Daily Reflections

Amos 3:7, 8; 7:15

The LORD does nothing
without revealing His plan to His servants, the prophets.
– The LORD has spoken;
who will not prophesy?

The LORD took me as I was following the flock,
and said to me:
Go, prophesy to My people.
– The LORD has spoken;
who will not prophesy?

Tuesday of the Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Saint Dominic, Confessor

Saint John Mary Vianney, Confessor (Traditional)

Sts. Cyriacus, Largus, Smaragdus, Martyrs (Traditional)

Solemnity of Saint Mary of the Cross, Religious (Australia)

SAINT DOMINIC, CONFESSOR

Dominic was born in 1170 in Calaruega, Spain, and joined the Augustinian Canons. While preaching against the Albigensian heresy in France, he saw the need for solid preachers of the Gospel who would be fortified by study, strengthened by prayer, and confirmed in poverty. The men who followed Dominic in this new form of religious life became known as the Order of Preachers, or the Dominicans. Pope Honorious III, in his 1216 bull approving the order, looked to Dominic’s brethren as “the future champions of the Faith and the true lights of the world”. Dominic died in 1221 surrounded by his friars.

SAINT JOHN MARY VIANNEY, CONFESSOR 

(See Friday 4th August blog for details)

STS. CYRIACUS, LARGUS, SMARAGDUS, MARTYRS

St. Cyriacus was a holy deacon of Rome under Popes Marcellinus and Marcellus. With Largus, Smaragdus, and about twenty others he crowned with martyrdom in 303, in the persecution Diocletian. The occasion of the translation of their remains many years later to a church dedicated to them led to the institution of a festival in their memory. St. Cyriacus is invoked for diseases of the eye, and against diabolical possessions.

SAINT MARY OF THE CROSS, RELIGIOUS

St. Mary MacKillop, also known as St. Mary of the Cross, was an Australian nun declared a saint by the Catholic Church. She was born in Melbourne, on January 15, 1842, as the eldest of their eight children.

MacKillop was educated in private schools and at home by her father. She received her First Holy Communion at the age of nine.

Growing up, MacKillop and her family struggled financially. The family farm never had much success. During most times, the family had to survive on the small wages the children were able to bring home.

When she was 14, MacKillop started working as a clerk in Melbourne. To provide for her needy family, she took a job as governess at her aunt and uncle, Alexander and Margaret Cameron’s property at Penola, South Australia in 1860. While there, Mary MacKillop was tasked with looking after their children and teaching them. MacKillop, determined to help the poor, included the other farm children on the Cameron estate in her care.

Her work as a governess and with the children brought her into contact with Father Woods, the parish priest in the south east.

MacKillop stayed with the Cameron’s for two years before accepting a job teaching the children of Portland, Victoria in 1862. Two years later, MacKillop opened her own boarding school called, Bay View House Seminary for Young Ladies, now known as Bayview College and was joined by the rest of her family.

Father Woods, concerned about the lack of Catholic education in South Australia, invited MacKillop and her sisters to open a Catholic school in Penola. Together, they successfully opened the school in a stable. Woods was appointed director of education and he and MacKillop were named founders of the school. Following renovations completed by their brother, the MacKillops started teaching more than 50 children. At this time, MacKillop formally declared her dedication to God and began wearing black.

In November 1866, Mary MacKillop and her sisters were joined by several other women. MacKillop, who now took on the religious name “Sister Mary of the Cross,” began wearing simple religious habits. The group of women began calling themselves the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Sacred Heart and moved to a new house in Adelaide.

In 1925, the Mother Superior of the Sisters of St Joseph, Mother Laurence, began the process to have MacKillop declared a saint. After several years of hearings, close examination of MacKillop’s writings and a 23-year delay, the initial phase of investigations was completed in 1973. After further investigations, MacKillop’s “heroic virtue” was declared in 1992.

That same year, the church endorsed the belief that Veronica Hopson, apparently dying of leukemia in 1961, was cured by praying for MacKillop’s intercession; MacKillop was beatified on January 19, 1995 by Pope John Paul II and she was canonized on October 17, 2010 by Pope Benedict XVI, making her the first Australian saint.

From various writings on the history of the Order of Preachers
(Libellus de principiis O.P: Acta canonizationis sancti Dominici: Monumenta O.P. Mist. 16, Romae 1935, pp. 30 ss, 146-147)

He spoke with God or about God

Dominic possessed such great integrity and was so strongly motivated by divine love, that without a doubt he proved to be a bearer of honour and grace. He was a man of great equanimity, except when moved to compassion and mercy. And since a joyful heart animates the face, he displayed the peaceful composure of a spiritual man in the kindness he manifested outwardly and by the cheerfulness of his countenance.

Wherever he went he showed himself in word and deed to be a man of the Gospel. During the day no one was more community-minded or pleasant toward his brothers and associates. During the night hours no one was more persistent in every kind of vigil and supplication. He seldom spoke unless it was with God, that is, in prayer, or about God, and in this matter he instructed his brothers.

Frequently he made a special personal petition that God would deign to grant him a genuine Charity, effective in caring for and obtaining the salvation of men. For he believed that only then would he be truly a member of Christ, when he had given himself totally for the salvation of men, just as the LORD Jesus, the Saviour of all, had offered Himself completely for our salvation. So, for this work, after a lengthy period of careful and provident planning, he founded the Order of Friars Preachers.

In his conversations and letters he often urged the brothers of the Order to study constantly the Old and New Testaments. He always carried with him the Gospel according to Matthew and the Epistles of Paul, and so well did he study them that he almost knew them from memory.

Two or three times he was chosen Bishop, but he always refused, preferring to live with his brothers in poverty. Throughout his life, he preserved the honour of his virginity. He desired to be scourged and cut to pieces, and so die for the Faith of Christ. Of him Pope Gregory IX declared: “I knew him as a steadfast follower of the apostolic way of life. There is no doubt that he is in Heaven, sharing in the glory of the Apostles themselves.

DAILY MEDITATION

All  our good works united would not equal one Sacrifice of the Mass, because they are  the work of men, while the Mass is the work of God. Martyrdom is nothing in comparison to the Mass, martyrdom being the sacrifice which man makes of his life to God, and the Mass the sacrifice which God makes of His own Body and Blood to man. When before the Blessed Sacrament, instead of looking around us, let us close our eyes and open our heart; it is then the good God will open His. We will go to Him, He will come to us; to ask and to receive will be as a breath from one to the other.

Our LORD has said, “Whatsoever ye ask the Father in My name, He will give it to you” [See John 16:23]. Never should we have thought of asking God for His own Son. But what man could never imagine, God has done; what man could never express nor conceive, and what he had never presumed to desire, God, in His love, has expressed, conceived, and executed. Could we ever have dared tell God to put His Son to death for us, to give us His Son’s Flesh to eat, and His Blood to drink? Were it otherwise, man would then have been able to imagine things that God could not do; he would have outstripped God in the inventions of love! Ah! no, this were impossible.

The good God, wishing to give Himself to us in the Sacrament of His love, has implanted in us a desire, grand and vast, that He alone can satisfy. Beside this beautiful Sacrament, we are like a person dying of thirst on the river shore: he needs, but bend his head to quench his thirst! Or like one who remains poor while a treasure is within reach which he has only to stretch forth his hand and take!… From this Heart flows a stream of tenderness and mercy to wash away the sins of the world…. When we come from the altar, were someone to say to us, “What do you bear away with you?” You could answer truthfully, “I bear Heaven within me.“

St. John Vianney [d. 1859] – French Catholic priest and model of pastoral zeal, known as the Curé of Ars and patron saint of parish priests.

Pure-Hearted Guides
Who “Listen and Understand”

The saints have done their utmost to love God with a love identical to His. God’s love is a love that is essentially active and effective, a love that acts and creates. The saints were not content with a simple emotional satisfaction, with a wonderful admiration, or with a superficial enthusiasm. They understood the saying of Jesus: It is not those who say to me, “LORD, LORD”, who will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but the person who does the Will of My Father in Heaven. The saints were consumed with a thirst for justice and the Kingdom of God…. God had stooped down towards us, in the excess of His Love, abasing Himself even to our level; He had descended quite lower than we, even to the point of taking upon Himself the gravest humiliations. The saints understood that they, in their turn, should humble themselves before God, because God had reversed His role. They wanted to descend from the throne of their own self-love and to seek the last place and that obligation of service God had chosen for Himself on earth….

Who can tell us what the object of love was for Saint Dominic in those nights of penance and prayer passed in tears at the foot of the altar? It was God, preferred above all, loved more than all, with undivided heart, yet with no exclusions—for this love embraced, elevated, and intensified all legitimate affections. In the fire of Charity, these affections became an ardent and consuming thirst for the salvation of souls. Finally, as God offered Himself for us on the Cross, so the saints offered themselves to God, even to the point of martyrdom, so that His Will might be accomplished, that His Kingdom might be established in souls, and that He might be glorified. And when, as in the case of Saint Dominic, they were unable to obtain martyrdom though ardently desiring it, they still experienced a daily death, though no less heroic, of labours, pains, and continual tribulations. As God gave Himself to them as Food, in the same way, they responded to His love and let themselves be consumed body and soul by Him, making themselves “food” of God.

Saint Dominic, Saint Catherine, Saint Peter Martyr, Saint Rose of Lima, Saint Catherine of Ricci, Saint Pius V, Saint Louis Bertrand, and all the saints tell us the same thing through their lives, namely, that the ardent Charity that burned in their hearts consumed them little by little, for this is the law of love. Love, which is as strong as death, makes us die to ourselves that we may be born to another life. Such is the response of the saints to God’s love.

Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, o.p.

Father Garrigou-Lagrange († 1964) was a prolific Dominican theologian and spiritual writer. He was the theology doctoral advisor of the future Saint John Paul II. [From Knowing the Love of God: Lessons from a Spiritual Master.Raymond Smith, o.p., and Rod Gorton, Trs. ©

“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

1 John 3:1-2

See how great is the love the Father has given us;
– we are called God’s children
and that is what we are.

We know that when He appears,
we shall be like Him,
for we shall see Him as He really is.
– We are called God’s children
and that is what we are.

FEAST OF THE TRANSFIGURATION OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST

The feast of the Transfiguration is a celebration of God’s revelation. The glory of God that was veiled in the law and prophets—from Moses to Elijah—is now unveiled before the Church, to the Apostles and us who receive their message. This feast does not simply point to a God who is brilliant upon a mountain. It also prepares us to remain faithful to a God crucified on a mountain. We ourselves have been saved through this vision of Christ in glory and Christ on the Cross, and are now continually transformed by both Tabor and Calvary. “And we, with our unveiled faces reflecting like mirrors the brightness of the LORD, all grow brighter and brighter as we are turned into the image that we reflect; this is the work of the LORD who is Spirit” (2 Co 3:18).

This festival was originally commemorated on the Vigil of Ember Saturday in Lent. With the decline of liturgical understanding a special festival was instituted in its honour, in order to arouse popular devotion to this mystery. It is now the patronal feast of the Lateran Basilica, and of all churches under the title of Holy Saviour.

From a sermon on the Transfiguration of the LORD by Anastasius of Sinai, Bishop
(Nn. 6-10: Melanges d’archéologie et d’histoire 67 [1955], 241-244)

It is good for us to be here

Upon Mount Thabor, Jesus revealed to His disciples a heavenly mystery. While living among them He had spoken of the Kingdom and of His second coming in glory, but to banish from their hearts any possible doubt concerning the Kingdom and to confirm their faith in what lay in the future by its prefiguration in the present, He gave them on Mount Thabor a wonderful vision of His Glory, a foreshadowing of the Kingdom of Heaven. It was as if He said to them: “As time goes by you may be in danger of losing your faith. To save you from this I tell you now that some standing here listening to me will not taste death until they have seen the Son of Man coming in the glory of His Father.” Moreover, in order to assure us that Christ could command such power when He wished, the evangelist continues: Six days later, Jesus took with Him Peter, James and John, and led them up a high mountain where they were alone. There, before their eyes, He was transfigured. His face shone like the sun, and His clothes became as white as light. Then the disciples saw Moses and Elijah appear, and they were talking to Jesus.

These are the divine wonders we celebrate today; this is the saving revelation given us upon the mountain; this is the festival of Christ that has drawn us here. Let us listen, then, to the sacred Voice of God so compellingly calling us from on high, from the summit of the mountain, so that with the LORD’s chosen disciples we may penetrate the deep meaning of these holy mysteries, so far beyond our capacity to express. Jesus goes before us to show us the Way, both up the mountain and into Heaven, and—I speak boldly—it is for us now to follow Him with all speed, yearning for the heavenly vision that will give us a share in His radiance, renew our spiritual nature and transform us into His own likeness, making us for ever sharers in His Godhead and raising us to heights as yet undreamed of.

Let us run with confidence and joy to enter into the cloud like Moses and Elijah, or like James and John. Let us be caught up like Peter to behold the divine vision and to be transfigured by that glorious Transfiguration. Let us retire from the world, stand aloof from the earth, rise above the body, detach ourselves from creatures and turn to the Creator, to whom Peter in ecstasy exclaimed: LORD, it is good for us to be here.

It is indeed good to be here, as you have said, Peter. It is good to be with Jesus and to remain here for ever. What greater happiness or higher honour could we have than to be with God, to be made like Him and to live in His Light?

Therefore, since each of us possesses God in his heart and is being transformed into His divine image, we also should cry out with joy: It is good for us to be here—here where all things shine with divine radiance, where there is joy and gladness and exultation; where there is nothing in our hearts but peace, serenity and stillness; where God is seen. For here, in our hearts, Christ takes up His abode together with the Father, saying as He enters: Today salvation has come to this House. With Christ, our hearts receive all the wealth of His Eternal blessings, and there where they are stored up for us in Him, we see reflected as in a mirror both the first fruits and the whole of the world to come.

Feast of God’s Mountain

I, too, stand today joyfully on this holy peak, this mountain, lovingly celebrating. Stretching out my hand, I cry out in a loud voice from this mountain, inviting all the mountains to worship Christ our God, bowing your peaks towards Mount Thabor!… Join in the songs of praise and in the joyful celebration of Christ on Mount Thabor with a single voice, singing to Him together and saying:

Hail, O Creator of all things, Christ our LORD, divinely born Bearer of Light, You who gave shape to all creation together, and who form it into something better still! Hail, Mary, living mountain of God, holier than all the saints: you who formed Christ in flesh without transforming Him—Mary, countrywoman of Nazareth, God-bearer, Virgin Mother! Hail, holy town, sacred dwelling of God: Nazareth, before all cities and all places the first of all cities! Hail, O icon of the heavenly kingdom, holy, All-holy Mount Thabor: beautiful with a loveliness beyond all mountains! Hail to you, too, O nearby Jordan: most divine and precious of all rivers: in your waves of joy—in your forbidding waters—you revealed, as did John the Forerunner, the rebirth that comes from God! Hail to you, too, Sea of Tiberias: at once small and yet more famous than all seas; when you were trodden upon by those dry and holy feet, you were also made holy!… Hail, children of Christ! Hail, boast of all the faithful peoples of the Church: for this present festive celebration is a time of joy and happiness, in which God’s people has come together for this brilliant feast of God’s mountain! Dance with one soul and one voice with the angels, move in a circle with the stars; proclaim the word with the Apostles, lead the way with Moses, cry out with Elijah; reveal the Truth from the peak, thunder from the cloud, bear witness from Heaven, shout from the mountaintop, trumpet forth from the rock; invite Nazareth, call Galilee together; make your festival brilliant, deck yourself with speeches of praise, shine out with lamps, skip with the mountains, dance with the maidens, resound with the sea, serve the people with the Jordan; walk up on the mountaintop, celebrate on Mount Thabor with Christ, the universal king—the true God, Our LORD Jesus Christ!

Saint Anastasius of Sinai

Saint Anastasius of Sinai († 8th century) was a Greek priest, theologian, and monk. [From Light on the Mountain: Greek Patristic and Byzantine Homilies on the Transfiguration of the Lord, Brian E. Daley, s.j., Tr. ©

DAILY MEDITATION 

“The exalted King of Glory, come, let us adore Him.” With these words the Invitatory of the Divine Office introduces today’s feast. The Transfiguration of Christ is a feast which celebrates the exaltation of Christ, the LORD. The patriarchs and prophets of the Old Testament, represented by Moses and Elias, give testimony on Tabor, and confess Him to be the Messias predicted in the Old Testament. The voice of the Father is heard from Heaven, saying: “This is My beloved Son;… hear ye Him“ [Gospel]. Christ’s Transfiguration on Mount Tabor assures us of His Divinity and confirms us in our Face and our Hope.

We believe firmly in Jesus, the King of Glory, who will come again with power and glory to judge the living and the dead. “We have not followed, cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and the presence of Our LORD Jesus Christ [His Second Coming with great power]; but having been made eyewitnesses of His majesty [Transfiguration]. 

“For He received from God the Father honour and glory; this Voice coming down to Him from the excellent glory: ‘This is, My Beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased, here ye Him.’And this Voice we heard brought from Heaven when we were with Him in the holy mount“ [Epistle]. The glory in which Peter saw the transfigured LORD on the mountain, gives Peter, and all of us, the certainty that the LORD will later reappear in His Glory, and that, even as man, He is the King of Glory. “Glory and wealth are in His house, and His justice remaineth  forever and ever” [Offertory]. 

Although He was the Son of God, “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death on the Cross. For which cause God also hath exalted Him, and hath given Him a name, which is above all names. That in the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow,… in Heaven, on earth, and under the earth. And that every tongue should confess that the LORD Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father“ [Philippians 2:8–11]. The prophets of the Old Testament also give testimony of Him [see Acts 10:43]. We who see Him in His glory on Tabor through Peter “have the more firm prophetical word, whereunto you do well to attend, as to a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day  dawn, and the daystar arise in your hearts“ [Epistle]. We believe; we adore the King of Glory. “I speak my words to the King” [Gradual]. My thoughts, my wishes, my time, my strength, my love, my sacrifices, all centre on Him.

Dom Benedict Baur [d.1963] – German Benedictine, respected theological, and arch abbot of Saint Martin’s Abbey in Bueron

Matthew 17:2, 3; see Luke 9:32, 34

His face shone like the sun;
– when the disciples saw His Glory,
they were filled with wonder and fear.

Suddenly Moses and Elijah appeared before them
speaking with Jesus.
– When the disciples saw His glory,
they were filled with wonder and fear.

“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

FIRST SATURDAYS DEVOTION

Our Lady appeared to St. Lucia in 1925, promising her gracious assistance unto salvation to all those who practised devotion to her immaculate heart through the five first Saturdays.

FIVE SATURDAYS IN PREPARATION FOR:

1. Blasphemy against her Immaculate Conception.
2. Blasphemy against her perpetual virginity.
3. Blasphemy against her divine eternity, and refusal to accept her as the mother of all men.
4. Instilling indifference, scorn, and even hatred towards this immaculate mother in the hearts of children.
5. Direct insults against her sacred images.

HOW TO COMPLETE THE FIVE FIRST SATURDAYS:

On the first Saturday of five consecutive months, go to Confession, receive Holy Communion, and keep Our Lady company by saying five decades of the Rosary, with fifteen minutes of meditation, with the intention of making reparation for the offenses listed above.

First Saturday of the Month 

The Dedication of the Basilica
of Saint Mary Major

The Dedication of the Church of St. Mary of the Snow (Traditional)

DEDICATION OF THE CHURCH OF ST. MARY OF THE SNOW

This date marks the dedication of Rome’s first Marian basilica by Pope Sixtus III around the year 435 to honour the Our Lady,after the Council of Ephesus in 431, in which the mother of Jesus was acclaimed as Mother of God. The original structure of Saint Mary Major was built in the 3RD century under Pope Liberius on the Esquiline at Rome. It is said that Mary signalled her choice of the church’s site with a miraculous snowfall  in the heat of August. This was the sign she gave to John, a devout and wealthy patrician, commanding that a church be built. For this reason that basilica is known as Saint-Mary-of-the-Snow, and the name is also given to the feast of its dedication. After the basilica’s construction, a miraculous shower of white rose petals fell upon the gathered faithful. The basilica is still known as Maria ad Nives, “Mary of the Snows”.The stations for Christmas are held in this church, because some relics of the Crib of Bethlehem preserved there. The Pope was also accustomed to officiate there on the first Sunday in advent, at the beginning of the ecclesiastical year.

From a homily delivered at the Council of Ephesus by Saint Cyril of Alexandria, Bishop
(Hom. 4: PG 77, 991, 995-996)

In praise of Mary, Mother of God

I see here a joyful company of Christian men met together in ready response to the call of Mary, the holy and ever-virgin Mother of God. The great grief that weighed upon me is changed into joy by your presence, venerable Fathers. Now the beautiful saying of David the Psalmist: How good and pleasant it is for brothers to live together in unity has come true for us.

Therefore, Holy and Incomprehensible Trinity, we salute you at whose summons we have come together to this church of Mary, the Mother of God.

Mary, Mother of God, we salute you. Precious vessel, worthy of the whole world’s reverence, you are an evershining light, the crown of virginity, the symbol of orthodoxy, an indestructible temple, the place that held Him Whom who [no] place can contain, mother and virgin. Because of you the holy Gospels could say: Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD.

We salute you, for in your holy womb He, who is beyond all limitation, was confined. Because of you the Holy Trinity is glorified and adored; the Cross is called precious and is venerated throughout the world; the heavens exult; the angels and archangels make merry; demons are put to flight; the devil that tempter, is thrust down from Heaven; the fallen race of man is taken up on high; all creatures possessed by the madness of idolatry have attained knowledge of the Truth; believers receive holy Baptism; the oil of gladness is poured out; the Church is established throughout the world; pagans are brought to repentance.

What more is there to say? Because of you the Light of the Only-begotten Son of God has shone upon those who sat in darkness and in the shadow of death; prophets pronounced the Word of God; the Apostles preached salvation to the Gentiles; the dead are raised to life, and kings rule by the power of the Holy Trinity.

Who can put Mary’s high honour into words? She is both mother and virgin. I am overwhelmed by the wonder of this miracle. Of course no one could be prevented from living in the house He had built for Himself, yet who would invite mockery by asking His own servant to become His mother?

Behold then the joy of the whole universe. Let the union of God and man in the Son of the Virgin Mary fill us with awe and adoration. Let us fear and worship the undivided Trinity as we sing the praise of the ever-virgin Mary, the holy temple of God, and of God Himself, her Son and spotless Bridegroom. To Him be Glory for ever and ever. Amen.

DAILY MEDITATION 

When God created this world, and beheld all the things that He had made, He saw that they were good, and was pleased in the manifestation of His own divine perfections which they presented. In Mary, He beheld a spotless creature, who, according to the Scripture expression, “Although black was beautiful“ [Canticle 1:4] – that is, who, also belonging to a sinful race, was unsullied by the stain of sin, having been exempted, through the future merits of her Divine Son, from contracting the guilt, and suffering the consequences of Adam’s prevarication. Hence, Richard of Saint Lawrence writes: “The Blessed Virgin was lovely, even in the eyes of God.“ 

We cannot doubt but that our first parents before their fall possessed natural advantages, which we no longer enjoy. Mary, through the Divine Mercy, was not only placed in the same condition, as if Adam had never fallen, but was, moreover, endowed with gifts, both of the natural and supernatural order, and in some measure proportioned to the greatness of her destiny. Hence, in the Canticle of Canticles, the spouse, by whom the holy Fathers understand the Blessed Virgin to be signified, is called “the fairest among women“ [1:7], and the daughters of Jerusalem are represented as struck with admiration at her beauty, and exclaiming: “return, return, Sulamitess; return, return, that we may behold, thee” [6:12].

If we admire the wisdom of God, exhibited in the beauty of the firmament, or in variety of wonders which the earth presents to our contemplation, how much more justly are we called on to admire the manifestation of the same divine perfections in this singularly favoured creature. “Who can refuse to love thee, Mary,“ says Saint Bonaventure; “thou art more beautiful than the sun; thou art sweeter than honey; to all thou art amiable, to all thou art gracious.” Mary was amiable beyond all other creatures, because, beyond all of the creatures, she reflected the divine perfections in the moral qualities of her nature. All that we can conceive of suavity of disposition, gentleness of nature, and kindliness of manner, were found in her in a degree for surpassing our conceptions.

Bishop Charles H Colton [d 1915] – American, 4th Bishop of Buffalo, New York, and ardent devotee of Our Lady.

RESPONSORY

Rejoice with me, all you who love the LORD,
for in my lowliness I have pleased the Most High.
– From my womb I have given birth to a Son who is both God and man.

From this day all generations will call me Blessed,
for the LORD has looked with favour on His lowly servant.
– From my womb I have given birth to a Son who is both God and man.

“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

First Friday of the Month

Saint John Mary Vianney, Confessor 

Saint Dominic, Confessor (Traditional)

SAINT JEAN MARY VIANNEY, CONFESSOR

Saint Jean Marie Vianney, patron of priests, known as the “Curé of Ars”. was born  of peasant stock in Dardilly, France, during the days of the French Revolution, John desired from a young age to be a priest and after years of difficult study in the seminary, was ordained a priest in 1815. Three years later he was made parish priest of Ars, a remote French hamlet near Lyons,   He brought Christ to his parishioners through the fervent celebration of the Eucharist, assistance to the poor, and, above all, the Sacrament of Penance where his reputation as a confessor and director of souls made him known throughout the Christian world. His life was one of extreme mortification.

Accustomed to the most severe austerities, beleaguered by swarms of penitents, and besieged by the devil, this great mystic manifested imperturbable patience. He was a wonderworker loved by the crowds, but he retained a childlike simplicity, and he remains to this day the living image of the priest after the Heart of Christ.

He heard confessions of people from all over the world for the sixteen hours each day.  Hundreds of pilgrims availed themselves of his aid every week. His life was filled with works of charity and love. It is recorded that even the staunchest of sinners were converted at his mere word. The Curé was still hearing confessions from his bed a few days before his death on August 4, 1859. He was canonized May 31, 1925.

SAINT DOMINIC, CONFESSOR

Saint Dominic, the founder of the order of Friars Preachers, was born in Spain in 1170, and died at Bologna, Italy, in 1221. In 1208, while the saint was at prayer, Our Lady appeared to him, gave him the Rosary, and bade him go forth and preach. Beads in hand, he led the Catholic troops against the Albigensians and crushed that heresy. Countless souls were brought to grace by his words. His parents attributed his birth to the prayers of the holy Benedictine Abbott, Dominic of Silos; his mother saw in a vision her child in the shape of a little dog, holding a torch in his mouth.  He became the great defender of Catholic Doctrine, and the opponent of heresies.

From the Catechetical Instructions by Saint John Mary Vianney, Priest
(Catechisme sur la prière: A. Monnin, Esprit du Curé d’Ars, Parish 1899, pp. 87-89)

The glorious duty of man: to pray and to love

My little children, reflect on these words: the Christian’s treasure is not on earth but in Heaven. Our thoughts, then ought to be directed to where our treasure is. This is the glorious duty of man: to pray and to love. If you pray and love, that is where a man’s happiness lies.

Prayer is nothing else but union with God. When one has a heart that is pure and united with God, he is given a kind of serenity and sweetness that makes him ecstatic, a light that surrounds him with marvellous brightness. In this intimate union, God and the soul are fused together like two bits of wax that no one can ever pull apart. This union of God with a tiny creature is a lovely thing. It is a happiness beyond understanding.

We had become unworthy to pray, but God in His goodness allowed us to speak with Him. Our prayer is incense that gives Him the greatest pleasure.

My little children, your hearts are small, but prayer stretches them and makes them capable of loving God. Through prayer we receive a foretaste of Heaven and something of paradise comes down upon us. Prayer never leaves us without sweetness. It is honey that flows into the soul and makes all things sweet. When we pray properly, sorrows disappear like snow before the sun.

Prayer also makes time pass very quickly and with such great delight that one does not notice its length. Listen: Once when I was a purveyor in Bresse and most of my companions were ill, I had to make a long journey. I prayed to the good God, and believe me, the time did not seem long.

Some men immerse themselves as deeply in prayer as fish in water, because they give themselves totally to God. There is not division in their hearts. O, how I love these noble souls! Saint Francis of Assisi and Saint Colette used to see Our LORD and talk to Him just as we talk to one another.

How unlike them we are! How often we come to church with no idea of what to do or what to ask for. And yet, whenever we go to any human being, we know well enough why we go. And still worse, there are some who seem to speak to the good God like this: “I will only say a couple of things to You, and then I will be rid of You.” I often think that when we come to adore the LORD, we would receive everything we ask for, if we would ask with Living Faith and with a pure heart.

Is not His mother the woman called Mary?”

The heart of Mary is so tender towards us that those of all the mothers in the world put together are like a piece of ice in comparison to hers. See how good the Holy Virgin is! Her great servant Saint Bernard used often to say to her, “I salute thee, Mary.” One day this good Mother answered him, “I salute thee, my son Bernard.”

The Ave Maria is a prayer that is never wearisome. The devotion to the Holy Virgin is delicious, sweet, nourishing. When we talk on earthly subjects or politics, we grow weary; but when we talk of the Holy Virgin, it is always new. All the saints have a great devotion to our Lady; no grace comes from Heaven without passing through her hands. We cannot go into a house without speaking to the porter; well, the Holy Virgin is the portress of Heaven.

When we have to offer anything to a great personage, we get it presented by the person he likes best, in order that the homage may be agreeable to him. So our prayers have quite a different sort of merit when they are presented by the Blessed Virgin, because she is the only creature who has never offended God. The Blessed Virgin alone has fulfilled the First Commandment—to adore God only, and love Him perfectly. She fulfilled it completely. All that the Son asks of the Father is granted Him. All that the Mother asks of the Son is in like manner granted to her. When we have handled something fragrant, our hands perfume whatever they touch: let our prayers pass through the hands of the Holy Virgin; she will perfume them…. The Holy Virgin is like a mother who has a great many children—she is continually occupied in going from one to the other.

Saint John Vianney

Saint John Vianney, the Curé of Ars († 1859), is the patron of priests. [From The Little Catechism of the Curé of Ars

DAILY MEDITATION

The life of Saint Dominic was one of tireless effort in the service of God. While he journeyed from place to place, he prayed and preached almost uninterruptedly. His penances were of such a nature as to cause the brethren, who accidentally discovered them, to fear the effect upon his life. While his charity was boundless, he never permitted it to interfere with the stern sense of duty that guided every action of his life. If he abominated heresy and laboured untiringly for its extirpation, it was because he loved truth and loved the souls of those among whom he laboured. He never failed to distinguish between sin and the sinner. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, if this  athlete of Christ, who had conquered himself before attempting the reformation of others, was more than once chosen to show forth the power of God. The failure of the fire at Fanjeaux to consume the dissertation he had employed against the heretics, and which was thrice thrown into the flames, the raising to life of Napoleon, Orsini; the appearance of the annals in the refectory of St. Sixtus in response to his prayers, are but a few of the supernatural happenings, by which God was pleased to  attest the eminent holiness of His servant. We are not surprised, therefore, that after signing the bowl of canonization on 13 July 1234, pope Gregory one X declared that he no more doubted the same thing us to Saint Dominic then he did that of Saint peter and Saint Paul.

Catholic Encyclopedia [1912] – classic multi-volume reference on “the constitution, doctrine, discipline, and history of the Catholic Church.

2 Corinthians 4:17; 1 Corinthians 2:9

For that which is at present momentary,
and light of our tribulation, worketh for us
above measure exceedingly an Eternal weight of Glory
– which far exceeds the burden of our suffering.

Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither hath it entered into the heart of man,
what things God hath prepared for them that love Him.
– Which far exceeds the burden of our suffering.

“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

Galatians 1:11, 12; 2 Corinthians 11:10, 7

The Gospel which I preached to you is not a human message.
– I did not receive it through any man,
but from Our LORD Jesus Christ who revealed it to me.

As surely as Christ’s Truth is in me,
I have preached the Gospel to you.
– I did not receive it through any man,
but from Our LORD Jesus Christ who revealed it to me

Thursday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time

Finding of the Body of St. Stephen (Traditional)

Saint Germanus of Auxerre, Bishop (Wales)

“At the end of time”, a net will be “cast into the sea that brings in a haul of all kinds” (Matthew 13:47-53). Only then will the angels reveal who are “the wicked” and who are “the just”. The divide between good and evil crosses all of our lives: that which is evil, which is not life-giving, must be cast into “the blazing furnace”. Like the sons of Israel, we must keep our eyes on the tabernacle in order to see things in the guiding light of the LORD’s glory.

THE FINDING OF THE BODY OF ST. STEPHEN (See blog on Wednesday 2 August for more)

SAINT GERMANUS OF AUXERRE, BISHOP

Born at Auxerre, Gaul, of Catholic parents he was also known as Germain; he studied at local schools and then law at Rome and became a lawyer. After he married, he was made governor of the Amorican border provinces of Gaul; in 418 was named Bishop of Auxerre. He changed his life to one of poverty and austerity, building a monastery, dedicated to Sts. Cosmas and Damian on the banks of the Yonne, and endowing various poor churches in the diocese. [It is unknown when his noble wife died.] In 429, he and St. Lupus, Bishop of Troyes, were sent to Britain to combat the Pelagian heresy which was raging there: they were most successful in restoring orthodoxy. On his way Germain stopped at Nanterre, where he met a young child, Genevieve, destined to become the patroness of Paris. One of the early lives of St. Patrick, Apostle of Ireland, tells us that he formed one of St. Germain’s suite on this occasion.

Tradition tells us that the main discussion with the representatives of Pelagianism took place at St. Alban’s, and resulted in the complete discomfiture of the heretics. Germain remained in Britain for some time preaching, and established several schools for the training of the clergy. It was on this trip that occurred the famous incident in which Germanus is reputed to have saved a force of Britons from destruction by a superior force of marauding Picts and Saxons. He led the Britons to a narrow ravine between two high mountains, and when the enemy approached had the Britons shout “Alleluia!” three times. The echoes magnified the shouts causing the invaders to believe they were confronted by a far superior force, and they fled. It was at this time that Germanus Baptized many of the Britons in the army. On his return to Gaul, he convinced Auxiliaris, prefect of Gaul, to reduce taxes when he healed Auxiliaris’ sick wife, returning Britain about 440 to combat Pelagianism once more. Again he was successful, eliminating the heresy, and founded numerous schools to teach true doctrine. When he returned to Gaul, he found that Aetius, a Roman general, had dispatched a barbarian army under Goar to put down a revolt in Amorica. Fearful of the savagery of the barbarian forces, Germanus persuaded Goar to desist and then went to Ravenna in an unsuccessful attempt to persuade Emperor Valentinian III to call off the attack. Germanus’ effort came to naught when news of another Amorican uprising reached the Emperor. Germanus died on July 31 while he was still in Ravenna, July 31 450. His body, as he requested when dying, was brought back to Auxerre and interred in the Oratory of St. Maurice, which he had built. Later the oratory was replaced by a large church, which became a celebrated Benedictine abbey known as St. Germain’s. This tribute to the memory of the Saint was the gift of Queen Clotilde, wife of Clovis. Some centuries later, Charles the Bald had the shrine opened, and the body was found intact. It was embalmed and wrapped in precious cloths, and placed in a more prominent position in the church. There it was preserved till 1567, when Auxerre was taken by the Huguenots, who desecrated the shrine and cast out the relics. It has been said that the relics were afterwards picked up and placed in the Abbey of St. Marion on the banks of the Yonne, but the authenticity of the relics in this church has never been canonically recognized. St. Germain was honoured in Cornwall and at St. Alban’s in England’s pre-reformation days, and has always been a patron of Auxerre.

From a catechetical instruction by Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, Bishop
(Cat. 18, 26-29: PG 33, 1047-1050)

The Church is the Bride of Christ

The Catholic Church is the distinctive name of this holy Church which is the Mother of us all. She is the Bride of Our LORD Jesus Christ, the Only-begotten Son of God (for Scripture says: Christ loved the Church and gave Himself up for Her). She is the type and she bears the image of the Jerusalem above that is free and is the Mother of us all, that Jerusalem which once was barren but now has many children.

The first assembly, that is, the assembly of Israel, was rejected, and now in the second, that is, in the Catholic Church, God has appointed first, Apostles, second, prophets, third, teachers then workers of miracles, then healers, helpers, administrators and speakers in various tongues, as Paul says; and together with these is found every sort of virtue—Wisdom and Understanding, Self-control and Justice, Mercy and Kindness, and invincible Patience in persecution. This Church in earlier days, when persecution and afflictions abounded, crowned her holy martyrs with the varied and many-flowered wreaths of endurance. But now when God has favoured us with times of peace, she receives her due honour from kings and men of high station, and from every condition and race of mankind. And while the rulers of the different nations have limits to their sovereignty, the holy Catholic Church alone has a power without boundaries throughout the entire world. For Scripture says: God has made peace Her border.

Instructed in this holy Catholic Church and bearing ourselves honourably, we shall gain the Kingdom of Heaven and inherit Eternal Life. For the sake of enjoying this at the LORD’s hands, we endure all things. The goal set before us is no trifling one; we are striving for Eternal Life. In the Creed, therefore, after professing our Faith “in the resurrection of the body,” that is, of the dead, which I have already discussed, we are taught to believe “in life everlasting,” and for this as Christians we are struggling.

Now real and true life is none other than the Father, who is the Fountain of Life and who pours forth His heavenly gifts on all creatures through the Son in the Holy Ghost, and the good things of Eternal Life are faithfully promised to us men also, because of His Love for us.

How to Be with the Righteous
at the End of the Age

Exult and praise your God, Who made and redeemed you and to Whom you are indebted for His many wonderful benefits and the daily gifts that He so graciously bestows on you and for which you can never give fitting or adequate thanks. Give praise and thanks as a mortal man in need of God’s mercy and as one always seeking and begging it. Though you may often fall, sin, and offend God, do not stop praying or praising Him; nor are you to yield to despair; rather, you are to humble yourself and pray. Love, and you will be loved in return, for love cleanses, heals, and makes up for all past failings. Love enlightens and inflames; it drives away sadness and creates joy of heart such as the world does not know or flesh and blood ever experienced. Praise God, and you will be praised; bless Him, and you will be blessed; sanctify His name, and you will be made holy; magnify Him, and you will be made great; glorify Him, and He will glorify you both in body and soul.

But when will this come about, LORD? When will You place perpetual praise on my lips? When will my heart and soul exult with Your saints in glory?

Hold on for a bit longer, and you will see great wonders when the last trumpet sounds. It is then that I shall give My saints rest and Eternal Life in exchange for all their pains and labours. What more do you want?

Nothing more; you are sufficient for me, my God and Saviour; You give Eternal Life to those who love and praise You. In place of insignificant deeds, You give what is all-important; for what is valueless, You give what is most valuable; and for what is perishable, you give something Eternal.

Venerable Thomas à Kempis

Thomas à Kempis († 1471) was a German priest and monk who wrote many spiritual works. [From On the Passion of Christ: According to the Four Evangelists: Prayers and Meditations, Joseph N. Tylenda, s.j., Tr.

DAILY MEDITATION 

At present, I might amuse and sustain myself with the vanities of sense and time, but they will not last forever. We shall be stripped of them when we pass out of this world. All shadows will one day be gone. And what shall I do then?… He will be all in all, whether I wish it or not. What a strait I shall then be in if I do not love Him, and there is then nothing else to love; if I feel averse to Him, and He is then ever looking upon me!

Ah, my dear LORD, how can I bear to say that You will be all in all, whether I wish it or not? Should I not wish it with my whole heart? What can give me happiness but You? If I had all the resources of time and sense about me, just as I have now, should I not in course of ages, nay of years, weary of them? If this world were to last forever, would it be able ever to supply my soul with food? Is there any earthly thing that I do not weary of at length even now? Do old men love what young men love? Is there not constant change? 

I am sure then, my God, that the time would come, though it might be long in coming, when I would have exhausted all the enjoyment the world could give. You alone, my dear LORD, are the Food for Eternity, and You alone. You only can satisfy the soul of man. Eternity would be misery without You, even though You did not inflict punishment. To see You, to gaze on You, to contemplate You: this alone is inexhaustible. You indeed are unchangeable, yet in You there are always more glorious depths and more varied attributes to search into; we shall ever be beginning as if we had never gazed upon You. In Your Presence are torrents of delight, and whoever tastes them will never let go. This is my true portion, O my LORD, here and hereafter! 

Saint John Henry Newman [+ 1890] – outstanding English convert, Priest, and theologian who led the Oxford movement of the nineteenth century.

“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

2 Corinthians 10:3-4; Ephesians 6:16, 17

Though we live in this world,
we do not rely solely on the resources of the world to do battle.
– Our warfare is not waged with the weapons of this world.

We arm ourselves with the shield of Faith
and with the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God.
– Our warfare is not waged with the weapons of this world.

Wednesday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time

Saint Eusebius of Vercelli, Bishop 

Saint Peter Julian Eymard, Priest

St. Alphonsus Mary Ligouri, Bishop, Confessor, Doctor of the Church (Traditional)

St. Stephen I, Pope, Martyr (Traditional)

Finding the Body of St. Stephen (Traditional)

SAINT EUSEBIUS, BISHOP

St. Eusebius  was a model bishop of the 4th century: faithful, vigilant, and long-suffering. He was born at the beginning of the fourth century in Sardinia.  He became a member of the Roman clergy and in 345 A.D. the people recognised Eusebius’ own ardent devotion and elected him their Bishop. Inspired by the writings of the Desert Fathers, he “brought the monastery to the city”, establishing a strict rule for the diocesan clergy. He spread religion by his preaching and established the monastic life in his diocese.  He was driven into exile to Palestine by Emperor Constantius  for his fidelity to the Nicene Creed and endured much suffering. In Palestine the Arian Bishop Patrophilus had him dragged through the streets and thrown into prison. Returning to his country, he worked tirelessly against the Arians for the restoration of the Faith, Eusebius urged his flock “to guard the Faith jealously, to preserve harmony, to be assiduous in prayer”. He died at Vercelli in 371.

ST. ALPHONSUS LIGOURI, BISHOP, CONFESSOR, DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH

(See yesterday’s blog for his bio))

ST. STEPHEN I, POPE, MARTYR

St. Stephen was beheaded by the persecutors toward the end of the Mass he was celebrating, while seated in the Episcopal chair in the catacombs in 257.

FINDING OF THE BODY OF ST. STEPHEN, MARTYR

The body of St. Stephen, the first martyr, with those of some other saints, was discovered near Jerusalem in the year 415. Later the body of the saint was taken to Constantinople and finally to Rome, where it now lies beside that of St. Lawrence. The many miracles that occurred on the finding of St. Stephen’s body led to the institution of this festival, besides that of December 26th. A tradition states that Gamaliel, the teacher of St. Paul, had buried the body of St. Stephen at his country house; Nicodemus and Abibas, son of Gamaliel, and Gamaliel himself, were also buried there.

SAINT PETER JULIAN EYMARD, PRIEST

St. Peter Julian Eymard was born 4 February 1811 at La Mure, Isère.  He was deeply devoted to Mary from his earliest days.  In 1828 he resolved to enter the novitiate of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate but was unable to complete his studies due to illness.  In 1834 he was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Grenoble.  He was dissatisfied with parish work, and decided to join the Marists.

In 1837, he entered the Society of Mary and became Provincial of the Order in 1844.  His new responsibilities included being in charge of the Third Order of Mary, dedicated to Marist spirituality and to the promotion of the Christian family.  Saint John Vianney was a member.

His eucharistic spirituality grew progressively and desired to establish a Marist community dedicated to eucharistic adoration.  When his superiors disapproved, he decided to leave the Society of Mary to begin a new religious society, the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament.

The Congregation began working with children in Paris to prepare them to receive their First Communion.  It also reached out to non-practicing Catholics, inviting them to repent and begin receiving Communion again.  Pope Pius IX granted a Decree of Approbation in June 1863 and the Saint became a strong proponent of frequent Holy Communion, a practice given more authoritative backing by Pope Saint Pius X in 1905.

In 1858, together with Marguerite Guillot, he founded the Servants of the Blessed Sacrament, a contemplative congregation for women.  It was reported that he said, “You take communion to become holy, not because you already are.”  Saint Peter died at the age of fifty-seven in La Mure on 1 August 1868.  He was declared venerable in 1908, beatified by Pope Pius XI on 12 July 1925, and canonized by Pope Saint John XXIII on 9 December 1962.  Pope Saint John Paul II named Eymard “Apostle of the Eucharist.”

From the writings of Saint Peter Julian Eymard, Priest
(La Présence réelle, vol. I, Paris, 1950, pp. 270-271 and 307-308)

The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Life

The Eucharist is the life of all nations.  It affords the very principle of life.  If there is no impediment, whether due to one’s nation or one’s language, all can come to the feasts of the Church.  The Eucharist brings to them the law of Charity and this Sacrament is its source.  For this very reason, it forms among them a common bond, that of Christian relationship.  All eat of the same bread, all are Jesus Christ’s guests, and He supernaturally forms among them a certain harmony of brotherly customs.  The Acts of the Apostles affirm that the primitive throng of Christians, both of converted Jews and baptized pagans, formed a single heart and soul even though coming from different regions.  Why?  Because they were assiduous in listening to the doctrine of the Apostles and persevering in the breaking of the bread.

The Eucharist is therefore the life of the soul as well as the life of human society, just as the sun is the life of the body as well as that of the earth.  Without it the earth is sterile.  The sun gladdens, adorns and fills it with good things; it gives effectiveness, strength and beauty to the body.  Before the marvels of the world we ought not to do as the pagans do, which is to worship the sun as if it were a god of the world.  The daystar itself obeys the uppermost Star, the divine Word, Jesus Christ.  He illuminates all those who come to this world, and acts Himself through the Eucharist, Sacrament of Life, in their innermost being and by that He forms families and nations.  Happy is the soul that finds this hidden treasure, and that drinks from the source of life by often eating the Bread of Life.

Furthermore, the Christian community is a family.  The bond that unites them is Jesus in the Eucharist.  He is the Father who prepares the family table.  Christian brotherhood was promulgated at the Last Supper together with Jesus Christ’s Fatherhood.  He himself called his Apostles filiolos, that is little children, and commanded them to love one another as He loved them.

At the Holy Table, all are children taking the same food.  Saint Paul concluded that all make up the same family, one body, for all share the same Bread, Jesus Christ.  Therefore, the Eucharist imparts on the Christian community the power to preserve the law of honour and love of neighbour.  Jesus Christ orders us to honour and love His brethren.  That is why He put Himself in their place:  “Whenever you did this to one of the least of My brethren, you did it to Me”.  And He gave Himself to each one by means of Holy Communion.

DAILY MEDITATION

What rendered still more certain the truth of our Faith was the formation of a new people of God by the conversion of the Gentiles: this was known to have been announced beforehand in the Scriptures, and this was seen to be realized, as soon as the apostles spread throughout the world…. men devoid of instruction, of wealth, of every human assistance, and even persecuted by the magistrates and the emperors – have induced, without divine assistance, so many Christians to renounce all their property, all their honours and generously to sacrifice their lives, amid tortures, the most excruciating that the power and the cruelty of the tyrants could invent? 

But what was still more marvellous was to behold  so many Gentiles embrace a religion difficult to believe and difficult to practice. It was difficult to believe on the part of the intellect, for this religion teaches mysteries beyond the reach of human reason; namely, the Trinity of one God in three distinct Persons, Who have but one nature, one power, and one will; the Incarnation of the Son of God come upon earth to die for the salvation of mankind; and many other articles, regarding Original Sin, the spirituality, and the immortality of the soul, the Sacraments, especially the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. It was difficult to practice on the part of the will, because it commands things contrary to the inclinations of nature corrupted by sin and repugnant to the libertinism, in which the pagans were living, who were accustomed to follow their passions and to give themselves up to the pleasures of the senses. Notwithstanding these obstacles, the Christian religion show itself embraced by so many nations! From the universal consent of nations, Saint Augustine argues the Divinity of our religion, saying that had not God illuminated by His powerful grace, so many people, civilized, and barbarian, learned and illiterate, noble and plebeian, all immersed in the superstitions of their country, imbued from their earliest years with maxims so opposed to the sanity of Faith, how could they have embraced it?

Saint Alphonsus Liguori [d 1787] – erudite Bishop, philosopher, theologian, lawyer, and artist, declared a Doctor of the Church in 1871.

The Pearl of Great Price

Most holy and dearly beloved, let human fear depart from your souls. You have the LORD’s own consolation, for He says to you, Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. This is a time of testing; this is a time for those who are tested to be made known…. I beg you to protect your Faith with great vigilance, to preserve harmony, to remain steadfast in prayer, to remember us unceasingly, that the LORD will deign to grant liberty to His Church, now in labour throughout the world, and that we who are oppressed may one day rejoice in freedom with you. May I be worthy to stand before God, praying for you through Our LORD Jesus Christ who is with Him, blessed for ever and unto all ages. Amen.

Again, I beseech and beg you, for the mercy of God, that each one discover his own message in this letter. I could not write to each one of you, as I have usually done, so I address all of you: my brothers and blessed sisters, as well, sons and daughters; I speak to each sex; I greet every age. May God protect you and grant you and all your dear ones good health, now and in the future….

We congratulate you because you live according to the Creed, strong in your Faith and mindful of us. However, resolve now to remain in communion with us, since you have been steadfast until now in the same confession, shunning all association with hypocrites. Carry on these matters as best you can; apply yourself energetically to prevail over the transgressors, to rebuke the unbelievers; fear nothing from the kingdom of this world, as you have despised it until now. The One who is within us is mightier than the rulers of this world…. We have desired to endure our sufferings so that, in keeping with what has been said, we might be glorified in the Kingdom of Heaven.

Saint Eusebius of Vercelli

Saint Eusebius of Vercelli († 371) was an Italian Bishop and is honoured for his defence of the full divinity of Christ. [From The Early Church and the State, Michael Di Maio, Agnes Cunningham, sscm, Trs.

“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

Luke 6:38; 2 Corinthians 9:7

Give to others and you will receive;
good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over,
will be poured into your lap.
– For whatever measure you give to others
will be the measure you receive.

Each person should give according to what he has inwardly decided,
not grudgingly or under compulsion.
– For whatever measure you give to others
will be the measure you receive.

Tuesday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time

Holy Machabees, Martyrs (Traditional)

St. Peter in Chains (Traditional)

Saint Alphonsus Mary Liguori, Bishop, Doctor of the Church

ST. PETER IN CHAINS

The chains with which Saint Peter the Apostle was fettered from time to time have always been the object of veneration among the faithful. They are preserved in a basilica in Rome, which is called Saint Peter ad Vincula [in chains]. The anniversary of the dedication of this church falls on August 1. The chains of the Apostle Paul are preserved in the Basilica of Saint Paul.

The reverence shown to the chains of the two apostles must have been very widely spread in olden times from the moment when Justinian I asked the Pope for “a portion of the chains of the holy apostles, if it were possible” and St. Gregory the Great relates that in his day the faithful were eagerly desirous of the favour of possessing at least a small quantity of the filings of Saint Paul’s chains.The chains of Saint Peter are in two portions, one having eleven links, shaped so as to hold the hand, and the other twenty-three links, at the end of which are two half circles to hold the neck. Only four links are preserved in the chains which bound Saint Paul.

ST. ALPHONSUS MARY LIGOURI, BISHOP, DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH

ALPHONSUS was born of noble and devout parents, near Naples, in 1696. His spiritual training was entrusted to the Fathers of the Oratory in that city, and from his boyhood Alphonsus was known as a most devout Brother of the Little Oratory. At the early age of sixteen he was made doctor in civil and canon law, and he threw himself into this career with ardour and success. A mistake, by which he lost an important cause, showed him the vanity of human fame, and driven to prayer, he heard the LORD’s voice: “Leave the world and give yourself to Me,”  which determined him to labour only for the glory of God. He entered the priesthood, devoting himself to the most neglected marginalized souls; and to carry on this work he founded later the missionary Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer (the Redemptorists). His keen legal mind and finely tuned pastoral sensibilities made him a sought-after confessor and beloved Bishop. At the age of sixty-six he became Bishop of St. Agatha, and undertook the reform of his diocese with the zeal of a saint. He made a vow never to lose time, and, though his life was spent in prayer and work, he composed a vast number of books, filled with such science, unction, and wisdom that he has been declared one of the Doctors of the Church (in 1871). Saint Alphonsus wrote his first book at the age of forty-nine, and in his eighty-third year had published about sixty volumes, when his director forbade him to write more. Very many of these books were written in the half-hours snatched from his labours as missionary, religious superior, and Bishop, or in the midst of continual bodily and mental sufferings. With his left hand he would hold a piece of marble against his aching head while his right hand wrote. Yet he counted no time wasted which was spent in charity. He did not refuse to hold a long correspondence with a simple soldier who asked his advice, or to play the harpsichord while he taught his novices to sing spiritual canticles. He lived in evil times, and met with many persecutions and disappointments. For his last seven years he was prevented by constant sickness from offering the Adorable Sacrifice; but he received Holy Communion daily, and his love for Jesus Christ and his trust in Mary’s prayers sustained him to the end. He died in 1787, in his ninety-first year.

From a sermon by Saint Alphonsus Liguori, Bishop and Doctor of the Church
(Tract. de praxi amandi Iesum Christum edit. latina. Romæ, 1909, pp. 9-14)

On the love of Christ

All holiness and perfection of soul lies in our love for Jesus Christ our God, who is our Redeemer and our Supreme Good. It is part of the love of God to acquire and to nurture all the virtues which make a man perfect.

Has not God in fact won for Himself a claim on all our love? From All Eternity He has loved us. And it is in this vein that He speaks to us: “O man, consider carefully that I first loved you. You had not yet appeared in the light of day, nor did the world yet exist, but already I loved you. From All Eternity I have loved you.”

Since God knew that man is enticed by favours, He wished to bind him to His love by means of His gifts: “I want to catch men with the snares, those chains of love in which they allow themselves to be entrapped, so that they will love Me.” And all the gifts which He bestowed on man were given to this end. He gave him a soul, made in His likeness, and endowed with memory, intellect and will; He gave him a body equipped with the senses; it was for him that He created Heaven and earth and such an abundance of things. He made all these things out of love for man, so that all creation might serve man, and man in turn might love God out of gratitude for so many gifts.

But He did not wish to give us only beautiful creatures; the Truth is that to win for Himself our love, He went so far as to bestow upon us the fullness of Himself. The Eternal Father went so far as to give us His only Son. When He saw that we were all dead through sin and deprived of His grace, what did He do? Compelled, as the Apostle says, by the superabundance of His love for us, He sent His Beloved Son to make reparation for us and to call us back to a sinless life.

By giving us His Son, Whom He did not spare precisely so that He might spare us, He bestowed on us at once every good: grace, Love and Heaven; for all these goods are certainly inferior to the Son: He who did not spare His own Son, but handed Him over for all of us: how could He fail to give us along with His Son all good things?

Ready to Enter the Father’s Kingdom

Saint Bernard wrote: “Death is precious insofar as it marks the end of the struggle; it is victory attained, it is the gate to Eternal Life.”… In the Scriptures, God calls those who die in His grace happy. Then I heard a voice from Heaven say to me, ‘Write down: Blessed are those who die in the LORD! Blessed indeed, the Spirit says; now they can rest for ever after their work, since their good deeds go with them.’ (Rv 14:13). And in the Book of Wisdom (3:1) we read: But the souls of the just are in the hands of God, and the torment of death shall not touch them.

The call to leave this world, which is so full of terror for those who love it, does not alarm good people. Those who love God are not afflicted at the thought of having to leave riches, possessions, wealth, or this world’s goods. They have never been attached to these so-called attractions. Neither do they fear giving up worldly honours or fame, for they have always avoided them, or considered them to be what they truly are, vanity and smoke…. And at the same time, as they await their merited crown in Heaven, they foresee that in Heaven they will be able to assist their loved ones more than while still on earth. Thus, good people are able to die in peace and happiness, saying with the Psalmist: I will lie down in peace and sleep comes at once for You alone, LORD, make me dwell in safety. In a word, those who during life have constantly said “My God and my All” will continue to repeat this prayer with greater consolation and tenderness at the hour of death….

O my God, I ask only to love You and hope always to ask to love You until, dying in Your love, I reach the Kingdom of love where, without the need to ask it anymore, I shall be full of love for All Eternity. Mary, my Mother, obtain for me the grace to love God ardently in this life, that I may love Him ardently for ever in the next.

Saint Alphonsus Liguori

Saint Alphonsus Liguori († 1787) was a Bishop and the founder of the Redemptorists. He is a Doctor of the Church and the patron saint of moral theologians. [From Preparation for Death: Prayers and Consolations for the Final Journey].

DAILY MEDITATION

The history of the seven Machabees and their heroic mother is one of the most beautiful and instructive ever written, and is well worth reading more than once. Parents are taught by it, how to instill into the hearts of their children obedience, to God and avoidance of sin; and children, how to live according to their parent’s precepts; while Christians, in general, are instructed by it how to keep the laws of God.

The seven holy martyrs rather suffered, the most terrible torments and cruel death, than touch the meats which God had forbidden them to use. This same God forbids you, on certain days, the use of certain food. Woe to you, if you allow yourself to be persuaded to partake of it through the bad example of others, or by their taunts and mockery, or from other frivolous excuses.  The holy martyrs, sustained themselves by the hope of the resurrection and of the recompense, which they would one day receive in Heaven. Your body will also rise again. You will receive again all your limbs, either for eternal reward, or eternal punishment, as you have used them in the service or to the displeasure of the Almighty. Woe to your tongue, your lips, your eyes, your hands and feet, if you do not use them better than you have done until now. Lastly, all should learn what their conduct should be, when they are tempted to sin. We must fight and say: “No, I will not do it. I obey, not him who tempts me, but the LORD, my God. I am ready to die, rather than transgress the laws of God.“ And let those who tempt others to sin consider well what one of the martyrs said to Antiochus: Thou shalt not escape the hand of the LORD”; and another: “Wait, patiently, and thou shalt recognize, in thy punishment, the power of the Almighty.”

Father Francis Xavier Weninger [d. 1888] – Austrian priest, professor, and author: joined the Jesuits as missionary preacher to the United States

“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

2 Corinthians 8:9; Philippians 2:7

You are well aware of the generosity of Our LORD Jesus Christ.
Though He was rich, He became poor for your sake,
– so that through His poverty you might become rich.

He emptied Himself, assuming the condition of a slave.
– So that through His poverty you might become rich.

Monday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time

Saint Ignatius of Loyola, Confessor

SAINT IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA, CONFESSOR 

Saint Ignatius was born at Loyola in Northern Spain, in the year 1491. He served his king as a courtier and a soldier till his thirtieth year. At that age, being laid low by a traumatic leg injury, he received the call of divine grace to leave the world. During his long convalescence, he was given, in the absence of other books, the reading of the Life of Jesus and the lives of the saints revealed to him that the Church Militant needed an army of glorious soldiers, to fight the forces of Satan: pagans, Mohammedans, protestants, etc. After a period of intense penances, Ignatius went to university in Paris, where he met Francis Xavier, Peter Faber, and the other original members of the Society of Jesus. He founded the Society of Jesus  (Jesuits) and as first General of this new spiritual chivalry he moved to the attack under the motto: “ Ad majorem Dei Gloriam – To the greater glory of God!” He embraced poverty and humiliation, that he might become more like to Christ, and won others to join him in the service of God. Prompted by their love for Jesus Christ, Ignatius and his companions made a vow to go to the Holy Land, but war broke out, and prevented the execution of their project. Then they turned to the Vicar of Jesus Christ, and placed themselves under his obedience. This was the beginning of the Society of Jesus. Our LORD promised Saint Ignatius that the precious heritage of His Passion should never fail his Society, a heritage of contradictions and persecutions. Saint Ignatius was cast into prison at Salamanca, on a suspicion of heresy. To a friend who expressed sympathy with him on account of his imprisonment, he replied, “It is a sign that you have but little love of Christ in your heart, or you would not deem it so hard a fate to be in chains for His sake. I declare to you that all Salamanca does not contain as many fetters, manacles, and chains as I long to wear for the love of Jesus Christ.” In the last fifteen years of his life, Ignatius led the order from Rome, writing almost seven thousand letters to encourage and guide his brethren.

With the sweet name of Jesus on his lips and in his heart, Saint Ignatius gave his soul to God on the 31st July, 1556. His body is preserved in Rome in the magnificent church built by Cardinal Alessandro Farnese and dedicated to his memory.

From the life of Saint Ignatius from his own words by Luis Gonzalez
(Cap. 1, 5-9: Acta Sanctorum, Julii, 7 [1898], 647)

Put inward experiences to the test to see if they come from God

Ignatius was passionately fond of reading worldly books of fiction and tales of knight-errantry. When he felt he was getting better, he asked for some of these books to pass the time. But no book of that sort could be found in the house; instead they gave him a life of Christ and a collection of the lives of saints written in Spanish.

By constantly reading these books he began to be attracted to what he found narrated there. Sometimes in the midst of his reading he would reflect on what he had read. Yet at other times he would dwell on many of the things which he had been accustomed to dwell on previously. But at this point Our LORD came to his assistance, insuring that these thoughts were followed by others which arose from his current reading.

While reading the life of Christ Our LORD or the lives of the saints, he would reflect and reason with himself: “What if I should do what Saint Francis or Saint Dominic did?” In this way he let his mind dwell on many thoughts; they lasted a while until other things took their place. Then those vain and worldly images would come into his mind and remain a long time. This sequence of thoughts persisted with him for a long time.

But there was a difference. When Ignatius reflected on worldly thoughts, he felt intense pleasure; but when he gave them up out of weariness, he felt dry and depressed. Yet when he thought of living the rigorous sort of life he knew the saints had lived, he not only experienced pleasure when he actually thought about it, but even after he dismissed these thoughts, he still experienced great joy. Yet he did not pay attention to this, nor did he appreciate it until one day, in a moment of insight, he began to marvel at the difference. Then he understood his experience: thoughts of one kind left him sad, the others full of joy. And this was the first time he applied a process of reasoning to his religious experience. Later on, when he began to formulate his spiritual exercises, he used this experience as an illustration to explain the doctrine he taught his disciples on the discernment of spirits.

DAILY MEDITATION

You will find much in the life of Saint Ignatius, which may serve you for instruction and example; and I will, in a few words, aid you to find some of the principle points:

The reform and holiness of the saint began by reading a devout book, the Lives of the Saints. As I told you elsewhere, the reading of pious books, especially the Lives of the Saints, is of very great spiritual benefit; while the reading of a wicked work does intense harm. The vices and consequent damnation of many are the effects of reading dangerous books; while the holiness and final salvation of others had their beginning in the lessons received while reading pious books. Judge from this in which direction your duty lies.

The purpose of all the actions of St. Ignatius was to promote the Glory of God and the salvation of souls, and as he sought in everything only the glory of God, he always selected what was agreeable, nay most agreeable to Him. To do that which is always the most pleasing to the Almighty, has always been the aim and distinguishing feature of all great saints on earth. To do that which is pleasing to God and to avoid that which is displeasing to Him is the duty of every Christian. To avoid only mortal sin is the sign of a very indifferent man, who neither loves God, nor is concerned about his salvation. Among which of these will you be ranked? Endeavour to have a place among the first, and do nothing, except for what you are convinced is pleasing to the Almighty, and avoid all that you know is displeasing to His Majesty. Perform all your works for the honour of God and the salvation of your soul.

Father Francis Xavier Weninger [d. 1888] – Austrian priest, professor, and author, joined the Jesuits as missionary preacher to the United States

Becoming “Full-Grown” in Christ

I have now passed through the most beautiful period of my life. One would not believe that possible. I have been happy, completely happy, as never before in my life. In the course of these weeks the dear LORD has let me know that He is satisfied with me. That makes me happy; all else cannot disturb me. Prison is better for me than a thousand lectures on behalf of the Catholic community, on apologetics, on the Gospel—much better than if I were to lecture on heaven knows what.

The day before yesterday I read a marvellously beautiful passage of Paul’s in the Epistle to the Philippians: I am glad to tell you, brothers, that the things that happened to me have actually been a help to the Good News. My chains, in Christ, have become famous not only all over the Praetorium but everywhere, and most of the brothers have taken courage in the LORD from these chains of mine and are getting more and more daring in announcing the Message without any fear… that makes me happy; and I shall continue being happy (Ph 1:12-14, 18-19). Is that not marvellous?

If people could only understand how little it takes to become truly happy inwardly! I have always known that God is good, but that He is good in the degree that I have been permitted to experience during the past fortnight, I should never have thought possible….

The ancients in their time used to say that it is sweet to die, likewise to suffer, for one’s native land. I have been granted this latter experience in bounteous measure, and I should not wish to have lacked it in my life. But it is even sweeter to suffer for the Holy Faith, and also to die for it. It is this that fills me with happiness here in prison, and that in turn is fortifying so many thousands of young people in Germany in their Catholic Faith. That too fills me with happiness.

Blessed Rupert Mayer

Blessed Rupert Mayer († 1945), “the Apostle of Munich”, was a German Jesuit priest and prominent critic of the Nazis, who imprisoned him several times. He died on All Saints’ Day while celebrating Mass, and was beatified in 1987 by Saint John Paul II. [From Dying We Live: The Final Messages and Records of the Resistance, Helmut Gollwitzer, Käthe Kuhn, Reinhold Schneider, Eds., Reinhard C. Kuhn, Tr. Translation copyright

“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

2 Corinthians 7:10, see 9

The sorrow God sends us produces a repentance
that leads to salvation,
– but worldly sorrow brings death.

Our sorrow was used by God,
and so we suffered no loss.
– But worldly sorrow brings death.

Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Ninth Sunday after Pentecost (Traditional)

Saint Peter Chrysologus, Bishop, Confessor, Doctor of the Church 

God says to Solomon, “Ask what you would like Me to give you.” “It pleased the LORD that Solomon should have asked” for an understanding heart, rather than long life or riches (First Book of Kings 3:5, 5-12). For with such a request, God can work miracles. “Turning everything to their good, God co-operates with all those who love Him.” Solomon’s heart is like that of the man who sells all he owns in order to buy the field where treasure is buried. The desire of Solomon is like that of the merchant who risks his whole livelihood in order to acquire a very fine pearl (Matthew 13:44-52). Such sacrifices can be made only because of the certainty that this treasure, this pearl of great price, corresponds to the deepest longing of a “discerning” heart: the longing for Christ Himself.

TRADITIONAL:

God is our Helper, and He will always come to our aid: He will open the ears of His mercy to our prayers, and will not allow us to be tempted beyond our strength. Let us obey therefore with joy the precepts of the LORD, let us virtually attend the mysteries of holy Mass, and partake of the Body of the LORD, the manna of our souls.

EPISTLE: 1 Cor 10: 6-13

Terrible punishments incurred by the people of Israel on account of their idolatry, is there lust, and their murmuring.

GOSPEL: Luke 19: 41-46

Jesus wept over Jerusalem and its future destruction. The sellers were driven from the temple for having transformed the house of prayer into a den of thieves.

SAINT PETER CHRYSOLOGUS, BISHOP, CONFESSOR, DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH 

St. Peter was born about the year 380 at Imola in Emilia, and there entered the priesthood. He was elected Bishop of Ravenna in 424 and instructed his flock by his learned sermons and writings. He died around the year 450.

From a sermon by Saint Peter Chrysologus, Bishop, Doctor of the Church
(Sermo 148: PL 52, 596-598)

The Incarnation and Human Dignity

A virgin conceived, bore a son, and yet remained a virgin. This is no common occurrence, but a sign; no reason here, but God’s Power, for He is the cause, and not nature. It is a special event, not shared by others; it is Divine, not human. Christ’s birth was not necessity, but an expression of Omnipotence, a sacrament of piety for the redemption of men. He who made man without generation from pure clay made man again and was born from a pure body. The Hand that assumed clay to make our flesh deigned to assume a Body for our salvation. That the Creator is in His creature and God is in the Flesh brings dignity to man without dishonour to Him who made him.

Why then, man, are you so worthless in your own eyes and yet so precious to God? Why render yourself such dishonour when you are honoured by Him? Why do you ask how you were created and do not seek to know why you were made? Was not this entire visible universe made for your dwelling? It was for you that the Light dispelled the overshadowing gloom; for your sake was the night regulated and the day measured, and for you were the heavens embellished with the varying brilliance of the sun, the moon and the stars. The earth was adorned with flowers, groves and fruit; and the constant marvellous variety of lovely living things was created in the air, the fields, and the seas for you, lest sad solitude destroy the joy of God’s new creation. And the Creator still works to devise things that can add to your glory. He has made you in His image that you might in your person make the invisible Creator present on earth; He has made you His legate, so that the vast empire of the world might have the LORD’s representative. Then in His mercy God assumed what He made in you; He wanted now to be truly manifest in man, just as He had wished to be revealed in man as in an image. Now He would be in reality what He had submitted to be in symbol.

And so Christ is born that by His birth He might restore our nature. He became a child, was fed, and grew that He might inaugurate the one perfect age to remain for ever as He had created it. He supports man that man might no longer fall. And the creature He had formed of earth He now makes heavenly; and what He had endowed with a human soul He now vivifies to become a heavenly spirit. In this way He fully raised man to God, and left in him neither sin, nor death, nor travail, nor pain, nor anything earthly, with the grace of Our LORD Christ Jesus, who lives and reigns with the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit, now and for ever, for all the ages of Eternity. Amen.

DAILY MEDITATION 

[Jesus] has come from His Father, come to represent His Father, and to make Him known, come to keep His laws perfectly and to give Him a perfect service, and He cannot pass over this desecration of His Father’s House (Luke 19:41-47).

The traffickers with no doubt have ready excuses for what their conscience told them was wrong. The animals were necessary for the sacrifices, the doves were the offerings of the poor – it was much more convenient for the people to be able to buy at the very gates of the temple – the moneychangers were simply a necessity, for had not every Jew to present the half shekel in the coin of the country? So would they salve their consciences; and so do we, when Jesus comes into the temple of our souls, and finds so much in His Father’s house that He cannot approve, so much traffic going on in His Father’s name, which is simply a traffic for self.“LORD, LORD, have not we prophesied in Thy name, and cast out devils in Thy name and done many miracles in Thy name? Then will I profess to them: I never knew you. Depart from Me, you that work iniquity“ [Matthew 7:22–23]. These are the words of Him who cleansed His Father’s temple and they were spoken to those who would never allow Him to cleanse the temples of their souls, but who went on trafficking for self till it was too late. 

They know He is right, and they hasten after their animals, which He has chased out of the temple  court with His “scourge of little cords” [John 2:15]. He upset the moneychangers’ tables and told the bird sellers to take the doves away.  He does not, as some pictures would have you suppose, open their cages and let them fly. This would have been a serious loss to their owners, and also would have prevented the poor from obtaining their offering.  Jesus is at home in the temple; it is His father’s house, and He will not have it desecrated.

Mother Saint Paul [d. 1940] – Superior of the Retreat of the Sacred Heart Sisters in Birmingham, author of many popular devotional works

Recognising the Great Treasure We Have in Christ

“They are the ones He chose specially long ago and intended to become true images of His Son, so that His Son might be the eldest of many brothers. He called those He intended for this; those He called He justified, and with those He justified he shared His glory. After saying this, what can we add? With God on our side who can be against us? Nothing therefore can come between us and the love of Christ.” (Rm 8:29-31, 35).

This is how the mystery of divine election appeared to theenlightened gaze of the Apostle. The ones He chose specially long ago: Are not we of that number? Cannot God say to our soulwhat He once said through the voice of His prophet: “Then I saw you as I was passing. Your time had come, the time for love. I spread part of My cloak over you and covered your nakedness; I bound myself by oath, I made a covenant with you—it is the LORD who speaks—and you became Mine.”(Ezk 16:8). Yes, we have become His through Baptism, that is what Paul means by these words: those He called; yes, called to receive the seal of the Holy Trinity; at the same time we have been made, in the words of Saint Peter, “to share the divine nature” (2 P 1:4), we have become “co-heirs with Christ” (He 3:14). Then, He has justified us by His Sacraments, by His direct “touches” in our contemplation in the depths of our soul; justified us also by Faith and according to the measure of our Faith in the redemption that Jesus Christ has acquired for us. And finally, He wants to glorify us, and for that reason, says Saint Paul, “He has made it possible for us to join the saints and with them to inherit the Light (Col 1:12), but we will be glorified in the measure in which we will have been conformed to the image of His Divine Son.

So let us contemplate this adored Image, let us remain unceasingly under its radiance so that it may imprint itself on us; let us go to everything with the same attitude of soul that our holy Master would have. Then we will realise the great plan which God kindly made in Christ from the beginning, to… “bring everything together under Christ, as Head” (Ep 1:9-10).

Saint Elizabeth of the Trinity

Saint Elizabeth of the Trinity († 1906) was a French Carmelite nun whose writings focused on the indwelling of the Trinity. She died from Addison’s disease at the age of twenty-six. [From I Have Found God: Complete Works, Volume I, General Introduction: Major Spiritual Writings, Sister Aletheia Kane, o.c.d., Tr.

“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

2 Corinthians 6:14, 16

What do righteousness and iniquity have in common?
Is there a common ground between the temple of God and idols?
– You are the temple of the Living God.

Are you not aware that you are God’s temple,
and that His Spirit lives within you?
– You are the temple of the Living God.

Saints Martha, Mary, and Lazarus

Saturday of the Bless Virgin Mary 

Saint Martha, Virgin (Traditional)

St Felix II, Simplicius, Faustinus, & Beatrice, Martyrs (Traditional)

Martha is remembered as the one who was fretting when Jesus came to dinner, in sharp contrast to her sister Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet. Jesus tells Martha that Mary has chosen the “better part”. Martha clearly takes Jesus’ correction to heart. When he comes to Bethany again, this time because her brother Lazarus has died, Martha is still the active one, the doer. She runs out to greet Jesus while Mary stays at home. But now Martha’s anxiety has given way to Faith: “I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the One who was to come into this world” (John 11: 19-27).

SAINT MARTHA, VIRGIN

The ways by which God leads men’s souls of varied; one way may be more perfect than another, but each soul must sanctify itself in its own fashion. Grace does not do violence to nature, but perfects it; thus, although Saint John tells us that Jesus loved Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, each of the sisters always retains her own individual character in the Gospel narrative. Mary feels more deeply, and, therefore, though she is habitually more recollected, yet she is also a woman of an eager and pleasing disposition, more courageous in her actions.

The virtues of Martha, the elder sister of Lazarus, on the other hand, are more commonplace and less exceptional and lived at Bethany a humble active life. She often gave hospitality to Our LORD.She is a good housekeeper, diligent, affectionate, and forbearing in undertaking the additional labour which Martha’s different nature puts upon her. In discharging her daily duties, she looks at life chiefly from the practical side. The Saviour loves her much, because, though Mary is eager to receive spiritual food from Him, Martha, on the contrary, shows a mother‘s tender care both for Him, and for His disciples, who were always received as members of the family in her home at Bethany.

According to one account they ended their days at Marseilles – seen Lazarus as Bishop, Saint Mary Magdalene as anchoress and St.  Martha as head of a small community of Holy women.

Sts. Felix II,  Simplicius, Faustinus & Beatrice, Martyrs

The martyr-Pope Saint Felix 11 governed, the church, during the exile of Pope Liberius, in the middle of the fourth century. Simplicius and Faustinuswere drowned in the Tiber, probably in 303, when the great persecution under Diocletian was at it’s height. Beatrice, their sister, with the aid of the priest Priscus, recovered their bodies, in order to give them burial; for which offence she was strangled in prison.

From a sermon by Saint Augustine, Bishop and Doctor of the Church
(Sermo 103, 1-2, 6: PL 38, 613, 615)

Blessed are they who deserved to receive Christ in their homes

Our LORD’s words teach us that though we labour among the many distractions of this world, we should have but one goal. For we are but travelers on a journey without as yet a fixed abode; we are on our way, not yet in our native land; we are in a state of longing, not yet of enjoyment. But let us continue on our way, and continue without sloth or respite, so that we may ultimately arrive at our destination.

Martha and Mary were sisters, related not only by blood but also by religious aspirations. They stayed close to Our LORD and both served Him harmoniously when He was among them. Martha welcomed Him as travelers are welcomed. But in her case, the maidservant received her LORD, the invalid her Saviour, the creature her Creator, to serve Him bodily food while she was to be fed by the Spirit. For the LORD willed to put on the form of a slave, and under this form to be fed by His own servants, out of condescension and not out of need. For this was indeed condescension, to present Himself to be fed; since He was in the flesh He would indeed be hungry and thirsty.

(Martha and Mary were sisters, related not only by blood but also by religious aspirations. They stayed close to our Lord and both served him harmoniously when he was among them. Martha welcomed him as travelers are welcomed. But in her case, the maidservant received her Lord, the invalid her Savior, the creature her Creator, to serve him bodily food while she was to be fed by the Spirit. For the Lord willed to put on the form of a slave, and under this form to be fed by his own servants, out of condescension and not out of need. For this was indeed condescension, to present himself to be fed; since he was in the flesh he would indeed be hungry and thirsty.)

The One Thing Necessary

Do not think of God’s action as something extraordinary. On the contrary, it makes itself felt in the tiny practical inspirations of every day: do this, give up that, and so on. Live thus, knowing that you are not alone; examine yourself in His presence, under His gaze, and be assured that He will not fail you in the least of the day’s happenings. Does a woman forget her baby at the breast…Yet even if these forget, I will never forget you. (Is 49:15).

Examine yourself as regards generosity. Do you do things by half measures? Do you give yourself only halfway—with God in prayer; with your neighbour in charity? Nature does its hardest to prevent us and keep us back repeatedly, and that in two ways. First, by introducing the natural spirit into all we do—by vanity, self-love—and then, negatively, by keeping back a part of the whole which of right belongs to God.

Seek God in your acts, since He is behind them all, and we are sanctified by the acts He wants from us. Do not seek Him in your ideas, by an effort of the head, but only where He is—for you. We so often seek Him where He is not, and naturally we do not find Him. Thus, when you are tired, for example, do not try to think things out, by abstracting from the present moment. Seek Him in the tiredness itself, by accepting whole-heartedly the situation as it is. God is there; He wants just that, and that is enough. It is the same with difficulties, with feelings of helplessness and the like…. Thus everything becomes an occasion for progress: everything becomes living—and lived—a full, inner life.

Dom Augustin Guillerand, O. Cart.

Dom Augustin Guillerand († 1945) was a French Carthusian monk and a revered spiritual author. [From Where Silence Is Praise: From the writings of Dom Augustin Guillerand, o. cart., A Monk of Parkminster, Tr.

DAILY MEDITATION 

Saint John tells us that “Jesus loved Martha and Mary and Lazarus“ [John 11:15], and yet, but few glimpses are vouchsafed us of them. First, the sisters were set before us with a word. Martha received Jesus into her house, and was busy in outward, loving, and lavish service, while Mary sat in silence at the feet she had bathed with her tears. Then, their brother is ill, and they send to Jesus, “LORD, he who Thou lovest is sick” [John 11:3]. And in His own time the LORD came, and they go out to meet Him; and then follows that scene of an unutterable tenderness and of sublimity unsurpassed: the silent waiting of Mary; Martha strong in Faith, but realizing so vividly, with her practical turn of mind, the fact of death, and hesitating: “Canst Thou show Thy wonders in the grave?“ [John 11:39]. And then, once again, on the eve of his passion, we see Jesus at Bethany. Martha, truth to her character, is soothing; Mary, as at first, pours the precious ornament, and adoration and love, on his divine head.

And then we find the tomb of Saint Martha, at Tarascon, in Provence. When the storm of persecution came, the family of Bethany, with a few companions, were put into a boat, without oars, or sail, and borne to the coast of France. Saint Mary’s tomb is that St. Baume; Saint Lazarus is venerated as the founder of the Church of Marseille; and the memory of the virtues and labours of Saint Martha is still fragrant at Avignon and Tarascon.

Reflection: when Martha received Jesus into her house, she was naturally busy in preparations for such a Guest. Mary sat at His feet, intent alone, on listening to His gracious words. Her sister so much that the time required of the service than this, and asked Our LORD to bid Mary help in serving. Once again, Jesus spoke in defence of Mary. “Martha, Martha,“ He said, “thou art lovingly anxious about many things; be not overeager; do thy choosen work with recollectedness. Just not Mary. Hers is the good part, the one only thing really necessary. Thine will be taken away, that something better be given thee” [Luke 10:41–42] spirit, the life of action ceases when the body is laid down; but the life of contemplation endures and is perfected in Heaven.

John Gilmary Shea [d.1892] – American author and celebrated historian, regarded as the father of American Catholic history.

“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