"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."[John 6:68]Wednesday of Holy week
Saints of the day:
SAINT HUGH
Bishop
(1053-1132)
Bishop
(1053-1132)
It was the happiness of this Saint to receive from his cradle the strongest impressions of piety by the example and care of his illustrious and holy parents. He was born at Chateau-neuf, in the territory of Valence in Dauphiné, in 1053. His father, Odilo, who served his country in an honorable post in the army, labored by all the means in his power to make his soldiers faithful servants of their Creator, and by severe punishments to restrain vice.
By the advice of his son, St. Hugh, he afterwards became a Carthusian monk, and died at the age of a hundred, having received Extreme Unction and Viaticum from the hands of his son. Our Saint likewise assisted, in her last moments, his mother, who had for many years, under his direction, served God in her own house, by prayer , fasting, and plenteous alms-deeds. Hugh, from the cradle, appeared to be a child of benediction. He went through his studies with great applause, and having chosen to serve God in an ecclesiastical state, he accepted a canonry in the cathedral of Valence .
His great sanctity and learning rendered him an ornament of that church, and he was finally made Bishop of Grenoble. He set himself at once to reprove vice and to reform abuses, and so plentiful was the benediction of Heaven upon his labors that he had the comfort to see the face of his diocese in a short time exceedingly changed. After two years he privately resigned his bishopric, presuming on the tacit consent of the Holy See, and, putting on the habit of St. Bennet, he entered upon a novitiate in the austere abbey of Casa-Dei in Auvergne. There he lived a year, a perfect model of all virtues to that house of Saints, till Pope Gregory VII. commanded him, in virtue of holy obedience, to resume his pastoral charge.
He earnestly solicited Pope Innocent II. for leave to resign his bishopric, that he might die in solitude, but was never able to obtain his request. God was pleased to purify his soul by a lingering illness before He called him to Himself. Some time before his death he lost his memory for everything but his prayers.
He closed his penitential course on the 1st of April in 1132, wanting only two months of being Eighty years old, of which he had been fifty-two years bishop. Miracles attested the sanctity of his happy death, and he was canonized by Innocent II. in 1134.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
SAINT MARY OF EGYPT
Hermit
(c. 344-421)
(c. 344-421)
At the tender age of twelve, Mary left her father's house that she might sin without restraint, and for seventeen years she lived in shame at Alexandria. Then she accompanied a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and entangled many in grievous sin.
She was in that city on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, and went with the crowd to the church which contained the precious wood. The rest entered and adored; but Mary was invisibly held back. In that instant her misery and pollution burst upon her. Turning to the Immaculate Mother, whose picture faced her in the porch, she vowed thenceforth to do penance if she might enter and stand like Magdalen beside the Cross. Then she entered in. As she knelt before Our Lady on leaving the church, a voice came to her which said, "Pass over Jordan, and thou shalt find rest ."
She went into the wilderness, and there, in 420, forty-seven years after, the Abbot Zosimus met her. She told him that for seventeen years the old songs and scenes had haunted her; ever since, she had had perfect peace. At her request he brought her on Holy Thursday the sacred body of Christ.
She bade him return again after a year, and this time he found her corpse upon the sand, with an inscription sayings "Bury here the body of Mary the sinner."
The Bollandists place her death on April 1, 421. The Greek Church celebrates her feast on 1 April, while the Roman Martyrology assigns it to 2 April, and the Roman Calendar to 3 April. The Greek date is more likely to be correct; the others may be due to the fact that on those days portions of her relics reached the West.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]Wednesday of Holy Week
Book of Isaiah 50:4 Adonai Elohim has given me
the ability to speak as a man well taught,
so that I, with my words,
know how to sustain the weary.
Each morning he awakens my ear
to hear like those who are taught.
5 Adonai Elohim has opened my ear,
and I neither rebelled nor turned away.
6 I offered my back to those who struck me,
my cheeks to those who plucked out my beard;
I did not hide my face
from insult and spitting.
7 For Adonai Elohim will help.
This is why no insult can wound me.
This is why I have set my face like flint,
knowing I will not be put to shame.
8 My vindicator is close by;
let whoever dares to accuse me
appear with me in court!
Let whoever has a case against me step forward!
9 Look, if Adonai Elohim helps me,
who will dare to condemn me?
Here, they are all falling apart
like old, moth-eaten clothes.
Psalm 69:8 (7) For your sake I suffer insults,
shame covers my face.
9 (8) I am estranged from my brothers,
an alien to my mother’s children,
10 (9) because zeal for your house is eating me up,
and on me are falling the insults
of those insulting you.
21 (20) Insults have broken my heart
to the point that I could die.
I hoped that someone would show compassion,
but nobody did;
and that there would be comforters,
but I found none.
22 (21) They put poison in my food;
in my thirst, they gave me vinegar to drink.
31 (30) I will praise God’s name with a song
and extol him with thanksgiving.
33 (32) The afflicted will see it and rejoice;
you seeking after God, let your heart revive.
34 (33) For Adonai pays attention to the needy
and doesn’t scorn his captive people.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ According to Saint Matthew 26:14 Then one of the Twelve, the one called Y’hudah from K’riot, went to the head cohanim 15 and said, “What are you willing to give me if I turn Yeshua over to you?” They counted out thirty silver coins and gave them to Y’hudah.[a] 16 From then on he looked for a good opportunity to betray him.
17 On the first day for matzah, the talmidim came to Yeshua and asked, “Where do you want us to prepare your Seder?” 18 “Go into the city, to so-and-so,” he replied, “and tell him that the Rabbi says, ‘My time is near, my talmidim and I are celebrating Pesach at your house.’” 19 The talmidim did as Yeshua directed and prepared the Seder.
20 When evening came, Yeshua reclined with the twelve talmidim; 21 and as they were eating, he said, “Yes, I tell you that one of you is going to betray me.” 22 They became terribly upset and began asking him, one after the other, “Lord, you don’t mean me, do you?” 23 He answered, “The one who dips his matzah in the dish with me is the one who will betray me. 24 The Son of Man will die just as the Tanakh says he will; but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for him had he never been born!” 25 Y’hudah, the one who was betraying him, then asked, “Surely, Rabbi, you don’t mean me?” He answered, “The words are yours.”[Footnotes:
Matthew 26:15 Zechariah 11:12]
Wednesday of Holy Week
Commentary for Today:
Saint Cyril of Jerusalem (313-350), Bishop of Jerusalem, Doctor of the Church
Catechetical Lectures to the Newly Baptized 13, §6
And wouldest thou know certainly, that the Cross is a glory to Jesus? Hear his own words, not mine. Judas had become ungrateful to the Master of the house, and was about to betray him. Having but just now gone forth from the table and drunk his cup of blessing, in return for that draught of salvation he sought to shed righteous blood. He who ate of his bread was lifting up his heel against him...Then said Jesus: “The hour is come for the Son of man to be glorified” (Jn 12,23). Seest thou how he knew the Cross to be His proper glory?... Not that he was without glory before: for he was glorified with the glory which was before the foundation of the world (Jn 17,5). He was ever glorified as God; but now he was to be glorified in wearing the crown of his patience.
He did not give up his life by compulsion, nor was he put to death by murderous violence, but of his own accord. Hear what he says: “I have power to lay down my life, and I have power to take it up again” (Jn 10,18); I yield it to my enemies of my own choice; for unless I chose, this could not be. He came therefore of his own set purpose to his passion, rejoicing in his noble deed, smiling at the crown, cheered by the salvation of humankind; not ashamed of the cross since it was to save the world.
____________________________He did not give up his life by compulsion, nor was he put to death by murderous violence, but of his own accord. Hear what he says: “I have power to lay down my life, and I have power to take it up again” (Jn 10,18); I yield it to my enemies of my own choice; for unless I chose, this could not be. He came therefore of his own set purpose to his passion, rejoicing in his noble deed, smiling at the crown, cheered by the salvation of humankind; not ashamed of the cross since it was to save the world.
No comments:
Post a Comment