example, concurred with her in every pious undertaking which she projected.
After twenty-three years' marriage God was pleased to call the king to himself, in 936. Maud, during his sickness, went to the church to pour forth her soul in prayer for him at the foot of the altar. As soon as she understood, by the tears and cries of the people, that he had expired, she called for a priest that was fasting to offer the holy sacrifice for his soul.
She had three sons: Otho, afterwards emperor; Henry, Duke of Bavaria; and St. Brunn, Archbishop of Cologne. Otho was crowned king of Germany in 937, and emperor at Rome in 962, after his victories over the Bohemians and Lombards.
The two oldest sons conspired to strip Maud of her dowry, on the unjust pretence that she had squandered the revenues of the state on the poor. The unnatural princes at length repented of their injustice, and restored to her all that had been taken from her.
She then became more liberal in her alms than ever, and founded many churches, with five monasteries.
In her last sickness she made her confession to her grandson William, the Archbishop of Mentz, who yet died twelve days before her, on his road home. She again made a public confession before the priests and monks of the place, received a second time the last sacraments, and, lying on a sack-cloth, with ashes on her head, died on the 14th of March in 968.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
St. Leobinus
St. Leobinus
Feastday: September 15Death: 556
Bishop of Chartres, France. He was a hermit priest and abbot before his consecration. When raiders attacked his monastery near Lyons, Leobinus was tortured and left for dead. He is sometimes called Lubin.
Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Book of Daniel 13: Susanna’s Beauty Attracts Two Elders
1 There was a man living in Babylon whose name was Joakim. 2 He married the daughter of Hilkiah, named Susanna, a very beautiful woman and one who feared the Lord. 3 Her parents were righteous, and had trained their daughter according to the law of Moses. 4 Joakim was very rich, and had a fine garden adjoining his house; the Jews used to come to him because he was the most honoured of them all.
5 That year two elders from the people were appointed as judges. Concerning them the Lord had said: ‘Wickedness came forth from Babylon, from elders who were judges, who were supposed to govern the people.’ 6 These men were frequently at Joakim’s house, and all who had a case to be tried came to them there.
7 When the people left at noon, Susanna would go into her husband’s garden to walk. 8 Every day the two elders used to see her, going in and walking about, and they began to lust for her. 9 They suppressed their consciences and turned away their eyes from looking to Heaven or remembering their duty to administer justice.
The Elders Attempt to Seduce Susanna
15 Once, while they were watching for an opportune day, she went in as before with only two maids, and wished to bathe in the garden, for it was a hot day. 16 No one was there except the two elders, who had hidden themselves and were watching her. 17 She said to her maids, ‘Bring me olive oil and ointments, and shut the garden doors so that I can bathe.’
19 When the maids had gone out, the two elders got up and ran to her. 20 They said, ‘Look, the garden doors are shut, and no one can see us. We are burning with desire for you; so give your consent, and lie with us. 21 If you refuse, we will testify against you that a young man was with you, and this was why you sent your maids away.’
22 Susanna groaned and said, ‘I am completely trapped. For if I do this, it will mean death for me; if I do not, I cannot escape your hands. 23 I choose not to do it; I will fall into your hands, rather than sin in the sight of the Lord.’
24 Then Susanna cried out with a loud voice, and the two elders shouted against her. 25 And one of them ran and opened the garden doors. 26 When the people in the house heard the shouting in the garden, they rushed in at the side door to see what had happened to her. 27 And when the elders told their story, the servants felt very much ashamed, for nothing like this had ever been said about Susanna.
The Elders Testify against Susanna
28 The next day, when the people gathered at the house of her husband Joakim, the two elders came, full of their wicked plot to have Susanna put to death. In the presence of the people they said, 29 ‘Send for Susanna daughter of Hilkiah, the wife of Joakim.’ 30 So they sent for her. And she came with her parents, her children, and all her relatives.
33 Those who were with her and all who saw her were weeping.
34 Then the two elders stood up before the people and laid their hands on her head. 35 Through her tears she looked up towards Heaven, for her heart trusted in the Lord. 36 The elders said, ‘While we were walking in the garden alone, this woman came in with two maids, shut the garden doors, and dismissed the maids. 37 Then a young man, who was hiding there, came to her and lay with her. 38 We were in a corner of the garden, and when we saw this wickedness we ran to them. 39 Although we saw them embracing, we could not hold the man, because he was stronger than we are, and he opened the doors and got away. 40 We did, however, seize this woman and asked who the young man was, 41 but she would not tell us. These things we testify.’
Because they were elders of the people and judges, the assembly believed them and condemned her to death.
42 Then Susanna cried out with a loud voice, and said, ‘O eternal God, you know what is secret and are aware of all things before they come to be; 43 you know that these men have given false evidence against me. And now I am to die, though I have done none of the wicked things that they have charged against me!’
44 The Lord heard her cry. 45 Just as she was being led off to execution, God stirred up the holy spirit of a young lad named Daniel, 46 and he shouted with a loud voice, ‘I want no part in shedding this woman’s blood!’
Daniel Rescues Susanna
47 All the people turned to him and asked, ‘What is this you are saying?’ 48 Taking his stand among them he said, ‘Are you such fools, O Israelites, as to condemn a daughter of Israel without examination and without learning the facts? 49 Return to court, for these men have given false evidence against her.’
50 So all the people hurried back. And the rest of the[Daniel 13:50 Gk lacks rest of the] elders said to him, ‘Come, sit among us and inform us, for God has given you the standing of an elder.’ 51 Daniel said to them, ‘Separate them far from each other, and I will examine them.’
52 When they were separated from each other, he summoned one of them and said to him, ‘You old relic of wicked days, your sins have now come home, which you have committed in the past, 53 pronouncing unjust judgements, condemning the innocent and acquitting the guilty, though the Lord said, “You shall not put an innocent and righteous person to death.” 54 Now then, if you really saw this woman, tell me this: Under what tree did you see them being intimate with each other?’ He answered, ‘Under a mastic tree.’[Daniel 13:54 The Greek words for mastic tree and cut are similar, thus forming an ironic wordplay] 55 And Daniel said, ‘Very well! This lie has cost you your head, for the angel of God has received the sentence from God and will immediately cut[Daniel 13:55 The Greek words for mastic tree and cut are similar, thus forming an ironic wordplay] you in two.’
56 Then, putting him to one side, he ordered them to bring the other. And he said to him, ‘You offspring of Canaan and not of Judah, beauty has beguiled you and lust has perverted your heart. 57 This is how you have been treating the daughters of Israel, and they were intimate with you through fear; but a daughter of Judah would not tolerate your wickedness. 58 Now then, tell me: Under what tree did you catch them being intimate with each other?’ He answered, ‘Under an evergreen oak.’[Daniel 13:58 The Greek words for evergreen oak and split are similar, thus forming an ironic wordplay] 59 Daniel said to him, ‘Very well! This lie has cost you also your head, for the angel of God is waiting with his sword to split[Daniel 13:59 The Greek words for evergreen oak and split are similar, thus forming an ironic wordplay] you in two, so as to destroy you both.’
60 Then the whole assembly raised a great shout and blessed God, who saves those who hope in him. 61 And they took action against the two elders, because out of their own mouths Daniel had convicted them of bearing false witness; they did to them as they had wickedly planned to do to their neighbour. 62 Acting in accordance with the law of Moses, they put them to death. Thus innocent blood was spared that day.
Psalms 23:(0) A psalm of David:
(1) Adonai is my shepherd; I lack nothing.
2 He has me lie down in grassy pastures,
he leads me by quiet water,
3 he restores my inner person.
He guides me in right paths
for the sake of his own name.
4 Even if I pass through death-dark ravines,
I will fear no disaster; for you are with me;
your rod and staff reassure me.
5 You prepare a table for me,
even as my enemies watch;
you anoint my head with oil
from an overflowing cup.
6 Goodness and grace will pursue me
every day of my life;
and I will live in the house of Adonai
for years and years to come.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:12 Yeshua spoke to them again: “I am the light of the world; whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light which gives life.” 13 So the P’rushim said to him, “Now you’re testifying on your own behalf; your testimony is not valid.” 14 Yeshua answered them, “Even if I do testify on my own behalf, my testimony is indeed valid; because I know where I came from and where I’m going; but you do not know where I came from or where I’m going. 15 You judge by merely human standards. As for me, I pass judgment on no one; 16 but if I were indeed to pass judgment, my judgment would be valid; because it is not I alone who judge, but I and the One who sent me. 17 And even in your Torah it is written that the testimony of two people is valid. 18 I myself testify on my own behalf, and so does the Father who sent me.”
19 They said to him, “Where is this ‘father’ of yours?” Yeshua answered, “You know neither me nor my Father; if you knew me, you would know my Father too.” 20 He said these things when he was teaching in the Temple treasury room; yet no one arrested him, because his time had not yet come.
Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Clement of Alexandria (150- c.215), theologian
Stromata
For light has arisen upon us who have been plunged in darkness and enclosed in the shadow of death (Lk 1:79), light purer than the sun and more beautiful than this life here below. This light is eternal life and all those who share in it live. Night flees from the light and, hiding itself for fear, gives way to the day of the Lord. The light that cannot be extinguished is shed abroad everywhere and the West has reunited with the East. This is what is meant by the “new creation”. Indeed, the sun of justice (Mal3:20) who illumines all things shines upon humankind after the example of his Father who makes the sun to rise on all men (Mt 5:45) and waters them with the dew of truth.
---------------------Daily Gospel for Sunday, 13 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Fifth Sunday of Lent - Year C
Saints of the day: St. Euphrasia, Virgin and Martyr (+ 303)
SAINT EUPHRASIA
Virgin and Martyr
(+ 303)
The holy virgin Euphrasia lived in Nicomedia during the reign of Maximian. She was of noble origin, beautiful and virtuous, and faithfully served Jesus Christ. Idolaters seized her and demanded that she sacrifice to demons, but she refused. They flogged her mercilessly; however, they could not break her resolve. Finally, they turned her over to a barbarian, and he took her to his home, intending to rape her. On the way, she prayed silently and ceaselessly to her most pure Bridegroom, Christ the Lord, beseeching Him to preserve her undefiled. Entering the house, the loathsome barbarian ordered her into his room. Euphrasia asked him to wait a moment before he ravished her, because she wished to give him a plant with miraculous power.Virgin and Martyr
(+ 303)
“If you wear this sprout on your person, no one can harm you,” she said, hoping to mislead him into thinking she was a sorceress.
“Give it to me later,” replied the barbarian.
“The plant is powerless if touched by a woman who has lost her virginity,” she explained.The barbarian agreed to let her go into the garden, where she broke off a sprig. She showed it to him, and he asked, “How will I know if you are telling the truth?”
Euphrasia held the sprout against her neck and said: “Strike my neck with a two-handed sword as hard as you can. You will not harm me at all.” The barbarian fetched a sword and brought it down with all his might, decapitating her. Too late, the imbecile realized he had been outwitted, and gnashed his teeth furiously. The wise virgin, who preferred to die rather than be sullied, departed to her Bridegroom Christ, providing us a wondrous example of chastity.[The Great Collection of the Lives of the Saints by St. Dimitry of Rostov]
Fifth Sunday of Lent - Year C
Book of Isaiah 43:16 Here is what Adonai says,
who made a way in the sea,
a path through the raging waves;
17 who led out chariot and horse,
the army in its strength —
they lay down, never to rise again,
snuffed out and quenched like a wick:
18 “Stop dwelling on past events
and brooding over times gone by;
19 I am doing something new;
it’s springing up — can’t you see it?
I am making a road in the desert,
rivers in the wasteland.
20 The wild animals will honor me,
the jackals and the ostriches;
because I put water in the desert,
rivers in the wasteland,
for my chosen people to drink,
21 the people I formed for myself,
so that they would proclaim my praise.
Psalms 126:(0) A song of ascents:
(1) When Adonai restored Tziyon’s fortunes,
we thought we were dreaming.
2 Our mouths were full of laughter,
and our tongues shouted for joy.
Among the nations it was said,
“Adonai has done great things for them!”
3 Adonai did do great things with us;
and we are overjoyed.
4 Return our people from exile, Adonai,
as streams fill vadis in the Negev.
5 Those who sow in tears
will reap with cries of joy.
6 He who goes out weeping
as he carries his sack of seed
will come home with cries of joy
as he carries his sheaves of grain.
Letter to the Philippians 3:8 Not only that, but I consider everything a disadvantage in comparison with the supreme value of knowing the Messiah Yeshua as my Lord. It was because of him that I gave up everything and regard it all as garbage, in order to gain the Messiah 9 and be found in union with him, not having any righteousness of my own based on legalism, but having that righteousness which comes through the Messiah’s faithfulness, the righteousness from God based on trust. 10 Yes, I gave it all up in order to know him, that is, to know the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings as I am being conformed to his death, 11 so that somehow I might arrive at being resurrected from the dead. 12 It is not that I have already obtained it or already reached the goal — no, I keep pursuing it in the hope of taking hold of that for which the Messiah Yeshua took hold of me. 13 Brothers, I, for my part, do not think of myself as having yet gotten hold of it; but one thing I do: forgetting what is behind me and straining forward toward what lies ahead, 14 I keep pursuing the goal in order to win the prize offered by God’s upward calling in the Messiah Yeshua.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 8:1 But Yeshua went to the Mount of Olives. 2 At daybreak, he appeared again in the Temple Court, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. 3 The Torah-teachers and the P’rushim brought in a woman who had been caught committing adultery and made her stand in the center of the group. 4 Then they said to him, “Rabbi, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. 5 Now in our Torah, Moshe commanded that such a woman be stoned to death. What do you say about it?” 6 They said this to trap him, so that they might have ground for bringing charges against him; but Yeshua bent down and began writing in the dust with his finger. 7 When they kept questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “The one of you who is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Then he bent down and wrote in the dust again. 9 On hearing this, they began to leave, one by one, the older ones first, until he was left alone, with the woman still there. 10 Standing up, Yeshua said to her, “Where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 She said, “No one, sir.” Yeshua said, “Neither do I condemn you. Now go, and don’t sin any more.”Fifth Sunday of Lent - Year C
Commentary of the day:
Symeon the New Theologian (c.949-1022), Greek monk, saint of the Orthodox churches
Hymn 45; SC 196
Make the brightness of your inaccessible light grow greater over me
To fill my heart with joy.
Be not angry; do not forsake me!
But make my soul radiant with your light,
For your light, O my God, is you…
I have gone aside from your straight road, the divine road,
And have fallen lamentably from the glory that had been given me.
I have been stripped of the shining robe, the divine robe,
And fallen into the darkness; now I lie in darkness
And do not realize I am deprived of light…
For if you have shone from on high, if you have appeared in the shadows,
If you have come into the world, O Merciful One,
If you have desired to live with men
In our human condition, for love of humankind,
If… you are said to be the light of the world (Jn 8:12)
And we do not even see you,
Is this not because we are completely blind
And more unfortunate than the blind, O my Christ?...
As for you, who are all good things, you give them unceasingly
to your servants, to those who see your light…
Whoever possesses you, truly possesses in you all other things.
May I not be deprived of you, O Lord! May I not be deprived of you, Creator!
May I not be deprived of you, O Merciful One, I, the humble stranger…
I beg you, set me with you,
Even if I have multiplied sins more than everyone else.
Receive my prayer like that of the publican (Lk 18:13)
Or like that of the sinful woman, Lord, even though I weep not as she did (Lk 7:38)…
Are you not the source of pity, the spring of mercy and river of goodness?
Therefore, on this account have pity on me!
Ah yes, you who had hands and feet nailed to the cross
And your side pierced with the lance, you the All-Compassionate,
Have pity on me and snatch me away from the eternal burning…
That on that day I may stand before you without condemnation
To be welcomed into your wedding chamber
In which I shall share your happiness, good Master,
In inexpressible joy throughout the ages. Amen.
---------------------To fill my heart with joy.
Be not angry; do not forsake me!
But make my soul radiant with your light,
For your light, O my God, is you…
I have gone aside from your straight road, the divine road,
And have fallen lamentably from the glory that had been given me.
I have been stripped of the shining robe, the divine robe,
And fallen into the darkness; now I lie in darkness
And do not realize I am deprived of light…
For if you have shone from on high, if you have appeared in the shadows,
If you have come into the world, O Merciful One,
If you have desired to live with men
In our human condition, for love of humankind,
If… you are said to be the light of the world (Jn 8:12)
And we do not even see you,
Is this not because we are completely blind
And more unfortunate than the blind, O my Christ?...
As for you, who are all good things, you give them unceasingly
to your servants, to those who see your light…
Whoever possesses you, truly possesses in you all other things.
May I not be deprived of you, O Lord! May I not be deprived of you, Creator!
May I not be deprived of you, O Merciful One, I, the humble stranger…
I beg you, set me with you,
Even if I have multiplied sins more than everyone else.
Receive my prayer like that of the publican (Lk 18:13)
Or like that of the sinful woman, Lord, even though I weep not as she did (Lk 7:38)…
Are you not the source of pity, the spring of mercy and river of goodness?
Therefore, on this account have pity on me!
Ah yes, you who had hands and feet nailed to the cross
And your side pierced with the lance, you the All-Compassionate,
Have pity on me and snatch me away from the eternal burning…
That on that day I may stand before you without condemnation
To be welcomed into your wedding chamber
In which I shall share your happiness, good Master,
In inexpressible joy throughout the ages. Amen.
Daily Gospel for Saturday, 12 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Maximilian
St. Maximilian
Feastday: March 12
Death: 296
St. Maximilian of Theveste, Martyr (Also known as Maximilian of Tebessa) Died 296. In the African churches of the late Roman Empire, it was not uncommon for liturgies to include readings from the acta and passios of martyrs. The one often included for Saint Maximilian is the authentic record of his trial in Numidia (now Algeria) and execution for refusing to be conscripted into the Roman army.
Maximilian resisted because he didn't want to be tainted by the idolatry of wearing the emperor's image around his neck. Maximilian also refused because he was a pacifist, perhaps one of the earliest conscientious objectors. There has long been a debate within the Church concerning the radical pacifism advocated by Our Lord and the less stringent, but more practical, position allowing self-defense and just war.
Prior to the Edict of Milan and the toleration of Christianity, Christians believed that bearing arms contradicted the Gospel. Tertullian, for example, prohibited military service. Saint Hippolytus said that it was impossible to be a soldier and a catechumen-as contradictory as being a prostitute and catechumen (at least part of his reasoning dealt with the association of soldiers with pagan gods and sacrifices).
The Church moderated its position. The Council of Arles (314) said that soldiers who left the army during peacetime would be excommunicated. About 295, the proconsul Dion went to Theveste to recruit soldiers for the third Augustan legion stationed there. At this time the Roman army was mainly volunteers, but sons of veterans were obliged to serve. Maximilian, the 21-year-old son of the Roman army veteran Fabius Victor, was presented to the recruiting agent. The advocatus Pompeianus, seeing that Maximilian would make an excellent recruit, asked for him to be measured: he was 5'10" tall.
The ensuing dialogue between the proconsul Dion and Maximilian has been preserved to this day. When asked his name, Maximilian replied, "Why do you wish to know my name? I cannot serve because I am a Christian." Nevertheless, orders were given for him to be given the military seal. He answered, "I cannot do it: I cannot be a soldier." When told he must serve or die, he said, "You may cut off my head, but I will not serve. My army is the army of God, and I cannot fight for this world," it was pointed out to him that there were Christians serving as bodyguards for the emperors Diocletian and Maximian.
To this he replied, "That is their business. I am a Christian, too, and I cannot serve." Dion then told Victor to correct his son. Victor, who had become a Christian like his son, said, "He knows what he believes, and he won't change his mind." Dion insisted, "Agree to serve and receive the military seal." "I already have the seal of Christ, my God . . . I will not accept the seal of this world; if you give it to me, I will break it for it is worthless. I cannot wear a piece of lead around my neck after I have received the saving sign of Jesus Christ, my Lord, the son of the living God. You do not know Him; yet He suffered for our salvation: God delivered Him up for our sins. He is the one whom all Christians serve; we follow Him as the Prince of Life and Author of Salvation."
Again Dion stated that there are other Christians who are soldiers. Maximilian answered, "They know what is best for them. I am a Christian and I cannot do what is wrong." Dion continued, "What wrong do those commit who serve in the army?" Maximilian answered, "You know very well what they do." Threatened with death if he remained obstinate, Maximilian answered, "This is the greatest thing that I desire. Dispatch me quickly. Therein lies my glory." Then he added, "I shall not die. When I leave this earth, I shall live with Christ, my Lord."
He was sentenced accordingly: "Whereas Maximilian has disloyally refused the military oath, he is sentenced to die by the sword." Just before his execution, Maximilian encouraged his companions to persevere and asked his father to give his new clothes to the executioner. We are told that Fabius Victor "went home happily, thanking God for having allowed him to send such a gift to heaven."
The place of Maximilian's death is given as Theveste (Tebessa) in Numidia, but it may have been nearer Carthage, where his body was taken for burial by a devout woman named Pompeiana. It was buried close to the relics of Saint Cyprian.
St. Luigi Orione, Priest (1872-1940)
Saint Luigi Orione
Priest
(1872-1940)
Luigi Orione was born in Pontecurone, diocese of Tortona, on 23 June 1872. At thirteen years of age he entered the Franciscan Friary of Voghera (Pavia), but he left after one year owing to poor health. From 1886 to 1889 he was a pupil of Saint John Bosco at the Valdocco Oratory (Youth Centre) in Turin.Priest
(1872-1940)
On 16 October 1889, he joined the diocesan seminary of Tortona. As a young seminarian he devoted himself to the care of others by becoming a member of both the San Marziano Society for Mutual Help and the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul. On 3 July 1892 he opened the first Oratory in Tortona to provide for the Christian training of boys. The following year, on 15 October 1893, Luigi Orione, then a seminarian of twenty-one, started a boarding school for poor boys, in the Saint Bernardine estate.
On 13 April 1895, Luigi Orione was ordained priest and, on that occasion, the Bishop gave the clerical habit to six pupils of the boarding school. Within a brief span of time, Don Orione opened new houses at Mornico Losana (Pavia), Noto - in Sicily, Sanremo and Rome.
Around the young Founder there grew up seminarians and priests who made up the first core group of the Little Work of Divine Providence. In 1899, he founded the branch of the Hermits of Divine Providence. The Bishop of Tortona, Mgr Igino Bandi, by a Decree of 21 March 1903, issued the canonical approval of the Sons of Divine Providence (priests, lay brothers and hermits) - the male congregation of the Little Work of Divine Providence. It aims to "co-operate to bring the little ones, the poor and the people to the Church and to the Pope, by means of the works of charity", and professes a fourth vow of special "faithfulness to the Pope". In the first Constitutions of 1904, among the aims of the new Congregation, there appears that of working to "achieve the union of the separated Churches".
Inspired by a profound love for the Church and for the salvation of Souls, he was actively interested in the new problems of his time, such as the freedom and unity of the Church, the Roman question, modernism, socialism and the Christian evangelisation of industrial workers.
He rushed to assist the victims of the earthquakes of Reggio and Messina (1908) and the Marsica region (1915). By appointment of Saint Pius X, he was made Vicar General of the diocese of Messina for three years.
On 29 June 1915, twenty years after the foundation of the Sons of Divine Providence, he added to the "single tree of many branches" the Congregation of the Little Missionary Sisters of Charity who are inspired by the same founding charism. Alongside them, he placed the Blind Sisters, Adorers of the Blessed Sacrament. Later, the Contemplative Sisters of Jesus Crucified were also founded.
For lay people he set up the associations of the "Ladies of Divine Providence", the "Former Pupils", and the "Friends". More recently, the Don Orione Secular Institute and the Don Orione Lay People's Movement have come into being.
Following the First World War (1914-1918), the number of schools, boarding houses, agricultural schools, charitable and welfare works increased. Among his most enterprising and original works, he set up the "Little Cottolengos", for the care of the suffering and abandoned, which were usually built in the outskirts of large cities to act as "new pulpits" from which to speak of Christ and of the Church - "true beacons of faith and of civilisation".
Don Orione's missionary zeal, which had already manifested itself in 1913 when he sent his first religious to Brazil, expanded subsequently to Argentina and Uruguay (1921), Palestine (1921), Poland (1923), Rhodes (1925), the USA (1934), England (1935), Albania (1936). From 1921-1922 and from 1934-1937, he himself made two missionary journeys to Latin America: to Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, going as far as Chile.
He enjoyed the personal respect of the Popes and the Holy See's Authorities, who entrusted him with confidential tasks of sorting out problems and healing wounds both inside the Church as well as in the relations with society. He was a preacher, a confessor and a tireless organiser of pilgrimages, missions, processions, live cribs and other popular manifestations and celebrations of the faith. He loved Our Lady deeply and fostered devotion to her by every means possible and, through the manual labour of his seminarians, built the shrines of Our Lady of Safe Keeping in Tortona and Our Lady of Caravaggio at Fumo. In the winter of 1940, with the intention of easing the heart and lung complaints that were troubling him, he went to the Sanremo house, even though, as he said, "it is not among the palm trees that I would like to die, but among the poor who are Jesus Christ". Only three days later, on 12 March 1940, surrounded by the love of his confreres, Don Orione died, while sighing "Jesus, Jesus! I am going".
His body was found to be intact at its first exhumation in 1965. It has been exposed to the veneration of the faithful in the shrine of Our Lady of Safe Keeping in Tortona ever since 26 October 1980 - the day in which Pope John Paul II inscribed Don Luigi Orione in the Book of the Blessed. He was canonized on 16 May 2004.[Copyright © Libreria Editrice Vaticana]
Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Book of Jeremiah 11:18 Adonai made this known to me, and then I knew —
you showed me what they were doing.
19 But I was like a tame lamb
led to be slaughtered;
I did not know that they were plotting
schemes against me —
“Let’s destroy the tree with its fruit,
we’ll cut him off from the land of the living,
so that his name will be forgotten.”
20 Adonai-Tzva’ot, righteous judge,
tester of motives and thoughts,
I have committed my cause to you;
so let me see your vengeance on them.
Psalms 7:2 (1) Adonai my God, in you I take refuge.
Save me from all my pursuers, and rescue me;
3 (2) otherwise, they will maul me like a lion
and tear me apart, with no rescuer present.
9 (8) Adonai, who dispenses judgment to the peoples,
judge me, Adonai, according to my righteousness
and as my integrity deserves.
10 (9) Let the evil of the wicked come to an end,
and establish the righteous;
since you, righteous God,
test hearts and minds.
11 (10) My shield is God,
who saves the upright in heart.
12 (11) God is a righteous judge,
a God whose anger is present every day.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 7:40 On hearing his words, some people in the crowd said, “Surely this man is ‘the prophet’”; 41 others said, “This is the Messiah.” But others said, “How can the Messiah come from the Galil? 42 Doesn’t the Tanakh say that the Messiah is from the seed of David[John 7:42 2 Samuel 7:12] and comes from Beit-Lechem,[John 7:42 Micah 5:1(2)] the village where David lived?” 43 So the people were divided because of him. 44 Some wanted to arrest him, but no one laid a hand on him.
45 The guards came back to the head cohanim and the P’rushim, who asked them, “Why didn’t you bring him in?” 46 The guards replied, “No one ever spoke the way this man speaks!” 47 “You mean you’ve been taken in as well?” the P’rushim retorted. 48 “Has any of the authorities trusted him? Or any of the P’rushim? No! 49 True, these ‘am-ha’aretz do, but they know nothing about the Torah, they are under a curse!”
50 Nakdimon, the man who had gone to Yeshua before and was one of them, said to them, 51 “Our Torah doesn’t condemn a man — does it? — until after hearing from him and finding out what he’s doing.” 52 They replied, “You aren’t from the Galil too, are you? Study the Tanakh, and see for yourself that no prophet comes from the Galil!” [John 7:52 Most scholars believe that 7:53–8:11 is not from the pen of Yochanan. Many are of the opinion that it is a true story about Yeshua written by another of his talmidim.] 53 Then they all left, each one to his own home.
Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Blessed Titus Brandsma, a Dutch carmelite, martyr (1881-1942)
Invitation to heroism in faith and love
The neo-paganism [of the Nazis] may well cast off love but, in spite of everything, history teaches us that we shall be victors over this neo-paganism through love. We shall not forsake love. Love will win back for us the hearts of these unbelievers. Nature is stronger than philosophy. Even if a philosophy condemns and rejects love and calls it weakness, the living witness of love will always renew its power to conquer and entrance the hearts of men.
---------------------Daily Gospel for Friday, 11 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Eulogius, Martyr (+ 859)
SAINT EULOGIUS
Martyr
(+ 859)
St. Eulogius was of a senatorian family of Cordova, at that time the capital of the Moors in Spain. Our Saint was educated among the clergy of the Church of St. Zoilus, a martyr who suffered with nineteen others under Diocletian. Here he distinguished himself, by his virtue and learning, and, being made priest, was placed at the head of the chief ecclesiastical school at Cordova. He joined assiduous watching, fasting, and prayer to his studies, and his humility, mildness, and charity gained him the affection and respect of every one.Martyr
(+ 859)
During the persecution raised against the Christians in the year 850, St. Eulogius was thrown into prison and there wrote his Exhortation to Martyrdom, addressed to the virgins Flora and Mary, who were beheaded the 24th of November, 851. Six days after their death Eulogius was set at liberty. In the year 852 several others suffered the like martyrdom. St. Eulogius encouraged all these martyrs to their triumphs, and was the support of that distressed flock.
The Archbishop of Toledo dying in 858. St. Eulogius was elected to succeed him; but there was some obstacle that hindered him from being consecrated, though he did not outlive his election two months.
A virgin, by name Leocritia, of a noble family among the Moors, had been instructed from her infancy in the Christian religion by one of her relatives, and privately baptized. Her father and mother used her very ill, and scourged her day and night to compel her to renounce the Faith. Having made her condition known to St. Eulogius and his sister Anulona, intimating that she desired to go where she might freely exercise her religion, they secretly procured her the means of getting away, and concealed her for some time among faithful friends.
But the matter was at length discovered, and they were all brought before the cadi, who threatened to have Eulogius scourged to death. The Saint told him that his torments would be of no avail, for he would never change his religion. Whereupon the cadi gave orders that he should be carried to the palace and be presented before the king's council. Eulogius began boldly to propose the truths of the Gospel to them. But, to prevent their hearing him, the council condemned him immediately to lose his head. As they were leading him to execution, one of the guards gave him a blow on the face, for having spoken against Mahomet; he turned the other cheek, and patiently received a second.
He received the stroke of death with great cheerfulness, on the 11th of March, 859. St. Leocritia was beheaded four days after him, and her body thrown into the river Guadalquivir, but taken out by the Christians.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
St. Oengus
St. Aengus
Feastday: March 11
Death: 824
Called Dengus and "the Culdee," a hermit and author of the Festlology of the Saints of Ireland, The Felire. The term Culdee refers to Aengus' love of solitude: Ceile De was a name given to the hermits of the time. Aengus, born in Clonengh, Ireland, became a solitary monk on the banks of the river Nore, where he communed with angels. In time he sought a more remote site near Maryborough, erecting a small hermitage there. Visitors drawn by his reputation for holiness drove Aengus to the monastery of Tallaght, near Dublin, then under the control of St. Maelruain. He tried to enter as a simple lay brother, not telling anyone who he was. Aengus, along with Maelruain (who had discovered the Culdee's real identity), wrote the Martyrology of Tallaght together in 790. Aengus completed his Felire in 805 in his Maryborough hermitage, having returned there when Maelruain died. Aengus passed away on March 11, 824, and was buried in Clonenagh.
Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Book of Wisdom 2:1 For they reasoned unsoundly, saying to themselves,
‘Short and sorrowful is our life,
and there is no remedy when a life comes to its end,
and no one has been known to return from Hades.
12 ‘Let us lie in wait for the righteous man,
because he is inconvenient to us and opposes our actions;
he reproaches us for sins against the law,
and accuses us of sins against our training.
13 He professes to have knowledge of God,
and calls himself a child[Wisdom 2:13 Or servant] of the Lord.
14 He became to us a reproof of our thoughts;
15 the very sight of him is a burden to us,
because his manner of life is unlike that of others,
and his ways are strange.
16 We are considered by him as something base,
and he avoids our ways as unclean;
he calls the last end of the righteous happy,
and boasts that God is his father.
17 Let us see if his words are true,
and let us test what will happen at the end of his life;
18 for if the righteous man is God’s child, he will help him,
and will deliver him from the hand of his adversaries.
19 Let us test him with insult and torture,
so that we may find out how gentle he is,
and make trial of his forbearance.
20 Let us condemn him to a shameful death,
for, according to what he says, he will be protected.’
Error of the Wicked
21 Thus they reasoned, but they were led astray,
for their wickedness blinded them,
22 and they did not know the secret purposes of God,
nor hoped for the wages of holiness,
nor discerned the prize for blameless souls;
Psalms 34:17 (16) But the face of Adonai opposes those who do evil,
to cut off all memory of them from the earth.
18 (17) [The righteous] cried out, and Adonai heard,
and he saved them from all their troubles.
19 (18) Adonai is near those with broken hearts;
he saves those whose spirit is crushed.
20 (19) The righteous person suffers many evils,
but Adonai rescues him out of them all.
21 (20) He protects all his bones;
not one of them gets broken.
23 (22) But Adonai redeems his servants;
no one who takes refuge in him will be condemned.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 7:1 After this, Yeshua traveled around in the Galil, intentionally avoiding Y’hudah because the Judeans were out to kill him. 2 But the festival of Sukkot in Y’hudah was near;10 But after his brothers had gone up to the festival, he too went up, not publicly but in secret.
25 Some of the Yerushalayim people said, “Isn’t this the man they’re out to kill? 26 Yet here he is, speaking openly; and they don’t say anything to him. It couldn’t be, could it, that the authorities have actually concluded he’s the Messiah? 27 Surely not — we know where this man comes from; but when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he comes from.” 28 Whereupon Yeshua, continuing to teach in the Temple courts, cried out, “Indeed you do know me! And you know where I’m from! And I have not come on my own! The One who sent me is real. But him you don’t know! 29 I do know him, because I am with him, and he sent me!”
30 At this, they tried to arrest him; but no one laid a hand on him; because his time had not yet come.
Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
John Tauler (c.1300-1361), Dominican
Sermon 12, for the Tuesday before Palm Sunday
This truly festal season of eternal life is what every person desires with a natural desire since everyone naturally wants to be happy. But desire alone is not enough. We should seek after God for himself alone and search for him for his own sake. Many would dearly love to have a foretaste of that true and great feast day and they are miserable because it isn't granted them. When they don't have the experience of a feast day within themselves when they pray and don't feel God's presence, this disappoints them. They pray even less and do so with bad grace, saying that they don't feel God and that it is for this reason that action and prayer upset them. Now this is what someone should never do. We should never carry out any work with a zeal turned cold, for God is always present there, and even if we don't feel him yet he has always entered secretly for the feast.
---------------------Daily Gospel for Thursday, 10 March 2016
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]
Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Saints of the day: St. Marie Eugenie of Jesus, foundress of the Religious of the Assumption (1817-1898)
Saint Marie Eugenie of Jesus
Foundress of the Religious of the Assumption
(1817 - 1898)
Anne Marie Eugenie was born in 1817 in Metz after Napoleon's complete defeat and the restoration of the Monarchy. She belonged to a non-believing and financially comfortable family and it seemed unlikely that she would trace a new spiritual path across the Church of France.Foundress of the Religious of the Assumption
(1817 - 1898)
Her father, follower of Voltaire and a liberal, was making his fortune in the banking world and in politics. Eugenie's mother provided the sensitive Eugenie with an education, which strengthened her character and gave her a strong sense of duty. Family life developed her intellectual curiosity and a romantic spirit, an interest in social questions and a broad world view.
Like her contemporary, George Sand, Anne Eugenie went to Mass on feast days and received the Sacraments of initiation, as was the custom but without any real commitment. However, her First Communion was a great mystical experience that foretold the secret of her future. She did not grasp its prophetic meaning until much later when she recognized it as her path towards total belonging to Jesus Christ and the Church.
Her youth was happy but not without suffering. She was affected when still a child by the death of an elder brother and a baby sister. Her health was delicate and a fall from a horse left serious consequences. Eugenie was mature for her age and learnt how to hide her feelings and to face up to events. Later, after a prosperous period for her father, she experienced the failure of his banks, the misunderstanding and eventual separation of her parents and the loss of all security. She had to leave her family home and go to Paris while Louis, closest to her in age and faithful companion went to live with their father. Eugenie went to Paris with the mother she adored, only to see her die from cholera after a few hours of illness, leaving her alone at the age of fifteen in a society that was worldly and superficial. Searching in anguish and almost desperate for the truth, she arrived at her conversion thirsty for the Absolute and open to the Transcendent.
When she was nineteen, Anne Eugenie attended the Lenten Conferences at Notre Dame in Paris, preached by the young Abbe Lacordaire, already well-known for his talent as orator. Lacordaire was a former disciple of Lamennais - haunted by the vision of a renewed Church with a special place in the world. He understood his time and wanted to change it. He understood young people, their questions and their desires, their idealism and their ignorance of both Christ and the Church. His words touched Eugenie's heart, answered her many questions, and aroused her generosity. Eugenie envisaged Christ as the universal liberator and his kingdom on earth established as a peaceful and just society. I was truly converted, she wrote, and I was seized by a longing to devote all my strength or rather all my weakness to the Church which, from that moment, I saw as alone holding the key to the knowledge and achievement of all that is good.
Just at this time, another preacher, also a former disciple of Lamennais, appeared on the scene. In the confessional, Father Combalot recognized that he had encountered a chosen soul who was designated to be the foundress of the Congregation he had dreamt of for a long time. He persuaded Eugenie to undertake his work by insisting that this Congregation was willed by God who had chosen her to establish it. He convinced her that only by education could she evangelize minds, make families truly Christian and thus transform the society of her time. Anne Eugenie accepted the project as God's will for her and allowed herself to be guided by the Abbe Combalot.
At twenty-two, Marie Eugenie became foundress of the Religious of the Assumption, dedicated to consecrate their whole life and strength to extending the Kingdom of Christ in themselves and in the world. In 1839, Mademoiselle Eugenie Milleret, with two other young women, began a life of prayer and study in a flat at rue Ferou near the church of St. Sulpice in Paris. In 1841, under the patronage of Madame de Chateaubriand, Lacordaire, Montalembert and their friends, the sisters opened their first school. In a relatively short time there were sixteen sisters of four nationalities in the community.
Marie Eugenie and the first sisters wanted to link the ancient and the new - to unite the past treasures of the Church's spirituality and wisdom with a type of religious life and education able to satisfy the demands of modern minds. It was a matter of respecting the values of the period and at the same time, making the Gospel values penetrate the rising culture of a new industrial and scientific era. The spirituality of the Congregation, centered on Christ and the Incarnation, was both deeply contemplative and dedicated to apostolic action. It was a life given to the search for God and the love and service of others.
Marie Eugenie's long life covered almost the whole of the 19th century. She loved her times passionately and took an active part in their history. Progressively, she channeled all her energy and gifts in tending and extending the Congregation, which became her life work. God gave her sisters and many friends. One of the first sisters was Irish, a mystic and her intimate friend whom she called at the end of her life, "half of myself." Kate O'Neill, called Mother Therese Emmanuel in religion, is considered as a co-foundress. Father Emmanuel d'Alzon, became Marie Eugenie's spiritual director soon after the foundation, was a father, brother or friend according to the seasons. In 1845, he founded the Augustinians of the Assumption and the two founders helped each other in a multitude of ways over a period of forty years. Both had a gift for friendship and they inspired many lay people to work with them and the Church. Together, as they followed Christ and labored with him, the religious and laity traced the path of the Assumption and took their place in the great cloud of witnesses.
In the last years of her life, Mother Marie Eugenie experienced a progressive physical weakening, which she lived in silence and humility - a life totally centered on Christ. She received the Eucharist for the last time on March 9, 1898 and on the 10th, she gently passed over to the Lord. She was beatified by Pope Paul VI on February 9, 1975 and canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on June 3, 2007 in Rome.[Copyright © Libreria Editrice Vaticana]
The Forty Martyrs of Sebaste († c. 320)
THE FORTY MARTYRS OF SEBASTE
(† c. 320)
The forty martyrs were soldiers quartered at Sebaste in Armenia, about the year 320. When their legion was ordered to offer sacrifice they separated themselves from the rest and formed a company of martyrs. After they had been torn by scourges and iron hooks they were chained together and led to a lingering death.(† c. 320)
It was a cruel winter, and they were condemned to lie naked on the icy surface of a pond in the open air till they were frozen to death. But they ran undismayed to the place of their combat, joyfully stripped off their garments, and with one voice besought God to keep their Tanks unbroken. "Forty," they cried, "we have come to combat: grant that forty may be crowned." There were warm baths hard by, ready for any one amongst them who would deny Christ.
The soldiers who watched saw angels descending with thirty-nine crowns, and, while he wondered at the deficiency in the number, one of the confessors lost heart, renounced his faith, and, crawling to the fire, died body and soul at the spot where he expected relief. But the soldier was inspired to confess Christ and take his place, and again the number of forty was complete.
They remained steadfast while their limbs grew stiff and frozen, and died one by one. Among the Forty there was a young soldier who held nut longest against the cold, and when the officers came to cart away the dead bodies they found him still breathing. They were moved with pity, and wanted to leave him alive in the hope that he would still change his mind. But his mother stood by, and 'this valiant woman could not bear to see her son separated from the band of martyrs. She exhorted him to persevere, and lifted his frozen body into the cart. He was just able to make a sign of recognition, and was borne away, to be thrown into the flames with the dead bodies of his brethren.[Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]]
St. Macarius
St. Macarius of Jerusalem
Feastday: March 10
Death: 335
Bishop of Jerusalem, Israel, who aided St. Helena in identifying the True Cross. He became the bishop of Jerusalem in 314 and was a foe of the Arian heresy. He was also one of the signers at the Council of Nicaea. When St. Helena discovered the True Cross in Jerusalem, Macanus suggested that a seriously ill woman be touched with each of the crosses to identify the real one. One cured the woman instantly. At the command of Emperor Constantine. Macanus built a church over Christ's sepulcher which was consecrated as a basilica on September 13.
Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Book of Exodus 32:7 Adonai said to Moshe, “Go down! Hurry! Your people, whom you brought up from the land of Egypt, have become corrupt! 8 So quickly they have turned aside from the way I ordered them to follow! They have cast a metal statue of a calf, worshipped it, sacrificed to it and said, ‘Isra’el! Here is your god, who brought you up from the land of Egypt!’” 9 Adonai continued speaking to Moshe: “I have been watching these people; and you can see how stiffnecked they are. 10 Now leave me alone, so that my anger can blaze against them, and I can put an end to them! I will make a great nation out of you instead.”
11 Moshe pleaded with Adonai his God. He said, “Adonai, why must your anger blaze against your own people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and a strong hand? 12 Why let the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intentions that he led them out, to slaughter them in the hills and wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce anger! Relent! Don’t bring such disaster on your people! 13 Remember Avraham, Yitz’chak and Isra’el, your servants, to whom you swore by your very self. You promised them, ‘I will make your descendants as many as the stars in the sky; and I will give all this land I have spoken about to your descendants; and they will possess it forever.’” 14 Adonai then changed his mind about the disaster he had planned for his people.
Psalms 106:19 In Horev they fashioned a calf,
they worshipped a cast metal image.
20 Thus they exchanged their Glory
for the image of an ox that eats grass!
21 They forgot God, who had saved them,
who had done great things in Egypt,
22 wonders in the land of Ham,
fearsome deeds by the Sea of Suf.
23 Therefore he said that he would destroy them,
[and he would have,] had not Moshe his chosen one
stood before him in the breach
to turn back his destroying fury.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 5:31 “If I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is not valid. 32 But there is someone else testifying on my behalf, and I know that the testimony he is making is valid — 33 you have sent to Yochanan, and he has testified to the truth. 34 Not that I collect human testimony; rather, I say these things so that you might be saved. 35 He was a lamp burning and shining, and for a little while you were willing to bask in his light.
36 “But I have a testimony that is greater than Yochanan’s. For the things the Father has given me to do, the very things I am doing now, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me.
37 “In addition, the Father who sent me has himself testified on my behalf. But you have never heard his voice or seen his shape; 38 moreover, his word does not stay in you, because you don’t trust the one he sent. 39 You keep examining the Tanakh because you think that in it you have eternal life. Those very Scriptures bear witness to me, 40 but you won’t come to me in order to have life!
41 “I don’t collect praise from men, 42 but I do know you people — I know that you have no love for God in you! 43 I have come in my Father’s name, and you don’t accept me; if someone else comes in his own name, him you will accept. 44 How can you trust? You’re busy collecting praise from each other, instead of seeking praise from God only.
45 “But don’t think that it is I who will be your accuser before the Father. Do you know who will accuse you? Moshe, the very one you have counted on! 46 For if you really believed Moshe, you would believe me; because it was about me that he wrote. 47 But if you don’t believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say?”
Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Commentary of the day:
Saint Jerome (347-420), priest, translator of the Bible, Doctor of the Church
Letter 53 to Saint Paulinus, Bishop of Nola
That is why the prophets were called “seers”; they saw him who was hidden and unknown to others. Abraham also “saw his day and rejoiced.” For Ezekiel, the heavens opened while the sinful people remained ignorant. David said: “Remove the veil from my eyes, and I will contemplate the marvels of your law.” For the law is spiritual, and to understand it, the veil must be lifted and “the glory of God must be contemplated with unveiled vision.”
In the Book of Revelation, a sealed book with seven seals is shown… How many people today who claim to be educated hold a sealed Book in their hands! And they are incapable of opening it unless it is opened by “him who has the key of David; if he opens, no one will close, and if he closes, no one will open.” In the Acts of the Apostles, the eunuch was reading the prophet Isaiah… However, without knowing him, he was ignorant of him whom he was venerating in that book. Philip came and showed him Jesus hidden under the letter… So understand that you cannot get involved in Holy Scripture without a guide who will show you the way.
(Biblical References: 1 Cor 2:7; 1 Cor 1:24; Col 2:31; 1 Sam 9:9; Jn 8:56; Ps 118:18; 2 Cor 3:16-18; Rev 5:1; Rev 3:7; Acts 8:26ff.)
---------------------In the Book of Revelation, a sealed book with seven seals is shown… How many people today who claim to be educated hold a sealed Book in their hands! And they are incapable of opening it unless it is opened by “him who has the key of David; if he opens, no one will close, and if he closes, no one will open.” In the Acts of the Apostles, the eunuch was reading the prophet Isaiah… However, without knowing him, he was ignorant of him whom he was venerating in that book. Philip came and showed him Jesus hidden under the letter… So understand that you cannot get involved in Holy Scripture without a guide who will show you the way.
(Biblical References: 1 Cor 2:7; 1 Cor 1:24; Col 2:31; 1 Sam 9:9; Jn 8:56; Ps 118:18; 2 Cor 3:16-18; Rev 5:1; Rev 3:7; Acts 8:26ff.)
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