Daily Gospel for Friday, 28 February 2014
"Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom would we go? You
have the words of eternal life." John 6:68
Friday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time
Saint(s) of the day:
SAINTS ROMANUS and LUPICINUS
Abbots
(5th century)
Romanus at thirty-five years of age left his relatives and spent
some time in the monastery of Ainay at Lyons, at the great church at the
conflux of the Saône and Rhone which the faithful had built over the ashes of
the famous martyrs of that city; for their bodies being burned by the pagans,
their ashes were thrown into the Rhone, but a great part of them was gathered
by the Christians and deposited in this place.
Romanus a short time after retired into the forests of Mount
Jura, between France and Switzerland, and fixed his abode at a place called
Condate, at the conflux of the rivers Bienne and Aliere, where he found a spot
of ground fit for culture, and some trees which furnished him with a kind of
wild fruit. Here he spent his time in praying, reading, and laboring for his
subsistence.
Lupicinus, his brother, came to him some time after in company
with others, who were followed by several more, drawn by the fame of the virtue
and miracles of these two Saints. Their numbers increasing, they built several
monasteries, and a nunnery called La Beaume, which no men were allowed ever to
enter, and where St. Romanus chose his burial-place.
The brothers governed the monks jointly and in great harmony,
though Lupicinus was the more inclined to severity of the two. Lupicinus used no
other bed than a chair or a hard board; never touched wine, and would scarcely
ever suffer a drop either of oil or milk to be poured on his pottage. In summer
his subsistence for many years was only hard bread moistened in cold water, so
that he could eat it with a spoon. His tunic was made of various skins of
beasts sewn together,. with a cowl; he used wooden shoes, and wore no stockings
unless when he was obliged to go out of the monastery.
St. Romanus died about the year 460, and St. Lupicinus survived
him almost twenty years.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
Blessed Daniel Brottier
Priest
(1876-1936)
Blessed Daniel Brottier was a French Spiritan born in France in
1876 and ordained priest 1899. His zeal for spreading the Gospel beyond the
classroom or the confines of France made him to join the Spiritan Congregation.
He was sent to Senegal, West Africa. After eight years there,
his health suffered and he went back to France where he helped raise funds for
the construction of a new cathedral in Senegal.
At the outbreak of World War I Daniel became a volunteer
chaplain. He attributed his survival on the front lines to the intercession of
Saint Therese of Lisieux, and built a chapel for her at Auteuil when she was
canonized.
After the war he established a project for orphans and abandoned
children "the Orphan Apprentices of Auteuil" in the suburb of Paris.
He gave up his soul to God on the 28th of February, 1936 and was
beatified only 48 years later in 1984 by Pope John Paul II.
Friday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time
James 5: 9 Don’t grumble, brothers, against one another, so that you
won’t be judged. Behold, the judge stands at the door. 10 Take, brothers, for
an example of suffering and of patience, the prophets who spoke in the name of
the Lord. 11 Behold, we call them blessed who endured. You have heard of the
patience of Job, and have seen the Lord in the outcome, and how the Lord is
full of compassion and mercy. 12 But above all things, my brothers, don’t
swear— not by heaven, or by the earth, or by any other oath; but let your “yes”
be “yes”, and your “no”, “no”; so that you don’t fall into hypocrisy.[a]
Footnotes:
a. James 5:12 TR reads “under judgment” instead of “into
hypocrisy”
Psalm 103: By David.
1 Praise Yahweh, my soul!
All that is within me,
praise his holy name!
2 Praise Yahweh, my soul,
and don’t forget all
his benefits;
3 who forgives all your sins;
who heals all your
diseases;
4 who redeems your life from destruction;
who crowns you with
loving kindness and tender mercies;
8 Yahweh is merciful and gracious,
slow to anger, and
abundant in loving kindness.
9 He will not always accuse;
neither will he stay
angry forever.
11 For as the heavens are high above the earth,
so great is his loving
kindness toward those who fear him.
12 As far as the east is from the west,
so far has he removed
our transgressions from us.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Mark 10:1 He
arose from there and came into the borders of Judea and beyond the Jordan.
Multitudes came together to him again. As he usually did, he was again teaching
them. 2 Pharisees came to him testing him, and asked him, “Is it lawful for a
man to divorce his wife?”
3 He answered, “What did Moses command you?”
4 They said, “Moses allowed a certificate of divorce to be
written, and to divorce her.”
5 But Jesus said to them, “For your hardness of heart, he wrote
you this commandment. 6 But from the beginning of the creation, God made them
male and female.[a] 7 For this cause a man will leave his father and mother,
and will join to his wife, 8 and the two will become one flesh,[b] so that they
are no longer two, but one flesh. 9 What therefore God has joined together, let
no man separate.”
10 In the house, his disciples asked him again about the same
matter. 11 He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife, and marries another,
commits adultery against her. 12 If a woman herself divorces her husband, and
marries another, she commits adultery.”
Footnotes:
a. Mark 10:6 Genesis 1:27
b. Mark 10:8 Genesis 2:24
Friday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time
Commentary of the Day:
Blessed John-Paul II, Pope from 1978 to 2005
General Audience of 02/04/1980 (trans. © copyright Libreria
Editrice Vaticana)
"From the beginning of creation, 'God made them male and
female"
Because the Word of God was made flesh, the body has entered –
if I might put it this way – the great door into theology... The incarnation,
and the redemption that follows from it, have become the definitive source for
the sacrament of marriage... Many people and christians seek in marriage the
fulfillment of their vocation. How many there are who desire to find in it
their way to salvation and holiness.
For them, the answer Christ gave to the Pharisees, defenders of
the Old Testament, is particularly important... Indeed, along the way of this
vocation, how indispensable is a deepened awareness of the significance of the
body in its masculine and feminine aspects! How necessary an exact
understanding of the spousal significance of the body and its procreative meaning
– granted that everything that forms the content of the life of married couples
always has to find its full and personal meaning in their life together, their
behavior and sentiments. This is all the more necessary against the background
of a civilization that exists under the pressure of materialist and utilitarian
ways of thinking and judging...
How significant it is that Christ, in his answer to all these
questions, commands man to return... to the origins of his theological history.
He orders him to set himself at the frontier between innocence, the first
happiness, and the inheritance of his first fall. Isn't he trying to tell him
that... the way on which he is leading the human being, man or woman, in the
sacrament of marriage, namely the way of the redemption of the body, consists
in the recovery of that dignity in which, at one and the same time, the true
meaning of the human body, its personal meaning and its “communal” meaning, is
fulfilled?
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