Daily Gospel for Tuesday, 17 June 2014

Daily Gospel for Tuesday, 17 June 2014
"Simon Peter answered him, 'Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words of eternal life.'"(John 6:68)
Tuesday of the Eleventh week in Ordinary Time
Saints of the Day:

Saint Herve of Brittany

Abbot

(6th century)

Saint Herve, sometimes called Harvey or Hervues, is venerated throughout Brittany but we have few reliable particulars on him--his life was not written until the late medieval period. All we really know is that he was a hermit in Brittany, where he is still highly venerated.
Herve was the son of the bard Hyvarnion, and was born blind. His father died when Herve was an infant.  He was raised by his uncles because his mother became an anchoress.
He lived for a while as a hermit and bard, and then joined a monastic school at Plouvien which had been founded by his uncle. Abbot of Plouvien, he built an abbey at Lanhourneau.
He was venerated as a miracle worker and bard. He is reported to have a special ministry of healing animals, and to have a domesticated wolf as a companion.
He is invoked against eye trouble, and he is depicted with a wolf.

Saimt Albert Chmielowski

Feastday: June 17

Birth: 1845

Death: 1916

Beatified By: June 22, 1983 by Pope John Paul II

Canonized By: November 12, 1989, in Saint Peter's Square by Pope John Paul II

Albert Chmielowski was a Polish religious brother and founder of the Albertines. He is a saint of the Catholic Church. Albert is also known as Brat Albert (Brother Albert); in recognition of his holiness, he has also been called the "Brother of Our Lord", "Brother of Our God", and "Our God's Brother".

Saints Teresa and Sancia of Portugal

Feastday: June 17

Teresa was the eldest daughter of King Sancho I of Portugal and sister of SS. Mafalda and Sanchia. She married her cousin, King Alfonso IX of Leon. The couple had several children, but when the marriage was declared invalid because of consanguinity, she returned to Portugal and founded a Benedictine monastery on her estate at Lorvao. She replaced the monks with nuns following the Cistercian Rule, expanded the monastery to accommodate three hundred nuns, and lived there. In about 1231, at the request of Alfonso's second wife and widow, Berengaria, she settled a dispute among their children over the succession of the throne of Leon, and on her return to Lorvao, she probably became a nun. Her cult, with that of her sister Sanchia, was approved by Pope Clement XI in 1705. Her feast day is June 17.

SAINT AVITUS

Abbot

St. Avitus was a native of Orleans, and, retiring into Auvergne, took the monastic habit, together with St. Calais, in the abbey of Menat, at that time very small, though afterward enriched by Queen Brunehault, and by St. Boner, Bishop of Clermont.
The two Saints soon after returned to Miscy, a famous abbey situated a league and a half below Orleans. It was founded toward the end of the reign of Clovis I. by St. Euspicius, a holy priest, honored on the 14th of June, and his nephew St. Maximin or Mesnim, whose name this monastery, which is now of the Cistercian Order, bears.
Many call St. Maximin the first abbot, others St. Euspicius the first, St. Maximin the second, and St. Avitus the third. But our Saint and St. Calais made not a long stay at Miscy, though St. Maximin gave them a gracious reception. In quest of a closer retirement, St. Avitus, who had succeeded St. Maximin, soon after resigned the abbacy, and with St. Calais lived a recluse in the territory now called Dunois, on the frontiers of La Perche.
Others joining them, St. Calais retired into a forest in Maine, and King Clotaire built a church and monastery for St. Avitus and his companions. This is at present a Benedictine nunnery, called St. Avy of Chateaudun, and is situated on the Loire, at the foot of the hill on which the town of Chateaudun is built, in the diocese of Chartres.
Three famous monks, Leobin, afterwards Bishop of Chartres, Euphronius, and Rusticus, attended our Saint to his happy death, which happened about the year 530. His body was carried to Orleans, and buried with great pomp in that city.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
Tuesday of the Eleventh week in Ordinary Time
1st book of Kings 21:17 Yahweh’s word came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, 18 “Arise, go down to meet Ahab king of Israel, who dwells in Samaria. Behold, he is in the vineyard of Naboth, where he has gone down to take possession of it. 19 You shall speak to him, saying, ‘Yahweh says, “Have you killed and also taken possession?”’ You shall speak to him, saying, ‘Yahweh says, “In the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth, dogs will lick your blood, even yours.”’”
20 Ahab said to Elijah, “Have you found me, my enemy?”
He answered, “I have found you, because you have sold yourself to do that which is evil in Yahweh’s sight. 21 Behold, I will bring evil on you, and will utterly sweep you away and will cut off from Ahab everyone who urinates against a wall,[a] and him who is shut up and him who is left at large in Israel. 22 I will make your house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha the son of Ahijah for the provocation with which you have provoked me to anger, and have made Israel to sin.” 23 Yahweh also spoke of Jezebel, saying, “The dogs will eat Jezebel by the rampart of Jezreel. 24 The dogs will eat he who dies of Ahab in the city; and the birds of the sky will eat he who dies in the field.”
25 But there was no one like Ahab, who sold himself to do that which was evil in Yahweh’s sight, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up. 26 He did very abominably in following idols, according to all that the Amorites did, whom Yahweh cast out before the children of Israel. 27 When Ahab heard those words, he tore his clothes, and put sackcloth on his flesh, and fasted, and lay in sackcloth, and went softly.
28 Yahweh’s word came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, 29 “See how Ahab humbles himself before me? Because he humbles himself before me, I will not bring the evil in his days; but in his son’s days will I bring the evil on his house.”
Footnotes:
a. 1 Kings 21:21 or, male
Psalms 51:3 For I know my transgressions.
    My sin is constantly before me.
4 Against you, and you only, have I sinned,
    and done that which is evil in your sight;
that you may be proved right when you speak,
    and justified when you judge.
5 Behold, I was born in iniquity.
    In sin my mother conceived me.
6 Behold, you desire truth in the inward parts.
    You teach me wisdom in the inmost place.
11 Don’t throw me from your presence,
    and don’t take your holy Spirit from me.
16 For you don’t delight in sacrifice, or else I would give it.
    You have no pleasure in burnt offering.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 5:43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor[a] and hate your enemy.’[b] 44 But I tell you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who mistreat you and persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Don’t even the tax collectors do the same? 47 If you only greet your friends, what more do you do than others? Don’t even the tax collectors[c] do the same? 48 Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.
Footnotes:
a. Matthew 5:43 Leviticus 19:18
b. Matthew 5:43 not in the Bible, but see Qumran Manual of Discipline Ix, 21-26
c. Matthew 5:47 NU reads “Gentiles” instead of “tax collectors”.
Tuesday of the Eleventh week in Ordinary Time
Commentary of the Day:

Julian of Norwich (1342-after 1416), recluse 

Revelations of divine love, ch. 35

"He makes his sun rise on the bad and the good"

All will be well; for the fulness of joy is to contemplate God in everything. For by the same blessed power, wisdom and love by which he made all things, our good Lord always leads them to the same end, and he himself will bring them there, and at the right time we shall see it... Everything which our Lord God does is righteous, and all which he tolerates is honorable; and in these two are good and evil comprehended. For our Lord does everything which is good, and our Lord tolerates what is evil. I do not say that evil is honorable, but I say that our Lord God's toleration is honorable, through which his goodness will be known eternally, and his wonderful meekness and mildness by this working of mercy and grace...
God himself is true righteousness, and all his works are righteously performed, as they are ordained from eternity by his exalted power, his exalted wisdom, his exalted goodness. And what he has ordained for the best he constantly brings to pass in the same way, and directs to the same end... in which righteousness we are endlessly and marvelously protected, above all creatures. 
And mercy is an operation which comes from the goodness of God, and it will go on operating so long as sin is permitted to harass righteous souls... By his toleration God permits us to fall, and in his blessed love, with his power and wisdom, we are protected, and by his mercy and race we are raised to much more joy. And so in righteousness and mercy he wishes to be known and loved, now and forever.
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