Tuesday, November 22nd. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 21:5-11.
Tuesday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
22 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. “
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 21:5-11.
While some people were speaking about how the temple was adorned with costly stones and votive offerings, Jesus said,
“All that you see here–the days will come when there will not be left a stone upon another stone that will not be thrown down.”
Then they asked him, “Teacher, when will this happen? And what sign will there be when all these things are about to happen?”
He answered, “See that you not be deceived, for many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he,’ and ‘The time has come.’ Do not follow them!
When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for such things must happen first, but it will not immediately be the end.”
Then he said to them, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.
There will be powerful earthquakes, famines, and plagues from place to place; and awesome sights and mighty signs will come from the sky.”
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National Catholic Broadcasting Council
Daily TV Mass
YouTube
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Father Michael Knox S.J
Celebrates Daily Mass from Loretto Abbey in Toronto
of
Daily TV Mass Tuesday, November 22, 2016
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Tuesday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
22 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Origen (c.185-253),
Priest and theologian
Commentary on St John’s Gospel, 10,39; PG14, 369f.
“Do you not know that you are the temple of God?” (1Cor 3,16)
“Jesus said to the Jews: ‘Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up’… But he was speaking about the temple of his body” (Jn 2,19.21)… Certain people think it impossible to apply to Christ’s body everything spoken about the Temple; they think his body was called ‘temple’ because, just as the first Temple was indwelt by God’s glory, so the Firstborn of all creation is the image and glory of God (Col 1,15) and therefore it is fitting that his Body, the Church, should be called the temple of God because it contains the divine image… But we have learned from Peter that the Church is the body and house of God, built of living stones, a spiritual house for a holy priesthood (1Pt 2,5).
Thus we can consider Solomon, the son of David, who built the Temple, as being a prefiguration of Christ: it was after the war, while peace reigned, that Solomon constructed a temple to the glory of God in the earthly Jerusalem…Just so, when all Christ’s enemies have been “put under his feet and the last enemy, death, has been destroyed” (1Cor 15,25-26), then there will be perfect peace, then Christ will be the “Solomon” whose name means “Peacemaker” and in him this prophecy will be fulfilled: “With those who hate peace, I speak of peace” (Ps 120[119], 6-7). Then each of these living stones will become a stone in the temple, according to their merits in this present life: one – apostle or prophet – placed in the foundation, will carry the stones set above it; another, following after those at the foundation and itself carried by the apostles, will carry other, weaker ones with it; one will be a stone completely on the inside, where the ark with the cherubim and the mercy seat is to be found (1Kgs 6,19); another will be the stone of the porch (v.3), and yet another, outside the vestibule for the priests and Levites, will be the altar stone where the grain offerings are made… The overseeing of the construction together with the organization of the ministers will be entrusted to the angels of God, those holy powers prefigured by Solomon’s prefects for the work… All these things will be accomplished when peace is perfect, when there reigns a great peace.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Tuesday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
22 November 2016
Saint of the day
St. Cecilia,
Virgin and Martyr († 230) – Memorial
SAINT CECILIA
Virgin and Martyr
(† 230)
In the evening of her wedding-day, with the music of the marriage-hymn ringing in her ears, Cecilia, a rich, beautiful, and noble Roman maiden, renewed the vow by which she had consecrated her virginity to God. “Pure be my heart and undefiled my flesh; for I have a spouse you know not of—an angel of my Lord.”
The heart of her young husband Valerian was moved by her words; he ‘received Baptism, and within a few days he and his brother Tiburtius, who had been brought by him to a knowledge of the Faith, sealed their confession with their blood. Cecilia only remained. “Do you not know,” was her answer to the threats of the prefect, “that I am the bride of my Lord Jesus Christ?” The death appointed for her was suffocation, and she remained a day and a night in a hot-air bath, heated seven times its wont. But “the flames had no power over her body, neither was a hair of her head singed.” The lictor sent to dispatch her struck with trembling hand the three blows which the law allowed, and left her still alive. For two days and nights Cecilia lay with her head, half severed on the pavement of her bath, fully sensible, and joyfully awaiting her crown; on the third the agony was over, and in 177 the virgin Saint gave back her pure spirit to Christ.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Matthew 28:20.
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“This is my commandment:
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Monday, November 21st. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 21:1-4.
Monday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
21 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“I tell you truly, this poor widow put in more than all the rest”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 21:1-4.
When Jesus looked up he saw some wealthy people putting their offerings into the treasury
and he noticed a poor widow putting in two small coins.
He said, “I tell you truly, this poor widow put in more than all the rest;
for those others have all made offerings from their surplus wealth, but she, from her poverty, has offered her whole livelihood.”
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National Catholic Broadcasting Council
Daily TV Mass
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Father John Bertao
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Daily TV Mass Monday, November 21, 2016
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Monday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
21 November 2016
Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
THE PRESENTATION
OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY
(Memorial)
Religious parents never fail by devout prayer to consecrate their children to the divine service and love, both before and after their birth. Some amongst the Jews, not content with this general consecration of their children, offered them to God in their infancy, by the hands of the priests in the Temple, to be lodged in apartments belonging to the Temple, and brought up in attending the priests and Levites in the sacred ministry.
It is an ancient tradition that the Blessed Virgin Mary was thus solemnly offered to God in the Temple in her infancy. This festival of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin the Church celebrates this day.
The tender soul of Mary was then adorned with the most precious graces, an object of astonishment and praise to the angels, and of the highest complacence to the adorable Trinity; the Father looking upon her as his beloved daughter, the Son as one chosen and prepared to become his mother, and the Holy Spirit as his darling spouse. Mary was the first who set up the standard of virginity; and, by consecrating it by a perpetual vow to our Lord, she opened the way to all virgins who have since followed her example.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Monday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
21 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Blessed Charles de Foucauld
(1858-1916), hermit and missionary in the Sahara
Meditations on the Gospel, 263
“Those others have all made offerings from their surplus wealth, but she… has offered her whole livelihood.”
Don’t let us despise the poor and little ones…; not only are they our brothers in God but they are the ones who most perfectly imitate Jesus in his outward life. They perfectly symbolize Jesus as workman at Nazareth. These are the firstborn among God’s elect and the first to be summoned to the Savior’s crib. They were Jesus’ constant companions from birth to death; both Mary and Joseph and the apostles belonged to them… Far from despising them, let us honor them, honoring in them the images of Jesus and his holy parents. Instead of spurning them, let us admire them… Let us imitate them and, seeing that theirs is the better state, the one chosen by Jesus for himself and those who belong to him, the one he called first around his crib, the one he showed forth in deed and word…, let us embrace it… Let us become poor workmen like him, like Mary, Joseph, the apostles, the shepherds and, if we should ever be called to the apostolate, let us remain in that life as poor as he himself remained, as poor as a saint Paul did, his “faithful imitator” (cf. 1Cor 11,1).
Let us never stop being poor in everything, brothers to the poor, friends of the poor; let us be the poorest of the poor as Jesus was and, like him, let us love the poor and keep them around us.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
Sunday, November 20th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 23:35-43.
Our Lord Jesus Christ the King – Solemnity – Year C
20 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 23:35-43.
The rulers sneered at Jesus and said, “He saved others, let him save himself if he is the chosen one, the Messiah of God.”
Even the soldiers jeered at him. As they approached to offer him wine
they called out, “If you are King of the Jews, save yourself.”
Above him there was an inscription that read, “This is the King of the Jews.”
Now one of the criminals hanging there reviled Jesus, saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us.”
The other, however, rebuking him, said in reply, “Have you no fear of God, for you are subject to the same condemnation?
And indeed, we have been condemned justly, for the sentence we received corresponds to our crimes, but this man has done nothing criminal.”
Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
He replied to him, “Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”
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The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Toronto
YOUTUBE
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Our Lord Jesus Christ the King – Solemnity – Year C
20 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Saint John Chrysostom (c.345-407),
Priest at Antioch then Bishop of Constantinople,
Doctor of the Church
Homily on the Cross and the criminal, 1, 3-4; PG 49, 403
“Above him there was an inscription that read: ‘This is the King of the Jews’”
“Lord, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.” The criminal did not venture to make this prayer before he had laid down the burden of his sins with his confession . So you see, O Christian, the power of confession. He acknowledged his sins and paradise was opened; he acknowledged his sins and gained confidence enough to ask for the Kingdom in spite of his deeds of robbery…
Do you want to know the Kingdom? What can you see here that is like it? You have the nails and cross before your eyes but this cross, said Jesus, is itself the very sign of the Kingdom. As for me, when I see him on the cross, I proclaim him king. Isn’t it the duty of a king to die for his subjects? He himself has said that: “The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep,” (Jn 10,11). This is no less true for a good king; he, too, lays down his life for his subjects. So I will proclaim him king on account of the gift he has made of his life: “Lord, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.”
Do you understand now how it is that the cross is the sign of the Kingdom? Here is yet another proof. Christ did not leave his cross on earth but took it up and bore it with him into heaven. We know this because he will have it with him when he returns in glory. To teach you how much this cross is worthy of veneration, he has made it a sign of glory… When the Son of Man comes: “the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light.” Then shall reign a light so bright that even the brightest stars will be eclipsed. “The stars will fall from the sky. Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven,” (Mt 24,29f.). Do you understand the power of the sign of the cross?… When a king enters a city, soldiers take up their standards, hoist them onto their shoulders and march in front of him to announce his arrival. In the same way, legions of angels and archangels will go before Christ when he comes from heaven. They will bear this sign on their shoulders announcing the coming of our king.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Our Lord Jesus Christ the King – Solemnity – Year C
20 November 2016
Solemnity
Our Lord Jesus Christ the King –
Solemnity
OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST THE KING
(Solemnity)
The solemnity of our Lord Jesus Christ the King indicates the end of the liturgical year.
The Gospel of this Sunday gives us a light for our life and for our behavior. The Kingdom of Christ does not belong to this world; even if the Lord said that his Kingdom is between us. The Gospel of the first Sunday of Advent will clarify about the end of the world, about the second coming of Christ and his advent in the glory.
The Church, because of her wisdom, proclaims that Jesus is really the Lord of the time and the eternity. Liturgical year helps us in path to salvation showing that life has a meaning, a future: being with God. Let us be on the watch… giving thanks for this year, in the joyful wait of Advent, in the contemplation of mystery of “God-with-us”, in faithful of his mercy that opens the door of the world that comes.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Our Lord Jesus Christ the King – Solemnity – Year C
20 November 2016
Saint of the day
St. Edmund the Martyr (841-870)
Saint Edmund the Martyr
King and Martyr
(841-870)
St. Edmund was elected king of the East Angles in 855 at the age of fourteen and began ruling Suffolk, England, the following year.
In 869 or 870, the Danes invaded Edmund’s realm, and he was captured at Hone, in Suffolk. After extreme torture, Edmund was beheaded and died calling upon Jesus.
According to Abbo of Fleury’s vita “His severed head was thrown into the wood. Day and night as Edmund’s followers went seeking, calling out “Where are you, friend?” the head answered, “Here, here, here,” until at last, “a great wonder”, they found Edmund’s head in the possession of a grey wolf, clasped between its paws. “They were astonished at the wolf’s guardianship”.The wolf, sent by God to protect the head from the animals of the forest, was starving but did not eat the head for all the days it was lost. After recovering the head the villagers marched back to the kingdom, praising God and the wolf that served him. The wolf walked beside them as if tame all the way to the town, after which it turned around and vanished into the forest.“
His shrine brought about the town of Bury St. Edmund’s.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
Friday, November 18th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 19:45-48.
Friday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
18 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer,
but you have made it a den of thieves.'”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 19:45-48.
Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things,
saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.'”
And every day he was teaching in the temple area. The chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people, meanwhile, were seeking to put him to death,
but they could find no way to accomplish their purpose because all the people were hanging on his words.
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Friday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
18 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Saint Augustine (354-430),
Saint Augustine (354-430),
Bishop of Hippo (North Africa) and Doctor of the Church
Sermon on Psalm 131[130], § 3
“All the people were hanging on his words”
We pray in God’s temple when we pray in the peace of the Church, in the unity of Christ’s body, because the Body of Christ is made up of the great mass of believers scattered throughout the world… It is in this temple, and not in the material Temple at Jerusalem, that we must pray “in spirit and truth” (Jn 4,23) if we are to be answered. The latter was “a shadow of things to come” (Col 2,17), which is why it fell to ruin… The temple that fell could not be the house of prayer of which it was said that: “My house will be called a house of prayer for all peoples” (Mk 11,17; Is 56,7; Jer 7,11).
Was it indeed the case that those who wanted to make of it “a den of thieves” were the cause of its fall? In the same way, neither do those leading a disordered life in the Church and seeking, so far as they might, to make the house of God a den of thieves, neither do those overthrow this temple. The time will come when they will be cast out beneath the blows of their sins. This gathering of the faithful, the temple of God and Body of Christ, has but one voice and sings as one person… If we want, this voice is ours; if we want, when we hear them singing we, too, will sing in our hearts
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Friday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
18 November 2016
Dedication of the Basilicas of Peter and Paul
Dedication of the Basilicas
of the Apostles Peter and Paul
in Rome
Among the holy places venerated by the Christians from the beginning, the chief has always been the Confession of St. Peter on Vatican Hill, hallowed by the tomb of the Prince of the Apostles. Here the Emperor Constantine is said to have come and, taking a shovel and a two-pronged fork, to have broken the sod to designate the site of the basilica which he built at his own expense. Pope Sylvester dedicated it on the fourteenth of the Calends of December and decreed that from that time henceforth all altars must be of stone. In later years when it became ruinous with age, it was rebuilt from the foundations through the piety and zeal of several Pontiffs. Urban VIII solemnly dedicated it on this same day in the year 1626.
Sylvester, likewise, dedicated the basilica of St. Paul the Apostle on the Ostian Way. It had been most sumptuously built by the same Emperor Constantine. After it was completely destroyed by fire, it was rebuilt more magnificently than before through the tireless efforts of four Pontiffs. Pius IX, taking advantage of the most auspicious occasion of the definition of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, surrounded by a host of bishops, solemnly consecrated it.
O God,
who for us bring each year
the recurrence of the consecration day of this your holy temple,
and always bring us back safely to the sacred rites, hear the payers of your people
and grant that whoever enters this temple to pray for blessings,
may rejoice in having obtained whatever he sought.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Friday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
18 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Rose Philippine Duchesne,
Religious (1769-1852)
Rose Philippine Duchesne
Religious, of the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus
(1769-1852)
Rose Philippine Duchesne was born August 29, 1769 in Grenoble, France. She was baptized in the Church of St. Louis and received the name of Philip, the apostle, and Rose of Lima, first saint of the new continent. She was educated at the Convent of the Visitation of Ste. Marie d’en Haut, then, drawn to the contemplative life, she became a novice there when she was 18 years old.
At the time of the Revolution in France, the community was dispersed and Philippine returned to her family home, spending her time nursing prisoners and helping others who suffered. After the Concordat of 1801, she tried with some companions to reconstruct the monastery of Ste. Marie but without success.
In 1804, Philippine learned of a new congregation, the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and offered herself and the monastery to the Foundress, Mother Madeleine Sophie Barat. Mother Barat visited Ste. Marie in 1804 and received Philippine and several companions as novices in the Society.
Even as Philippine’s desire deepened for the contemplative life, so too her call to the missions became more urgent – a call she had heard since her youth. In a letter she wrote to Mother Barat, she confided a spiritual experience she had had during a night of adoration before the Eucharist on Holy Thursday: “I spent the entire night in the new World … carrying the Blessed Sacrament to all parts of the land … I had all my sacrifices to offer: a mother, sisters, family, my mountain! When you say to me ‘now I send you’, I will respond quickly ‘I go”‘. She waited, however, another 12 years.
In 1818 Philippine’s dream was realized. She was sent to respond to the bishop of the Louisiana territory, who was looking for a congregation of educators to help him evangelize the Indian and French children of his diocese. At St. Charles, near St. Louis, Missouri, she founded the first house of the Society outside France. It was in a log cabin – and with it came all the austerities of frontier life: extreme cold, hard work, lack of funds. She also had difficulty learning English. Communication at best was slow; news often did not arrive from her beloved France. She struggled to remain closely united with the Society in France.
Philippine and four other Religious of the Sacred Heart forged ahead. In 1820 she opened the first free school west of the Mississippi. By 1828 she had founded six houses. These schools were for the young women of Missouri and Louisiana. She loved and served them well, but always in her heart she yearned to serve the American Indians. When she was 72 and no longer superior, a school for the Potawatomi was opened at Sugar Creek, Kansas. Though many thought Philippine was too sick to go, the Jesuit head of the mission insisted: “She must come; she may not be able to do much work, but she will assure success to the mission by praying for us. Her very presence will draw down all manner of heavenly favors on the work”.
She was with the Potawatomi but a year; however, her pioneer courage did not weaken, and her long hours of contemplation impelled the Indians to name her, Quah-kah-ka-num-ad,
“Woman-Who-Prays-Always”. But Philippine’s health could not sustain the regime of village life. In July 1842, she returned to St. Charles, although her heart never lost its desire for the missions: “I feel the same longing for the Rocky Mountain missions and any others like them, that I experienced in France when I first begged to come to America…”.
Philippine died at St. Charles, Missouri, November 18, 1852 at the age of 83.
© Copyright 2000 – Libreria Editrice Vaticana
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Friday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
18 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Odo of Cluny
(† 942)
Odo of Cluny, 11th century miniature
SAINT ODO OF CLUNY
(† 942)
On Christmas-eve, 877, a noble of Aquitaine implored Our Lady to grant him a son. His prayer was heard; Odo was born, and his grateful father offered him to St. Martin. Odo grew in wisdom and in virtue, and his father longed to see him shine at court. But the attraction of grace was too strong. Odo’s heart was sad and his health failed, until he forsook the world and sought refuge under the shadow of St. Martin at Tours.
Later on he took the habit of St. Benedict at Baume, and was compelled to become abbot of the great abbey of Cluny, which was then building. He ruled it with the hand of a master and the winningness of a Saint.
The Pope sent for him often to act as peacemaker between contending princes, and it was on one of those missions of mercy that he was taken ill at Rome. At his urgent entreaty he was borne back to Tours, where he died at the feet of «his own St. Martin,” in 942.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
Thursday, November 17th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 19:41-44.
Thursday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
17 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“They will smash you to the ground and your children within you”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 19:41-44.
As Jesus drew near Jerusalem, he saw the city and wept over it,
saying, “If this day you only knew what makes for peace–but now it is hidden from your eyes.
For the days are coming upon you when your enemies will raise a palisade against you; they will encircle you and hem you in on all sides.
They will smash you to the ground and your children within you, and they will not leave one stone upon another within you because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.”
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National Catholic Broadcasting Council
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Celebrates Daily Mass from Loretto Abbey in Toronto
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Daily TV Mass Thursday, November 17, 2016
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Thursday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
17 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Elizabeth of Hungary
(† 1231) – Memorial
SAINT ELIZABETH OF HUNGARY
(† 1231)
Elizabeth was daughter of a king of Hungary, and niece of St. Hedwige. She was betrothed in infancy to Louis, Landgrave of Thuringia, and brought up in his father’s court. Not content with receiving daily numbers of poor in her palace, and relieving all in distress, she built several hospitals, where she served the sick, dressing the most repulsive sores with her own hands.
Once as she was carrying in the folds of her mantle some provisions for the poor, she met her husband returning from the chase. Astonished to see her bending under the weight of her burden, he opened the mantle which she kept pressed against her, and found in it nothing but beautiful red and white roses, although it was not the season for flowers. Bidding her pursue her way, he took one of the marvellous roses, and kept it all his life.
On her husband’s death she was cruelly driven from her palace, and forced to wander through the streets with her little children, a prey to hunger and cold; but she welcomed all her sufferings, and continued to be the mother of the poor, converting many by her holy life.
She died in 1231, at the age of twenty-four.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Thursday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
17 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Gregory Thaumaturgus,
Bishop (3rd century)
SAINT GREGORY THAUMATURGUS
Bishop
(3rd Century)
St. Gregory was born in Pontus, of heathen parents. In Palestine, about the year 231, he studied philosophy under the great Origen, who led him from the pursuit of human wisdom to Christ, who is the Wisdom of God. Not long after, he was made Bishop of Neo Cæsarea in his own country.
As he lay awake one night an old man entered his room, and pointed to a lady of superhuman beauty, and radiant with heavenly light. This old man was St. John the Evangelist, and the lady told him to give Gregory the instruction he desired. Thereupon he gave St. Gregory a creed which contained in all its fulness the doctrine of the Trinity. St. Gregory set it in writing, directed all his preaching by it, and handed it down to his successors.
Strong in this faith, he subdued demons; he foretold the future. At his word a rock moved from its place, a river changed its course, a lake was dried up. He converted his diocese, and strengthened those under persecution. He struck down a rising heresy; and, when he was gone, this creed preserved his flock from the Arian pest.
St. Gregory died in the year 270.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
Wednesday, November 16th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 19:11-28.
Wednesday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
16 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
‘I tell you, to everyone who has, more will be given,
but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 19:11-28.
While people were listening to Jesus speak, he proceeded to tell a parable because he was near Jerusalem and they thought that the Kingdom of God would appear there immediately.
So he said, “A nobleman went off to a distant country to obtain the kingship for himself and then to return.
He called ten of his servants and gave them ten gold coins and told them, ‘Engage in trade with these until I return.’
His fellow citizens, however, despised him and sent a delegation after him to announce, ‘We do not want this man to be our king.’
But when he returned after obtaining the kingship, he had the servants called, to whom he had given the money, to learn what they had gained by trading.
The first came forward and said, ‘Sir, your gold coin has earned ten additional ones.’
He replied, ‘Well done, good servant! You have been faithful in this very small matter; take charge of ten cities.’
Then the second came and reported, ‘Your gold coin, sir, has earned five more.’
And to this servant too he said, ‘You, take charge of five cities.’
Then the other servant came and said, ‘Sir, here is your gold coin; I kept it stored away in a handkerchief,
for I was afraid of you, because you are a demanding person; you take up what you did not lay down and you harvest what you did not plant.’
He said to him, ‘With your own words I shall condemn you, you wicked servant. You knew I was a demanding person, taking up what I did not lay down and harvesting what I did not plant;
why did you not put my money in a bank? Then on my return I would have collected it with interest.’
And to those standing by he said, ‘Take the gold coin from him and give it to the servant who has ten.’
But they said to him, ‘Sir, he has ten gold coins.’
‘I tell you, to everyone who has, more will be given, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.
Now as for those enemies of mine who did not want me as their king, bring them here and slay them before me.'”
After he had said this, he proceeded on his journey up to Jerusalem.
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Daily TV Mass Wednesday, November 16, 2016
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Wednesday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
16 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Saint Josémaria Escriva de Balaguer (1902-1975),
Priest, founder
A homily from ‘Amigos de Dios’
“Trade with it”
“Sir, here is your gold coin; I kept it stored away in a handkerchief.” What is this man going to do with himself now since he has abandoned his means of work? Being irresponsible, he has opted for the convenient solution of giving back only what he has received. He will devote himself to killing time: minutes, hours, days, months, years, life itself! The others go to a lot of trouble: they trade; they are nobly concerned with restoring even more to their master than they received – necessary fruit in that the recommendation was very specific: “Engage in trade with these until I come”, take on this work so as to make a profit until your master returns. But as for him, he does nothing; this man wastes his life.
What shame it is to live only to kill time, God’s treasure! Nothing excuses such an attitude. Saint John Chrysostom writes: “Let no one say: ‘I only have one talent; there’s nothing I can do with it.’ With only one talent you can still act in a commendable way.” It’s a sad thing not to turn all our capacities, great or small, to good account, to real gain – capacities that God bestows on man so that he can devote himself to serving souls and society! When a Christian holds back through egoism, when he hides away, takes no interest, in a word when he kills his time, then he runs the strong risk of killing his heaven too. He who loves God does not limit himself merely to putting all he owns, all he is, at Christ’s service: he gives his very self.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Wednesday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
16 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Margaret of Scotland
(c. 1046-1093)
SAINT MARGARET OF SCOTLAND
Queen of Scotland
Foundress of abbeys
(† 1093)
Saint Margaret’s name signifies “pearl;” “a fitting name,” says Theodoric, her confessor and her first biographer, “for one such as she.” Her soul was like a precious pearl. A life spent amidst the luxury of a royal court never dimmed its lustre, or stole it away from him who had bought it with his blood. She was the grand, daughter of an English king; and in 1070 she became the bride of Malcolm, and reigned Queen of Scotland till her death in 1093.
How did she become a Saint in a position where sanctity is so difficult?
First, she burned with zeal for the house of God. She built churches and monasteries; she busied herself in making vestments; she could not rest till she saw the laws of God and His Church observed throughout her realm.
Next, amidst a thousand cares, she found time to converse with God-ordering her piety with such sweetness and discretion that she won her husband to sanctity like her own. He used to rise with her at night for prayer; he loved to kiss the holy books she used, and sometimes he would steal them away, and bring them back to his wife covered with jewels. Lastly, with virtues so great, she wept constantly over her sins, and begged her confessor to correct her faults.
St. Margaret did not neglect her duties in the world because she was not of it. Never was a better mother. She spared no pains in the education of her eight children, and their sanctity was the fruit of her prudence and her zeal. Never was a better queen. She was the most trusted counsellor of her husband, and she labored for the material improvement of the country.
But, in the midst of the world’s pleasures, she sighed for the better country, and accepted death as a release. On her death-bed she received the news that her husband and her eldest son were slain in battle. She thanked God, who had sent this last affliction as a penance for her sins. After receiving Holy Viaticum, she was repeating the prayer from the Missal, “O Lord Jesus Christ, who by thy death didst give life to the world, deliver me.” At the words “deliver me,” says her biographer, she took her departure to Christ, the Author of true liberty.
St Margaret was declared Patroness of Scotland in 1673.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Wednesday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
16 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Gertrude the Great,
Abbess († c. 1302)
SAINT GERTRUDE
Abbess
(† c. 1302)
Gertrude was born in the year 1256, of a noble Saxon family, and placed at the age of five for education in the Benedictine abbey of Rodelsdorf. Her strong mind was carefully cultivated, and she wrote Latin with unusual elegance and force; above all, she was perfect in humility and mortification, in obedience, and in all monastic observances.
Her life was crowded with wonders. She has in obedience recorded some of her visions, in which she traces in words of indescribable beauty the intimate converse of her soul with Jesus and Mary. She was gentle to all, most gentle to sinners; filled with devotion to the Saints of God, to the souls in purgatory, and above all to the Passion of Our Lord and to His Sacred Heart.
She ruled her abbey with perfect wisdom and love for forty years. Her life was one of great and almost continual suffering, and her longing to be with Jesus was not granted till 1301 or 1302, when she had reached her forty-one year.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
Tuesday, November 15th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 19:1-10.
Tuesday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
15 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“Zacchaeus, come down quickly,
for today I must stay at your house.”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 19:1-10.
At that time, Jesus came to Jericho and intended to pass through the town.
Now a man there named Zacchaeus, who was a chief tax collector and also a wealthy man,
was seeking to see who Jesus was; but he could not see him because of the crowd, for he was short in stature.
So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree in order to see Jesus, who was about to pass that way.
When he reached the place, Jesus looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house.”
And he came down quickly and received him with joy.
When they all saw this, they began to grumble, saying, “He has gone to stay at the house of a sinner.”
But Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Behold, half of my possessions, Lord, I shall give to the poor, and if I have extorted anything from anyone I shall repay it four times over.”
And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house because this man too is a descendant of Abraham.
For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost.”
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Daily TV Mass Tuesday, November 15, 2016
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Tuesday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
15 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Albert the Great,
(c. 1200-1280)
SAINT ALBERT the GREAT
Bishop and Doctor of Church
(c. 1200-1280)
Albert, called the Great, because of his extraordinary learning, was born at Lauingen on the Danube in Swabia, and was carefully educated from boyhood. To pursue higher studies, he left his native land and went to Padua.
At the urging of the blessed Jordan, Master General of the Order of Preachers, and against the futile opposition of his uncle, he sought admission into the family of Dominic. After being elected to membership among the brethren, he was conspicuous for his piety and for his strict observance of the rule.
He had the greatest love for the Blessed Virgin Mary and burned with zeal for souls. He was sent to complete his studies at Cologne. Afterward he was appointed professor at Hildesheim, Fribourg, Ratisbon and Strasbourg, successively.
In the chair at Paris, he gained great fame. Among his beloved pupils was Thomas Aquinas and he was the first to recognize and acclaim the greatness of that intellect. At Anagni, in the presence of the Supreme Pontiff Alexander IV, he refuted that William who had impiously attacked the mendicant Orders. He was later appointed Bishop of Ratisbon.
In giving counsel and in settling disputes, he bore himself so admirably that he earned the title of Peacemaker. He wrote many things on almost every branch of learning, especially on sacred subjects, and composed some magnificent works upon the Sacrament of the Altar.
Most famous for virtue and miracles, he fell asleep in the Lord in the year 1280.
As, by the authority of the Roman Pontiffs, he had been venerated for a long time in many diocese and in the Order of Preachers, Pope Pius XI, gladly acceded to the wish of the Congregation of Sacred Rites and, adding the title of Doctor, extended his feast to the universal Church. Pius XII constituted him the heavenly patron with God of all students of the natural sciences.
Roman Breviary – Benziger Brothers, 1964
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
_______________________________________
Tuesday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
15 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Raphael Kalinowski,
O.C.D. († 1907)
Raphael Kalinowski
O.C.D.
(1835-1907)
Father Raphael of Saint Joseph Kalinowski, was born at Vilna, 1st September 1835, and at baptism received the name Joseph. Under the teaching of his father Andrew, at the Institute for Nobles at Vilna, he progressed so well that he received the maximum distinction in his studies. He then went for two years (1851-1852) to the school of Agriculture at Hory-Horky. During the years 1853-1857, he continued his studies at the Academy of Military Engineering at St Petersburg, obtaining his degree in Engineering, and the rank of Lieutenant. Immediately afterwards he was named Lecturer in Mathematics at the same Academy. In 1859, he took part in the designing of the Kursk-Kiev-Odessa railway.
In 1863 the Polish insurrection against their Russian oppressors broke out. He resigned from the Russian forces, and accepted the post of Minister of War for the region of Vilna, in the rebel army. On 24th March 1864, he was arrested and condemned to death, a penalty that was mitigated to 10 years hard labour in Siberia. With an admirable strength of spirit, patience, and love for his fellow exiles, he knew how to instill into them the spirit of prayer, serenity and hope, and to give material help together with a word of encouragement.
Repatriated in 1874, he accepted the post of tutor to the Venerable Servant of God, Augusto Czartoryski, living mostly in Paris. His influence on the young prince was such, that Augusto discovered his true vocation as priest and religious. He was received into the Salesians by their founder, Saint John Bosco, in 1887. On the other hand, Joseph Kalinowski entered the Discalced Carmelites at Graz in Austria, and received the religious name of Brother Raphael of Saint Joseph. He studied theology in Hungary, and was ordained Priest at Czerna near Krakow, 15th January 1882.
Afire with apostolic zeal, he did not spare himself in helping the faithful, and assisting his Carmelite brothers and sisters in the ascent of the mountain of perfection.
In the sacrament of Reconciliation, he lifted up many from the mire of sin. He did his utmost for the work of reunification of the Church, and bequeathed this mission to his Carmelite brothers and sisters. His superiors entrusted him with many important offices, which he carried out perfectly, right until the time of his death.
Overcome by fatigue and suffering, and held in great respect by all the people, he gave his soul to God, 15th November 1907, at Wadowice in the monastery founded by himself. He was buried in the monastery cemetery, at Czerna, near Krakow.
During his life and after death, he enjoyed a remarkable fame for sanctity, even on the part of the most noble and illustrious of people, such as the Cardinals Dunajewski, Puzyna, Kakowski and Gotti. The Ordinary Process for his eventual beatification, was set in motion in the Curia of Krakow during the years 1934-1938, and later taken to Rome where in 1943 was issued the Decree concerning his writings. His cause was introduced in 1952. From 1953-1956 the Apostolic Process was carried out, and the Congregation proceeded to the discussion on his virtues.
Pope John Paul II, on the 11th October 1980, promulgated the Decree on the heroicity of his virtues. After the approval of the miraculous healing of the Reverend Mis, the Holy Father beatified Father Raphael Kalinowski at Krakow on 22nd June 1983.
As the fame of his miracles was increasing, the Curia of Krakow in 1989, set in motion the Canonical Process to investigate the extraordinary healing of a young child. The discussions of the doctors, theologians and cardinals, were brought to a happy conclusion. On the 10th July 1990, the Holy Father John Paul II, approved the miracle for the canonization.
In the Consistory of 26th November 1990, Pope John Paul together with the Cardinals, decided to canonize Blessed Raphael Kalinowski. They set the ceremony for Sunday, 17th November 1991. Pope John Paul II, canonized him, and presented him as a model to all Christians in the universal Church.
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Tuesday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
15 November 2016
Saints of the day
Bl. Mary of the Passion
(1839-1904)
Blessed Mary of the Passion
Foundress of the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary
(1839-1904)
Born on 21st May 1839 in Nantes, France, into a noble Christian family, Hélène Marie Philippine de Chappotin de Neuville, in religion Mary of the Passion, showed from childhood eminent natural gifts and a deep faith.
In April 1856, during a retreat, she first experienced a call from God to a life of total consecration. The unforeseen death of her mother delayed its realisation. In December 1860, with the consent of the Bishop of Nantes, she entered the Poor Clares whose ideal of the simplicity and poverty of Saint Francis attracted her.
On 23rd January 1861, while still a postulant, she had a profound experience of God who invited her to offer herself as a victim for the Church and the Pope. This experience marked her for life. A short time after, having become seriously ill, she had to leave the monastery. When she was well again, her confessor directed her towards the Society of Marie Reparatrice. She entered with them in 1864 and on the following 15th August, in Toulouse, she received the religious habit with the name of Mary of the Passion.
In March 1865, while still a novice, she was sent to India, to the Apostolic Vicariate of Madurai, confided to the Society of Jesus. The Reparatrice sisters there had the task of formation of sisters of an autochthonous congregation as well as being involved in other apostolic activities. It was there, that she pronounced her temporary vows on 3rd May 1866.
Because of her gifts and virtues, she was nominated local superior and then, in July 1867, she was named provincial superior of the three convents of the Reparatrice. Under her guidance, the works of the apostolate developed, peace which had been some-what disturbed by tensions which were already existing in the mission, was re-established and fervour and regularity flourished again in the communities.
In 1874, a new house was founded in Ootacamund in the Vicariate of Coimbatore, confided to the Paris Foreign Mission Society. However in Madurai the dissensions became exacerbated to such an extent that, in 1876 some religious, among them Mary of the Passion, were driven to leave the Society of Marie Reparatrice, reuniting, at Ootacamund under the jurisdiction of the Vicar Apostolic of Coimbatore, Monsignor Joseph Bardou MEP.
In November 1876, Mary of the Passion went to Rome to regularize the situation of the twenty separated sisters and, on 6th January 1877, obtained the authorization from Pius IX to found a new Institute which was to be specifically missionary and was to be called the Missionaries of Mary.
On the suggestion of the Congregation of Propaganda Fide, Mary of the Passion opened a novitiate in Saint-Brieuc in France, where very soon numerous vocations came along. In April 1880, and in June 1882, the Servant of God went to Rome to resolve the difficulties which were threatening to hinder the stability and growth of the young Institute. This latter journey, on June 1882, marked an important stage in her life: in fact she was authorized to open a house in Rome and, through providential circumstances, she rediscovered the Franciscan direction which God had indicated to her twenty-two years previously. On 4th October 1882, in the Church of the Aracoeli, she was received into the Third Order of Saint Francis and thus began her relationship with the Servant of God, Fr. Bernardin de Portogruaro, Minister General, who with paternal solicitude would support her in her trials.
In March 1883, due to latent opposition, Mary of the Passion was deposed from her office of Superior of the Institute. However, after an inquiry ordered by Leo XIII, her innocence was fully acknowledged and at the Chapter of July 1884 she was re-elected.
The Institute of the Missionaries of Mary then began to develop rapidly. On 12th August 1885 the Laudatory Decree, and that of affiliation to the Order of Friars Minor were issued. The Constitutions were approved ad experimentum on 17th July 1890 and definitively on 11th May 1896. Missionaries were sent regularly to the most perilous and distant places overcoming all obstacles and boundaries.
The zeal of the Foundress knew no bounds in responding to the calls of the poor and the abandoned. She was particularly interested in the promotion of women and the social question: with intelligence and discretion she offered collaboration to the pioneers who were working in these spheres, which they appreciated very much.
Her intense activity drew its dynamism from contemplation of the great mysteries of faith. For Mary of the Passion, all led back to the Unity-Trinity of God Truth-Love, who communicates Himself to us through the paschal mystery of Christ. It was in union with these mysteries that, in an ecclesial and missionary dimension, she lived her vocation of offering. Jesus in the Eucharist was for her, “the great missionary” and Mary, in the disponibility of her «Ecce», traced out for her the path of unconditional donation to the work of God. Thus she opened her Institute to the horizons of universal mission, accomplished in Francis of Assisi’s evangelical spirit of simplicity, poverty and charity .
She took great care, not only of the external organization of the works, but above all of the spiritual formation of the religious. Gifted with an extraordinary capacity for work, she found time to compose numerous writings on formation, whilst by frequent correspondence she followed her missionaries dispersed throughout the world, relentlessly calling them to a life of holiness. In 1900 her Institute received the seal of blood through the martyrdom of seven Franciscan Missionaries of Mary, who were beatified in 1946 and canonised during the Great Jubilee of the year 2000. To be the spiritual mother of these missionaries who had known how to live to the shedding of their blood, the ideal proposed by her, was for Mary of the Passion, both a great sorrow, a great joy and a time of great emotion.
Worn out by the fatigue of incessant journeys and daily labour, Mary of the Passion, after a brief illness, died peacefully in San Remo on 15th November 1904, leaving more than 2,000 religious and eighty-six houses scattered about the four continents. Her mortal remains repose in a private oratory of the General House of the Institute of the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary in Rome.
In February 1918, in San Remo, the Informative Process was opened for the Cause of Beatification and Canonization. In 1941, the Decree on the writings was promulgated and, during the following years, numerous postulatory letters were addressed to the Holy See from all parts of the world in favour of the Cause of the Servant of God. After the Consultors had voted unanimously in its favour, the Decree for the Introduction of the Cause was published on 19th January 1979, with the approbation of His Holiness John Paul II. On 28th June 1999 the Sovereign Pontiff John Paul II solemnly promulgated the Decree on the heroicity of the virtues of Mother Mary of the Passion
On 5th March 2002, the healing of a religious, suffering from “pulmonary and vertebral TBC, Pott’s Disease”, was recognized as a miracle granted by God through the intercession of the Venerable Mary of the Passion. On 20th October 2002, she was beatified.
– Copyright © Libreria Editrice Vaticana
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
_____________________
Monday, November 14th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 18:35-43.
Monday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
14 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“Lord, please let me see.”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 18:35-43.
As Jesus approached Jericho a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging,
and hearing a crowd going by, he inquired what was happening.
They told him, “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.”
He shouted, “Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!”
The people walking in front rebuked him, telling him to be silent, but he kept calling out all the more, “Son of David, have pity on me!”
Then Jesus stopped and ordered that he be brought to him; and when he came near, Jesus asked him,
What do you want me to do for you? He replied, “Lord, please let me see.”
Jesus told him, “Have sight; your faith has saved you.”
He immediately received his sight and followed him, giving glory to God. When they saw this, all the people gave praise to God.
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Daily TV Mass Monday, November 14, 2016
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Monday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time
14 November 2016
Saint of the day
St. Lawrence O’Toole,
Archbishop of Dublin (c. 1125-1180)
SAINT LAWRENCE O’TOOLE
Archbishop of Dublin
(c. 1125-1180)
St. Lawrence, it appears, was born about the year 1125. When only ten years old, his father delivered him up as a hostage to Dermod Mac Murchad, King of Leinster, who treated the child with great inhumanity, until his father obliged the tyrant to put him in the hands of the Bishop of Glendalough, in the county of Wicklow. The holy youth, by his fidelity in corresponding with the divine grace, grew to be a model of virtues.
On the death of the bishop, who was also abbot of the monastery, St. Lawrence was chosen abbot in 1150, though but twenty-five years old, and governed his numerous community with wonderful virtue and prudence. In 1161 St. Lawrence was unanimously chosen to fill the new metropolitan See of Dublin.
About the year 1171 he was obliged, for the affairs of his diocese, to go over to England to see the king, Henry II., who was then at Canterbury. The Saint was received by the Benedictine monks of Christ Church with the greatest honor and respect. On the following day, as the holy archbishop was advancing to the altar to officiate, a maniac, who had heard much of his sanctity, and who was led on by the idea of making so holy a man another St. Thomas, struck him a violent blow on the head. All present concluded that he was mortally wounded; but the Saint coming to himself, asked for some water, blessed it, and having his wound washed with it, the blood was immediately stanched, and the archbishop celebrated Mass.
In 1175 Henry II of England became offended with Roderic, the monarch of Ireland, and St. Lawrence undertook another journey to England to negotiate a reconciliation between them. Henry was so moved by his piety, charity, and prudence that he granted him everything he asked, and left the whole negotiation to his discretion.
Our Saint ended his journey here below on the 14th of November, 1180, and was buried in the church of the abbey at Eu, on the confines of Normandy.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
Sunday, November 13th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 21:5-19.
Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year C
13 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“They will seize and persecute you,
they will hand you over to the synagogues and to prisons”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 21:5-19.
While some people were speaking about how the temple was adorned with costly stones and votive offerings, Jesus said,
“All that you see here–the days will come when there will not be left a stone upon another stone that will not be thrown down.”
Then they asked him, “Teacher, when will this happen? And what sign will there be when all these things are about to happen?”
He answered, “See that you not be deceived, for many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he,’ and ‘The time has come.’ Do not follow them!
When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for such things must happen first, but it will not immediately be the end.”
Then he said to them, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.
There will be powerful earthquakes, famines, and plagues from place to place; and awesome sights and mighty signs will come from the sky.”
Before all this happens, however, they will seize and persecute you, they will hand you over to the synagogues and to prisons, and they will have you led before kings and governors because of my name.
It will lead to your giving testimony.
Remember, you are not to prepare your defense beforehand,
for I myself shall give you a wisdom in speaking that all your adversaries will be powerless to resist or refute.
You will even be handed over by parents, brothers, relatives, and friends, and they will put some of you to death.
You will be hated by all because of my name,
but not a hair on your head will be destroyed.
By your perseverance you will secure your lives.”
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The Sunday Mass – 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time (November 13, 2016)
Presider: Rev. Tom Lynch
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Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year C
13 November 2016
Saint Ambrose (c.340-397),
Bishop of Milan and Doctor of the Church
Commentary on Saint Luke’s gospel, X, 6-8 (cf. SC 52, p. 158f., rev.)
The coming of Christ
“Not one stone will remain upon another: all shall be destroyed.” These words were true of the Temple built by Solomon… for everything built by human hands either wears away or disintegrates or is overthrown by violence or destroyed by fire… But there is also a temple within every one of us that crumbles whenever faith is lacking and most especially if, in Christ’s name, one falsely tries to gain possession of interior convictions. Perhaps this is the most helpful interpretation where we are concerned. Indeed, what is the point of my knowing the day of judgement? Being aware of so many sins, what is the point of knowing the Savior will one day come if he has not come into my soul, if he is not recalled to my mind, if Christ does not live in me, if Christ does not speak in me? So it is to me Christ must come and it is for my sake his coming must take place.
The Lord’s second coming takes place as the world draws to a close, when we are able to say: “The world is crucified to me and I to the world” (Gal 6,14)… To the one to whom the world is dead, Christ is everlasting; to such a one the temple is spiritual, the Law spiritual, even the Passover is spiritual… And so, for that person wisdom’s presence has come to pass, along with virtue and justice and the presence of the resurrection, for Christ indeed died once for the sins of the people in order daily to redeem the sins of the people.
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Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year C
13 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Frances Xavier Cabrini,
(1850-1917)
SAINT FRANCES XAVIER CABRINI
Virgin and Foundress
(1850-1917)
Frances Cabrini was born and baptized on 15 July 1850 in Sant’Angelo Lodigiano in northern Italy, to a family rich in faith and piety. Early in life she began her journey as a disciple of the Lord, who led her to the heights of sanctity in mysterious and unforeseen ways.
The turning-point in her life was entering the “House of Providence” in Codogno, where tribulations and difficulties strengthened her missionary fervour and her resolve to dedicate herself totally to the Lord. She received the religious habit, and while keeping the name Frances, later added Xavier to it in memory of the great Jesuit missionary and patron of the missions. Thanks to the encouragement and support of Bishop Domenico Maria Gelmini of Lodi, Sr Frances Xavier left the “House of Providence” with seven companions to found your institute in an old Franciscan monastery. First called the “Salesian Missionaries of the Sacred Heart”, they received diocesan approval in 1881.
Pope Leo XIII asked her to care for poor Italian immigrants Mother Cabrini asked her sisters for evangelical obedience, mortification, renunciation, vigilance of the heart and interior silence as necessary virtues for conforming their lives to Christ and for fostering and living their missionary desires. Vocations surprisingly blossomed and the institute rapidly expanded in Lombardy and beyond the region, with the opening of the first house in Rome and papal approval of the “Missionaries of the Sacred Heart of Jesus” on 12 March 1888, scarcely eight years after their foundation.
The famous words of Pope Leo XIII to your foundress, “Not to the East, but to the West”, are well known. She longed to go to China, but his words gave new energy and direction to her missionary zeal. The invitation of the Vicar of Christ directed her towards the masses of immigrants who, at the end of the 1800s, were crossing the ocean in large numbers to the United States of America, often in conditions of extreme poverty.
From that moment on, Mother Cabrini’s tireless apostolic work was more and more inspired by her desire to bring salvation to all, and in a hurry. She used to say: “The Heart of Jesus does things in such a hurry that I can barely keep up with Him”. With a group of sisters she left for New York on the first of many voyages in which, as a messenger of hope, she would achieve ever new goals in her tireless apostolate: Nicaragua, Brazil and Argentina, in addition to France, Spain and England.
Armed with remarkable boldness, she started schools, hospitals and orphanages from nothing for the masses of the poor who ventured into the new world in search of work. Not knowing the language and lacking the wherewithal to find a respectable place in American society, they were often victims of the unscrupulous. Her motherly heart, which gave her no peace, reached out to them everywhere: in hovels, prisons and mines. Never intimidated by toil or distance, Mother Cabrini traveled from New York to New Jersey, from Pennsylvania to Illinois, from California to Louisiana and Colorado. Even today in the United States, where she is still familiarly called “Mother Cabrini”, there is a surprisingly deep devotion to someone who, while loving her country of origin, wanted to take American citizenship.
She was beatified by Pope Pius XI in 1938, just 21 years after her death in Chicago on 22 December 1917, and was canonized in 1946 by Pope Pius XII. In the Holy Year of 1950, he proclaimed her patroness of immigrants: this little woman who, by defending the dignity of those forced to live far from their country, had became an indomitable peacemaker.
(Message of John Paul II to the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart on 150th anniversary of Mother Cabrini’s birth)
Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini
was the first United States citizen to be canonized.
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©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year C
13 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Agostina Livia Pietrantoni,
(1864-1894)
Saint Agostina Livia Pietrantoni
(1864-1894)
Virgin
Congregation of the Sisters of the Charity
of Saint Jeanne-Antide Thouret
A land… a family
“Once there was, and there still is, but with a new face now, a village named Pozzaglia. In the Sabina hills… and there was a blessed house, a cosy little nest filled with childrens’ voices, amongst which that of Olivia who was later called Livia and was to take the name of Agostina in the religious life.”
The very short life of Sister Agostina, which inspired Paul VI, the Pope who beatified her, to relate it in extraordinarily poetical terms, began and unfolded itself: “simple, transparent, pure, loving…but ended sorrowfully and tragically… or rather symbolically.”
27th March 1864. Livia was born and baptized in the little village of Pozzaglia Sabina, at an altitude of 800 meters in the beautiful area which is bordered geographically by Rieti, Orvinio, Tivoli. She was the second of 11 children! Her parents, Francesco Pietrantoni and Caterina Costantini, were farmers and worked their small plot of land along with a few added plots which they leased. Livia’s childhood and youth were imbued with the values of an honest, hard-working and religious family, in the blessed house in which “all were careful to do good and where they often prayed”. This period was marked especially by the wisdom of Uncle Domenico who was a real patriarch.
At the age of 4 Livia received the Sacrament of Confirmation, and around 1876 she received her first Holy Communion, certainly with an extraordinary awareness, judging by the life of prayer, generosity and sacrifice which followed it. Very early on, in the large family in which everyone seemed to be a beneficiary to her time and help, she learned from her mother Caterina the thoughtfulness and maternal gestures which she showed with such gentleness towards her many younger brothers and sisters. She worked in the fields and looked after the animals… Therefore, she barely experienced childrens’ games… or school which she attended very irregularly, but from which she drew great benefit to the point of earning the title of “teacher” from her classmates.
Work and… pride
At the age of 7, along with other children, she began “to work”, transporting by the thousand, sacks of stones and sand for constructing the road from Orvinio to Poggio Moiano. At the age of 12 she left with other young “seasonal workers” who were going to Tivoli during the winter months for the olive harvest. Precociously wise, Livia took on the moral and religious responsibility for her young companions. She supported them in this tough work far from their families, and proudly and courageously stood up to the arrogant and unscrupulous “bosses.”
Vocation and detachment
Through her wisdom, her respect for others, her generosity, her beauty, Livia was a young attractive woman… and several young men in the village had their eyes on her. Their admiring looks did not escape mother Caterina’s notice and she dreamed of marrying her daughter well. Yet what did Livia think? What was the secret of her heart? Why did she not make a choice? Why did she not make up her mind? “Malle daring by the voice which spoke to her inwardly, the voice of her vocation, she surrendered; it was Christ who would be her Beloved, Christ, her Spouse.” To these in her family or in the village who attempted to dissuade her by saying she was running away from hard work, Livia replied: “I wish to choose a Congregation in which there is work both day and night.” Everyone was certain that these words were genuine. A first trip to Rome in the company of her Uncle Fra Matteo ended in bitter disillusionment; they refused to accept her.
However, a few months later, the Mother General of the Sisters of Charity of Saint Jeanne-Antide Thouret, let her know that she was expecting her at the Generalate. Livia understood that this time she was saying farewell for ever. With emotion she took leave of the village people, all the loved corners of her land, her favourite prayer places, the parish and the Virgin of Rifolta; she kissed her parents goodbye, received on her knees the blessing of Uncle Domenico, “kissed the door of her house, traced the sign of the cross on it and left hurriedly…”
Formation and mission
23rd March 1886. Livia was 22 when she arrived in Rome at Via S. Maria in Cosmedin. A few months as a postulant and novice were enough to prove that the young girl had the makings of a Sister of Charity, that is of a “servant of the poor”, in the tradition of Saint Vincent de Paul and Saint Jeanne-Antide. Indeed, Livia brought to the Convent a particularly solid human potential inherited from her family which guaranteed its success. When she received the religious habit and was given the name of Sister Agostina, she had the premonition that it fell to her to become the saint bearing this name. For Indeed she had not heard of any Saint Agostina!
Sister Agostina was sent to the Hospital of Santo Spirito where 700 years of glorious history had led it to be called “the school of Christian charity.” In the wake of the saints who had preceded her, amongst whom were Charles Borromeo, Joseph Casalanz, John Bosco, Camillus de Lellis, Sister Agostina made her personal contribution and in this place of suffering gave expression to charity to the point of heroism.
Silence, prayer and goodness
The atmosphere in the hospital was hostile to religion. The Roman question poisoned peoples’ minds. The Capuchin fathers were driven out, the Crucifix and all other religious signs were forbidden. The hospital even wanted to send the sisters away but was afraid of becoming unpopular. Instead their lives were made “impossible” and they were forbidden to speak of God.
But Sister Agostina did not need her mouth in order to “cry out for God” and no gag was able to prevent her life from proclaiming the Gospel! First in the childrens’ ward and later in the tuberculosis ward, a place of despair and death, where she caught the mortal contagion of which she was miraculously healed, she showed a total dedication and an extraordinary concern for each sick person, above all for the most difficult, violent and obscene ones like “Romanelli.”
In secret, in a small hidden corner she had found for herself to reside, in the hospital, Sister Agostina commended them all to the Virgin and promised her many more vigils and greater sacrifices in order to obtain the grace of the conversion of the most stubborn ones. How many times she offered Joseph Romanelli to Our Lady! He was the worst of them all, the most vulgar and insolent, especially towards Sister Agostina, who was more and more attentive towards him and welcomed his blind mother with great kindness when she carne to visit him. He was capable of anything and everyone had had enough of him. When, after the umpteenth provocation at the expense of the women working in the laundry, the Director expelled him, from the hospital, he sought a target for his fury and poor Agostina was the victim he picked. ‘I will kill you with my own hands.” “Sister Agostina, you only have a month to live!,” were the threats which he had sent to her several times in little notes.
Romanelli was not joking, in fact, and Sister Agostina put no limits either on her generosity for the Lord… She was prepared to pay the price of love with her own life, without fleeing or placing any blame. …When Romanelli caught her unawares and struck her before she could escape, that 13th November 1894, her lips uttered nothing but invocations to the Virgin Mary and words of forgiveness.
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©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year C
13 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Stanislaus Kostka
(1551-1568)
SAINT STANISLAS KOSTKA
(1551-1568)
St. Stanislas was of a noble Polish family. At the age of fourteen he went with his elder brother Paul to the Jesuits’ College at Vienna; and though Stanislas was ever bright and sweet-tempered, his austerities were felt as a reproach by Paul, who shamefully maltreated him. This ill-usage and his own penances brought on a dangerous illness, and, being in a Lutheran house, he was unable to send for a priest. He now remembered to have read of his patroness, St. Barbara, that she never permitted her clients to die without the Holy Viaticum: he devoutly appealed to her aid, and she appeared with two angels, who gave him the Sacred Host.
He was cured of this illness by our Lady herself, and was bidden by her to enter the Society of Jesus. To avoid his father’s opposition, he was obliged to fly from Vienna; and, having proved his constancy by cheerfully performing the most menial offices, he was admitted to the novitiate at Rome. There he lived for ten short months marked by a rare piety, obedience, and devotion to his institute.
He died, as he had prayed to die, on the feast of the Assumption, 1568, at the age of seventeen.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
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Matthew 28:20.
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“This is my commandment:
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BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
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Saturday, November 12th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 18:1-8.
Saturday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
12 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
Jesus told his disciples a parable about the necessity
for them to pray always without becoming weary.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 18:1-8.
Jesus told his disciples a parable about the necessity for them to pray always without becoming weary. He said,
“There was a judge in a certain town who neither feared God nor respected any human being.
And a widow in that town used to come to him and say, ‘Render a just decision for me against my adversary.’
For a long time the judge was unwilling, but eventually he thought, ‘While it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being,
because this widow keeps bothering me I shall deliver a just decision for her lest she finally come and strike me.'”
The Lord said, “Pay attention to what the dishonest judge says.
Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who call out to him day and night? Will he be slow to answer them?
I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily. But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”
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Saturday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
12 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Saint Basil (c.330-379),
Monk and Bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia,
Doctor of the Church
Homily 5
“Jesus told them… to pray always”
Don’t restrict your prayer simply to asking in words. To be sure, God has no need of discussion; even if we were not to ask him anything, he knows what is needful for us. What is there to say? Prayer does not consist in formulae; it encompasses the whole of life. “Whatever you eat or drink,” the apostle Paul says, “or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God” (1Cor 10,31). Are you at table? Pray. In taking bread, give thanks to him who bestowed it; in drinking wine, remember him who gave you this gift to rejoice your heart and solace your ills. Once the meal is finished, do not fail, come what may, in the remembrance of your benefactor. When you put on your tunic, thank him who gave it you; when you put on your cloak, bear witness to your regard for the God who provides us with clothing suitable for winter and summer and so as to protect our life.
When day is done thank him who has given you sun for the day’s work and fire to give light at night and supply for our needs. Nighttime provides you with cause for thanksgiving: when looking at the sky and contemplating the beauty of the stars, pray to the Lord of the universe who has made all things with such wisdom. When you see all nature lying asleep, adore him again who relieves all our weariness with sleep and restores the vigor of our strength with a little rest.
In this way you will pray without ceasing: if your prayer does not satisfy itself with formulae but, to the contrary, if you remain united to God throughout your existence in such a way as to make an unceasing prayer of your life .
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Saturday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
12 November 2016
Saint of the day
St. Josaphat,
Bishop and Martyr (c.1580-1623) –
Memorial
SAINT JOSAPHAT
Bishop and Martyr
(c. 1580 – 1623)
Born in the Ukraine about 1580, ordained about 1604, Josaphat became a monk. He was a noted theologian and preacher, and loyal to Rome.
He was made bishop of Polotz in 1617, and embarked on a thoroughgoing pastoral reform, visiting his clergy, seeing that the people were instructed and taking an interest in the liturgy.
His reforms aroused hostility, and he was murdered at Vitebsk, during a pastoral visit, in 1623.
The Weekday Missal (1975)
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Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
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BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
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Friday, November 11th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 17:26-37.
Friday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
11 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“There will be two women grinding meal together;
one will be taken, the other left.”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 17:26-37.
Jesus said to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man;
they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage up to the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all.
Similarly, as it was in the days of Lot: they were eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting, building;
on the day when Lot left Sodom, fire and brimstone rained from the sky to destroy them all.
So it will be on the day the Son of Man is revealed.
On that day, a person who is on the housetop and whose belongings are in the house must not go down to get them, and likewise a person in the field must not return to what was left behind.
Remember the wife of Lot.
Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses it will save it.
I tell you, on that night there will be two people in one bed; one will be taken, the other left.
And there will be two women grinding meal together; one will be taken, the other left.”
They said to him in reply, “Where, Lord?” He said to them, “Where the body is, there also the vultures will gather.
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Friday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
11 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Saint Roman the Melodist
Saint Romanos Melodios (?-c 560),
Composer of hymns
Hymn of Noah, str. 11f. (cf. SC 99, p.117f. rev.)
“As it was in the days of Noah”
Noah, the wise… went into the ark at God’s orders together with his sons and their wives, a mere eight souls in all. With constant groans this servant prayed thus: “Let me not perish with sinners, my Savior, for already I see chaos swamping creation and the elements shaken with fear… The clouds are ready, the sky stormy, angels run before your wrath.” At these words, God shut the ark and sealed it as his faithful one cried out: “Save mankind from wrath, O redeemer of the world, may you protect us with your love.”
Then, from the heights of heaven, the judge gives the order: immediately the floodgates open, pouring down rain and hail in torrents from one end of the world to the other; fear causes the springs of the abyss to gush forth, flooding the earth in every quarter… Such were the results of God’s anger because humankind had persisted in its hardness of heart instead of hastening to cry out to him with faith: “Save all humankind from wrath in the love you have for us, O Redeemer of the world”…
Then the choir of angels cried out, seeing carnal men destroyed: “Now let the just possess the length and breadth of the earth!” For the Creator delights to behold those made in his own image (Gn 1,26); this is why he set aside his saints to save them. Noah… released the dove and in the evening it returned, bearing an olive branch in its beak, symbolically announcing God’s mercy. Then Noah came out of the ark as from the tomb, according to the command he had received…, not, as formerly, like Adam, who had eaten of the tree that brings death, for Noah had brought forth the fruits of repentance, saying: “Save all humankind from wrath in the love you have for us, O Redeemer of the world.”
Corruption and wickedness have perished; the man of upright heart is victorious by his faith for he has found grace… Then the just man (Gn 6,9) offers an unblemished sacrifice to the Lord… The Creator, smelling the sweet-smelling odor, declares: “Nevermore will the world perish in a flood, even should all men lead a life of wickedness. Today I will make with them a binding covenant. I will show my bow as a sign to all the dwellers on earth, that thus they may call upon my name: “Save all humankind from wrath in the love you have for us, O Redeemer of the world.”
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Friday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
11 November 2016
Saint of the day
St. Martin of Tours,
Bishop († 397) – Memorial
SAINT MARTIN OF TOURS
Bishop
(† 397)
When a mere boy, Martin became a Christian catechumen against his parents’ wish; and at fifteen was therefore seized by his father, a pagan soldier, and enrolled in the army.
One winter’s day, when stationed at Amiens, he met a beggar almost naked and frozen with cold. Having no money, he cut his cloak in two and gave him the half. That night he saw Our Lord clothed in the half cloak, and heard Him say to the angels: “Martin, yet a catechumen, hath wrapped Me in this garment.” This decided him to be baptized, and shortly after he left the army.
He succeeded in converting his mother; but, being driven from his home by the Arians, he took shelter with St. Hilary, and founded near Poitiers the first monastery in France.
In 372 he was made Bishop of Tours. His flock, though Christian in name, was still pagan in heart. Unarmed and attended only by his monks, Martin destroyed the heathen temples and groves, and completed by his preaching and miracles the conversion of the people, whence he is known as the Apostle of Gaul.
His last eleven years were spent in humble toil to atone for his faults, while God made manifest by miracles the purity of his soul.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
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BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
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###########################
Tuesday, November 8th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 17:7-10.
Tuesday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
8 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
‘Prepare something for me to eat. Put on your apron and wait on me
while I eat and drink. You may eat and drink when I am finished’?
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 17:7-10.
Jesus said to the Apostles: “Who among you would say to your servant who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the field, ‘Come here immediately and take your place at table’?
Would he not rather say to him, ‘Prepare something for me to eat. Put on your apron and wait on me while I eat and drink. You may eat and drink when I am finished’?
Is he grateful to that servant because he did what was commanded?
So should it be with you. When you have done all you have been commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do.'”
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Tuesday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
8 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Benedict XVI,
Benedict XVI,
Pope from 2005 to 2013
Encyclical “Deus caritas est”, § 35 (trans. © copyright Libreria Editrice Vaticana)
“Useless servants”
The proper way of serving others leads to humility. The one who serves does not consider himself superior to the one served, however miserable his situation at the moment may be. Christ took the lowest place in the world—the Cross—and by this radical humility he redeemed us and constantly comes to our aid. Those who are in a position to help others will realize that in doing so they themselves receive help; being able to help others is no merit or achievement of their own. This duty is a grace.
The more we do for others, the more we understand and can appropriate the words of Christ: “We are useless servants” (Lk 17:10). We recognize that we are not acting on the basis of any superiority or greater personal efficiency, but because the Lord has graciously enabled us to do so. There are times when the burden of need and our own limitations might tempt us to become discouraged. But precisely then we are helped by the knowledge that, in the end, we are only instruments in the Lord’s hands; and this knowledge frees us from the presumption of thinking that we alone are personally responsible for building a better world. In all humility we will do what we can, and in all humility we will entrust the rest to the Lord.
It is God who governs the world, not we. We offer him our service only to the extent that we can, and for as long as he grants us the strength. To do all we can with what strength we have, however, is the task which keeps the good servant of Jesus Christ always at work: “The love of Christ urges us on” (2 Cor 5:14).
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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Tuesday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
8 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Godfrey,
Bishop (1066-1115)
SAINT GODFREY
Bishop
(1066-1115)
St Godfrey was born in 1066 in the diocese of Soissons (France). At the age of 25, he was ordained priest and became the abbot of the Abbey of Nogent-sous-Coucy.
He was named bishop of Amiens (France) in 1104. He was noted for his rigid austerity with himself, those around him, and in his approach to his mission as bishop.
He was an enforcer of clerical celibacy and an opponent of drunkenness and simony.
For most of his time as bishop, he wished to resign and retire as a Carthusian monk. In 1114 he moved to a monastery, but a few months later he was called back to his post by the people of Amiens, and he agreed. He also took part in the Council of Chálons.
He fell sick and took refuge in the abbey of Saint Crépin in Soissons, where he died in 1115.
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Tuesday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
8 November 2016
Saints of the day
Bl. John Duns Scotus,
O.F.M. (c.1266-1308)
Blessed John Duns Scotus
Franciscan Theologian
(c. 1266 – 1308)
Blessed John (Johannes) Duns Scotus was one of the more important theologians and philosophers of the High Middle Ages. Born at Duns in the county of Berwick, Scotland around 1266, John was descended from a wealthy farming family. John received the habit of the Friars Minor at Dumfries, where his uncle Elias Duns was superior. After novitiate he studied at Oxford and Paris and was ordained to the priesthood on 17 March 1291.
He was nicknamed Doctor Subtilis (the “Subtle Doctor”) for his penetrating and subtle manner of thought and he was remembered mostly for his defense of the doctrine of Immaculate Conception. During the night of Christmas, 1299 at the Oxford Convent, Bl. John, immersed in his contemplation of the adorable mystery of the Incarnation of the Word, was rapt in ecstasy. The Blessed Mother appeared to him and placed on his arms the Child Jesus who kissed and embraced him fondly.
He died in 1308 and he is buried in the Franciscan church near the famous Cologne cathedral.
Drawing on the work of John Duns Scotus, Pope Pius IX solemnly defined the Immaculate Conception of Mary in 1854. On March 20, 1993 John Duns Scotus, the “Subtle Doctor,” was beatified in 1993 by Pope John Paul II at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.
Bl. John Duns Scotus, “The minstrel of the Word Incarnate” and “Defender of Mary’s Immaculate Conception” was presented by Pope John Paul II to our age “wealthy of human, scientific and technological resources, but in which many have lost the sense of faith and lead lives distant from Christ and His Gospel,” as “a Teacher of thought and life.” For the Church, he is “an example of fidelity to the revealed truth, of effective, priestly, and serious dialogue in search for unity.”
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
Monday, November 7th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 17:1-6.
Monday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
7 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“And if he wrongs you seven times in one day and returns to you
seven times saying, ‘I am sorry,’ you should forgive him.”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 17:1-6.
Jesus said to his disciples, “Things that cause sin will inevitably occur, but woe to the person through whom they occur.
It would be better for him if a millstone were put around his neck and he be thrown into the sea than for him to cause one of these little ones to sin.
Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.
And if he wrongs you seven times in one day and returns to you seven times saying, ‘I am sorry,’ you should forgive him.”
And the apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith.”
The Lord replied, “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to (this) mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.
Copyright © Confraternity of Christian Doctrine,USCCB
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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National Catholic Broadcasting Council
Daily TV Mass
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Monsignor Sam Bianco
Celebrates Daily Mass from Loretto Abbey in Toronto
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Daily TV Mass Monday, November 7, 2016
___________________________________
Monday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
7 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Saint Augustine (354-430),
Saint Augustine (354-430), Bishop of Hippo (North Africa) and Doctor of the Church
Discourse on the Psalms, Ps 60,9; CCL 39,771
Ask forgiveness and forgive others
“All the ways of the Lord are love and truth toward those who keep his covenant and decrees,” (Ps 25 [24],10). What this psalm says about love and truth is of first importance… It speaks of love because God pays no regard to our merits but to his own kindness so as to forgive us our sins and assure us of eternal life. It also speaks of truth because God never fails to hold good his promises. Let us acknowledge this divine example and imitate the God who has shown us his love and his truth… Like him, let us fulfil works full of love and truth in this world . Let us show goodness to the weak and poor and even towards our enemies.
Let us live in truth by avoiding wrongdoing. Let us not increase our sins since whoever presumes on God’s kindness lets the will to make God unjust insinuate itself within him. He imagines to himself that, even if he persists in his sins and refuses to repent, God will come in any case to give him a place among his faithful servants. But would it be just for God to set you in the same place as those who have renounced their sins while you continue in your own?… Then why do you want to bend him to your will? Submit yourself, rather, to his.
In this respect the psalmist rightly says: “Who will seek beside him the mercy and truth of the Lord?”… Why say “beside him”? Many seek to learn about the love of the Lord and his truth in the holy Scriptures. But once they have found them, they live for themselves, not for him. They are looking for their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. They preach about love and truth but do not practice them. But he who loves God and Christ, when preaching about the divine truth and love, seeks them for God’s sake and not for his own interests. He is not preaching about them so as to draw material advantages from them but for the good of Christ’s members, namely the faithful. He distributes what he has learned among these in the spirit of truth “so that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died,” (2Cor 5,15). “Who will seek the love and truth of the Lord?”
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
_______________________________________
Monday of the Thirty-second week in Ordinary Time
7 November 2016
Saint of the day
St. Willibrord,
Bishop (657-739)
SAINT WILLIBRORD
Bishop
(657-739)
Willibrord was born in Northumberland in 657, and when twenty years old went to Ireland, to study under St. Egbert; twelve years later, he felt drawn to convert the great pagan tribes who were hanging as a cloud over the north of Europe.
He went to Rome for the blessing of the Pope, and with eleven companions reached Utrecht. The pagans would not accept the religion of their enemies, the Franks; and St. Willibrord could only labor in the track of Pepin Heristal, converting the tribes whom Pepin subjugated.
At Pepin’s urgent request, he again went to Rome, and was consecrated Archbishop of Utrecht. He was stately and comely in person, frank and joyous, wise in counsel, pleasant in speech, in every work of God strenuous and unwearied. Multitudes were converted, and the Saint built churches and appointed priests all over the land. He wrought many miracles, and had the gift of prophecy.
He labored unceasingly as bishop for more than fifty years, beloved alike of God and of man, and died full of days and good works.
Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
Saturday, November 5th. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 16:9-15.
Saturday of the Thirty-first week in Ordinary Time
5 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“You cannot serve God and mammon.”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 16:9-15.
Jesus said to his disciples: “I tell you, make friends for yourselves with dishonest wealth, so that when it fails, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.
The person who is trustworthy in very small matters is also trustworthy in great ones; and the person who is dishonest in very small matters is also dishonest in great ones.
If, therefore, you are not trustworthy with dishonest wealth, who will trust you with true wealth?
If you are not trustworthy with what belongs to another, who will give you what is yours?
No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.”
The Pharisees, who loved money, heard all these things and sneered at him.
And he said to them, “You justify yourselves in the sight of others, but God knows your hearts; for what is of human esteem is an abomination in the sight of God.”
Copyright © Confraternity of Christian Doctrine,USCCB
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THANK YOU
National Catholic Broadcasting Council
Daily TV Mass
YouTube
by
Father Pat Fitzpatrick C.S.Sp.
Celebrates Daily Mass from Loretto Abbey in Toronto
of
Daily TV Mass Saturday, November 5, 2016
___________________________________________
Saturday of the Thirty-first week in Ordinary Time
5 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Saint Gregory Nazianzen (330-390),
Bishop and Doctor of the Church
Homily 14, On love for the poor, 24-25 ; PL 35, 887 (trans. Breviary for the 1st Monday in Lent, rev.)
“If you are not trustworthy with dishonest wealth, who will trust you with true wealth?”
Brethren and friends, let us by no means be wicked stewards of God’s gift to us. If we are, we will have to listen to Saint Peter saying: “Be ashamed, you who hold back what belongs to another, take as an example the justice of God, and no one will be poor.” While others suffer poverty, let us not labour to hoard and pile up money, for if we do, holy Amos will threaten us sharply in these words: “Hear this, you who say, When will the new moon be over, that we may sell; and the sabbath, that we may open up our treasures?” (8,5)…
Let us imitate the first and most important law of God who sends his rain on the just and on sinners and makes the sun. shine on all men equally (Mt 5,45). God opens up the earth, the springs, the streams and the woods to all who live in the world. He gives the air to the birds, the water to the fish and the basic needs of life abundantly to all, without restriction or limitation or preference. These basic goods are common to all, provided by God generously and with nothmg lacking. He has done this so that creatures of the same nature may receive equal gifts and that he may show us how rich is his kindness.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
_________________________________________
Saturday of the Thirty-first week in Ordinary Time
5 November 2016
Saint of the day
St. Bertilla,
Abbess (7th century)
Image: N/A
SAINT BERTILLA
Abbess
(7th century)
St. Bertilla was born of one of the most illustrious families in the territory of Soissons (France), in the reign of Dagobert I. As she grew up she learned perfectly to despise the world, and earnestly desired to renounce it. Not daring to tell this to her parents, she first consulted St. Ouen, by whom she was encouraged in her resolution.
The Saint’s parents were then made acquainted with her desire, which God inclined them not to oppose. They conducted her to Jouarre, a great monastery in Brie, four leagues from Meaux, where she was received with great joy and trained up in the strictest practice of monastic perfection.
By her perfect submission to all her sisters she seemed every one’s servant, and acquitted herself with such great charity and edification that she was chosen prioress to assist the abbess in her administration.
About the year 646 she was appointed first abbess of the abbey of Chelles, which she governed for forty-six years with equal vigor and discretion, until she closed her penitential life in 692.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
FRANCIS XAVIER SAMSEN 
Wednesday, November 23rd. Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St Luke 21:12-19.
Wednesday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
23 November 2016
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ
“I myself shall give you a wisdom in speaking that all
your adversaries will be powerless to resist or refute.”
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 21:12-19.
Jesus said to the crowd: “They will seize and persecute you, they will hand you over to the synagogues and to prisons, and they will have you led before kings and governors because of my name.
It will lead to your giving testimony.
Remember, you are not to prepare your defense beforehand,
for I myself shall give you a wisdom in speaking that all your adversaries will be powerless to resist or refute.
You will even be handed over by parents, brothers, relatives, and friends, and they will put some of you to death.
You will be hated by all because of my name,
but not a hair on your head will be destroyed.
By your perseverance you will secure your lives.”
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Daily TV Mass
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Celebrates Daily Mass from Loretto Abbey in Toronto
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Daily TV Mass Wednesday, November 23, 2016
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Wednesday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
23 November 2016
Commentary of the day
Saint Cyprian (c.200-258),
Bishop of Carthage and martyr
The benefits of patient endurance, 13.15
“By patient endurance you will save your lives.”
For our salvation, our Lord and Master gave us this commandment: “Whoever holds out till the end will escape death.” (Mt 10:22) … The very fact that we are Christians grounds our faith and our hope. But so that hope and faith might bear fruit, patient endurance is necessary. We do not seek the glory that is here below, but the future glory. The apostle Paul warned us: “In hope we were saved. But hope is not hope if its object is seen; how is it possible for one to hope for what he sees? And hoping for what we cannot see means awaiting it with patient endurance.” (Rom 8:24-25) In another passage, Paul gave the same teaching to the righteous who work so that God’s gifts might bear fruit in order to prepare greater treasures for themselves in heaven…: “While we have the opportunity, let us do good to all… Let us not grow weary of doing good; if we do not relax our efforts, in due time we shall reap our harvest.” (Gal 6:10.9)… And when Paul talked about charity, he added perseverance and patient endurance: “Love is patient; love is kind. Love is not jealous, it does not put on airs… Love is not prone to anger; neither does it brood over injuries… There is no limit to love’s forbearance, to its trust, its hope, its power to endure.” (1 Cor 13:4-7) He thus shows that love is capable of persevering to the end, since it can bear all things. Finally, Paul said in another passage: “Bear with one another lovingly. Make every effort to preserve the unity which has the Spirit as its origin and peace as its binding force.” (Eph 4:2-3) Thus he shows that brothers can preserve neither unity nor peace if they do not encourage one another by bearing with one another, and if they do not maintain the bond of concord by means of their patient endurance.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
____________________________________
Wednesday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
23 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Columban,
Abbot († 615)
SAINT COLUMBAN
Abbot
(† 615(
Saint Columban was born in Ireland before the middle of the sixth century.
He was well trained in the classics and theology. After entering the monastic life, he went to France and founded many monasteries which he ruled with strict discipline. After being forced into exile, he went to Italy and founded the monastery of Bobbio.
He died in 615.
Christian Prayer : The Liturgy of the Hours; Daughters of St. Paul * St. Paul Editions * 1976
__________________________________
Lord,
you called Saint Columban to live the monastic life
and to preach the gospel with zeal.
May his prayers and his example
help to us to seek you above all things
and to work with all our hearts
for the spread of the faith.
Grant this through Christ our Lord. Amen.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
______________________________________
Wednesday of the Thirty-fourth week in Ordinary Time
23 November 2016
Saints of the day
St. Clement I,
Pope and martyr († 100)
SAINT CLEMENT I
POPE AND MARTYR
(† 100)
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Let us devote our attention to the Apostolic Fathers, that is, to the first and second generations in the Church subsequent to the Apostles. And thus, we can see where the Church’s journey begins in history.
St Clement, Bishop of Rome in the last years of the first century, was the third Successor of Peter, after Linus and Anacletus. The most important testimony concerning his life comes from St Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons until 202. He attests that Clement “had seen the blessed Apostles”, “had been conversant with them”, and “might be said to have the preaching of the apostles still echoing [in his ears], and their traditions before his eyes” (Adversus Haer. 3, 3, 3).
Later testimonies which date back to between the fourth and sixth centuries attribute to Clement the title of martyr.
The authority and prestige of this Bishop of Rome were such that various writings were attributed to him, but the only one that is certainly his is the Letter to the Corinthians. Eusebius of Caesarea, the great “archivist” of Christian beginnings, presents it in these terms: “There is extant an Epistle of this Clement which is acknowledged to be genuine and is of considerable length and of remarkable merit. He wrote it in the name of the Church of Rome to the Church of Corinth, when a sedition had arisen in the latter Church. We know that this Epistle also has been publicly used in a great many Churches both in former times and in our own” (Hist. Eccl. 3, 16).
An almost canonical character was attributed to this Letter. At the beginning of this text – written in Greek – Clement expressed his regret that “the sudden and successive calamitous events which have happened to ourselves” (1, 1) had prevented him from intervening sooner. These “calamitous events” can be identified with Domitian’s persecution: therefore, the Letter must have been written just after the Emperor’s death and at the end of the persecution, that is, immediately after the year 96.
Clement’s intervention – we are still in the first century – was prompted by the serious problems besetting the Church in Corinth: the elders of the community, in fact, had been deposed by some young contestants. The sorrowful event was recalled once again by St Irenaeus who wrote: “In the time of this Clement, no small dissension having occurred among the brethren in Corinth, the Church in Rome dispatched a most powerful Letter to the Corinthians exhorting them to peace, renewing their faith and declaring the tradition which it had lately received from the Apostles” (Adv. Haer. 3, 3, 3).
Thus, we could say that this Letter was a first exercise of the Roman primacy after St Peter’s death. Clement’s Letter touches on topics that were dear to St Paul, who had written two important Letters to the Corinthians, in particular the theological dialectic, perennially current, between the indicative of salvation and the imperative of moral commitment.
First of all came the joyful proclamation of saving grace. The Lord forewarns us and gives us his forgiveness, gives us his love and the grace to be Christians, his brothers and sisters.
It is a proclamation that fills our life with joy and gives certainty to our action: the Lord always forewarns us with his goodness and the Lord’s goodness is always greater than all our sins.
However, we must commit ourselves in a way that is consistent with the gift received and respond to the proclamation of salvation with a generous and courageous journey of conversion.
In comparison with the Pauline model, the innovation added by Clement is to the doctrinal and practical sections, which constituted all the Pauline Letters, a “great prayer” that virtually concludes the Letter.
The Letter’s immediate circumstances provided the Bishop of Rome with ample room for an intervention on the Church’s identity and mission. If there were abuses in Corinth, Clement observed, the reason should be sought in the weakening of charity and of the other indispensable Christian virtues.
He therefore calls the faithful to humility and fraternal love, two truly constitutive virtues of being in the Church: “Seeing, therefore, that we are the portion of the Holy One”, he warned, “let us do all those things which pertain to holiness” (30, 1).
In particular, the Bishop of Rome recalls that the Lord himself, “where and by whom he desires these things to be done, he himself has fixed by his own supreme will, in order that all things, being piously done according to his good pleasure, may be acceptable unto him…. For his own peculiar services are assigned to the high priest, and their own proper place is prescribed to the priests, and their own special ministries devolve on the Levites. The layman is bound by the laws that pertain to laymen” (40, 1-5: it can be noted that here, in this early first-century Letter, the Greek word “laikós” appears for the first time in Christian literature, meaning “a member of the laos”, that is, “of the People of God”).
In this way, referring to the liturgy of ancient Israel, Clement revealed his ideal Church. She was assembled by “the one Spirit of grace poured out upon us” which breathes on the various members of the Body of Christ, where all, united without any divisions, are “members of one another” (46, 6-7).
The clear distinction between the “lay person” and the hierarchy in no way signifies opposition, but only this organic connection of a body, an organism with its different functions. The Church, in fact, is not a place of confusion and anarchy where one can do what one likes all the time: each one in this organism, with an articulated structure, exercises his ministry in accordance with the vocation he has received.
With regard to community leaders, Clement clearly explains the doctrine of Apostolic Succession. The norms that regulate it derive ultimately from God himself. The Father sent Jesus Christ, who in turn sent the Apostles. They then sent the first heads of communities and established that they would be succeeded by other worthy men.
Everything, therefore, was made “in an orderly way, according to the will of God” (42). With these words, these sentences, St Clement underlined that the Church’s structure was sacramental and not political.
The action of God who comes to meet us in the liturgy precedes our decisions and our ideas. The Church is above all a gift of God and not something we ourselves created; consequently, this sacramental structure does not only guarantee the common order but also this precedence of God’s gift which we all need.
Finally, the “great prayer” confers a cosmic breath to the previous reasoning. Clement praises and thanks God for his marvellous providence of love that created the world and continues to save and sanctify it.
The prayer for rulers and governors acquires special importance. Subsequent to the New Testament texts, it is the oldest prayer extant for political institutions. Thus, in the period following their persecution, Christians, well aware that the persecutions would continue, never ceased to pray for the very authorities who had unjustly condemned them.
The reason is primarily Christological: it is necessary to pray for one’s persecutors as Jesus did on the Cross.
But this prayer also contains a teaching that guides the attitude of Christians towards politics and the State down the centuries. In praying for the Authorities, Clement recognized the legitimacy of political institutions in the order established by God; at the same time, he expressed his concern that the Authorities would be docile to God, “devoutly in peace and meekness exercising the power given them by [God]” (61, 2).
Caesar is not everything. Another sovereignty emerges whose origins and essence are not of this world but of “the heavens above”: it is that of Truth, which also claims a right to be heard by the State.
Thus, Clement’s Letter addresses numerous themes of perennial timeliness. It is all the more meaningful since it represents, from the first century, the concern of the Church of Rome which presides in charity over all the other Churches.
In this same Spirit, let us make our own the invocations of the “great prayer” in which the Bishop of Rome makes himself the voice of the entire world: “Yes, O Lord, make your face to shine upon us for good in peace, that we may be shielded by your mighty hand… through the High Priest and Guardian of our souls, Jesus Christ, through whom be glory and majesty to you both now and from generation to generation, for evermore” (60-61).
BENEDICT XVI General audience (March 7, 2007)
© Copyright 2007 – Libreria Editrice Vaticana
____________________________
All-powerful and ever-living God,
we praise your power and glory revealed to us in the lives of all your saints.
Give us joy on this feast of Saint Clement,
the priest and martyr who bore witness with his blood
to the love he proclaimed and the gospel he preached.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
©Evangelizo.org 2001-2016
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“I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20.
***********************************************
“This is my commandment:
love one another as I love you.”
###########################
BE MERCIFUL, O LORD,
FOR WE HAVE SINNED.
###########################
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