DAILY GOSPEL: 25/08/2010
«Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.» John 6,68
Wednesday of the Twenty-first week in Ordinary Time
Second Letter to the Thessalonians 3:6-10.16-18.
We instruct you, brothers, in the name of (our) Lord Jesus Christ,to shun any brother who conducts himself in a disorderly way and not according to the tradition they received from us.
For you know how one must imitate us. For we did not act in a disorderly way among you,
nor did we eat food received free from anyone. On the contrary, in toil and drudgery, night and day we worked, so as not to burden any of you.
Not that we do not have the right. Rather, we wanted to present ourselves as a model for you, so that you might imitate us.
In fact, when we were with you, we instructed you that if anyone was unwilling to work, neither should that one eat.
May the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you.
This greeting is in my own hand, Paul's. This is the sign in every letter; this is how I write.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with all of you.
Psalms 128(127):1-2.4-5.
A song of ascents. Happy are all who fear the LORD, who walk in the ways of God.
What your hands provide you will enjoy; you will be happy and prosper:
Just so will they be blessed who fear the LORD.
May the LORD bless you from Zion, all the days of your life That you may share Jerusalem's joy
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 23:27-32.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of dead men's bones and every kind of filth.
Even so, on the outside you appear righteous, but inside you are filled with hypocrisy and evildoing.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the memorials of the righteous,
and you say, 'If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have joined them in shedding the prophets' blood.'
Thus you bear witness against yourselves that you are the children of those who murdered the prophets;
now fill up what your ancestors measured out!
We instruct you, brothers, in the name of (our) Lord Jesus Christ,to shun any brother who conducts himself in a disorderly way and not according to the tradition they received from us.
For you know how one must imitate us. For we did not act in a disorderly way among you,
nor did we eat food received free from anyone. On the contrary, in toil and drudgery, night and day we worked, so as not to burden any of you.
Not that we do not have the right. Rather, we wanted to present ourselves as a model for you, so that you might imitate us.
In fact, when we were with you, we instructed you that if anyone was unwilling to work, neither should that one eat.
May the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you.
This greeting is in my own hand, Paul's. This is the sign in every letter; this is how I write.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with all of you.
Psalms 128(127):1-2.4-5.
A song of ascents. Happy are all who fear the LORD, who walk in the ways of God.
What your hands provide you will enjoy; you will be happy and prosper:
Just so will they be blessed who fear the LORD.
May the LORD bless you from Zion, all the days of your life That you may share Jerusalem's joy
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 23:27-32.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of dead men's bones and every kind of filth.
Even so, on the outside you appear righteous, but inside you are filled with hypocrisy and evildoing.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the memorials of the righteous,
and you say, 'If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have joined them in shedding the prophets' blood.'
Thus you bear witness against yourselves that you are the children of those who murdered the prophets;
now fill up what your ancestors measured out!
Mt 23,27-32
Saint Gregory of Nyssa (c.335-395), monk and Bishop
Homily 6 on the Beatitudes ; PG 44,1269 (©Ancient Christian Writers)
"Blessed are the pure in heart, they shall see God" (Mt 5,8)
Bodily health is one of the desirable things in human life; but it is blessed not only to know the principle of health, but to be healthy... The Lord Jesu does not say it is blessed to know something about God, but to have God present within oneself. «Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God» (Mt 5,8). I do not think that if the eye of one's soul has been purified, he is promised a direct vision of God; but perhaps this marvelous saying may suggest what the Word expresses more clearly...: «The Kingdom of God is within you» (Lk 17,21). By this we should learn that if a man's heart has been purified from every creature and all unruly affections, he will see the Image of the Divine Nature in his own beauty...
There is in you, human beings, a desire to contemplate the true good... For He who made you did at the same time endow your nature with this wonderful quality. For God imprinted on it the likeness of the glories of His own Nature, as if moulding the form of a carving into wax. But evil... has rendered useless to you this wonderful thing that lies hidden under vile coverings. If, therefore, you wash off by a good life the filth that has been stuck on your heart like plaster, the Divine Beauty will again shine forth in you. It is the same as happens in the case of iron. If freed from rust it will shine and glisten brightly in the sun. So it is also with the inner man, which the Lord calls the heart. When he has scraped off the rustlike dirt which dank decay has caused to appear on his form, he will once more recover the likeness of the archetype and be good.
There is in you, human beings, a desire to contemplate the true good... For He who made you did at the same time endow your nature with this wonderful quality. For God imprinted on it the likeness of the glories of His own Nature, as if moulding the form of a carving into wax. But evil... has rendered useless to you this wonderful thing that lies hidden under vile coverings. If, therefore, you wash off by a good life the filth that has been stuck on your heart like plaster, the Divine Beauty will again shine forth in you. It is the same as happens in the case of iron. If freed from rust it will shine and glisten brightly in the sun. So it is also with the inner man, which the Lord calls the heart. When he has scraped off the rustlike dirt which dank decay has caused to appear on his form, he will once more recover the likeness of the archetype and be good.
St. Louis, King of France (1215-1270)
SAINT LOUIS
King of France
(1215-1270)
King of France
(1215-1270)
The mother of Louis told him she would rather see him die than commit a mortal sin, and he never forgot her words. King of France at the age of twelve, he made the defence of God's honor the aim of his life. Before two years, he had crushed the Albigensian heretics, and forced them by stringent penalties to respect the Catholic faith. Amidst the cares of government, he daily recited the Divine Office and heard two Masses, and the most glorious churches in France are still monuments of his piety. When his courtiers remonstrated with Louis for his law that blasphemers should be branded on the lips, he replied, "I would willingly have my own lips branded to root out blasphemy from my kingdom."
The fearless protector of the weak and the oppressed, he was chosen to arbitrate in all the great feuds of his age, between the Pope and the Emperor, between Henry III. and the English barons. In 1248, to rescue the land which Christ had trod, he gathered round him the chivalry of France, and embarked for the East. There, before the infidel, in victory or defeat, on the bed of sickness or a captive in chains, Louis showed himself ever the same,-the first, the best, and the bravest of Christian knights. When a captive at Damietta, an Emir rushed into his tent brandishing a dagger red with the blood of the Sultan, and threatened to stab him also unless he would make him a knight, as the Emperor Frederick had Facardin. Louis calmly replied that no unbeliever could perform the duties of a Christian knight. In the same captivity he was offered his liberty on terms lawful in themselves, but enforced by an oath which implied a blasphemy, and though the infidels held their swords' points at his throat, and threatened a massacre of the Christians, Louis inflexibly refused.
The death of his mother recalled him to France; but when order was reestablished he again set forth on a second crusade. In August, 1270, his army landed at Tunis, and, though victorious over the enemy, succumbed to a malignant fever. Louis was one of the victims. He received the Viaticum kneeling by his camp-bed, and gave up his life with the same joy that he had given all else for the honor of God.
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