Friday 2 June, 2023

Job 12:13, 14; 23:13

With God is all Wisdom and Power;
in Him are Counsel and Understanding.
– When He destroys, there is no rebuilding;
if He imprisons a man,
no one can release him.

Once He has decided,
no one can change His mind;
whatever He determines, He does.
– When He destroys, there is no rebuilding;
if He imprisons a man,
no one can release him.

Friday of the Eighth Week in Ordinary Time

Whit Friday (Ember Friday of Pentecost) (Traditional)

First Friday of the Month

Saints Marcellinus and Peter, Martyrs

SS. Tiburtius, Valerian and Maximus, Martyrs and Erasmus, Bishop, Martyr (Traditional)

WHIT FRIDAY (EMBER FRIDAY OF PENTECOST)

Gospel Reading: Lk 5:17-26

The stational Mass was at one time placed at Saints John and Paul, but in the earlier days was held where the Roman Missal now assigns it, at the 12 Holy Apostles.
The spirit in which the Church solemnizes Her feasts is one of intense spiritual joy. The Introit today contains, as it were, the summary of a great ascetic treatise on Christian Joy: “My lips shall rejoice when I shall sing to Thee, alleluia, alleluia”; this is the inward consequence of this prayer of love.
In the Postcommunion we pray that the Sacred Mysteries of the altar, which we have just celebrated in obedience to our LORD’s command, may become a remedy which shall strengthen our weakness in the hard trials that beset us.

“Here is this Heart that has loved men so much and instead, receives nothing but ingratitude, irreverence and contempt, in this Sacrament of Love”.

SAINTS MARCELLINUS AND PETER , MARTYRS

PETER, an exorcist, arrested during the brutal persecution, was cast into prison at Rome, under the emperor Diocletian, by the judge Serenus, in the first years of the 4th century,for confessing the Christian Faith. There he set free Paulina, the daughter of Artemius, the keeper of the prison, from an evil spirit which tormented her. Upon this, Artemius and his wife and all their house, with their neighbours who had run together to see the strange thing, were converted to Jesus Christ. Peter therefore brought them to MARCELLINUS the priest, who baptized them all. When Serenus heard of it, he called Peter and Marcellinus before him, and sharply rebuked them, adding to his bitter words threats and terrors, unless they would deny Christ. Marcellinus answered him with Christian boldness, whereupon he caused him to be buffeted, separated him from Peter, and shut him up naked, in a prison strewn with broken glass, without either food or light. Peter also he confined. But when both of them were found to increase in Faith and courage in their bonds, they were beheaded, and were secretly executed in the Silva Nigra (Black Woods). They remained unshaken in their testimony, confessing Jesus Christ gloriously by their blood. A church was erected at the site in the 4th century.

SAINTS TIBURTIUS, VALERIAN, AND MAXIMUS, MARTYRS AND ERASMUS, BISHOP, MARTYR

Sts. Tiburtius, Valerian, Maximus and Erasmus, pray for us!

The holy Martyrs, Tiburtiius and his Companions were martyred at Rome in 229 A.D. The Bishop Erasmus was martyred in 303 A.D.

From the Moral Reflections on Job by Saint Gregory the Great, Pope
(Lib. 10, 47-48; PL 75, 946-947)

The Interior Witness

Whoever is mocked by his friend, as I am, shall call upon God, and He shall hear him. A weak-minded person is frequently diverted toward pursuing exterior happiness when the breath of popular favour accompanies his good actions. So he gives up his own personal choices, preferring to remain at the mercy of whatever he hears from others. Thus, he rejoices not so much to become but to be called blessed. Eager for praise, he gives up what he had begun to be; and so he is severed from God by the very means by which he appeared to be commendable in God.

But sometimes a soul firmly strives for righteousness and yet is beset by men’s ridicule. He does what is admirable but he gets only mockery. He might have gone out of himself because of man’s praise; he returns to himself when repelled by their abuse. Finding no resting-place without, he cleaves more intensely to God within. All his Hope is fixed on his Creator, and amid all the ridicule and abuse he invokes his interior witness alone. One who is afflicted in this way grows closer to God the more he turns away from human popularity. He straightway pours himself out in prayer, and, pressured from without, he is refined with a more perfect purity to penetrate what is within.

In this context, the words apply: Whoever is mocked by his friend, as I am, shall call upon God, and He shall hear him. For while the wicked reproach the just, they show them whom they should look to as the witness of their actions. Thus afflicted, the soul strengthens itself by Prayer; it is united within to one who listens from on High precisely because it is cut off externally from the praise of men. Again, we should note how appropriately the words, are inserted, as I am. There are some people who are both oppressed by human mockery and are yet deprived of God’s favourable hearing. For when the mockery is done to a man’s own sin, it obviously does not produce the merit that is due to virtue.

The simplicity of the just man is laughed to scorn. It is the wisdom of this world to conceal the heart with stratagems, to veil one’s thoughts with words to make what is false appear true and what is true appear false. On the other hand it is the Wisdom of the just never to pretend anything for show, always to use words to express one’s thoughts, to love the Truth as it is and to avoid what is false, to do what is right without reward and to be more willing to put up with evil than to perpetrate it, not to seek revenge for wrong, and to consider as gain any insult for Truth’s sake. But this guilelessness is laughed to scorn, for the Virtue of Innocence is held as foolishness by the wise of this world. Anything that is done out of Innocence, they doubtless consider to be stupidity, and whatever Truth approves of, in practice is called folly by their worldly wisdom.

Faith, Prayer, and Martyrdom

Reflect on how wonderful it is, in the depths of night, when every human being and wild animal and winged creature is asleep, when there is the most profound silence, for you alone to be awake and to converse boldly with the common Master of all. So, sleep is sweet? But nothing is sweeter than praying. If you converse with Him one on one, you can accomplish a lot, with no one hassling you or cheating you of your supplication. You also have time on your side with regard to obtaining what you want. So, you’re tossing and turning, lying on a soft mattress, and can’t bear the thought of getting up? Reflect on the martyrs lying today on the iron ladder, not with a mattress lying underneath, but live coals strewn under it.

I want to conclude my sermon here so that you go away with the memory of the ladder fresh and crisp, and remember it at night and during the day. For even if countless chains restrain us, we’ll be able to smash them all easily and rise for Prayer if we constantly reflect on this ladder…. And just like people who make their houses brilliant by decorating them all over with colourful fresco, so too let us paint the martyrs’ tortures on the walls of our mind. For while that [former] painting is frivolous, this brings reward. This painting requires no money, nor expenditure, nor any skill…. By making our house brilliant with this painting’s rich colours, we may make it a fitting inn for the King of Heaven. For if He sees such paintings in our mind, He will come with the Father and, with the Holy Ghost, will make His dwelling-place among us. And from then on our mind will be a royal house and no unnatural thought will be able to enter while, like a colourful picture, the memory of the martyrs is always stored up inside and gives off much reflected light within and while God, the King of all, is constantly dwelling with us. So, by welcoming Christ here, we will be able to be welcomed into the Eternal Dwellings after we depart here. May we all attain these things through the Grace and loving kindness of Our LORD Jesus Christ, through Whom and with Whom be Glory to the Father, together with the Holy and Life-giving Spirit, for ever and ever. Amen.

Saint John Chrysostom

Psalm 119:104-105; John 6:69

I hate the ways of falsehood.

– Your Word is a Lantern which guides my steps,

a Light for the pathway before me.

LORD, to whom shall we go?

You have the words of Eternal Life.

– Your Word is a Lantern which guides my steps,

a Light for the pathway before me.

“The refusal to take sides on great moral issues is itself a decision. It is a silent acquiescence to evil. The Tragedy of our time is that those who still believe in honesty lack fire and conviction, while those who believe in dishonesty are full of passionate conviction.”
– Ven. Archbishop Fulton Sheen

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Daily Reflections