Liturgical Year 2018-2019, Vol. 3
Lent by Jennifer Gregory Miller and Darden Brock (editors)
Third of six volumes covering the 2018-2019 Catholic liturgical year, covering all the days of Lent.
Trinity Communications CatholicCulture.org P.O. Box 582 Manassas, VA 20108 © Copyright Trinity Communications 2019 Book ID: LY20182019-V3-L-jmgmdb
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We look forward to seeing you at www.catholicculture.org. Table of Contents
Introduction to the Liturgical Year 6 Introduction to Lent 9 March 6th (Ash Wednesday) 12 March 7th (Optional Memorial of Sts. Perpetua and Felicity, martyrs) 18 March 8th (Optional Memorial of St. John of God, religious ) 22 March 9th (Optional Memorial of St. Frances of Rome, religious) 26 March 10th (First Sunday of Lent ) 31 March 11th (Monday of the First Week of Lent) 35 March 12th (Tuesday of the First Week of Lent) 40 March 13th (Wednesday of the First Week of Lent) 46 March 14th (Thursday of the First Week of Lent) 53 March 15th (Friday of the First Week of Lent) 58 March 16th (Saturday of the First Week of Lent) 62 March 17th (Second Sunday of Lent) 67 March 18th (Optional Memorial of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, bishop, confessor and doctor) 72 March 19th (Solemnity of St. Joseph, Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary) 77 March 20th (Wednesday of the Second Week of Lent) 85 March 21st (Thursday of the Second Week of Lent) 89 March 22nd (Friday of the Second Week of Lent) 92 March 23rd (Optional Memorial of St. Turibio de Mogrovejo, bishop) 97 March 24th (Third Sunday of Lent) 104 March 25th (Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord) 108 March 26th (Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent) 116 March 27th (Wednesday of the Third Week of Lent) 121 March 28th (Thursday of the Third Week of Lent) 125 March 29th (Friday of the Third Week of Lent) 129 March 30th (Saturday of the Third Week of Lent) 133 March 31st (Fourth Sunday of Lent) 137 April 1st (Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent) 142 April 2nd (Optional Memorial of St. Francis of Paola, hermit) 147 April 3rd (Wednesday of the Fourth Week of Lent) 150 April 4th (Optional Memorial of St. Isidore, bishop and doctor ) 155
April 5th (Optional Memorial of St. Vincent Ferrer, priest ) 158 April 6th (Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent) 162 April 7th (Fifth Sunday of Lent) 167 April 8th (Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent) 171 April 9th (Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent) 174 April 10th (Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent) 177 April 11th (Memorial of St. Stanislaus, bishop & martyr ) 180 April 12th (Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent) 184 April 13th (Optional Memorial of St. Martin I) 187 April 14th (Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion) 192 April 15th (Monday of Holy Week) 198 April 16th (Tuesday of Holy Week ) 202 April 17th (Wednesday of Holy Week) 205 The Sacred Triduum 209 April 18th (Holy Thursday) 210 April 19th (Good Friday) 217 April 20th (Holy Saturday — Easter Vigil) 223 LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 6
Introduction to the Liturgical Year
The Church inculcates Christ and His mission through the patterns and rhythms of her Liturgical Year. She is herself the universal sacrament of salvation and the visible manifestation on earth of the presence of the Kingdom of God even now. But the Church also has various ministries and means by which she carries out her special mission. The Liturgical Year is perhaps the most important means she uses to sanctify the concept of time itself. During the course of the Liturgical Year, the saving actions of Christ are presented again to the Faithful in an effective spiritual sequence that provides occasions for deepening our experience of Christ, for giving scope to our need for fasts and feasts, penance and joy, the remission of sin and the foretaste of heavenly glory. The annual cycle invites us to live the Christian mysteries more deeply, to let the Christ-life seep into our very bones, and in so doing to transform and renew all human endeavors, all human culture. The backbone of the Liturgical Year is the Liturgical Calendar, an annual cycle of seasons and feasts which both commemmorate and invite us to more fully enter into the real history of our salvation. At the same time, the days devoted to the celebration of many of the Church’s saints provide us with inspiring models of what it means to exemplify the love and virtues which Our Lord and Savior so zealously wishes us to share. In this way, we may develop in and through time a heart like unto His own. On the CatholicCulture.org website, we have collected and organized a great many resources for helping all of us to live the Liturgical Year more consciously and more actively. In addition to the accounts of the nature, history and purposes of the great feasts, and of course the lives of the saints, we have brought together a wide variety of customs for celebrating the various seasons and feasts which have grown up in cultures throughout the world. And in connection with these customs, we have also collected appropriate prayers and devotions, family activities, and even receipes—the better to help us taste and see the glory of the Lord! (Ps 34:8) All of these resources are organized according to the Liturgical Calendar, and many of them are deliberately oriented toward use by the family, or what recent popes have referred to as the domestic church. The family is to be the Church in miniature, the first of all Christian communities, the warm embrace in which new souls are claimed for Christ and nourished in every way for His service. The family is also the source of the
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Church’s manifold vocations, including the vocations of those who dedicate themselves exclusively to Christ and the Church’s service as priests and religious. Thus, in every way, the Church public, the Church as a whole, the mystical body of Christ in its fulness, depends on the health and strength of the domestic church, even as she nourishes the domestic church through her presence, her sacraments, her counsel, her teaching—and, of course, her Liturgical Year. It is not possible in an eBook to reproduce the full richness and flexibility of these resources as they are presented on our website ( www.catholicculture.org). The visual displays of eBooks cannot, in most cases, equal those of web pages, and it is generally not as easy to follow the many links available to explore the full range of offerings. What we have done in the volumes of this series is to present the days of the Liturgical Year in sequence, grouped in their proper seasons, so that the user can follow the unfolding of the Liturgical Year with immediate access to the meaning of each day, complete with its spiritual and liturgical explanations, and its biographies of the saints. Following the basic presentation for each day are many links to additional information, prayers, activities and recipes which relate specifically to that day or the Season as a whole. These materials can be used with profit by anyone. However, if we were to offer specific advice to parents on how they may make the best use of all the resources in their own families, we would emphasize the following two points: First, remember that all of us, but especially children, grow spiritually when we have the opportunity to associate living examples, customs and activities with God’s love and saving power. This sort of participation helps children to learn the Faith along with their mother’s milk, so to speak—or, as we said above, to get it into their very bones. Children also need heroes, and one way or another they will find them. The saints make the best of all possible heroes. Second, avoid trying to do too much. Select carefully and emphasize a few things that you believe will work well in your situation. Keep your attitude joyful and relaxed. With a little judicious planning, let your family’s own customs grow and develop over time. Much of this will be carried on for generations to come, generations which trace their own faith to and through you. A word, finally, on the sources of much of the material presented both in this eBook and on the much larger web site. Many of these wonderful books are, sadly, out of print, but we owe a great debt to them. You may enjoy pursuing some of these sources on your own. The years listed are the original publication dates; some have gone through multiple editions. They include:
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Berger, Florence. Cooking for Christ (National Catholic Rural Life Conference) 1949 Burton, Katherine and Helmut Ripperger. The Feast Day Cookbook, 1951 Butler, Alban. Butler’s Lives of the Saints (updated since the 18th century, up to 12 volumes depending on edition) Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy 2002 Gueranger, OSB (Abbot). The Liturgical Year, 1983 Kelly, Fr. George A. Catholic Family Handbook, 1959 Lodi, Enzo. Saints of the Roman Calendar, 1993 McLoughlin, Helen. My Nameday—Come for Dessert, 1962 Mueller, Therese. Our Children’s Year of Grace, 1943 Newland, Mary Reed. Saints and Our Children, 1958 Newland, Mary Reed. We and Our Children, 1954 Newland, Mary Reed. The Year and Our Children, 1956 Parsch, Dr. Pius. The Church’s Year of Grace (5 volumes), 1953 Trapp, Maria Augusta. Around the Year with the Trapp Family, 1955 Weiser, Francis X., SJ. The Easter Book, 1954.
May you find in this series of volumes on the Liturgical Year a true gateway to the riches of Christ!
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/otc.cfm?id=871
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Introduction to Lent
Lent is the penitential season of approximately 40 days set aside by the Church in order for the faithful to prepare for the celebration of the Lord’s passion, death and resurrection. During this holy season, inextricably connected to the Paschal Mystery, the catechumens prepare for Christian initiation, and current Church members prepare for Easter by recalling their baptism and by works of penance, that is, prayer, fasting and almsgiving. As we enter Lent in this spirit of the Church and of her liturgy we seek to wash away the stains of sin and to rid ourselves of all that prevents us from living a truly Christian life. Ash Wednesday is the clarion call to “Repent and believe the gospel” (Mk 1:15). For the next forty days, the faithful willingly submit to fasting and self-denial in imitation of Our Lord’s forty-day fast in the desert. It is in these dark and still nights, these desert-times, that the soul experiences its greatest growth. There, in the inner arena, the soul battles the world, the flesh and the devil just as Our Lord battled Satan's triple temptation in the desert. His battle was external, for Jesus could not sin; our battle is interior, but with a hope sustained by the knowledge of Christ’s Easter victory over sin and death. The word Lent is derived from an Anglo-Saxon word lengten or lencten meaning spring. We are “to spring” into action, to do the tasks of the season, to prepare for the new growth and graces that will overflow at Easter. In most places, Lent corresponds to Spring, the most important season for a farmer, in which he prepares the soil thoroughly and plants the seed carefully, hoping that the seed buried deep in the soil will produce an abundant crop. On Palm Sunday, the very threshold of his death and Resurrection, Our Lord assured his followers that “unless the grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat. But if it dies, it produces much fruit. The man who loves his life loses it, while the man who hates his life in this world preserves it to life eternal” (Jn 12:24-25). Because of this theme of dying in order to rise, the watchword for the liturgical celebrations of the Season of Lent is austerity. The Church has proclaimed a time of fasting and self-denial and she teaches by example. The priest is vested in violet, the gloomy color of affliction and mortification, except on the Fourth Sunday of Lent (Laetare Sunday) when he might choose the festive option of rose vestments. The sanctuary is bereft of flowers, and less ornate linens and candlesticks adorn the altar. The
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Gloria will not be prayed on Sunday, while the Alleluia will be entirely absent throughout Lent. There are two exceptions to the Lenten austerity. On the Solemnities of St. Joseph (March 19) and the Annunciation (March 25) the Church sets aside her purple for white vestments, sings the Gloria and prays the Creed. Throughout the season, the readings of the Lenten Liturgies give us daily lessons based on three major themes:
1. The first three weeks call us to repentance and to the practice of virtue, though the Church will suspend her penitential readings on Laetare Sunday, the midway point of the Lenten journey, to rejoice that Easter is near. 2. The second theme that threads its way through the seasonal readings is the instruction of the catechumens who are preparing for Easter-birth. The Rites of Christian Initiation span the season of Lent and culminate in the Easter Vigil Rites of Baptism and Confirmation of the Elect. The various readings put before our eyes many Old Testament characters and events that prefigure Christ and the Paschal Mystery: Christ is the new Adam, and he is the Isaac of the New Covenant; the Church is the new Ark which saves mankind through the waters of Baptism, and so on. 3. The final scriptural theme unfolding in the last two weeks of Lent is the mounting opposition to Christ. The sixth and final Sunday of Lent (Passion or Palm Sunday) will usher in Holy Week, the greatest and holiest of all weeks. The liturgies of Holy Week and the Sacred Triduum are too rich to be summarized here.
Note that the penitential regulations of Lent are as follows in most dioceses of the Roman Rite:
Abstinence on all the Fridays of Lent, and on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. No meat may be eaten on days of abstinence. Catholics 14 years and older are bound to abstain from meat. Invalids, pregnant and nursing mothers are exempt. Fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. Fasting means having only one full meal to maintain one's strength. Two smaller, meatless and penitential meals are permitted according to one's needs, but they should not together equal the one
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full meal. Eating solid foods between meals is not permitted. Catholics from age 18 through age 59 are bound to fast. Again, invalids, pregnant and nursing mothers are exempt.
This third volume of our Liturgical Year series covers all the days of Lent and the Sacred Triduum, from Ash Wednesday through Holy Saturday, the day before Easter. For more ideas, prayers and activities to assist families in living the liturgical season of Lent, we suggest that you visit the Lenten Workshop on CatholicCulture.org.
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Lent: March 6th
Ash Wednesday Old Calendar: Ash Wednesday
The time has now come in the Church year for the solemn observance of the great central act of history, the redemption of the human race by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. In the Roman Rite, the beginning of the forty days of penance is marked with the austere symbol of ashes which is used in today’s liturgy. The use of ashes is a survival from an ancient rite according to which converted sinners submitted themselves to canonical penance. The Alleluia and the Gloria are suppressed until Easter. Abstinence from eating meat is to be observed on all Fridays during Lent. This applies to all persons 14 and older. The law of fasting on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday applies to all Catholics who have completed their eighteenth year to the beginning of the sixtieth year. Today the Church ordinarily celebrates the feast of Sts. Cyril and Methodius but the Ash Wednesday liturgy supersedes it.
Ash Wednesday At the beginning of Lent, on Ash Wednesday, ashes are blessed during Mass, after the homily. The blessed ashes are then “imposed” on the faithful as a sign of conversion, penance, fasting and human mortality. The ashes are blessed at least during the first Mass of the day, but they may also be imposed during all the Masses of the day, after the homily, and even outside the time of Mass to meet the needs of the faithful.
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Priests or deacons normally impart this sacramental, but instituted acolytes, other extraordinary ministers or designated lay people may be delegated to impart ashes, if the bishop judges that this is necessary. The ashes are made from the palms used at the previous Passion Sunday ceremonies.
— Ceremonies of the Liturgical Year, Msgr. Peter J. Elliott
The act of putting on ashes symbolizes fragility and mortality, and the need to be redeemed by the mercy of God. Far from being a merely external act, the Church has retained the use of ashes to symbolize that attitude of internal penance to which all the baptized are called during Lent. — Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy From the very early times the commemoration of the approach of Christ’s passion and death was observed by a period of self-denial. St. Athanasius in the year 339 enjoined upon the people of Alexandria the 40 days’ fast he saw practiced in Rome and elsewhere, “to the end that while all the world is fasting, we who are in Egypt should not become a laughing stock as the only people who do not fast but take our pleasure in those days.” On Ash Wednesday in the early days, the Pope went barefoot to St. Sabina’s in Rome “to begin with holy fasts the exercises of Christian warfare, that as we do battle with the spirits of evil, we may be protected by the help of self-denial.” — Daily Missal of the Mystical Body
Things to Do:
Go with your family to receive ashes at Mass today. Leave them on your forehead as a witness to your faith. Here is a Lenten reflection on the meaning of the ashes on Ash Wednesday. If you have children, you may want to share this with them in terms that they can understand. Today parents should encourage their children to reflect upon what regular penances they will perform throughout this season of Lent. Ideally, each member of the family should choose his own personal penance as well as some good act that he will perform (daily spiritual reading, daily Mass, extra prayers, almsgiving, volunteer work, housecleaning, etc.), and the whole family may wish to give up one thing together (TV, movies, desserts) or do something extra (family rosary, Holy Hour, Lenten Alms Jar). The use of Sacrifice Beans may help children to keep track of their Lenten penances. Some families begin this activity (with undyed beans!) on Ash
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penances. Some families begin this activity (with undyed beans!) on Ash Wednesday and then use the collected beans to cook a penitential bean dish for Good Friday at the end of Lent. Here is a Lenten prayer that the family may pray every night from Ash Wednesday to the first Saturday in Lent, to turn the family’s spiritual focus towards this holy season. Read Pope Francis’s 2017 Message for Lent.
Stational churches are the churches that are appointed for special morning and evening services during Lent, Easter and some other important days. The tradition started in order to strengthen the sense of community within the Church in Rome, as this system meant that the Holy Father would visit each part of the city and celebrate Mass with the congregation. The first stational church during Lent is St. Sabina at the Aventine. It was built in the 5th century, presumably at the site of the original Titulus Sabinae, a church in the home of Sabina who had been martyred c. 114. The tituli were the first parish churches in Rome. St Dominic lived in the adjacent monastery for a period soon before his death in 1221. Among other residents of the monastery were St Thomas Aquinas. For more information, see Roman Pilgrimage: The Station Churches, a review of George Weigel’s book by Jennifer Gregory Miller, The Pontifical North American College page, the Vatican’s Lenten Calendar, and “Station Churches”, a Lenten Journey by Fr. Bill.
Daily Readings for: March 06, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Grant, O Lord, that we may begin with holy fasting this campaign of Christian service, so that, as we take up battle against spiritual evils, we may be armed with weapons of self-restraint. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
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who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Fritatta Sardegna (Omelet Sardinian) Oeufs à la Mistral (Baked Eggs) Pain Doré (Golden Toast) Aioli (Garlic Mayonnaise) Dark Rye Bread Herb Omelet III Old-Fashioned Johnnycake Ricotta Omelet Scrambled Eggs and Cheese Scrambled Eggs with Mushrooms Scrambled Eggs with Shrimps
ACTIVITIES
A Two-Fold Theme: Baptism and Penance Ash Wednesday Ash Wednesday Pretzels: Fastenbrezel Examination of Conscience Family Chart Farewell to Alleluia Grapevine Crown of Thorns Hymn: Attende Domine - Hear, O Lord Lenten Alms Jar Lenten Customs of the Russian Germans Lenten Fasting Regulations
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NOW Cross Palm Burning Procession for Ash Wednesday Palms and Ashes Personal Program for Lent Pretzels for God: Lent and the Pretzel Salt Dough Crown of Thorns Sorrow, Keystone for Lent Spirit of Lent, The The “Now Cross” The Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy The Liturgy of Lent The Mystery of Lent The Precepts of the Church The Springtime of Lent Time for God Tuesday-Before-Ash-Wednesday Procession Value of Fasting, The Why Ashes? Why Fasting and Abstinence? Why Forty Days? The Stational Church
PRAYERS
Prayer Before a Crucifix Prayer from Ash Wednesday to Saturday Way of the Cross To Keep A True Lent Book of Blessings: Blessing and Distribution of Ashes
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Book of Blessings: Blessing and Distribution of Ashes Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (1st Plan) Blessing and Distribution of Ashes
LIBRARY
Ash Wednesday Emphasizes That Life Is a Pilgrimage | Cardinal John O’Connor What Are the Origins of Ash Wednesday and the Use of Ashes? | Fr. William Saunders
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Lent: March 7th
Optional Memorial of Sts. Perpetua and Felicity, martyrs Old Calendar: St. Thomas Aquinas, confessor and doctor
The account of the martyrdom of Sts. Perpetua and Felicity forms one of the finest pages of the history of the first centuries of the Church. It shows us clearly the wonderful sentiments of these two women when they heard that they had been condemned to the wild beasts. Knowing their own weakness but relying on the strength of Christ, who was fighting with them, they went to their martyrdom as to a triumphant celebration, to which they were invited by Christ. They were exposed to the fury of wild beasts in the amphitheater at Carthage, A.D. 203, and finally killed by the sword. Their names are still mentioned together in the Roman Canon of the Mass. According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. Thomas Aquinas which is now celebrated in the Ordinary Form on January 28.
Sts. Perpetua and Felicity Vibia Perpetua, a well-to-do young woman and mother, and Felicitas, a slave who gave birth to a child three days before suffering a martyr’s death, were catechumens. Against such prospective converts the persecution of Septimius Severus was particularly severe. These two holy women suffered death on the
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 19 seventh of March in Carthage. The Breviary relates the following touching episode:
Now the day had arrived when they were to be thrown to the wild beasts. Felicitas began to be sorrowful because she feared she would have to wait longer than her companions. For eight months she had been pregnant and therefore, according to Roman law, could not be executed before the birth of the child. But the prayers of her fellow sufferers hastened her time and she gave birth to a baby girl.
While she was suffering from the pains of childbirth, one of the guards called out to her, “If you are suffering so much now, what will you do when you are thrown to the wild beasts?” “Now I suffer,” she answered, “but there Another will be in me, who will suffer for me, because I will suffer for Him.” When she was in travail she had sorrow, but when she was set before the wild beasts she rejoiced (Martyrology).
Finally, on the seventh of March, these heroic women were led into the amphitheatre and severely scourged. Then they were tossed about by an exceptionally wild cow, gored, and thrown to the ground.
Excerpted from The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch
Patron: Perpetua — Cattle, death of children, martyrs. Felicity — Death of children; martyrs; sterility; to have male children; widows.
Symbols: Perpetua — Wild cow; spiked ladder guarded by a dragon. Felicity — Seven swords; cauldron of oil and sword; sword with seven heads; eight palms.
Things to Do:
The story of the sufferings of today’s saints is preserved for us in authentic “Acts of the Martyrs” that were composed partly by the saints themselves, and partly by eyewitnesses (perhaps Tertullian). The account may be classed with the most beautiful portions of ancient Christian literature that have come down to us.
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beautiful portions of ancient Christian literature that have come down to us. Read from this account here.
Today’s station is at St. George’s. Pope St. Gregory established a diaconia, an institution that cared for the poor, at the site of this church. The area has a special place in the history of Rome, as an ancient tradition claims that it was here that Romulus killed his brother Remus before founding the city.
Daily Readings for: March 07, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, at the urging of whose love the Martyrs Saints Perpetua and Felicity defied their persecutors and overcame the torment of earth, grant, we ask, by their prayers, that we may ever grow in your love. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Skewered Beef Roman Style
ACTIVITIES
Story of the Martyrdom of Sts. Felicity and Perpetua
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Third Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 3 Prayer Before a Crucifix
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Prayer Before a Crucifix
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: March 8th
Optional Memorial of St. John of God, religious Old Calendar: St. John of God
“God is love! Whoever abides in love; abides in God and God in him” (motto of St. John’s community). St. John of God, who was of Portuguese descent, was first a shepherd, a dealer and then a soldier. At the age of forty he was converted, and devoted himself to the care of those sick in mind, showing himself in this thankless task to be a true innovator and a saint of super-human heroism. He founded the Order of the Brothers Hospitallers, which bears his name. He died at Granada in 1550. Pope Leo XIII declared him patron of hospitals and of the sick and commanded his name to be placed in the Litanies of the Dying.
St. John of God In 1503, at the age of eight, John fled from his parents for some unknown reason. For a while he was a shepherd, then a book dealer. Matters spiritual were of no particular interest until he heard the preaching of Blessed John of Avila. Then his conversion was so sincere and sudden that he was considered to be out of his mind. He was incarcerated in the Royal Hospital in Granada, and suffered the cruel treatment of the day. Here he discovered how to show his love for God, through caring for those who were unable to respond to this cruel treatment. He resolved to devote the remainder of his life caring for people living on the margins of society. Following John’s death on his 55th birthday, March 8th, his helpers banded together to live in the same radical, spiritual way of Hospitality that John had exemplified and in 1572 they were approved by Pius V, as the Hospitaller Brothers of (St) John of God. The members bind themselves by a fourth vow, the service of the sick. Because of his work
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 23 our saint has become the patron of hospitals and the dying. His name is in the Litany of the Dying. From St. John’s Life by Bihlmeyer: On July 3, 1549, a fire broke out in the kitchen of the Royal hospital at Granada that had been founded by the Spanish king and queen, Ferdinand and Isabella. It threatened to spread to the large wards where hundreds of sick were lying. The storm and fire bells rang loudly. People rushed from all sides, John in the lead. The fire was beyond control, firemen and volunteers were unable to extinguish it. No one dared to enter the burning building from which came the pitiful cries of the sick in the agony of imminent and certain death. Fire and smoke choked the exits. Those who could still arise from their beds stood pleading at the windows. The scene was enough to drive a person insane. John could not stand idly by. Disregarding smoke and flame, he rushed in among the sick, opened doors and windows, gave terse orders and directions as to how they who could might save themselves; some he led, others he dragged or carried into the open, often two at a time. When all the bedridden were safe, he wasted no time in throwing coverlets, bed clothing, chairs and other valuables out of the windows, thus saving the property of the poor. Then he took an axe, climbed to the roof and began chopping away vigorously. Suddenly the liberated flames leapt up high beside him. He fled, only to continue his heroic work in another part of the building. There too a wave of fire soon stopped him. He was standing literally between two infernos. Moments passed, he was lost in the heat of the flames and the choking smoke. A quarter of an hour—loud cries of fear could be heard for the brave man—and then he sprang from the fire, blackened by smoke but unscathed except for singed eyebrows. Joyously the crowd surrounded him, congratulating the savior of the sick. John’s modesty, however, prevented him from accepting praise and honors.
Excerpted from The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch
Patron: Booksellers; heart patients; hospitals; nurses; the sick; the dying and firefighters.
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Symbols: The pomegranate—the fruit which represents charity and love, in the Bible, is the coat of arms of the Hospitaller Order and its motto is “God is Love”. John is depicted in art washing the feet of Jesus. A famous painting by Gomez-Moreno 1880 depicts John rescuing the patients from the inferno at the Royal Hospital (where he himself had been a patient 10 years earlier) where not even one life was lost.
Things to Do:
St. John of God followed his impulses when it came to serving Christ. He never reconsidered or second-guessed the inspirations of the Holy Spirit, but he acted on them instantly, whether or not they seemed practical. Today do not dissuade yourself from doing heroic little acts of charity, but follow God’s will immediately as it is manifested to you. St. John of God never thought of himself but always reached out to others. Examine your conscience tonight and ask yourself: do I habitually give greater importance to others’ needs before my own? Do I esteem myself over-highly, or do I consider myself of least importance? There is something lacking in present-day hospital methods that characterized the age-old practice of the Church, viz., a harmonious, organic relationship between liturgy and care of the sick. Pray the Litany of the Sick for those hospitalized. And pray that hospital care will incorporate the Christian dimension and respect each person as an image of God.
The station for today is on Mt. Coelius in the basilica which the Christian Senator Pammachius built over the home of the martyrs Sts. John and Paul and which is dedicated to them. Near the church was a hospice where Pammachius dispensed his fortune in charity to the poor.
Daily Readings for: March 08, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
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Collect: O God, who filled Saint John of God with a spirit of compassion, grant, we pray, that, giving ourselves to works of charity, we may merit to be found among the elect in your Kingdom. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Mushroom Stroganoff
ACTIVITIES
Examination of Conscience Examination of Conscience for Children
PRAYERS
Litany for the Sick and Afflicted Litany of Saint John of God
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-08
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Lent: March 9th
Optional Memorial of St. Frances of Rome, religious Old Calendar: St. Frances of Rome; St. Dominic Savio (Historical)
“I give you a new commandment: Love one another as I have loved you, says the Lord (Jn 13:34).” In the fifteenth century St. Frances, among the noble ladies of Rome, showed herself an example of what a Christian wife should be. After the death of her husband she retired from the world and lived in a monastery of Oblates that she had founded under the Rule of St. Benedict. God favored her with the visible presence of her guardian angel with whom she conversed familiarly. Historically today is the feast of St. Dominic Savio was an Italian adolescent student of Saint John Bosco. He was studying to be a priest when he became ill and died at the age of 14, possibly from pleurisy.
St. Frances of Rome St. Frances of Rome (1384-1440) founded the institute known as the “Oblati di Tor de Specchi” in the Holy City. She was a wealthy patrician and after her husband died, she gave up all her wealth to live a life of abject poverty. Her special privilege from heaven was familiar conversation with her guardian angel. Reading the life of St. Frances, one
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 27 gains the impression that she moved and lived in the spiritual world more than on earth; in fact, that which gives her life its unique character is her intimate relationship with the blessed world of holy spirits. During the three periods of her life, three angels of different rank accompanied her, ready to protect her soul against any onslaught of hell and to lead her step by step to spiritual perfection. Day and night the saint saw her angel busy at a mysterious task. With three little golden spindles he unceasingly spun golden threads, strung them around his neck, and diligently wound them into balls. A half year before her death he changed his work. Instead of spinning more golden thread, he began to weave three carpets of varying size with the golden thread he had spun. These carpets symbolized her lifework as virgin, mother, and religious. Shortly before her death, she noticed how the angel was hurrying his work, and his face was unusually fresh and happy. At the very moment when the last carpet had reached its required length, her soul departed into eternal bliss.
Excerpted from The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch
Patron: automobile drivers, automobilists, cab or taxi drivers, death of children, lay people, motorists, people ridiculed for their piety, Roman housewives, widows.
Symbols: often depicted as a woman habited in black with a white veil, accompanied by her guardian angel, and sometimes carrying a basket of food; Nun with her guardian angel dressed as a deacon. Monstrance and arrow; book; angel with a branch of oranges; receiving the veil from the Christ Child in the arms of the Blessed Virgin.
Things to Do:
Today’s Gospel is often used by Protestants to challenge the Catholic practice of calling our priests “Father.” Learn how to defend this practice — begin by reading Art Kelly’s apologetics article, Call No Man Father?. Discuss this custom and the reasoning behind it with your children. Invoke St. Frances’ protection as you are getting in your car to drive somewhere today. St. Frances was certain that she had a vocation to the religious life from the age of eleven. However, her father forced her to marry, and so she instead joyfully loved and served her husband until his death enabled her to enter the religious life when
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she was fifty-two years old. Even when you may have certainty that God is calling you to walk a certain path, His timing may be different from your own. Reflect on your own vocation: regardless of any doubts you may have, or seemingly unfulfilled desires to do more for God, abandon yourself to His will of the present moment, and joyfully focus on fulfilling the small duties which your vocation asks of you. Read about sanctification through the present moment in Rev. Jean-Pierre de Caussade’s excellent little work, Abandonment to Divine Providence (online version).
St. Dominic Savio Here was a boy-saint who died at the age of fifteen, was one of the great hopes of St. John Bosco for the future of his congregation, and was canonized in 1954. He was one of ten children of Carlo and Birgitta Savio. Carlo was a blacksmith and Birgitta was a seamstress. When Don Bosco was looking for young men to train as priests for his Salesian Order, his parish priest suggested Dominic Savio. Dominic became more than a credit to Don Bosco’s school—he single-handedly organized those who were to be the nucleus of Don Bosco’s order. St. Dominic Savio was twelve when he met Don Bosco and organized a group of boys into the Company of the Immaculate Conception. Besides its religious purpose, the boys swept and took care of the school and looked after the boys that no one seemed to pay any attention to. When, in 1859, Don Bosco chose the young men to be the first members of his congregation, all of them had been members of Dominic’s Company. For all that, Dominic was a normal, high-spirited boy who sometimes got into trouble with his teachers because he would often break out laughing. However, he was generally well disciplined and gradually gained the respect of the tougher boys in Don Bosco’s school. In other circumstances, Dominic might have become a little self-righteous snob, but Don Bosco showed him the heroism of the ordinary and the sanctity of common sense. “Religion must be about us as the air we breathe,” Don Bosco
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common sense. “Religion must be about us as the air we breathe,” Don Bosco would say, and Dominic Savio wore holiness like the clothes on his back. He called his long hours of prayer “his distractions.” In 1857, at the age of fifteen, he caught tuberculosis and was sent home to recover. On the evening of March 9, he asked his father to say the prayers for the dying. His face lit up with an intense joy and he said to his father: “I am seeing most wonderful things!” These were his last words.
— Excerpted from The One Year Book of Saints by Rev. Clifford Stevens
Patron: Boys; children’s choirs; choir boys; choirs; falsely accused people; juvenile delinquents; Pueri Cantors.
Things to Do: Learn more about the Salesians and Salesian saints.
The station for today is at the church dedicated to St. Augustine of Hippo. Michalangelo was one of the artists commissioned for the decoration of the church. The Renaissance façade, one of the first in this style, is built of travertine marble said to be from the ruins of the Colosseum.
Daily Readings for: March 09, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who have given us in Saint Frances of Rome a singular model of both married and monastic life, grant us perseverance in your service, that in every circumstance of life we may see and follow you. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
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RECIPES
Scottish Oat Scones
ACTIVITIES
Teaching Self-Denial
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Third Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 3 Novena Prayer in Honor of St. John Ogilvie Prayer to Saint Dominic Savio
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-09
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Lent: March 10th
First Sunday of Lent Old Calendar: First Sunday of Lent
Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit for forty days in the wilderness, tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing in those days; and when they were ended, he was hungry. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.” And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘ Man shall not live by bread alone.’” And the devil took him up. and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory; for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. If you, then, will worship me, it shall all be yours.” And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘ You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.’ ”
Sunday Readings The first reading is from Deuteronomy 26: 4-10. In these verses we have the ritual prescribed by Moses for the feast of the harvest thanksgiving. The people once settled in the Promised Land are to show their gratitude to the good God who brought them out of the slavery of Egypt and gave them this good land to be their home. The second reading is from St. Paul to the Romans 10: 8-13. He is discussing the sad fact that Israel (as a whole) rejected Christ as the promised Messiah and the Son of God. The Gospel is from St. Luke 5:1-11. Christ’s voluntary self-mortification of forty days’ fast, with its accompanying temptations, was but part of the self-mortification, with
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 32 its climax on the Cross, which He gladly underwent for our salvation. He did not need to fast in order to keep the inclinations of the body in subjection, He did not need to allow the insult of temptation. He could have said, “begone Satan” at the beginning as easily and as effectively as be said it at the end. But He willingly underwent this humiliation in order to set us an example and to prove to us the infinite love He bears us and the value, the priceless value, He sets on our eternal salvation. He became like us in all things (except sin) in order to make it possible for us to become like Him—the beloved of his Father—and co-heirs with Him in the kingdom of heaven. With this example given us by Christ no Christian can or should expect to travel the road to heaven without meeting obstacles and temptations. Our weak human nature is of itself, even without any external tempter, a source of many temptations to us, especially of those three illustrated in the case of Christ. Our body desires all the pleasures and comforts that can be got out of life and resents any curtailment of these desires even on the part of our Creator and Benefactor. Our gifts of intelligence and free-will often tempt most of us to look for power, political or economic, over our fellowmen. We want to be better off than others in this world, when our purpose in life is to help ourselves and our fellowmen to the better life. Finally. so fully occupied are many in the mad rush after pleasure and power that they have no time to devote to the one thing that matters, the attainment of eternal life. Yet, through some foolish logic of our own, we expect God to do for us what we refuse to do for ourselves. We are tempting God by presuming he will save us if we have deliberately chosen the road to perdition. There are few, if any, amongst us who can honestly say: “I am free from such inclinations or temptations.” The vast majority of us can and should beat our breasts and say with the publican: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.” And merciful he will be if we turn to him with true humility. He may not remove all our temptations, all our wrong inclinations, but he will give us the grace to overcome them if we sincerely seek his aid.
Excerpted from The Sunday Readings by Fr. Kevin O’Sullivan, O.F.M.
The Station today is at St. John Lateran. The Lateran is comprised of the Basilica, the Pontifical Palace and the Baptistry. The church is dedicated to the Christ the Savior. In the fifth century the titles of St. John Baptist and St. John the Evangelist were added. The Papal altar contains the wooden
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Evangelist were added. The Papal altar contains the wooden altar on which St. Peter is said to have celebrated Mass. This basilica is the mother of all churches and is the only church which has the title of Archbasilica.
Commentary for the Readings in the Extraordinary Form: First Sunday of Lent “Not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God” (Gospel). 1. In this picture the devil points to the bread of fleshly desire. “Now is the acceptable time” to “ration” our self-indulgence, our worship of physical culture (Epistle), and to feed our souls with the Divine Word. This temptation calls for the mortification of self. 2. The “pinnacle of the temple” (in the upper left corner), recalls the pride of usurping God’s power, of trying to live beyond His reach. We must topple ourselves from the pinnacle of pride and lift ourselves up by prayer to the pinnacle of God Himself. 3. The “kingdoms of the world,” seen in the distance (in middle of picture), represent those who covet mere earthly “glory.” To offset this temptation there must be almsgiving or devoting one’s talents to the service of one’s neighbor. The Epistle exhorts us not to receive “in vain” this plan of personal reformation, first by warning, then by encouraging us in the eternal struggle between Christ and Antichrist.
Excerpted from My Sunday Missal, Confraternity of the Precious Blood
Daily Readings for: March 10, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
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Collect: Grant, almighty God, through the yearly observances of holy Lent, that we may grow in understanding of the riches hidden in Christ and by worthy conduct pursue their effects. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Pease Porridge
ACTIVITIES
The Kaleidoscope of Lent
PRAYERS
Prayer for the First Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 1 Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (1st Plan)
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-10
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Lent: March 11th
Monday of the First Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Eulogius, priest & martyr (Hist); St. Sophronius (Hist)
Historically today is the feast of the martyred priest, St. Eulogius of Cordoba, Spain, who was slain by the Moors. A noted scholar of Scripture, Eulogius was arrested in 850 after writing Exhortation of Martyrdom for two young virgin martyrs, Flora and Mary, who were beheaded after refusing to abjure the faith. Released after a time Eulogius ws named archbishop of Cordoba or Toledo. Before he could be consecrated, he aided Leocritia, a young Moorish woman who had converted to Christianity. They were caught and beheaded. Eulogius also wrote The Memorial of the Saints and an Apologia. It is also historically the feast of St. Sophronius a simple monk who pursued a life of prayer and sacrifice first in the desert of Egypt, then near the Jordan River, then finally in the Holy City of Jerusalem. He was ultimately chosen to be bishop and Patriarch of Jerusalem in the early 7th century. He valiantly defended the true and full humanity of Christ in the face of the heresy of Monothelitism, which denied that Jesus had a human as well as a divine will. The year before his death in 638, he witnessed the capture of Jerusalem by the Muslims under the Caliph Omar. Several of his sermons and poems have survived till this day. St. Sophronius is known as one of the Fathers of the Church.
St. Eulogius St. Eulogius was of a senatorian family of Cordova, at that time the capital of the Moors in Spain. Our Saint was educated among the clergy of the Church of St. Zoilus, a martyr who suffered with nineteen others under Diocletian. Here he distinguished himself, by his virtue and learning, and, being made priest, was placed at the head of the chief
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 36 ecclesiastical school at Cordova. He joined assiduous watching, fasting, and prayer to his studies, and his humility, mildness, and charity gained him the affection and respect of every one. During the persecution raised against the Christians in the year 850, St. Eulogius was thrown into prison and there wrote his Exhortation to Martyrdom, addressed to the virgins Flora and Mary, who were beheaded the 24th of November, 851. Six days after their death Eulogius was set at liberty. In the year 852 several others suffered the like martyrdom. St. Eulogius encouraged all these martyrs to their triumphs, and was the support of that distressed flock. The Archbishop of Toledo dying in 858. St. Eulogius was elected to succeed him; but there was some obstacle that hindered him from being consecrated, though he did not outlive his election two months. A virgin, by name Leocritia, of a noble family among the Moors, had been instructed from her infancy in the Christian religion by one of her relatives, and privately baptized. Her father and mother used her very ill, and scourged her day and night to compel her to renounce the Faith. Having made her condition known to St. Eulogius and his sister Anulona, intimating that she desired to go where she might freely exercise her religion, they secretly procured her the means of getting away, and concealed her for some time among faithful friends. But the matter was at length discovered, and they were all brought before the cadi, who threatened to have Eulogius scourged to death. The Saint told him that his torments would be of no avail, for he would never change his religion. Whereupon the cadi gave orders that he should be carried to the palace and be presented before the king’s council. Eulogius began boldly to propose the truths of the Gospel to them. But, to prevent their hearing him, the council condemned him immediately to lose his head. As they were leading him to execution, one of the guards gave him a blow on the face, for having spoken against Mahomet; he turned the other cheek, and patiently received a second. He received the stroke of death with great cheerfulness, on the 11th of March, 859. St. Leocritia was beheaded four days after him, and her body thrown into the river Guadalquivir, but taken out by the Christians.
Excerpted from Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
St. Sophronius Patriarch St. Sophronius of Jerusalem was called the
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Sophist because of his knowledge of Greek. He was an ardent opponent of monothelitism. Many of his writings, including the Florilegium and the Life of St. John the Almsgiver, are no longer extant. He wrote an encomium on John of Cyrus and composed 23 anacreontic odes on the feasts of the church. His Christmas homily of 634 suggests that the Saracens held Bethlehem at that time. (Historians had dated the event later). The Orthodox remember St. Sophronius chiefly as the author of the life of St. Mary of Egypt. Sophronius was born in Damascus around 560. He and his friend John Moschus became ascetics together while they were in their late teens or early twenties. Some say they lived near the Jordan; some say they lived in Egypt. In 605, Sophronius fled to Alexandria in the wake of Persian invaders, and when the Persians invaded Alexandria in 616, he fled to Rome. In 619, he returned to Palestine and lived in the Theodosius monastery in Jerusalem. When Patriarch Cyrus of Alexandria began to preach monothelitism, St. Sophronius traveled to that city to argue against him; in 633, when Patriarch Sergius of Constantinople began to preach monothelitism, St. Sophronius traveled to that city to argue against him. Neither visit was successful. After Sophronius was elected Patriarch of Jerusalem in 634, he wrote the Synodical Letter to teach the two wills of Christ. In 637, the Muslims captured Jerusalem; St. Sophronius died a year later of grief at the fall of his city.
Things to Do:
Read more about this Father of the Church at: The St. Pachomius Library, St. Sophronius of Jerusalem, St. Sophronius, Patriarch of Jerusalem, St. Sophronius and Butler’s Lives of the Saints—Saint Sophronius, Patriarch of Jerusalem, Confessor.
The Station today is at St. Peter in Chains. The church was one of the tituli, Rome’s first parish churches, known as the Titulus Eudoxiae or the Eudoxiana. It was built over the ruins of an Imperial villa in 442 (or possibly 439), to house the chains that had bound St. Peter in prison in Jerusalem.
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Daily Readings for: March 11, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Convert us, O God our Savior, and instruct our minds by heavenly teaching, that we may benefit from the works of Lent. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Monastery Soup
ACTIVITIES
Sorrow, Keystone for Lent
PRAYERS
Prayer for the First Week of Lent Novena to St. Joseph Lent Table Blessing 1 Novena to St. Joseph II Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph The Marian Prayer of St. Sophronius (A.D. 560-638)
LIBRARY
The History of the Latin Vulgate | John E. Steinmeuller D.D., S.Scr.L. The Last Ancient Patriarch of Jerusalem: Saint Sophronius | Robert Saffern
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View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-11
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Lent: March 12th
Tuesday of the First Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Gregory the Great, pope and doctor
According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of Pope St. Gregory the Great. His feast in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite is celebrated on September 3. Luigi Giovanni Orione, F.D.P., was an Italian priest who was active in answering the social needs of his nation as it faced the social upheavals of the late 19th century. To this end, he founded a religious institute of men. He was canonized by St. John Paul II on May 16, 2004.
Thanks to Fear of the Lord, There is no Fear of Evil History, in fact, is not alone in the hands of dark powers, chance or human choices. Over the unleashing of evil energies, the vehement irruption of Satan, and the emergence of so many scourges and evils, the Lord rises, supreme arbiter of historical events. He leads history wisely towards the dawn of the new heavens and the new earth, sung in the final part of the book under the image of the new Jerusalem (cf. Revelation 21-22). It must be reaffirmed, therefore, that God is not indifferent to human events, but penetrates them realizing his “ways,” namely his plans and his efficacious “deeds.” According to our hymn, this divine intervention has a very specific purpose: to be a sign that invites all the peoples of the earth to conversion. Nations must learn to “read” in history a message of God. Humanity’s history is not confused and without meaning, nor is it given over, without appeal, to the malfeasance of the arrogant and perverse. There is the possibility to recognize divine action hidden in it. In the pastoral constitution “Gaudium et Spes,” Vatican Council II also invites the believer to scrutinize, in the light
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 41 of the Gospel, the signs of the times to see in them the manifestation of the very action of God (cf. n. 4 and 11). This attitude of faith leads man to recognize the power of God operating in history, and thus to open himself to fear of the name of the Lord. In biblical language, in fact, this “fear” does not coincide with dread, but is the recognition of the mystery of the divine transcendence. Because of this, it is the basis of faith and is joined with love: “the Lord your God requires of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul” (cf. Deuteronomy 10:12). Following this line, in our brief hymn, taken from Revelation, fear and glorification of God are united: “Who will not fear you, Lord, or glorify your name” (15:4)? Thanks to fear of the Lord there is no fear of the evil that rages in history and one takes up again with vigor the journey of life, as the prophet Isaiah declared: “Strengthen the hands that are feeble, make firm the knees that are weak, say to those whose hearts are frightened: ‘Be strong, fear not!’” (Isaiah 35: 3-4).
Excerpted from Thanks to Fear of the Lord, There Is No Fear of Evil, Pope Benedict XVI, May 11, 2005
Things to Do:
Your children may want to spend their afternoon learning about different local charitable organizations or needy families to whom the alms from the family’s Lenten Jar will be given.
St. Luigi Orione Luigi Orione was born in Pontecurone, diocese of Tortona, on 23 June 1872. At thirteen years of age he entered the Franciscan Friary of Voghera (Pavia), but he left after one year owing to poor health. From 1886 to 1889 he was a pupil of Saint John Bosco at the Valdocco Oratory (Youth Centre) in Turin. On 16 October 1889, he joined the diocesan seminary of Tortona. As a young seminarian he devoted himself to the care of others by becoming a member of
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 42 both the San Marziano Society for Mutual Help and the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul. On 3 July 1892 he opened the first Oratory in Tortona to provide for the Christian training of boys. The following year, on 15 October 1893, Luigi Orione, then a seminarian of twenty-one, started a boarding school for poor boys, in the Saint Bernardine estate. On 13 April 1895, Luigi Orione was ordained priest and, on that occasion, the Bishop gave the clerical habit to six pupils of the boarding school. Within a brief span of time, Don Orione opened new houses at Mornico Losana (Pavia), Noto - in Sicily, Sanremo and Rome. Around the young Founder there grew up seminarians and priests who made up the first core group of the Little Work of Divine Providence. In 1899, he founded the branch of the Hermits of Divine Providence. The Bishop of Tortona, Mgr Igino Bandi, by a Decree of 21 March 1903, issued the canonical approval of the Sons of Divine Providence (priests, lay brothers and hermits) - the male congregation of the Little Work of Divine Providence. It aims to “co-operate to bring the little ones, the poor and the people to the Church and to the Pope, by means of the works of charity,” and professes a fourth vow of special “faithfulness to the Pope.” In the first Constitutions of 1904, among the aims of the new Congregation, there appears that of working to “achieve the union of the separated Churches.” Inspired by a profound love for the Church and for the salvation of Souls, he was actively interested in the new problems of his time, such as the freedom and unity of the Church, the Roman question, modernism, socialism and the Christian evangelisation of industrial workers. He rushed to assist the victims of the earthquakes of Reggio and Messina (1908) and the Marsica region (1915). By appointment of Saint Pius X, he was made Vicar General of the diocese of Messina for three years. On 29 June 1915, twenty years after the foundation of the Sons of Divine Providence, he added to the “single tree of many branches” the Congregation of the Little Missionary Sisters of Charity who are inspired by the same founding charism. Alongside them, he placed the Blind Sisters, Adorers of the Blessed Sacrament. Later, the Contemplative Sisters of Jesus Crucified were also founded. For lay people he set up the associations of the “Ladies of Divine Providence,” the “Former Pupils,” and the “Friends.” More recently, the Don Orione Secular Institute and the Don Orione Lay People’s Movement have come into being. Following the First World War (1914-1918), the number of schools, boarding houses, agricultural schools, charitable and welfare works increased. Among his most
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 43 enterprising and original works, he set up the “Little Cottolengos,” for the care of the suffering and abandoned, which were usually built in the outskirts of large cities to act as “new pulpits” from which to speak of Christ and of the Church - “true beacons of faith and of civilisation.” Don Orione’s missionary zeal, which had already manifested itself in 1913 when he sent his first religious to Brazil, expanded subsequently to Argentina and Uruguay (1921), Palestine (1921), Poland (1923), Rhodes (1925), the USA (1934), England (1935), Albania (1936). From 1921-1922 and from 1934-1937, he himself made two missionary journeys to Latin America: to Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, going as far as Chile. He enjoyed the personal respect of the Popes and the Holy See’s Authorities, who entrusted him with confidential tasks of sorting out problems and healing wounds both inside the Church as well as in the relations with society. He was a preacher, a confessor and a tireless organiser of pilgrimages, missions, processions, live cribs and other popular manifestations and celebrations of the faith. He loved Our Lady deeply and fostered devotion to her by every means possible and, through the manual labour of his seminarians, built the shrines of Our Lady of Safe Keeping in Tortona and Our Lady of Caravaggio at Fumo. In the winter of 1940, with the intention of easing the heart and lung complaints that were troubling him, he went to the Sanremo house, even though, as he said, “it is not among the palm trees that I would like to die, but among the poor who are Jesus Christ.” Only three days later, on 12 March 1940, surrounded by the love of his confreres, Don Orione died, while sighing “Jesus, Jesus! I am going.” His body was found to be intact at its first exhumation in 1965. It has been exposed to the veneration of the faithful in the shrine of Our Lady of Safe Keeping in Tortona ever since 26 October 1980 - the day in which Pope John Paul II inscribed Don Luigi Orione in the Book of the Blessed. He was canonized on 16 May 2004. © Libreria Editrice Vaticana
Things to Do:
Learn more about the Sons of Divine Providence the order founded in Italy in 1893 by St. Luigi Orione.
At Rome, the Station is in the church of St. Anastasia, where,
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formerly, the Mass of the Aurora on Christmas Day was celebrated. The first church was built in the late 3rd or early 4th century, and was one of the first parish churches of ancient Rome. It was given by a woman called Anastasia and called titulus Anastasiae after her. Later, it was dedicated to a martyr of the same name.
Daily Readings for: March 12, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Look upon your family, Lord, that, through the chastening effects of bodily discipline, our minds may be radiant in your presence with the strength of our yearning for you. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Lenten Soup Whole Wheat Bread II
ACTIVITIES
Good Example — A Lesson in Discipline Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart! Religion in the Home for Elementary School: March Religion in the Home for Preschool: March
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Novena to St. Joseph
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Lent Table Blessing 4 Novena to St. Joseph II Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph
LIBRARY
Gregory the Great, a Model for Civil and Religious Leaders | Pope Benedict XVI Saint Gregory the Great (1) | Pope Benedict XVI Saint Gregory the Great (2) | Pope Benedict XVI The Divine Office, Part III: From St. Gregory the Great to Pius X | Benedictine Monks of Buckfast Abbey
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Lent: March 13th
Wednesday of the First Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Roderick, martyr (Hist)
On the Cross, Christ is both priest and victim; he fulfills Isaiah’s description of him as the suffering servant. And the whole of his teaching is to make us ready to live our sacramental life in his spirit of sacrifice. He impressed on us that we must match the outward sign of his sacraments in our lives. When we became other Christs in Baptism, we became other Christs in Baptisms, we became sharers in the priesthood of the Lord. We gained the ability and the responsibility of combining our inward obedience with every outward act of sacrifice that we make as priests and victims. In every Mass, then, we agree to offer our obedience to atone for, to correct the disobedience of sin. On his part, Christ agrees to renew his sacrifice of atonement and obedience, in which we join; and to nourish us on the victim, his flesh and blood, the covenant food.
—St. Andrew Bible Mission Historically today is the feast of St. Roderick of Cordoba, a priest and martyr who lived in Moorish Spain in the 9th century. He was beheaded in 857.
Confidence and Union with God in Temptation Nothing is more efficacious against temptation than the remembrance of the Cross of Jesus. What did Christ come to do here below if not to “destroy the works of the devil”? And how has He destroyed them, how has He “cast out” the devil, as He Himself says, if not by His death upon the Cross? Let us then lean by faith upon the cross of Christ Jesus, as our baptism gives us the
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 47 right to do. The virtue of the cross is not exhausted. In baptism we were marked with the seal of the cross, we became members of Christ, enlightened by His light, and partakers of His life and of the salvation He brings to us. Hence, united to Him, whom shall we fear? Dominus illuminatio mea et salus mea; quern timebo? Let us say to ourselves: “He hath given His angels charge over thee to keep thee in all thy ways.” “Because he hoped in Me (says the Lord) I will deliver him; I am with him in tribulation, I will deliver him, and I will glorify him. I will fill him with length of days, and I will show him My salvation.”
Excerpted from Christ the Life of the Soul, Dom Marmion.
St. Roderick of Cordoba Jesus warned his disciples that they should expect no better treatment than Himself. They would be haled before governors and kings on His account, and brothers would even hand brothers over for execution. That prophecy was literally fulfilled in the case of St. Roderick, a Spanish martyr who died at the hands of the Muslim Moors in A.D. 857. His was a bitter case of the reverse of Christian love. We owe the account to eyewitness St. Elogius, who later on died for the faith himself. It must be admitted that when the Mohammedans invaded Spain in A.D. 711, even they were sometimes shocked by the lack of religious principles among a large number of the Hispanic Christians. As the Moors swarmed in, the Catholics, far from presenting a strong front, became divided. Many, whether out of fear or lack of faith, voluntarily gave up their Christianity. Families thus split asunder and the members on either side railed at each other. St. Roderick was to prove a sad victim of this sort of betrayal. He was a good priest of Cabra who had two irresponsible brothers. One of them was a bad Christian who had all but abandoned his faith. The other had gone still further and joined Islam. One night the two started to fight each other unmercifully. Roderick tried to break them up, but instead of yielding, they turned on him and beat him senseless. Then the Muslim brother had the priest put on a litter and carried half-conscious through the streets. The Muslim accompanied the bier, proclaiming that Father Roderick, too, had apostatized, and that he
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 48 wanted it known publicly before he died. Eventually the victim did recover and went off to a safe place. But Father Roderick had not yet seen the last of his renegade brother. The Muslim met the priest soon afterwards in the streets of Cordova. He had Roderick taken at once before the Mohammedan kadi (judge), where he accused him of the crime of having returned to Christianity after public profession of his Muslimism. Although Father Roderick protested that he had never denied his Christian faith, the kadi clapped him into the city’s worst dungeon. In that fetid jail, the priest at least had the comfort of finding one Solomon, another Christian prisoner who had been accused of the same “unforgiveable” crime. Both of them were given a long term of imprisonment, in the hope that they would convert. But each man encouraged the other, and they remained firm in their Christian convictions. Even when separated, they would not change their belief. Eventually, the kadi ordered the Catholic priest and the layman beheaded. St. Eulogius saw their headless bodies lying on the riverside. He noticed that the guards were careful to throw into the stream any stones stained with the men’s blood, for fear the faithful might pick them up as relics. The soldiers sought in vain to ward off veneration of SS. Roderick and Solomon. Spanish Christians would always honor them thereafter as martyrs. And they would also gradually learn from this heroism that the Faith is something really worth dying for.
—Father Robert F. McNamara
Excerpted from St. Kateri Tekakwitha Parish
St. Euphrasia Antigonus, the father of this saint, was a nobleman of the first rank and quality in the court of Theodosius the Younger, nearly allied in blood to that emperor, and honoured by him with several great employments in the state. He was married to Euphrasia, a lady no less illustrious for her birth and virtue, by whom he had one only daughter and heiress, called also Euphrasia, the saint of whom we treat. After her birth, her pious parents, by mutual
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 49 consent, engaged themselves by vow to pass the remainder of their lives in perpetual continence, that they might more perfectly aspire to the invisible joys of the life to come; and from that time they lived together as brother and sister, in the exercise of devotion, alms-deeds, and penance. Antigonus died within a year, and the holy widow, to shun the importunate addresses of young suitors for marriage, and the distraction of friends, not long after withdrew privately with her little daughter into Egypt, where she was possessed of a very large estate. In that country she fixed her abode near a holy monastery of one hundred and thirty nuns, who never used any other food than herbs and pulse, which they took only after sunset, and some only once in two or three days: they wore and slept on sackcloth, wrought with their hands, and prayed almost without interruption. When sick, they bore their pains with patience, esteeming them an effect of the divine mercy, and thanking God for the same; nor did they seek relief from physicians, except in cases of absolute necessity, and then only allowed of ordinary general remedies, as the monks of La Trappe do at this day. Delicate and excessive attention to health nourishes self-love and immortification, and often destroys that health which it studies anxiously to preserve. By the example of these holy virgins, the devout mother animated herself to fervour in the exercise of religion and charity, to which she totally dedicated herself. She frequently visited these servants of God, and earnestly entreated them to accept a considerable annual revenue, with an obligation that they should always be bound to pray for the soul of her deceased husband. But the abbess refused the estate, saying, “We have renounced all the conveniences of the world, in order to purchase heaven. We are poor, and such we desire to remain.” She could only be prevailed upon to accept a small matter to supply the church-lamp with oil, and for incense to be burned on the altar. The young Euphrasia, at seven years of age, made it her earnest request to her mother that she might be permitted to serve God in this monastery. The pious mother, on hearing this, wept for joy, and not long after presented her to the abbess, who, taking up an image of Christ, gave it into her hands. The tender virgin kissed it, saying, “By vow I consecrate myself to Christ.” Then the mother led her before an image of our Redeemer, and lifting up her hands to heaven, said “Lord Jesus Christ, receive this child under your special protection. You alone cloth she love and seek: to you cloth she recommend herself.” Then turning to her dear daughter, she said, “May God, who laid the foundations of the mountains, strengthen you always in his holy fear.” And leaving her in the hands of the abbess, she went out of the monastery weeping. Some time after this she fell sick, and being forewarned of her death, gave her last
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 50 instructions to her daughter in these words: “Fear God, honour your sisters, and serve them with humility. Never think of what you have been, nor say to yourself that you are of royal extraction. Be humble and poor on earth, that you may be rich in heaven.” The good mother soon after slept in peace. Upon the news of her death, the Emperor Theodosius sent for the noble virgin to court, having promised her in marriage to a favourite young senator. But the virgin wrote him with her own hand the following answer: “Invincible emperor, having consecrated myself to Christ in perpetual chastity, I cannot be false to my engagement, and marry a mortal man, who will shortly be the food of worms. For the sake of my parents, be pleased to distribute their estates among the poor, the orphans, and the church. Set all my slaves at liberty, and discharge my vassals and servants, giving them whatever is their due. Order my father’s stewards to acquit my farmers of all they owe since his death, that I may serve God without let or hindrance, and may stand before him without the solicitude of temporal affairs. Pray for me, you, and your empress, that I may be made worthy to serve Christ.” The messengers returned with this letter to the emperor, who shed many tears in reading it. The senators who heard it burst also into tears, and said to his majesty, “She is the worthy daughter of Antigonus and Euphrasia, of your royal blood, and the holy offspring of a virtuous stock.” The emperor punctually executed all she desired, a little before his death, in 395. St. Euphrasia was to her pious sisters a perfect pattern of humility, meekness, and charity. If she found herself assaulted by any temptation, she immediately discovered it to the abbess, to drive away the devil by that humiliation, and to seek a remedy. The discreet superioress often enjoined her, on such occasions, some humbling and painful penitential labour; as sometimes to carry great stones from one place to another; which employment she once, under an obstinate assault, continued thirty days together with wonderful simplicity, till the devil being vanquished by her humble obedience, and chastisement of her body, he left her in peace. Her diet was only herbs or pulse, which she took after sunset, at first every day, but afterwards only once in two or three, or sometimes seven days. But her abstinence received its chief merit from her humility, without which it would have been a fast of devils. She cleaned out the chambers of the other nuns, carried water to the kitchen, and out of obedience cheerfully employed herself in the meanest drudgery, making painful labour a part of her penance. To mention one instance of her extraordinary meekness and humility it is related that one day a maid in the kitchen asked her why she fasted whole weeks, which no other
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 51 attempted to do besides the abbess. Her answer was that the abbess had enjoined her that penance. The other called her an hypocrite. Upon which Euphrasia fell at her feet, begging her to pardon and pray for her. In which action it is hard to say whether we ought more to admire the patience with which she received so unjust a rebuke and slander, or the humility with which she sincerely condemned herself; as if, by her hypocrisy and imperfections, she had been a scandal to others. She was favoured with miracles both before and after her death, which happened in the year 410, and the thirtieth of her age. Her name is recorded on this day in the Roman Martyrology. See her ancient authentic life in Rosweide, p. 351, D’Andilly, and most correct in the Acta Sanctorum, by the Bollandists.
Excerpted from Vol. III of The Lives or the Fathers, Martyrs and Other Principal Saints by the Rev. Alban Butler, the 1864 edition published by D. & J. Sadlier, & Company)
Today’s Station is at St. Mary Major. The spring Ember Week consecrated the new season to God and by prayer and fasting sought to obtain abundant graces for those who on Saturday were to receive Holy Orders. The Station was fittingly held in the church, which witnessed the first scrutinies for the coming ordinations, and which was dedicated to the mother of the great High Priest.
Daily Readings for: March 13, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Look kindly, Lord, we pray, on the devotion of your people, that those who by self-denial are restrained in body may by the fruit of good works be renewed in mind. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
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Sautéed Red Cabbage
ACTIVITIES
La Falla de San Chusep—Saint Joseph’s Day in Valencia
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Novena to St. Joseph Lent Table Blessing 4 Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: March 14th
Thursday of the First Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Matilda (Hist)
Historically today is the feast of St. Matilda, Queen of Germany and wife of King Henry. She was well known throughout the realm for her generosity, she taught the ignorant, comforted the sick, and visited prisoners. Betrayed by Otto after Henry’s death when he falsely accused her of financial mismanagement.
The Value of Fasting Is fasting really worthwhile? Whenever I consider the value of a religious practice, I always look into the earthly life of our Savior. He is our model. He dwelt with us in order to teach us how to form our lives inwardly and outwardly. Christ Himself fasted often and accorded it high praise in His teaching. Recall how He fasted forty days before entering upon His work of teaching. At the beginning of Lent the Church wishes to stamp this fact deep in our hearts: our fasting must be in union with and in imitation of Christ’s. I call to mind the mystery-laden, pregnant words spoken by our Savior when the disciples, unable to cure a possessed boy, asked, “Why could we not cast him out?,” and Jesus answered, “This kind can be driven out in no way except by prayer and fasting” (Mark 9:29). This reply has always made the deepest impression on me. Prayer and fasting are extraordinary means (we may call them violent means) when other simpler ways are of no avail against the powers of hell. Now another saying of Jesus comes to mind. When John’s disciples began to reproach Him, “Why do Your disciples not fast?,” He replied: “Can you make the wedding guests fast as long as the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them; in those days they will fast” (Luke 5:35). There is a
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 54 hidden depth of meaning in these words. The coming of Christ among men was a wedding feast. Fasting had no place. But it is most proper to fast when the divine Bridegroom is taken away. Fasting on Fridays and during Holy Week, then, is in accord with Christ’s own wishes. I should like to cite one further passage from the Gospel, one which casts light on fasting from another direction. Once our Savior compared Himself with the Baptist in these words, “John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a devil!’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Behold a glutton and a wine drinker.’” John was a man devoted to penance, an ascetic, who fasted throughout his life. Not so Christ. His way of living was not based exclusively upon self-denial and mortification, but upon an ordered enjoyment of life. So we learn from the Savior that fasting should be the exception, not the rule, in Christian morality. To complete the lesson let us consider for a moment the passage in the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus speaks of the three important pious exercises of fasting, prayer, and almsgiving. He highly recommends all three, but warns against practicing these virtues in a pharisaical manner. The main points in Jesus’ doctrine on fasting, then, are:
1. Fasting is an extremely important means of resisting the inroads of hell (hence Lent). 2. Fasting should be practiced as a memorial of Christ’s death (Friday, Holy Week).
3. Fast days occur by way of exception in Christian life, they are not the normal practice. 4. Fasting holds a place alongside prayer and almsgiving as a pious exercise.
Excerpted from The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch.
St. Matilda This princess was daughter of Theodoric, a powerful Saxon count. Her parents placed her very young in the monastery of Erford, of which her grandmother Maud was then abbess. Our Saint remained in that house, an accomplished model of all virtues, till her parents
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 55 married her to Henry, son of Otho, Duke of Saxony, in 913, who was afterwards chosen king of Germany. He was s pious and victorious prince, and very tender of his subjects. Whilst by his arms he checked the insolence of the Hungarians and Danes, and enlarged his dominions by adding to them Bavaria, Maud gained domestic victories over her spiritual enemies more worthy of a Christian and far greater in the eyes of Heaven. She nourished the precious seeds of devotion and humility in her heart by assiduous prayer and meditation. It was her delight to visit, comfort, and exhort the sick and the afflicted; to serve and instruct the poor, and to afford her charitable succor to prisoners. Her husband, edified by her example, concurred with her in every pious undertaking which she projected. After twenty-three years’ marriage God was pleased to call the king to himself, in 936. Maud, during his sickness, went to the church to pour forth her soul in prayer for him at the foot of the altar. As soon as she understood, by the tears and cries of the people, that he had expired, she called for a priest that was fasting to offer the holy sacrifice for his soul. She had three sons: Otho, afterwards emperor; Henry, Duke of Bavaria; and St. Brunn, Archbishop of Cologne. Otho was crowned king of Germany in 937, and emperor at Rome in 962, after his victories over the Bohemians and Lombards. The two oldest sons conspired to strip Maud of her dowry, on the unjust pretence that she had squandered the revenues of the state on the poor. The unnatural princes at length repented of their injustice, and restored to her all that had been taken from her. She then became more liberal in her alms than ever, and founded many churches, with five monasteries. In her last sickness she made her confession to her grandson William, the Archbishop of Mentz, who yet died twelve days before her, on his road home. She again made a public confession before the priests and monks of the place, received a second time the last sacraments, and, lying on a sack-cloth, with ashes on her head, died on the 14th of March in 968.
Excerpted from Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
Things to Do:
Learn more about St. Matilda here.
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The Station today is at St. Lawrence in Panisperna. The church stands on the site of St. Lawrence’s martyrdom. The appellation refers to the name of the street, which in turn most likely refers to the tradition of the Poor Clares in the adjacent convent of distributing bread and ham (pane e perna) on August 10th, the feast day of St. Lawrence. This is done in remembrance of St. Lawrence distributing funds from the church to the poor.
Daily Readings for: March 14, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Bestow on us, we pray, O Lord, a spirit of always pondering on what is right and of hastening to carry it out, and since without you we cannot exist, may we be enabled to live according to your will. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever
RECIPES
Yellow Split Pea Soup
ACTIVITIES
La Falla de San Chusep—Saint Joseph’s Day in Valencia Why Fasting and Abstinence?
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Novena to St. Joseph
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Lent Table Blessing 4 Novena to St. Joseph II Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-14
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Lent: March 15th
Friday of the First Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Louise de Marillac, widow (Hist); St. Longinus (Hist)
According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. Louise de Marillac. She was born in 1592, and married in 1613. When her husband died she made a vow of widowhood and devoted herself entirely to works of charity. St. Vincent de Paul, who became her spiritual director, gradually initiated her into his own charitable works for the poor and afflicted, and in 1639 they founded the Congregation of the Daughters of Charity to which St. Louise dedicated the rest of her life. She was canonized by Pope Pius XI on March 11, 1934.
St. Louise de Marillac St. Louise de Marrillac married an official of the royal court, Antony Le Gras, and after his death in 1625 was an active supporter of the charitable work of St Vincent de Paul, who came to put more and more reliance on her. Mademoiselle Le Gras, as she was known, became the co-founder with him of the Daughters of Charity, whose ‘convent is the sick-room, their chapel the parish church, their cloister the city streets’; it was she who drew up the first draft of their rule of life. Her clear intelligence and wide sympathy played a big part in the beginnings of the congregation, whose aspirants she trained and whose rapid growth involved responsibilities which largely fell on her. At the time
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 59 of her death there were already over forty houses of the sisters in France, the sick poor were looked after at home in twenty-six Parisian parishes, hundreds of women were given shelter, and there were other undertakings as well. St Louise was not physically robust, but she had great powers of endurance, and her selfless devotion was a source of incalculable help and encouragement to Monsieur Vincent.
— Dictionary of Saints by Donald Attwater.
Patron: Disappointing children, widows, loss of parents, sick people, social workers, Vincentian Service Corps, people rejected by religious orders.
Symbols: Saint Louise is depicted wearing the original Vincentian habit of grey wool with a large headdress of white linen (typical of poor women in 17th century Brittany), perhaps with an infant in her arms.
Things to Do:
Teach your children this simple morning aspiration by St. Louise: “Grant me the grace to spend this day without offending You and without failing my neighbor.” Begin planning a family Passion presentation or play in which all can participate. You may want to plan this for the end of Lent — Spy Wednesday or Holy Thursday would be particularly appropriate days for this.
St. Longinus St. Longinus was the Roman centurion who pierced the side of Christ with a lance. He is said to have converted to Christianity after experiencing the darkness after Christ’s death. St. Luke tells us that the centurion “gave praise to God”, and exclaimed, “Truly this was an upright man.” (Luke 23:47) What was believed to be the Holy Lance of Longinus, was given to Innocent VIII in 1492.
Things to Do:
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Read more about the statue of St. Longinus at St. Peter’s Basilica. Read The Life of Saint Longinus from the Golden Legend.
Today’s station is at the Church of the Twelve Apostles. Traditionally, this is the place where the Romans choose their candidates for priesthood (Rite of Election). It was erected by Julius I (337-352) over the barracks of ancient Rome’s firemen and entrusted since 1463 to the Conventual Franciscans. Originally dedicated to the Apostles St. James and St. Philip, it was rededicated to all the Apostles in the 16th century.
Daily Readings for: March 15, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Grant that your faithful, O Lord, we pray, may be so conformed to the paschal observances, that the bodily discipline now solemnly begun may bear fruit in the souls of all. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Cheese Manicotti
ACTIVITIES
Value of Fasting, The
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent
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Novena to St. Joseph Lent Table Blessing 4 Novena to St. Joseph II Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph Prayer in Honor of St.Louise de Marillac
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-15
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Lent: March 16th
Saturday of the First Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Heribert, archbishop (Hist); St. Abraham & St. Mary, hermit (Hist)
While still more people gathered in the crowd, he said to them, "This generation is an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign will be given it, except the sign of Jonah. Just as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to this generation. At the judgment the queen of the south will rise with the men of this generation and she will condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and there is something greater than Solomon here. At the judgment the men of Nineveh will arise with this generation and condemn it, because at the preaching of Jonah they repented, and there is something greater than Jonah here (Lk 11:29-32). Historically today is the feast of St. Heribert, who was Archbishop of Cologne and Chancellor of Holy Roman Emperor Otto III, and was canonized in 1074. It is also the feast of Sts. Abraham, hermit and his neice, St. Mary who lived in the 4th century.
Meditation - The Faults of Our Neighbor In disagreements between you and your neighbor, you must always remember that to be in the right is the consideration that influences a Christian the least. The philosopher may indulge such a satisfaction. But to be in the right and to act as if one were not, to allow one’s opponent to triumph on the side of injustice,-this means to overcome evil by good, and to secure peace for one’s soul. No more convincing argument for your own vindication is required than the silent exterior acknowledgment that you are in the wrong. He who edifies does more for the truth than he who is zealous for the combat. Instead of trying to refute those that are in the wrong, it is better to pray for them. A
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 63 stream flows much more rapidly when nothing is done to hold it back. Pray for those who are prejudiced against you, never become embittered against them, pity them, await their return to better feelings, and help to free them from their prejudices. One would not be human if he does not feel how easy it is to stray, and how much it costs to acknowledge this. The spirit of meekness, of indulgence, of patience and humility in examining the behavior of others toward us, secures us that peace of mind which is not compatible with the jealous, suspicious sensibilities of self-love. — Fénelon
Things to Do:
Read this thought-provoking article by George Rutler, Why We Need Lent, to understand why such a season of mortification is necessary for us to become saints.
Saint Heribert Heribert was born in Worms and he was the son of Hugo, count of Worms. He was educated in the school of Worms Cathedral and at the Benedictine Gorze Abbey in Lorraine, France. He returned to Worms Cathedral to be provost and was ordained a priest in 994. In the same year Otto III appointed him chancellor for Italy and four years later also for Germany, a position which he held until Otto’s death on 23 January 1002. Heribert was made an archbishop of Cologne on 998. Then, he also served Emperor St. Henry. Heribert built the monastery of Deutz, on the Rhine and performed miracles, including ending a drought. He is thus invoked for rains. He died in Cologne on March 16, 1021 and was buried at Deutz. He was already honoured as a saint during his lifetime and was canonized by Pope St. Gregory VII about 1074. © Evangelizo.org
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St. Abraham & St. Mary Abraham was a rich nobleman of Edessa. At his parents’ desire he married, but escaped to a cell near the city as soon as the feast was over. He walled up the cell-door, leaving only a small window through which he received his food. There for fifty years he sang God’s praises and implored mercy for himself and for all men. The wealth which fell to him on his parents’ death he gave to the poor. As many sought him for advice and consolation, the Bishop of Edessa, in spite of his humility, ordained him priest. St. Abraham was sent, soon after his ordination, to an idolatrous city which had hitherto been deaf to every messenger. He was insulted, beaten, and three times banished, but he returned each time with fresh zeal. For three years he pleaded with God for those souls, and in the end prevailed. Every citizen came to him for Baptism. After providing for their spiritual needs he went back to his cell more than ever convinced of the power of prayer. His brother died, leaving an only daughter, Mary, to the Saint’s care. He placed her in a cell near his own, and devoted himself to training her in perfection. After twenty years of innocence she fell, and fled in despair to a distant city, where she drowned the voice of conscience in sin. The Saint and his friend St. Ephrem prayed earnestly for her during two years. Then he went disguised to seek the lost sheep, and had the joy of bringing her back to the desert a true penitent. She received the gift of miracles, and her countenance after death shone as the sun. St. Abraham died five years before her, about 360. All Edessa came for his last blessing and to secure his relics.
Excerpted from Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
Things to Do:
Read The Life of Saint Abraham, Hermit, by S. Ephraem the Deacon and also read more at Ephraim of Syria.
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The Station is in the basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican, where the people would assemble towards evening, that they might be present at the ordination of the priests and sacred ministers. This day was called Twelve-Lesson-Saturday, because, formerly, twelve passages from the holy Scriptures were read, as upon Holy Saturday. Built by Constantine in 323, the basilica was erected over the place where St. Peter was buried.
Daily Readings for: March 16, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Turn our hearts to you, eternal Father, and grant that, seeking always the one thing necessary and carrying out works of charity, we may be dedicated to your worship. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Eggplant Gratin
ACTIVITIES
La Falla de San Chusep—Saint Joseph’s Day in Valencia
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Novena to St. Joseph Lent Table Blessing 4 Novena to St. Joseph II Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph
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LIBRARY
None
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Lent: March 17th
Second Sunday of Lent Old Calendar: Second Sunday of Lent
Between Moses and Elias Jesus shows forth His divine glory, thus foreshadowing His resurrection. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end of all things. Today’s Mass places before us the transfigured Lord and the model toward Whom we must tend, and our own transfiguration as the goal we must attain. We attain this goal by a profound realization of our sinfulness and need of a Redeemer; by preserving purity of body and soul; by combatting our passions and carnal instincts and observing the commandments and most importantly by participating in the Mass. — Excerpted from Cathedral Daily Missal The feast of St. Patrick, which is ordinarily celebrated today, is superseded by the Sunday liturgy.
Sunday Readings The first reading is taken from the book of Genesis 15:5-12; 17-18. God made a Covenant or pact with Abram in which he promised to make Abram the father of a great race to which he would give the land of Canaan as their territory. The faith of Abram is praised because he believed God’s promise, I.e. that he would have descendants even though his wife Sarah was barren. The second reading is from the letter of St. Paul to the Philippians 3:17; 4:1. In the preceding verses St. Paul has been telling his converts that he has given up all earthly things for the sake of the Christian faith and promise. He admits he is far from perfect but he continues to press forward on the road to heaven.
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The Gospel is from St. Luke 9:28-36. It was out of the abundance of his divine love that God gave a glimpse of the future glory of Christ in his risen humanity to the three disciples on that memorable occasion. And with Christ he showed two others of his faithful servants also in glory. He understood the human weakness of the disciples, and foresaw the shock to their faith which the sad scenes of the passion and crucifixion of their beloved Master would be some weeks later. So, to strengthen and forearm them for that sad trial, he gave them a glimpse of the future glory which was to be theirs, too. if they persevered. It is for this same reason that this all-important event in the life of Christ and of his Apostles has been preserved for us in the Gospels and is put before us today. Like the Apostles, we. too, believe firmly in God. We. too, are convinced that Christ was sent by God to bring us to heaven. We now have much more convincing proof that Christ was not only the Messiah, an envoy of God, but the very Son of God—something the Apostles did not then understand. But we are still very like them in our human weakness, and in our half-hearted acceptance of God’s purpose for and promises to us. The Apostles had to face the awful test to their faith and trust in God, which the passion and crucifixion of Christ was for them. We now accept with gratitude and realize that Christ “had to suffer and thus enter into his glory.” We even understand that the very purpose of Christ’s passion was that, in spite of our mortality and weakness, we also might enter into eternal glory through his suffering, on condition that we remain true to our faith. In our moments of cool, calm reasoning we can see clearly how good God has been to us, how wonderful his love which has arranged for us an eternity of happiness, the perfect fulfillment of every rational human desire. We can also see how little God asks of us during our few short years here, in return for the everlasting happy home he has prepared for us. But unfortunately we have many moments in life in which cool, calm reasoning does not prevail. We have moments when our vices and not our virtues take charge, moments when we are prepared to sell our eternal heritage in exchange for a mess of earthly pottage. Some of us may already have bartered our heavenly home for some temporal gain or pleasure—but while there is life there is hope. We can still put things right with
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God. “Lord, it is good for us to be here”; it is wonderful to be adopted sons of God on the road back to our Father. It is wonderful to be assured that in death this body of ours with its pains and aches, its attraction to earthly things and worse still its propensity to sin, will give place to a glorified body. This glorified body will be free from all pain and corruption and will possess all the human spiritual gifts of intelligence and will to so much greater a degree as will enable us to appreciate and enjoy the eternal happiness in store for us.
Excerpted from The Sunday Readings by Fr. Kevin O’Sullivan, O.F.M.
The Station at Rome is in the church of St. Mary in Dominica, on Monte Celio. Tradition tells us that in this basilica was the diaconicum of which St. Lawrence had charge, and from which he distributed to the poor the alms of the Church.
Commentary for the Readings in the Extraordinary Form: Second Sunday of Lent “Behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elias talking together with Him” (Gospel). Last Sunday we beheld Jesus as Man, suffering and conquering the three temptations. Today a faint glimpse of Jesus as God is a further Lenten incentive against discouragement or failure. We behold Moses, the lawgiver, pointing to the code of the Ten Commandments; Elias, the prophet, pointing to the creed of Divine Truth. “This is the will of God…walking” in the way of His Commandments (Epistle, applying your mind to Divine Truth, so that “you (may) learn how to possess (your) vessel in holiness.” "Your sanctification (Epistle) is an interior obligation in your own private life; also exterior (Prayer), to the extent of helping your neighbor, for "the Lord is the avenger" of deception in everyday business (Epistle).
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Excerpted from My Sunday Missal, Confraternity of the Precious Blood
Daily Readings for: March 17, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who have commanded us to listen to your beloved Son, be pleased, we pray, to nourish us inwardly by your word, that, with spiritual sight made pure, we may rejoice to behold your glory. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Fall or Winter Sunday Dinner Menu Huevos Rancheros
ACTIVITIES
How the Devil Tempts Us
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Second Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 2 Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (1st Plan)
LIBRARY
A Revival of Christian Culture Through the Family | Jennifer Gregory Miller
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Lent: March 18th
Optional Memorial of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, bishop, confessor and doctor Old Calendar: St. Cyril of Jerusalem; Our Lady of Mercy (Hist)
Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, was banished from his see on three occasions. With St. Athanasius and others, he belongs to the great champions of faith in the fight against Arianism. Famous as a teacher and preacher, he has left a series of catechetical instructions that constitute a priceless heirloom from Christian antiquity. Of the twenty-four extant discourses, nineteen were directed to catechumens during Lent as a preparation for baptism, while five so-called mystagogical instructions were given during Easter time to make the mysteries of Christianity better known to those already baptized. Historically today is the feast of Our Lady of Mercy.
St. Cyril of Jerusalem Cyril of Jerusalem was given to the study of the Holy Scriptures from childhood, and made such progress that he became an eminent champion of the orthodox faith. He embraced the monastic institute and bound himself to perpetual chastity and austerity of life. He was ordained priest by St. Maximus, Patriarch of Jerusalem, and undertook the work of preaching to the faithful and instructing the catechumens, in which he won the praise of all. He was the author of those truly wonderful Catechetical Instructions, which embrace clearly and fully all the teaching of the Church, and contain an excellent defense of each of the dogmas of religion against the enemies of the faith. His treatment of these subjects is so distinct and clear that he refuted not only the heresies of his own
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 73 time, but also, by a kind of foreknowledge, as it were, those which were to arise later. Thus he maintains the Real Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ in the adorable sacrament of the Altar. On the death of Patriarch St. Maximus, the bishops of the province chose Cyril in his place. As Bishop he endured, like blessed Athanasius, his contemporary, many wrongs and sufferings for the sake of the faith at the hands of the Arians. They could not bear his strenuous opposition to their heresy, and thus assailed him with calumnies, deposed him in a pseudo-council and drove him from his see. To escape their rage, he fled to Tarsus in Cilicia and, as long as Constantius lived, he bore the hardships of exile. On the death of Constantius and the accession of Julian the Apostate, Cyril was able to return to Jerusalem, where he set himself with burning zeal to deliver his flock from false doctrine and from sin. He was driven into exile a second time, under the Emperor Valens, but when peace was restored to the Church by Theodosius the Great, and the cruelty and insolence of the Arians were restrained, he was received with honor by the Emperor as a valiant soldier of Christ and restored to his see. With what earnestness and holiness he fulfilled the duties of his exalted office was proved by the flourishing state of the Church at Jerusalem, as described by St. Basil, who spent some time there on a pilgrimage to the holy places. Tradition states that God rendered the holiness of this venerable Patriarch illustrious by signs from heaven, among which is numbered the apparition of a cross, brighter than the sun, which was seen at the beginning of his Patriarchate. Not only Cyril himself, but pagans and Christians alike were witnesses of this marvel, which Cyril, after having given thanks to God in church, announced by letter to Constantius. A thing no less wonderful came to pass when the Jews were commanded by the impious Emperor Julian to restore the Temple which had been destroyed by Titus. An earthquake arose and great balls of fire broke out of the earth and consumed the work, so that Julian and the Jews were struck with terror and gave up their plan. This had been clearly foretold by Cyril. A little while before his death, he was present at the Ecumenical Council at Constantinople, where the heresies of Macedonius and Arius were condemned. After his return to Jerusalem, he died a holy death at sixty-nine years of age in the thirty-fifth year of his bishopric. Pope Leo XIII ordered that his office and mass should be said throughout the Universal Church.
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Things to Do:
Read part of St. Cyril’s Catechetical Lectures On the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, which is very fitting meditation material for Lent.
Our Lady of Mercy Devotion to the Virgin of Mercy dates back to the time of the founding of Lima. It is known that the Mercederian friars, who came to Peru with the conquerors, had already built their primitive convent chapel around 1535. This chapel served as Lima’s first parish until the construction of the Main Church in 1540. The Mercederians not only evangelized the region, but they also participated in the city’s development, building beautiful churches that have been preserved as a valuable cultural and religious patrimony. With these friars came their celestial patroness, the Virgin of Mercy, a Marian title of the thirteenth century. Tradition has it that around 1218, St. Peter Nolasco and James I, King of Aragon and Catalonia, experienced separately a vision of the Most Holy Virgin who asked them to found a religious order dedicated to rescuing the many Christian captives held by the Moslems. This Order of Our Lady of Mercy, approved as a military order in 1235 by Pope Gregory IX, was able to liberate thousands of Christian prisoners, and later became dedicated to teaching and social work. The Mercederian friars’ habit imitates the garments worn by the Virgin when she appeared to the founder of the order. [Our Lady of Our Lady of Mercy] The image of the Virgin of Mercy is dressed all in white: over her long tunic she wears a scapular with the shield of the order imprinted breast high. A cloak covers her shoulders and her long hair is veiled by a fine lace mantilla. Some images have her standing, with the child in her arms, and others with her arms extended showing a royal scepter in her right hand and in the left some open chains, a symbol of liberation. Such is the appearance of the beautiful image venerated in the Basilica of Mercy in the capital of Peru. It was enthroned at the beginning of the XVII century and has been considered the patroness of the capital. In 1730 she was proclaimed “Patroness of the Peruvian Lands”
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 75 patroness of the capital. In 1730 she was proclaimed “Patroness of the Peruvian Lands” and in 1823 “Patroness of the Armies of the Republic.” On the first centennial of the nation’s independence, the image was solemnly crowned and received the title of “Grand Marshall of Peru,” on September 24, 1921, Feast of Our Lady of Mercy, since then declared a national holiday, when every year the army renders homage to her high military rank. The image carries numerous decorations granted by the Republic of Peru, its governors and national institutions. In 1970 the town council of Lima gave her the “Keys of the City,” and in 1971 the president of the Republic conferred on her the Great Peruvian Cross of Naval Merit, gestures which evidence the affection and devotion of Peru to Our Lady of Mercy, that many consider their national patroness.
Excerpted from ALL ABOUT MARY
The Station today is at St. Clement’s. The oldest level is thought to be the titulus Clementis, one of the first parish churches in Rome, and probably belonged to the family of Titus Flavius Clemens, consul and martyr and a contemporary of Pope St. Clement. Set right next to a pagan temple, a Mithraeum or Temple of Mithras, it was one of the first churches in Rome.
Daily Readings for: March 18, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who through the Bishop Saint Cyril of Jerusalem led your Church in a wonderful way to a deeper sense of the mysteries of salvation, grant us, through his intercession, that we may so acknowledge your Son as to have life ever more abundantly. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
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Chicken Noodle Soup
ACTIVITIES
Namedays What is a Nameday?
PRAYERS
Novena to St. Joseph Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (2nd Plan) Novena to St. Joseph II Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph
LIBRARY
Saint Cyril of Jerusalem | Pope Benedict XVI
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Lent: March 19th
Solemnity of St. Joseph, Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary Old Calendar: St. Joseph, Spouse of the Virgin Mary
St. Joseph, the spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the foster-father of Jesus, was probably born in Bethlehem and probably died in Nazareth. His important mission in God’s plan of salvation was “to legally insert Jesus Christ into the line of David from whom, according to the prophets, the Messiah would be born, and to act as his father and guardian” (Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy). Most of our information about St. Joseph comes from the opening two chapters of St. Matthew’s Gospel. No words of his are recorded in the Gospels; he was the “silent” man. We find no devotion to St. Joseph in the early Church. It was the will of God that the Virgin Birth of Our Lord be first firmly impressed upon the minds of the faithful. He was later venerated by the great saints of the Middle Ages. Pius IX (1870) declared him patron and protector of the universal family of the Church.
St. Joseph St. Joseph was an ordinary manual laborer although descended from the royal house of David. In the designs of Providence he was destined to become the spouse of the Mother of God. His high privilege is expressed in a single phrase, “Foster-father of Jesus.” About him Sacred Scripture has little more to say than that he was a just man-an expression which indicates how faithfully
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 78 he fulfilled his high trust of protecting and guarding God’s greatest treasures upon earth, Jesus and Mary. The darkest hours of his life may well have been those when he first learned of Mary’s pregnancy; but precisely in this time of trial Joseph showed himself great. His suffering, which likewise formed a part of the work of the redemption, was not without great providential import: Joseph was to be, for all times, the trustworthy witness of the Messiah’s virgin birth. After this, he modestly retires into the background of holy Scripture. Of St. Joseph’s death the Bible tells us nothing. There are indications, however, that he died before the beginning of Christ’s public life. His was the most beautiful death that one could have, in the arms of Jesus and Mary. Humbly and unknown, he passed his years at Nazareth, silent and almost forgotten he remained in the background through centuries of Church history. Only in more recent times has he been accorded greater honor. Liturgical veneration of St. Joseph began in the fifteenth century, fostered by Sts. Brigid of Sweden and Bernadine of Siena. St. Teresa, too, did much to further his cult. At present there are two major feasts in his honor. On March 19 our veneration is directed to him personally and to his part in the work of redemption, while on May 1 we honor him as the patron of workmen throughout the world and as our guide in the difficult matter of establishing equitable norms regarding obligations and rights in the social order. —Excerpted from The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch St. Joseph is invoked as patron for many causes. He is the patron of the Universal Church. He is the patron of the dying because Jesus and Mary were at his death-bed. He is also the patron of fathers, of carpenters, and of social justice. Many religious orders and communities are placed under his patronage.
Patron: Against doubt; against hesitation; Americas; Austria; Diocese of Baton Rouge, Louisiana; California; Belgium; Bohemia; bursars; cabinetmakers; Canada; Carinthia; carpenters; China; confectioners; craftsmen; Croatian people (in 1687 by decree of the Croatian parliament) dying people; emigrants; engineers; expectant mothers; families; fathers; Florence, Italy; happy death; holy death; house hunters; immigrants; interior souls; Korea; laborers; Diocese of La Crosse, Wisconsin; Archdiocese of Louisville, Kentucky; Diocese of Manchester, New Hampshire; Mexico; Diocese of Nashville, Tennessee; New France; New World; Oblates of Saint Joseph; people in doubt; people who fight Communism; Peru; pioneers; protection of the Church; Diocese of San Jose, California; diocese of Sioux Falls, South Dakota; social justice; Styria, Austria; travelers; Turin Italy; Tyrol Austria; unborn children Universal Church; Vatican II;
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Vietnam; Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston West Virginia; wheelwrights; workers; working people.
Symbols: Bible; branch; carpenter’s square; carpenter’s tools; chalice; cross; hand tools; infant Jesus; ladder; lamb; lily; monstrance; old man holding a lily and a carpenter’s tool such as a square; old man holding the infant Jesus; plane; rod.
Things to Do:
A table overflowing with good Italian food honoring St. Joseph is a traditional Sicilian custom. The feast of San Giuseppe began in the Middle Ages when Sicily was suffering from a severe drought and the desperate people begged St. Joseph for rain. When they received rainy weather in response, they held a huge “feste” in Saint Joseph’s honor. Even today, Sicilians go to Mass before their St. Joseph’s day dinner and then process to their festive tables, decked out in flowers, breads, and all sorts of Italian foods. The priest blesses the food, and everyone shouts “Viva la tavola di San Giuse!” (which your children will readily do with great gusto). After the meal is done, everyone present is given something to take home, in the generous spirit of this day. Try some of our delicious recipes linked here. We especially recommend the traditional Minestrone. Italian sausage is always a favorite, as well. And you should have bread of all kinds — this recipe for Italian Decorative Breads can provide the traditional shape of your choice (St. Joseph’s staff, his beard, etc). Also a traditional must with children is St. Joseph’s Sfinge, (Cream Puffs), for which we have several recipes on this site. Plan a St. Joseph’s potluck for this day with other Catholic families — invite a parish priest and ask his blessing over the food before you begin the meal. If you do not have the time or resources to do this, plan a smaller affair with your own family, complete with prayers to St. Joseph, a little procession with candles for the older children and your favorite hymns, and then the father of the family ought to say a special blessing over the food before you begin. Check out this wonderful site that explains the St. Joseph Altar more in detail, includes recipes, history, and allows virtual offerings. For further reading: 1. Saint Joseph Altars by Kerri McCaffety (Photographer).
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2. A Table for Saint Joseph: Celebrating March 19th with Devotions, Authentic Italian Recipes, and Timeless Traditions by Mary Anne Scanlan Grasso. 3. The Saint Joseph’s Day Table Cookbook by Mary Ann Giordano. 4. Read the section of Directory on Popular Piety and Liturgy on St. Joseph. 5. Read Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical on Devotion to St. Joseph. 6. Interested in history? Read this article on the history of devotions to St. Joseph, Finding St. Joseph, by Sandra Miesel.
Pray this prayer and litany in honor of St. Joseph with your family rosary tonight.
Here is a link to several meditations on St. Joseph — choose the one that is perfect for you and your family! Here are some ideas for teaching children about St. Joseph. Young girls ought to pray to St. Joseph for their future spouse.
The Station today is at St. Balbina’s, virgin and martyr (130), the daughter of the tribune and martyr, St. Quirinus. The church is ancient, and was probably built in the 4th century above the house of the consul Lucius Fabius Cilone. The first reference to it is found in a 6th century document, where it is referred to as Sanctae Balbinae. It was consecrated by Pope St. Gregory the Great.
Daily Readings for: March 19, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Grant, we pray, almighty God, that by Saint Joseph’s intercession your Church may constantly watch over the unfolding of the mysteries of human
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salvation, whose beginnings you entrusted to his faithful care. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Paella Valenciana (Chicken and fish with rice) Vdolky (Bohemian Pan Cakes) Ensalada de Escarola Turron de Jijona Almond Cookies Almond Squares Beef with Peppers Broiled Veal Rolls Bunuelous Cannoli (Shells) Cannoli Filling Cavazune Crown Cake Heart Cake (cut-up) Italian Anise Toast Italian Bread Sticks Italian Decorative Breads Italian Vegetable Soup Maccu Meatless Antipasto Minestrone Minestrone Palermo Bread
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Pane de San Giuseppe Pecan Cookies Pignolatti Raisin Bread Red Wine Cookies Ricotta Filling Saint Joseph’s Day Dinner Sopa de Pescado Spaghetti with Fennel Sauce St. Joseph’s Cream Puffs I St. Joseph’s Cream Puffs II St. Joseph’s Cream Puffs III St. Joseph’s Cream Puffs IV St. Joseph’s Cream Puffs V St. Joseph’s Sfinge I St. Joseph’s Sfinge II Sweet-Sour Beef Balls with Pineapple and Peppers Symbolic Pastries Vuccidrato—Jesus Wreath Vuccidrato—Joseph’s Staff Vuccidrato—Mary’s Palms
ACTIVITIES
“Tupa-Tupa” (Knocking) for St. Joseph’s Day La Falla de San Chusep—Saint Joseph’s Day in Valencia Family and Friends of Jesus Scrapbook Album Fava Beans for St. Joseph’s Day Feast of St. Joseph
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History of the St. Joseph Altar Religion in the Home for Preschool: March St. Joseph’s Oil St. Joseph’s Table or Buffet Dinner St. Joseph’s Table: An Age-Old Tradition Story-Telling Traditions related to Saint Joseph
PRAYERS
Prayer to St. Joseph Novena to St. Joseph Book of Blessings: Blessing of Saint Joseph’s Table March Devotion: Saint Joseph St. Joseph Prayer for protection Ad te Beate Ioseph - To thee, O blessed Joseph Litany of St. Joseph Chaplet of St. Joseph Seven Sorrows and Joys of Saint Joseph Blessing of the St. Joseph Altar Novena to St. Joseph II Thirty Days’ Prayer to Saint Joseph Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph
LIBRARY
Finding St. Joseph | Sandra Miesel Guardian of the Redeemer (Redemptoris Custos) | Pope John Paul II Imitate St Joseph’s Simple, Hard-Working Style | Pope John Paul II
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Love and Serve the Church Like St Joseph | Pope John Paul II On Devotion to St. Joseph (Quamquam pluries) | Pope Leo XIII Saint Joseph Continues in His Role as Protector of the Body of Christ | Pope John Paul II Saint Joseph the Worker, Man of Faith and Prayer | Pope John Paul II St. Joseph and the Third Christian Millennium! | Rev. Regis Scanlon O.F.M. Cap. St. Joseph, a Witness to Fulfillment of the Promise | Pope John Paul II St. Joseph, Patron of the Universal Church | Pope John Paul II St. Joseph: Man of Trust | Pope John Paul II Thirty Days Prayer to St. Joseph | Unknown St. Joseph — a Compilation | Various
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Lent: March 20th
Wednesday of the Second Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Photina (Hist)
The theme of life and light has colored the Liturgy of this week. Before leading the catechumens into the Mystery of Christ’s Passion and Death, the Church presents Christ to them once more as the Light of the world who has power to open man’s eyes to his Light. He will veil it for a while during his Passion but it will burst forth in full splendor again on Easter morning. Historically today is the feast of St. Photina, the Samaritan woman at the well.
Meditation We must forgive our neighbor always. This fraternal charity is the source of strength among the members of the Mystical Body: “If two of you shall consent upon earth concerning anything whatsoever they shall ask, it shall be done to them by my Father.” This charity should animate us in giving fraternal correction, which should always be free from all vanity, self-love and desire to humiliate and defame. The Church dispenses Christ’s forgiveness through the power of the keys: “whatsoever you shall loose upon earth shall be loosed also in heaven.” Christ’s pardon of us is limitless. Just as the small quantity of oil, increasing miraculously at the word of Elias, enabled the poor widow to pay all her debts, so the infinite merits of Christ enable us to expiate all our sins. Love of God and of neighbor imposes on us constant self-denial and self-mastery. Only love working through mortification will enable us to ascend the “holy hill” and dwell in “God’s tabernacle.” — The Cathedral Daily Missal by Right Rev. Msgr. Rudolph G. Bandas
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Things to Do:
Discuss the idea of forgiveness with your children — emphasizing with today’s Gospel that Christ’s forgiveness is limitless to those who humbly repent of their offenses against Him. Ask them ways in which they practice this virtue every day, with their sisters and brothers, with their parents, and with their friends. Throughout this fourth week of Lent, often the time when children begin to lose focus or weary of this penitential season, give them something tangible to work on, such as a Lenten Scrapbook, an ongoing activity that will engage their minds and stretch their creativity in putting their faith into pictures.
St. Photina St. Photina was that Samaritan woman whom our Lord met at Jacob’s Well. When He disclosed the secret of her profligate life, she believed in Him at once as that Messiah which was to come, and began spreading the Gospel among the Samaritans, converting many. Later, she and her son Josiah and her five sisters went to Carthage to preach and then to Rome. Another son, Victor, was a soldier and had already come to Emperor Nero’s attention as being a Christian. The Emperor summoned the whole family and with threats and tortures tried to force them to renounce their faith in Jesus Christ. Meanwhile, when Nero’s daughter Domnina came in contact with Photina (the Lord Himself had given her the name, meaning “resplendent” or “shining with light”), she, too, was converted. The enraged emperor had the heads of the sons and sisters cut off; Photina was held in prison for a few more weeks before being thrown into a well, where she joyously gave her soul to the Lord.
Excerpted from Orthodox America
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The Station is at the church of St. Cecelia where the Saint lived and was martyred and where her body now rests. The first church on the site was built in the 3rd or 5th century, and the baptistery from this church was found during excavations, situated underneath the present Chapel of Relics. A house from the Imperial era was also found, and tradition claims that the church was built over the house in which St Cecilia lived. This house was one of the tituli, the first parish churches of Rome, known as the titulus Ceciliae.
Daily Readings for: March 20, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Keep your family, O Lord, schooled always in good works, and so comfort them with your protection here as to lead them graciously to gifts on high. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Ensalada de Escarola
ACTIVITIES
Religion in the Home for Elementary School: March Religion in the Home for Preschool: March
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 4 Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (2nd Plan)
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Litany of Humility
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-20
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Lent: March 21st
Thursday of the Second Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Benedict, abbot
Sin is the great barrier between God and man. Sin, caused the beginning of hell and made devils of the fallen angels. Sin drove Adam and Eve out of their paradise and took away their marvelous gifts of grace and of freedom from sickness and death. But only in the sufferings and death of the God-man do we see what God really thinks of sin. Before sin there existed no sickness, no death, no hatred, no discord, no ugliness. Every suffering and disorder in the world is a reflection of sin. Every Mass, continuing the atoning Sacrifice of Calvary, is God’s mercy to sinners throughout the world. Every sacrament is God’s means of restoring all things in Christ. — Daily Missal of the Mystical Body According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. Benedict, “Father of Western Monasticism,” twin brother of St. Scholastica. His feast in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite is celebrated on July 11.
Meditation - On the Compassion of Some Women of Jerusalem A goodly number of the women of Jerusalem (not disciples of Jesus) met this saddest of funeral processions. No doubt their weeping and sobbing and loud wailing, however sincere, was not in real accord with the sorrow that was straining Jesus’ heart to the breaking point-His sorrow, namely, over their refusal to accept the truth of His Messiahship and of His supreme royalty as the promised Christ and Savior. Still, the heart of Jesus was deeply affected by the sympathy of these women. Contrasted with all else that was poured into His ears, it was very acceptable and was gratefully received.
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But what lastingly gives this incident its chief significance is the fact that, even here in His greatest misery, Jesus is thinking predominantly of the doom of the Holy City and its temple, now practically sealed. Evidently His heart is aching at the vision of the horrors that will soon overtake it and the whole Jewish race, for its criminal blindness to His divine credentials and its obstinate refusal to profit by His teaching and His Precious Blood. For the days are near, when the barren among the Jewish women will be called blessed; when death, sudden and terrible though it be, will seem preferable to life. Try, therefore, to look deep into Jesus’ Sacred Heart in its very keen sympathy for these women, and especially for their children. For of the children here present in the procession, or carried in the arms of their mothers, many no doubt were to be witnesses and victims of the abomination of desolation coming upon Jerusalem not forty years hence (Luke 19:41-44)
Excerpted from Our Way to the Father by Leo M. Krenz, S.J.
The Station for today is in the celebrated basilica, St. Maria in Trastevere. It was consecrated in the third century, under the pontificate of St. Callixtus, and was the first church built in Rome in honor of our Blessed Lady.
Daily Readings for: March 21, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who delight in innocence and restore it, direct the hearts of your servants to yourself, that, caught up in the fire of your Spirit, we may be found steadfast in faith and effective in works. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
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Eggs Benedict Lenten Eggs Benedict
ACTIVITIES
Motivating Children to Perform Good Deeds
PRAYERS
Sacrifice Beads Roman Ritual: Blessing of Bees Lent Table Blessing 4
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-21
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Lent: March 22nd
Friday of the Second Week of Lent
The clear will of God is the light and the salvation of all men. No one can desire anything good unless God desires it. Even the best of intentions, even seemingly worthy projects, are no good if they are not God’s will at the moment. Distress, suffering, even death, can be accepted as His mysterious will. His creative love is always at work drawing the greatest possible good out of everything. Be the humble servant of God’s will and you will be truly wise and always at peace. —Daily Missal of the Mystical Body Today is the feast of Blessed Clemens August von Galen, Bishop of Münster (1933-1946).
Bl. Clemens August von Galen Clemens August von Galen was born on 16 March 1878 in Dinklage Castle, Oldenburg, Germany, the 11th of 13 children born to Count Ferdinand Heribert and Elisabeth von Spee. His father belonged to the noble family of Westphalia, who since 1660 governed the village of Dinklage. For over two centuries his ancestors carried out the inherited office of camerlengo of the Diocese of Münster. Clemens August grew up in Dinklage Castle and in other family seats. Due to the struggle between Church and State, he and his brothers were sent to a school run by the Jesuits in Feldkirch, Austria. He remained there until 1894, when he transferred to the Antonianum in Vechta. After graduation, he studied philosophy and theology in Frebur, Innsbruck and Münster, and was ordained a priest on 28 May 1904 for the Diocese of Münster by Bishop Hermann Dingelstadt.
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Parish priest, concern for poor His first two years as a priest were spent as vicar of the diocesan cathedral where he became chaplain to his uncle, Bishop Maximilian Gerion von Galen. From 1906 to 1929, Fr von Galen carried out much of his pastoral activity outside Münster: in 1906 he was made chaplain of the parish of St Matthias in Berlin-Schönberg; from 1911 to 1919 he was curate of a new parish in Berlin before becoming parish priest of the Basilica of St Matthias in Berlin-Schönberg, where he served for 10 years; here, he was particularly remembered for his special concern for the poor and outcasts. In 1929, Fr von Galen was called back to Münster when Bishop Johannes Poggenpohl asked him to serve as parish priest of the Church of St Lambert.
"Nec laudibus, nec timore’ In January 1933, Bishop Poggenpohl died, leaving the See vacant. After two candidates refused, on September 5, 1933 Fr Clemens was appointed Bishop of Münster by Pope Pius XI. On October 28, 1933 he was consecrated by Cardinal Joseph Schulte, Archbishop of Cologne; Bishop von Galen was the first diocesan Bishop to be consecrated under Hitler’s regime. As his motto, he chose the formula of the rite of episcopal consecration: "Nec laudibus, nec timore" (Neither praise nor threats will distance me from God). Throughout the 20 years that Bishop von Galen was curate and parish priest in Berlin, he wrote on various political and social issues; in a pastoral letter dated 26 March 1934, he wrote very clearly and
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 94 critically on the “neopaganism of the national socialist ideology”. Due to his outspoken criticism, he was called to Rome by Pope Pius XI in 1937 together with the Bishop of Berlin, to confer with them on the situation in Germany and speak of the eventual publication of an Encyclical. On 14 March 1937 the Encyclical “Mit brennender Sorge” (To the Bishops of Germany: The place of the Catholic Church in the German Reich) was published. It was widely circulated by Bishop von Galen, notwithstanding Nazi opposition.
“Lion of Munster” In the summer of 1941, in answer to unwarranted attacks by the National Socialists, Bishop von Galen delivered three admonitory sermons between July and August. He spoke in his old parish Church of St Lambert and in Liebfrauen-Ueberlassen Church, since the diocesan cathedral had been bombed. In his famous speeches, Bishop von Galen spoke out against the State confiscation of Church property and the programmatic euthanasia carried out by the regime. The clarity and incisiveness of his words and the unshakable fidelity of Catholics in the Diocese of Münster embarrassed the Nazi regime, and on 10 October 1943 the Bishop’s residence was bombed. Bishop von Galen was forced to take refuge in nearby Borromeo College. From 12 September 1944 on, he could no longer remain in the city of Münster, destroyed by the war; he left for the zone of Sendenhorst. In 1945, Vatican Radio announced that Pope Pius XII was to hold a Consistory and that the Bishop of Münster was also to be present.
Creation of a Cardinal After a long and difficult journey, due to the war and other impediments, Bishop von Galen finally arrived in the “Eternal City”. On 21 February 1946 the Public Consistory was held in St Peter’s Basilica and Bishop von Galen was created a Cardinal. On 16 March 1946 the 68-year-old Cardinal returned to Münster. He was cordially welcomed back by the city Authorities and awarded honorary citizenship by the burgomaster.
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On the site of what remained of the cathedral, Cardinal von Galen gave his first (and what would be his last) discourse to the more than 50,000 people who had gathered, thanking them for their fidelity to the then-Bishop of Münster during the National Socialist regime. He explained that as a Bishop, it was his duty to speak clearly and plainly about what was happening. No one knew that the Cardinal was gravely ill, and when he returned to Münster on 19 March 1946 he had to undergo an operation. Cardinal von Galen died just three days later, on 22 March. He was buried on 28 March in the Ludgerus Chapel, which has become a place of pilgrimage to this defender of the faith in the face of political oppression. © Libreria Editrice Vaticana
Things to Do:
Read this sermon by Bl. Clemens August Count von Galen. From Catholic Culture’s Library read these inspiring articles on the life of Bl. Clemens August Count von Galen: Faith and Fatherland, One Fearless Voice: The Lion of Munster; The Bishop vs. the Nazis: Bl. Clemens von Galen in World War II Germany.
The Station for today is in the church of St. Vitalis, martyr, the father of the two illustrious Milanese martyrs, Sts. Gervasius and Protasius. It was built about 400, and consecrated by Pope Innocent I in 401/2. The dedication to St. Vitalis and his family was given in 412. The church has been rebuilt several times, of which the most comprehensive rebuilding was that of Pope Sixtus IV before the 1475 Jubilee. It was then granted to Clerics Regular.
Daily Readings for: March 22, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
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Collect: Grant, we pray, almighty God, that, purifying us by the sacred practice of penance, you may lead us in sincerity of heart to attain the holy things to come. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Irish Soda Bread Lenten Soup
ACTIVITIES
Religion in the Home for Elementary School: March Religion in the Home for Preschool: March
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 4 Prayer Before a Crucifix
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-22
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Lent: March 23rd
Optional Memorial of St. Turibio de Mogrovejo, bishop Old Calendar: Our Lady of Victories (Hist)
St. Turibio, a Spaniard, served God from his infancy. Appointed Archbishop of Lima, he landed in South America in 1581. He died March 23, 1606, having, by his indefatigable zeal and by the boundlessness of his charity, literally renewed the face of the Church of Peru. According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite his feast is celebrated on April 27. Historically today is the feast of Our Lady of Victories, (there are nine seperate days in honor of Our Lady of Victory, the main being October 7) Today’s feast commemorates the victory in Hungary. On August 6, 1716, Prince Eugene of Savoy defeated a large invading Ottoman army at Peterwardein, Hungary. The victory set the stage for the reconquest of Hungary from the Turks.
St. Turibio de Mogrovejo Together with Rose of Lima, Turibio is the first known saint of the New World, serving the Lord in Peru, South America, for twenty-six years. Born in Spain and educated for the law, he became so brilliant a scholar that he was made professor of law at the University of Salamanca and eventually became chief judge of the Inquisition at Granada. He succeeded too well. But he was not sharp enough a lawyer to prevent a surprising sequence of events. When the archbishopric of Lima in Spain’s Peruvian colony became vacant, it was
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 98 decided that Turibio was the man needed to fill the post: He was the one person with the strength of character and holiness of spirit to heal the scandals that had infected that area. He cited all the canons that forbade giving laymen ecclesiastical dignities, but he was overruled. He was ordained priest and bishop and sent to Peru, where he found colonialism at its worst. The Spanish conquerors were guilty of every sort of oppression of the native population. Abuses among the clergy were flagrant, and he devoted his energies (and suffering) to this area first. He began the long and arduous visitation of an immense archdiocese, studying the language, staying two or three days in each place, often with neither bed nor food. He confessed every morning to his chaplain, and celebrated Mass with intense fervor. Among those to whom he gave the Sacrament of Confirmation was Saint Rose of Lima, and possibly Saint Martin de Porres. After 1590 he had the help of another great missionary, Saint Francis Solanus. His people, though very poor, were sensitive, dreading to accept public charity from others. Turibio solved the problem by helping them anonymously. When Turibio undertook the reform of the clergy as well as unjust officials, he naturally suffered opposition. Some tried, in human fashion, to “explain” God’s law in such a way as to sanction their accustomed way of life. He answered them in the words of Tertullian, “Christ said, ‘I am the truth’; he did not say, ‘I am the custom.”’
Patron: Peru, Latin American Bishops, Native Rights, (Also, Lawyers may seek his intercession because he was a Lawyer in Spain)
Things to Do:
Read more about St. Turibio. St. Turibio started the first seminary in the Americas, the (in Spanish) Conciliar Seminary of Lima, and was named the first male saint of the New World. Offer a rosary today for an increase in vocations and for those studying for the priesthood. St. Turibio fought for social justice, championing the rights of the natives against the Spanish masters. Make a contribution to your local food pantry, volunteer at
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the Spanish masters. Make a contribution to your local food pantry, volunteer at a crisis pregnancy center, cut out pictures of children from third world countries and make a display in your home to encourage your children to make sacrifices or to contribute money to the less fortunate. Cook a Peruvian dish in honor of St. Turibio.
Our Lady of Victory In 1432, John Hunyady, a Catholic Hungarian national distinguished himself at the Siege of the Szendro Castle in Hungary. For this very reason King Sigismund appointed him as one of his royal counselors. John Hunyady later became Count of Temes and supported the election of Wladislaw III of Poland, to the throne of Hungary. For supporting the Polish King, Hunyady was proclaimed Commander of the Fortress of Belgrade and Voivode of Transylvania. John Hunyady was privately devoted to the Blessed Virgin and prayed for her intercession during the wars against the Ottoman powers. Victories always occurred, following his prayers to Our Lady. In 1441, the Hungarians were victorious against the Ottomans at Szendro, at Maros-Szent-Imre in 1442, and captured Sofia in Bulgaria in 1443. In 1453, the Ottoman Islamists invaded the Christian territories, conquering Constantinople. Churches were demolished and the Byzantine Cathedral, referred to as Saint Sophia’s Cathedral, was desecrated and converted into a mosque. Following the fall of Constantinople, Sultan Mehmet II prepared for war against Hungary. In 1454, Serbia fell to the Ottoman Sultan. Together with the Franciscan monk, Father John Capistrano, John Hunyady marshaled an army at Szeged, and won back the territory at Szendro. The Ottomans pressed forward and Hunyady defended the Southern border of Hungary. Father Capistrano was ordered by the Catholic Pontiff to preach a crusade against the Ottoman invaders. On July 21 and 22, Father Capistrano and John Hunyady lead the Hungarian troops to battle. Invoking the name of Jesus Christ and his Blessed Mother, Father John urged the troops and led them to victory. The cleric was hailed as the ‘Apostle of Europe’ for the victory delivered on July 21, halted the Islamic Ottoman expansion for another seventy years. In 1690, Father Capistrano was
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 100 canonized. Both Father Capistrano and John Hunyadi died shortly following the Battle at Belgrade where the miraculous intervention of the Blessed Virgin took place. John Hunyady experienced defeats and was at least twice captured by his enemies, in 1458 his second son became King of Hungary. Following the victory at Belgrade, in recognition of the heavenly aid granted by Our Lady, Pope Callistus III ordered the daily Angelus to be recited at midday, for that was the hour the Ottoman forces were defeated. In modern times the prayer of the Angelus is recited at midday commemorating the Catholic victory at Belgrade and in honor of Our Lady. Apart from Father Capistrano, a second Franciscan who saved Hungary from similar invasions was the Capuchin Father Mark D’Aviano. Following the successful defense in Vienna of 1683, the Battle of Budapest in Hungary, was the next place where the Ottoman Scimitar was to fall. Budapest capitulated to the Islamic Empire and a triple ring of fortifications was constructed around the city. The city’s Catholic Cathedral, dedicated to Saint Stephen, was similarly to Constantinople’s Saint Sophia, profanely converted into a mosque. Holding a large banner bearing the Image of Saint Joseph, Father Mark ran into the thick of battle. Once the bastions were breached, Father Mark entered the breach intending to reach the profaned cathedral. Fearlessly, ignoring the thundering cannons, he sang litanies to the Blessed Virgin and by evening he placed the banner of Saint Joseph in the reconquered cathedral. Following this victory, Catholic churches were once again rebuilt in this land and a short period of peace ensued. At the Battle of Essech, Father Mark encouraged the generals by assuring them a speedy victory. He postulated that in order to defeat such a formidable enemy, the recourse with confidence to the God of the Heavenly Hosts was necessary, “…without whom all human endeavor is vain.”(1) Although he was a cleric, Father Mark D’Aviano did not neglect the necessary and essential preparations for properly training troops, stocking ammunition, defining supply lines, speed when marching, efficient spying and the maintenance of a good diplomatic rapport between the Christian leaders. He advocated that: “The leaders must fight with upright intentions and not out of jealousy, pride, or personal interest.”(2) Belgrade was the next battle scene. When exposed to the grandiose power of the Ottoman forces the Catholic leaders faltered and hesitated, Father Mark insisted that even if such odds were against them, the Christians would be victorious. According to Father D’Aviano, armies could do nothing against the Ottoman Turk, but if Our Lady was worthily honored, she would intercede for victory. The battles were indeed won and the Ottomans ousted. In 1699, the Turks signed the Peace of Karlowitz. That same year Father Mark D’Aviano, passed away peacefully. The son of Prince Eugene Maurice of
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Savoy was born in 1663 and named Eugene after his father. Throughout his early youth he brought himself as an exemplary Catholic. Many at court thought that Eugene was destined at becoming an abbot, in fact he was referred to as the ‘petit abbe’ or the ‘little abbot.’ To the court’s surprise, Eugene developed a liking for the military but was denied entrance by the king. Eugene left France to enroll within the Austrian military, and was deployed where the most need was required, that meant against the invading Ottomans. In 1683, Eugene distinguished himself at Petronell and was appointed Commander of a Dragoon regiment. He served against the Ottomans at Buda and Belgrade. In 1690, the Ottoman Turks recaptured Belgrade and Eugene defeated the Ottomans at the Battle of Zenta. The 1699, the ‘Treaty of Karlowitz’ followed the victory. After Karlowitz, a short time of peace was welcome, unfortunately, the Ottoman Empire was not true to the treaty. The Empire ignored its pledges of Peace and invaded the West, retaking Morea from Venice in 1714. The Austrians declared war on the Ottoman Empire on April 13, 1716. Prince Eugene of Savoy defeated the Ottoman Turks at the Battle of Peterwardein on August 5 (Feast of Our Lady of the Snows) and Temesvar on the morrow of the Feast of Our Lady of the Pillar, October 13, 1716, he captured Belgrade. In 1716, the Battle at Peterwardein witnessed an Ottoman army consisting of 40,000 Janissaries, 20,000 Sipahis and 10,000 Tartars under the command of Grand Vizier Damad Ali. Battles started on August 3, and on August 5 the Austrian counter-attack under Prince Eugene began. The Austrians attacked by encircling the Sipahis and the Tartars, who gave way to the superior, disciplined army. Following this victory, Eugene attacked the Ottoman camp and was supported by the firing cannon of six frigates from the Danube River. In the Ottoman camps many were slain, including Damad Ali, their Commander. An event which was considered unusual for the time and season of the year, was a heavy snowfall on the morning of August 5, which covered Peterwardein. Prince Eugene sought the intercession of Our Lady of the Snows and following this victory granted by Our Lady’s intercession; he commemorated this event by ordering the construction of a church on Tekije Hill. The church overlooks the battlefield and is today known as ‘Our Lady of Tekije’ and ‘Our Lady of the Snows.’ The church is used both by the Roman Catholic and Orthodox denominations. On the morrow of the Feast of the Assumption of 1717, on August 16, the Ottoman forces were ousted from Belgrade. At the Treaty of Passarowitz on July 21, 1718, the Ottoman
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Empire ceded the Banat, Serbia, a portion of Bosnia and Vallachia to Austria.
Excerpted from The Catholic Southern Front Dispatch Chapter 9/32 - Hungary invaded
Things to Do:
Visit this link for more information. Learn more about Fr. Baker and Our Lady of Victory here.
The Station is in the church of Sts. Peter and Marcellinus, two celebrated martyrs of Rome under the persecution of Diocletian. Their relics were brought to the church in 1256, and the church was restored the same year on order from Pope Alexander IV.
Daily Readings for: March 23, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who gave increase to your Church through the apostolic labors and zeal for truth of the Bishop Saint Turibius, grant that the people consecrated to you may always receive new growth in faith and holiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Aji de Gallina Arroz con Leche
ACTIVITIES
Lenten Practices for Children
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PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 4 Prayer to Our Queen of Victories Litany of Our Lady of Victory
LIBRARY
St. Toribio de Mogrovejo: Apostle of Peru | Joseph F. X. Sladky
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-23
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Lent: March 24th
Third Sunday of Lent Old Calendar: Third Sunday of Lent
“Sir,” the man replied “leave it one more year and give me time to dig round it and manure it: it may bear fruit next year; if not, then you can cut it down.” (Lk. 13:9) "In the Christian life, faith has consequences, that to ‘serve God’ we must renounce ‘Mammon,’ that to be free for God we must break the hold that the world has on us. Faith demands a reconstruction of the inner life, a reforming that can be brought about only by overcoming.
—The Conversion of Augustine, Romano Guardini
Sunday Readings The first reading is taken from the book of Exodus, 3:1-8, 13-15. The story of the salvation of God’s people continues during this Lenten season. Today we hear of Moses’ encounter with God at the burning bush. The second reading is from the first letter of Paul to the Corinthians, 10:1-6, 10-12. St. Paul establishes a parallel between the situation of the Israelites in the desert and the Corinthians. "Paul wants to remind us that we are not saved merely because we happen to have been the recipients of God’s free grace. We have to demonstrate that we are willing recipients of that free gift. The children of Israel received it, but they proved to be unworthy of it, and so they were not saved." (Origin (ca. A.D. 240, Commentary on First Corinthians 4, 45, 205) The Gospel is from St. Luke, 13:1-9. Our Lord stresses that we need to produce plenty of fruit (cf. Lk 8:11-15) in keeping with the graces we have received (cf. Lk
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12:48). But he also tells us that God waits patiently for this fruit to appear; he does not want the death of the sinner; he wants him to be converted and to live (Ezek 33:11) and, as St Peter teaches, he is "forebearing towards you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance" (2 Pet 3:9). But God’s clemency should not lead us to neglect our duties and become lazy and comfort-seeking, living sterile lives. He is merciful, but he is also just and he will punish failure to respond to his grace. “There is one case that we should be especially sorry about — that of Christians who could do more and don’t; Christians who could live all the consequences of their vocation as children of God, but refuse to do so through lack of generosity. We are partly to blame, for the grace of faith has not been given us to hide but to share with others (cf. Mt 5:151). We cannot forget that the happiness of these people, in this life and in the next, is at stake. The Christian life is a divine wonder with immediate promises of satisfaction and serenity — but on condition that we know how to recognize the gift of God (cf. Jn 4:10) and be generous, not counting the cost” (J. Escriva, Christ is passing by, 147). — The Navarre Bible - St. Luke
Things to Do:
Truly observe this Sunday in Lent with your family — Make it relaxing as befits the Lord’s Day. Remember that the Sundays of Lent are not counted in the total forty days of this holy season, so you are not expected to continue your penances and fasting on this day. Reread the Gospel together and discuss it as a family, play games, cook a nice meal. We especially recommend the Late Spring Special Menu, with chicken stew and dumplings as the main dish, or the Spring, Fall, or Winter Sunday Dinner Menu, with the “best-ever meat loaf!” Read this document by our Holy Father, On Keeping the Lord’s Day Holy. Begin to pray the Prayer for the Third Week of Lent with your family.
The Station is in the basilica of St. Lawrence outside the walls. The name of this, the most celebrated of the martyrs of Rome, would remind the catechumens that the faith they were about to profess would require them to be ready for many sacrifices. In the primitive Church, the third Sunday in Lent was called Scrutiny Sunday, because it was on this day that they began to
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examine the catechumens, who were to be admitted to Baptism on Easter night.
Commentary for the Readings in the Extraordinary Form: Third Sunday of Lent “When (Jesus) cast out the devil, the dumb man spoke.” But as indicated by the little whining group to the right, some complained: “By Beelzebub, the prince of devils, He casts out devils” (Gospel). Formerly, on this day, candidates were examined in preparation for Baptism on Holy Saturday. The first effect of Baptism is to free the souls from the power of the devil. The house of which Jesus speaks, is the human soul before His coming, degraded by idolatry, by sensuality, under the tyranny of the evil spirit. Mary holding the Infant (pictured in the upper left corner) is a symbol of our Baptism. Mary gives birth to us as members of the Mystical Body of her Christ. Moreover, like her, “blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it” (Gospel). These baptismal duties of death to sin and life in God (Epistle are meant to gladden, not to oppress the human heart (Offertory), intended by God for Divine possession (Communion Verse), safe from diabolical obsession.
Excerpted from My Sunday Missal, Confraternity of the Precious Blood
Daily Readings for: March 24, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, author of every mercy and of all goodness, who in fasting, prayer and almsgiving have shown us a remedy for sin, look graciously on this confession of our lowliness, that we, who are bowed down by our conscience, may always be lifted up by your mercy. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
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RECIPES
Spring, Fall or Winter Sunday Dinner Menu
ACTIVITIES
Explaining the Mass and Sacraments
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Third Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 3 Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (1st Plan)
LIBRARY
I Will Arise and Return to My Father | Pope John Paul II
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-24
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Lent: March 25th
Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord Old Calendar: Annunciation of the Lord
Again Lent’s austerity is interrupted as we solemnly keep a feast in honor of the Annunciation. The Annunciation is a mystery that belongs to the temporal rather than to the sanctoral cycle in the Church’s calendar. For the feast commemorates the most sublime moment in the history of time, the moment when the Second Divine Person of the most Holy Trinity assumed human nature in the womb of the Virgin Mary. Thus it is a feast of our Lord, even as it is of Mary, although the liturgy centers wholly around the Mother of God. — The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch Today is also the historical feast of St. Dismas, the good thief and St. Margaret Clitherow, wife and mother who was one of the English martyrs.
The Annunciation A tradition, which has come down from the apostolic ages, tells us that the great mystery of the Incarnation was achieved on the twenty-fifth day of March. It was at the hour of midnight, when the most holy Virgin was alone and absorbed in prayer, that the Archangel Gabriel appeared before her, and asked her, in the name of the blessed Trinity, to consent to become the Mother of God. Let us assist, in spirit, at this wonderful interview between the angel and the Virgin: and, at the same time, let us think of that other interview which took place between Eve and the serpent. A holy bishop and martyr of the second century, Saint Irenaeus, who had received the tradition from the very disciples of the apostles, shows us that Nazareth is the counterpart of Eden.
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In the garden of delights there is a virgin and an angel; and a conversation takes place-between them. At Nazareth a virgin is also addressed by an angel, and she answers him; but the angel of the earthly paradise is a spirit of darkness, and he of Nazareth is a spirit of light. In both instances it is the angel that has the first word. ‘Why,’ said the serpent to Eve, ‘hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’ His question implies impatience and a solicitation to evil; he has contempt for the frail creature to whom he addresses it, but he hates the image of God which is upon her. See, on the other hand, the angel of light; see with what composure and peacefulness he approaches the Virgin of Nazareth, the new Eve; and how respectfully he bows himself down before her: ‘Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with thee! Blessed art thou among women!’ Such language is evidently of heaven: none but an angel could speak thus to Mary. Scarcely has the wicked spirit finished speaking than Eve casts a longing look at the forbidden fruit: she is impatient to enjoy the independence it is to bring her. She rashly stretches forth her hand; she plucks the fruit; she eats it, and death takes possession of her: death of the soul, for sin extinguishes the light of life; and death of the body, which being separated from the source of immortality, becomes an object of shame and horror, and finally crumbles into dust. But let us turn away our eyes from this sad spectacle, and fix them on Nazareth. Mary has heard the angel’s explanation of the mystery; the will of heaven is made known to her, and how grand an honor it is to bring upon her! She, the humble maid of Nazareth, is to have the ineffable happiness of becoming the Mother of God, and yet the treasure of her virginity is to be left to her! Mary bows down before this sovereign will, and says to the heavenly messenger: ‘Behold the handmaid of the Lord: be it done to me according to thy word.’ Thus, as the great St. Irenaeus and so many of the holy fathers remark, the obedience of the second Eve repaired the disobedience of the first: for no sooner does the Virgin of Nazareth speak her fiat, ‘be it done,’ than the eternal Son of God (who, according to the divine decree, awaited this word) is present, by the operation of the Holy Ghost, in the chaste womb of Mary, and there He begins His human life. A Virgin is a Mother, and Mother of God; and it is this Virgin’s consenting to the divine will that has made her conceive by
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 110 the power of the Holy Ghost. This sublime mystery puts between the eternal Word and a mere woman the relations of Son and Mother; it gives to the almighty God a means whereby He may, in a manner worthy of His majesty, triumph over satan, who hitherto seemed to have prevailed against the divine plan. Never was there a more entire or humiliating defeat than that which this day befell satan. The frail creature, over whom he had so easily triumphed at the beginning of the world, now rises and crushes his proud head. Eve conquers in Mary. God would not choose man for the instrument of His vengeance; the humiliation of satan would not have been great enough; and therefore she who was the first prey of hell, the first victim of the tempter, is selected to give battle to the enemy. The result of so glorious a triumph is that Mary is to be superior not only to the rebel angels, but to the whole human race, yea, to all the angels of heaven. Seated on her exalted throne, she, the Mother of God, is to be the Queen of all creation. Satan, in the depths of the abyss, will eternally bewail his having dared to direct his first attack against the woman, for God has now so gloriously avenged her; and in heaven, the very Cherubim and Seraphim reverently look up to Mary, and deem themselves honored when she smiles upon them, or employs them in the execution of any of her wishes, for she is the Mother of their God. Therefore is it that we, the children of Adam, who have been snatched by Mary’s obedience from the power of hell, solemnize this day of the Annunciation. Well may we say of Mary those words of Debbora, when she sang her song of victory over the enemies of God’s people: ‘The valiant men ceased, and rested in Israel, until Debbora arose, a mother arose in Israel. The Lord chose new wars, and He Himself overthrew the gates of the enemies.’ Let us also refer to the holy Mother of Jesus these words of Judith, who by her victory over the enemy was another type of Mary: ‘Praise ye the Lord our God, who hath not forsaken them that hope in Him. And by me, His handmaid, He hath fulfilled His mercy, which He promised to the house of Israel; and He hath killed the enemy of His people by my hand this night… . The almighty Lord hath struck him, and hath delivered him into the hands of a woman, and hath slain him.’
Excerpted from The Liturgical Year, Abbot Gueranger O.S.B.
Things to Do:
This feast is very important in the defense of the life of unborn children. Even with small children, this is a good day to begin teaching about the high value God places on human life. He loved us so much that he became one of us, took
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on our human nature and became an innocent, completely dependent infant. This is a Solemnity, so when this feast falls during the Lenten season, our Lenten penance obligations are lifted. We should celebrate by some special food or dinner. This feast day forecasts the blessed event of Christmas, and illustrates how the liturgical year is an endless circle of days. To celebrate this circle or cycle, serve a cake, coffee rings, or wreath-shaped cookies, or foods shaped in ring molds for this feast day. A perfect symbolic food would be an angel food cake for the archangel Gabriel, baked in a tube pan for the endless circle, decorated with the frosting highlighted with blue for Mary. A traditional food for this day is waffles. “Lady Day” or Annunciation, is the only feast of Mary that Sweden still celebrates since the Lutheran faith became the state religion in 1593. In most of Europe, waffles are a traditional feast day food, but on the feast of the Annunciation in Sweden this is THE “Waffle Day” ( Vaffeldagen), where waffles are served either for breakfast, lunch or dinner, with lingonberries or cloudberries. .
St. Dismas Saint Dismas (sometimes spelled Dysmas or only Dimas, or even Dumas), also known as the Good Thief or the Penitent Thief, is the apocryphal name given to one of the thieves who was crucified alongside Christ according to the Gospel of Luke 23:39-43: And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, “If thou be Christ, save thyself and us.” But the other answering rebuked him, saying, “Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this man hath done nothing amiss.” And he said unto Jesus, “Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.” And Jesus said unto him, “Verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me in paradise.”
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St. Margaret Clitherow St. Margaret is considered the first woman martyred under Queen Elizabeth’s religious suppression. Margaret was raised a Protestant but converted to Catholicism about two to three years after she was married. According to her confessor, Fr. Mush, Margaret became a Catholic because she “found no substance, truth nor Christian comfort in the ministers of the new church, nor in their doctrine itself, and hearing also many priests and lay people to suffer for the defense of the ancient Catholic Faith.” Margaret’s husband, John Clitherow, remained a Protestant but supported his wife’s decision to convert. They were happily married and raised three children: Henry, William, and Anne. She was a businesswoman who helped run her husband’s butcher shop business. She was loved many people even her Protestant neighbors. Margaret practiced her faith and helped many people reconcile themselves back into the Catholic Church. She prayed one and a half hours every day and fasted four times a week. She regularly participated in mass and frequently went to confession. When laws were passed against Catholics, Margaret was imprisoned several times because she did not attend Protestant services. Other laws were passed which included a 1585 law that made it high treason for a priest to live in England and a felony for anyone to harbor or aid a priest. The penalty for breaking such laws was death. Despite the risk, Margaret helped and concealed priests. Margaret said “by God’s grace all priests shall be more welcome to me than ever they were, and I will do what I can to set forward God’s Catholic service.” Margaret wanted her son Henry to receive a Catholic education so she endeavored that her son be sent outside the Kingdom to Douai, France for schooling. Such an act was considered a crime. When the authorities discovered their intention, the Common Council had the Clitherow house searched. They initially found nothing but later retrieved religious vessels, books and vestments used for Holy Mass. They also found a secret hiding place but no renegade priests. Still, Margaret was arrested. Margaret refused to plead and to be tried saying, “Having made no offense, I need no trial.” English law decreed that anyone who refused to plead and to be tried should be “pressed to death.” So on the morning of March 25, 1586, after sewing her own shroud the night before and after praying for the Pope, cardinals, clergy, and the Queen, Margaret was
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 113 before and after praying for the Pope, cardinals, clergy, and the Queen, Margaret was executed. She lay sandwiched between a rock and a wooden slab while weights were dropped upon her, crushing her to death. She did not cry out but prayed “Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, have mercy upon me.” She died at age 30. Moved by her saintly life, all her children entered the religious life. Anne became a nun. Henry and William both became priests. On October 25, 1970, Pope Paul VI declared Margaret a saint.
Excerpted from Savior.org
Things to Do:
Read St. Margaret: Mother and Martyr
The Station is in the church of St. Mark, which was built in the fourth century in honor of the evangelist, by the holy Pope Mark, whose relics are kept there.
Daily Readings for: March 25, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who willed that your Word should take on the reality of human flesh in the womb of the Virgin Mary, grant, we pray, that we, who confess our Redeemer to be God and man, may merit to become partakers even in his divine nature. Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Angel Food Cake I Angel Food Cake II Boiled White Icing
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Boiled White Icing Classic Angel Food Cake European Chocolate Icing Jellied Macaroni Ring Luscious Coffee Ring Seed Cake Swedish Waffles Tirami Su: “Pick-Me-Up” Dessert Waffles Waffles
ACTIVITIES
Angelus Lesson Annunciation Day Food Ideas Annunciation Tableau Annunciation: A Little Play for Preschool Children Celebrating the Feasts of the Blessed Virgin Feast of the Annunciation: Origin and Traditions Feasts of Mary in the Family Feasts of Our Lady in the Home Marian Hymn: ’Tis Said of Our Dear Lady Marian Hymn: A Single Branch Three Roses Bore Marian Hymn: Ave Maria Dear Marian Hymn: Beautiful, Glorious Marian Hymn: Lourdes Hymn or Immaculate Mary Marian Hymn: Salve Regina Marian Hymn: Stella Matutina Marian Hymn: Virgin Blessed, Thou Star the Fairest
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Mary Garden Teaching Moments for the Feast of the Annunciation
PRAYERS
Angelus Domini (The Angel of the Lord) Litany of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Litany of Loretto) Table Blessing for the Solemnity of the Annunciation Annunciation Novena Table Blessing for the Feasts of the Mother of God Novena for the Annunciation
LIBRARY
Behold the Handmaid of the Lord | Fr. Francis J. Connell C.SS.R. Mary Responds to God with Spousal Love | Pope John Paul II Mary’s Faith in the Light of the Mystery of the Annunciation | Pope Benedict XVI We Repeat The Words Of The Annunciation For The World, The Church | Guiseppe Luppino
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-25
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Lent: March 26th
Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Ludger, bishop (Hist)
“If your virtue goes no deeper than that of the scribes and pharisees, you will never get into the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 5:20).” The need to make reparation is a vital, inescapable urge of a free person. His very nature cries out for order and peace. His reason tells him that where an order has been violated, the order must be repaired; and the higher the order, the greater must be the reparation. To be free at all, is to accept the responsibility for atonement. Sin is a violation of God’s order. Sin demands reparation — the reparation of personal penance, personal prayer, personal charity to all. Part of our atonement to God is made by serving our fellow men. — Daily Missal of the Mystical Body
Meditation The story of the Prodigal Son is repeated again today. It is the history of the Church; it is the history of our own desertion. In this Gospel we are given an urgent call to repentance and conversion. “Father, I have sinned.” Penance alone can save us. Our Father welcomes us with mercy. The sin and its eternal punishment are forgiven; the good works which we did before sin and the merits which we lost through sin are revived. The Father receives us again as His children, and celebrates a joyful banquet with us at Holy Communion. In the story of each human life, God’s mercy stands on one side and the unfaithfulness of man on the other. Will God have to cast us off as He did the people of Israel? Have we not fully deserved it? Sometimes it appears that God wishes to allow our faithless generation to go its own way. If He does, it will merit a well deserved
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 117 punishment. What can save us from rejection? Only penance, self-examination, and conversion. “Be converted to Me with all your heart, in fasting and in weeping and in mourning” (Joel 2:12).
Excerpted from The Light of the World by Benedict Baur, O.S.B.
Things to Do:
The parable of the lost sheep and the prodigal son in today’s Gospel are both very important for your children to learn by heart. The well-known Catechesis of the Good Shepherd for children was developed by Sofia Cavaletti, a Roman Catholic Hebrew scholar who spent 30 years researching the religious development of children, and Gianna Gobbi, an educator who was trained by Maria Montessori. Through her observation of children’s responses to different religious themes, Cavaletti found that an overwhelming number of younger children responded especially well to depictions of Christ as the Good Shepherd. Here is a brief article discussing the increasing prevalence of this religious program today. Find out more about this curriculum and try it with your own children. If you are pressed for time, find out about the nearest (Catholic) Good Shepherd program and consider enrolling your child.
St. Ludger St. Ludger was born in Friesland about the year 743. His father, a nobleman of the first rank, at the child’s own request, committed him very young to the care of St. Gregory, the disciple of St. Boniface, and his successors in the government of the see of Utrecht. Gregory educated him in his monastery and gave him the clerical tonsure. Ludger, desirous of further improvement, passed over into England, and spent four years and a half under Alcuin, who was rector of a famous school at York. In 773 he returned home, and St. Gregory dying in 776, his successor, Alberic, compelled our Saint to
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 118 receive the holy order of priesthood, and employed him for several years in preaching the Word of God in Friesland, where he converted great numbers, founded several monasteries, and built many churches. The pagan Saxons ravaging the country, Ludger travelled to Rome to consult Pope Adrian II, what course to take, and what he thought God required of him. He then retired for three years and a half to Monte Casino, where he wore the habit of the Order and conformed to the practice of the rule during his stay, but made no religious vows. In 787, Charlemagne overcame the Saxons and conquered Friesland and the coast of the Germanic Ocean as far as Denmark. Ludger, hearing this, returned into East Friesland, where he converted the Saxons to the Faith, as he also did the province of Westphalia. He founded the monastery of Werden, twenty-nine miles from Cologne. In 802, Hildebald, Archbishop of Cologne, not regarding his strenuous resistance, ordained him Bishop of Munster. He joined in his diocese five cantons of Friesland which he had converted, and also founded the monastery of Helmstad in the duchy of Brunswick. Being accused to the Emperor Charlemagne of wasting his income and neglecting the embellishment of churches, this prince ordered him to appear at court. The morning after his arrival the emperor’s chamberlain brought him word that his attendance was required. The Saint, being then at his prayers, told the officer that he would follow him as soon as he had finished them. He was sent for three several times before he was ready, which the courtiers represented as a contempt of his Majesty, and the emperor, with some emotion, asked him why he had made him wait so long, though he had sent for him so often. The bishop answered that though he had the most profound respect for his Majesty, yet God was infinitely above him; that whilst we are occupied with Him, it is our duty to forget everything else. This answer made such an impression on the emperor that he dismissed him with honor and disgraced his accusers. St. Ludger was favored with the gifts of miracles and prophecy. His last sickness, though violent, did not hinder him from continuing his functions to the very last day of his life, which was Passion Sunday, on which day he preached very early in the morning, said Mass towards nine, and preached again before night, foretelling to those that were about him that he should die the following night, and fixing upon place in his monastery of Werden where he chose to be interred. He died accordingly on the 26th of March, at midnight.
Excerpted from Lives of the Saints, by Alban Butler, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]
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The Station is in the church of St. Pudentiana, daughter of Pudens the senator. This holy virgin of Rome lived in the second century. She was remarkable for her charity, and for the zeal wherewith she sought for and buried the bodies of the martyrs. Her church is built on the very spot where stood the house in which she lived with her father and her sister St. Praxedes. St. Peter the Apostle had honored this house with his presence, during the lifetime of Pudentiana’s grandfather.
Daily Readings for: March 26, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: May your grace not forsake us, O Lord, we pray, but make us dedicated to your holy service and at all times obtain for us your help. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
New Orleans Shrimp and Spaghetti Shrimp Jambalaya
ACTIVITIES
Lenten Prayer Pot
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (2nd Plan) Prayer Before a Crucifix
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Prayer Before a Crucifix
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-26
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Lent: March 27th
Wednesday of the Third Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. John of Capistrano, confessor; St. Gontran, king (Hist)
“There were many lepers in Israel at the time of Eliseus the prophet, and none of them was cleansed but Naaman the Syrian.” Naaman’s cure, an anticipatory figure of baptism, also declares in advance the universality of salvation. Naaman was the Syrian general who, in obedience to the commands of Eliseus, was cured of leprosy by bathing in the Jordan. At a later date Jesus Himself was to receive in the waters of the Jordan the baptism of John the Baptist. Let us always keep in mind that repentance and a humble confession of our guilt will draw upon us the mercy of God and infuse into our hearts the hope of pardon. According to the 1962 Missal of Bl. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. John of Capistrano whose feast is celebrated in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite on October 23.
The Need for Mortification Today Lent is essentially a time of prayer and mortification. The body which has been indulged for so many months must now be denied. Even though fasting and abstinence are impossible for some of us, the penitential spirit may not be shirked. Modern creeds approximate more and more the pagan conception of man, and the penitential spirit is, of course, unbearable to those whose only philosophy of life is the song of the banqueter: “Let us eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” Modern civilization scoffs at the notion of doing penance as if it were a vice of the pietist who wants to exalt one side of his nature at the expense of the other, although it is no small thing that the soul should be king of the body. Penance has a deeper
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 122 significance than that, as I have pointed out. But, says the modern scoffer, “a man is no better and no worse than God made him. God who gave him impulses cannot be angry if he obeys them. Let a man snatch the passing pleasure.” In the Cathedral of Lubeck in Germany is a Lenten Monitory which may be taken as God’s answer to such blasphemy:
Ye call Me Master, and obey Me not: Ye call Me Light, and see Me not; Ye call Me Way, and walk Me not; Ye call Me Life, and desire Me not; Ye call Me Wise, and follow Me not: Ye call Me Fair, and love Me not; Ye call Me Rich, and ask Me not: Ye call Me Eternal, and seek Me not; Ye call Me Gracious, and trust Me not; Ye call Me Noble, and serve Me not; Ye call Me God, and fear Me not; If I condemn you—blame Me not. Amen
Excerpted from Message of the Gospels
St. Gontran St. Gontran was the son of King Clotaire and grandson of Clovis I and Saint Clotildis. When Clotaire died in 561, his domains were divided among his four sons. While Gontran’s brother Caribert reigned at Paris, Sigebert in Metz, and Chilperic in Soissons, he was crowned king of Orleans and Burgundy in 561. He then made Chalons-sur-Saone his capital. When compelled to take up arms against his ambitious brothers and the Lombards, he made no other use of his victories, gained under the conduct of a brave general called Mommol, than to give peace to his dominions. The crimes in which the barbarous habits of his nation involved him, he effaced by tears of repentance. The prosperity of his reign, both in peace and war, condemns those who suppose that human policy cannot be
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 123 determined by the maxims of the Gospel, whereas the truth is just the contrary: no others can render a government so efficacious and prosperous. Saint Gontran always treated the pastors of the Church with respect and veneration. He was the protector of the oppressed, and the tender parent of his subjects. He gave the greatest attention to the care of the sick. He fasted, prayed, wept, and offered himself to God night and day as a victim ready to be sacrificed on the altar of His justice, to avert His indignation, which Saint Gontran believed he himself provoked and drew down upon his innocent people. He was a severe punisher of crimes in his officers and others, and by many wholesome regulations he restrained the barbarous licentiousness of his troops; but no man was ever more ready to forgive offenses against his own person. With royal magnificence, he built and endowed many churches and monasteries. This good king died on the 23rd of March in 593, in the sixty-eighth year of his age, having reigned thirty-one years.
Excerpted from Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a compilation based on Butler’s Lives of the Saints and other sources by John Gilmary Shea (Benziger Brothers: New York, 1894).
The Station is at the church of Sts. Cosmas and Damian, physicians. These martyrs were twin brothers originating from Arabia. They practiced medicine in Aegea, Cilicia, but accepted no money from the poor. Their beautiful Christian lives edified the pagans and converted many to the Faith. They were arrested in the persecution of Diocletian, subjected to torture, and finally beheaded.
Daily Readings for: March 27, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Grant, we pray, O Lord, that, schooled through Lenten observance and nourished by your word, through holy restraint we may be devoted to you with all our heart and be ever united in prayer. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
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who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Fillet of Flounder in Tomato Sauce
ACTIVITIES
Motivating Children to Perform Good Deeds
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (2nd Plan)
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-03-27
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Lent: March 28th
Thursday of the Third Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. John of Capistrano, confessor; St. Gontran, king (Hist)
“There were many lepers in Israel at the time of Eliseus the prophet, and none of them was cleansed but Naaman the Syrian.” Naaman’s cure, an anticipatory figure of baptism, also declares in advance the universality of salvation. Naaman was the Syrian general who, in obedience to the commands of Eliseus, was cured of leprosy by bathing in the Jordan. At a later date Jesus Himself was to receive in the waters of the Jordan the baptism of John the Baptist. Let us always keep in mind that repentance and a humble confession of our guilt will draw upon us the mercy of God and infuse into our hearts the hope of pardon. According to the 1962 Missal of Bl. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. John of Capistrano whose feast is celebrated in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite on October 23.
The Need for Mortification Today Lent is essentially a time of prayer and mortification. The body which has been indulged for so many months must now be denied. Even though fasting and abstinence are impossible for some of us, the penitential spirit may not be shirked. Modern creeds approximate more and more the pagan conception of man, and the penitential spirit is, of course, unbearable to those whose only philosophy of life is the song of the banqueter: “Let us eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” Modern civilization scoffs at the notion of doing penance as if it were a vice of the pietist who wants to exalt one side of his nature at the expense of the other, although it is no small thing that the soul should be king of the body. Penance has a deeper
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 126 significance than that, as I have pointed out. But, says the modern scoffer, “a man is no better and no worse than God made him. God who gave him impulses cannot be angry if he obeys them. Let a man snatch the passing pleasure.” In the Cathedral of Lubeck in Germany is a Lenten Monitory which may be taken as God’s answer to such blasphemy:
Ye call Me Master, and obey Me not: Ye call Me Light, and see Me not; Ye call Me Way, and walk Me not; Ye call Me Life, and desire Me not; Ye call Me Wise, and follow Me not: Ye call Me Fair, and love Me not; Ye call Me Rich, and ask Me not: Ye call Me Eternal, and seek Me not; Ye call Me Gracious, and trust Me not; Ye call Me Noble, and serve Me not; Ye call Me God, and fear Me not; If I condemn you—blame Me not. Amen
Excerpted from Message of the Gospels
St. Gontran St. Gontran was the son of King Clotaire and grandson of Clovis I and Saint Clotildis. When Clotaire died in 561, his domains were divided among his four sons. While Gontran’s brother Caribert reigned at Paris, Sigebert in Metz, and Chilperic in Soissons, he was crowned king of Orleans and Burgundy in 561. He then made Chalons-sur-Saone his capital. When compelled to take up arms against his ambitious brothers and the Lombards, he made no other use of his victories, gained under the conduct of a brave general called Mommol, than to give peace to his dominions. The crimes in which the barbarous habits of his nation involved him, he effaced by tears of repentance. The prosperity of his reign, both in peace and war, condemns those who suppose that human policy cannot be
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 127 determined by the maxims of the Gospel, whereas the truth is just the contrary: no others can render a government so efficacious and prosperous. Saint Gontran always treated the pastors of the Church with respect and veneration. He was the protector of the oppressed, and the tender parent of his subjects. He gave the greatest attention to the care of the sick. He fasted, prayed, wept, and offered himself to God night and day as a victim ready to be sacrificed on the altar of His justice, to avert His indignation, which Saint Gontran believed he himself provoked and drew down upon his innocent people. He was a severe punisher of crimes in his officers and others, and by many wholesome regulations he restrained the barbarous licentiousness of his troops; but no man was ever more ready to forgive offenses against his own person. With royal magnificence, he built and endowed many churches and monasteries. This good king died on the 23rd of March in 593, in the sixty-eighth year of his age, having reigned thirty-one years.
Excerpted from Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a compilation based on Butler’s Lives of the Saints and other sources by John Gilmary Shea (Benziger Brothers: New York, 1894).
The Station is at the church of Sts. Cosmas and Damian, physicians. These martyrs were twin brothers originating from Arabia. They practiced medicine in Aegea, Cilicia, but accepted no money from the poor. Their beautiful Christian lives edified the pagans and converted many to the Faith. They were arrested in the persecution of Diocletian, subjected to torture, and finally beheaded.
Daily Readings for: March 28, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: We implore your majesty most humbly, O Lord, that, as the feast of our salvation draws ever closer, so we may press forward all the more eagerly towards the worthy celebration of the Paschal Mystery. Through our Lord Jesus Christ,
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your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.r.
RECIPES
Fillet of Flounder in Tomato Sauce
ACTIVITIES
Motivating Children to Perform Good Deeds
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (2nd Plan)
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: March 29th
Friday of the Third Week of Lent
“Then in anger his master handed him over to the torturers until he should pay back the whole debt. So will my heavenly Father do to you, unless each of you forgives your brother from your heart.” (Mt. 18:35) No one is merciful like God, and no one pardons as God pardons. The mercy of the Jews was confined to forgiving seven times. Jesus desires that His disciples should always forgive — even to seventy times seven times.
Converting Our Hearts Every Day The Season of Lent for every Christian should mark a turning point, accentuating that change in thought and life which becomes daily in those who truly wish to follow Jesus. In the Gospel the word “daily” is heard many times, for example speaking of the demands of discipleship, the Lord says: “every day” it is necessary to take up the cross and follow Him (cfr. Lk 9, 23). “ Every day ” is synonymous with “totality,” donation, which, because it is “daily”, renews itself and never breaks up, never weakens. Just as running water flows continually and is always fresh and clear, so too the spiritual life: to maintain its vivacity it draws continually from the grace which flows from Jesus. In this sense we clearly understand the necessity to “pray without ceasing”. A great temptation on the path of conversion is to stop, to “stagnate”: we remain as we are, we do not to renew ourselves, and in doing so deceiving ourselves and others with a “Christianity” consisting of habits and “goals reached”. The journey of Lent invites us to remove these illusions, the word of Jesus resounds louder than ever: “repent and believe in the Gospel”. To be authentic conversion should never stop; the true Christian experiences the dynamics of conversion, like walking behind Jesus, on a path which never stops because it is at the spiritual level, if we stop, we go backwards! “ ‘Once the hand is laid on the plough, no one who looks back is fit for the kingdom of
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‘Once the hand is laid on the plough, no one who looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.’” (Lk 9, 62). So as not to interrupt our conversion, our journey of ‘becoming’ Christians, the only possibility is daily conversion: denying ourselves, our ambitions every day, with the dynamic power of love. Selfishness has its own dynamics, which is also daily and drives us to satisfy ‘ego’. Only the disciple who gives himself entirely to the Lord, day after day, becomes increasingly similar to his Master and lives in joy, light and love. If a Christian says he has no joy, light or love then he must make a profound examination of conscience to discern areas where the power of selfishness prevails over the dynamics of conversion. It is not God who is sparing with himself, or who hesitates to give Himself to us, it is man, as St Teresa of Avila says so well: “ If we attain to the perfect possession of this true love of God, it brings all blessings with it. But so niggardly and so slow are we in giving ourselves wholly to God that we do not prepare ourselves as we should to receive that precious thing which it is His Majesty’s will that we should enjoy only at a great price.” (Life, chapter 11, paragraph 1). Dying to self costs, but it obtains the greatest result: it allows Jesus to live in us. In fact there can be no dynamics of conversion, without daily “renouncing self" precisely to live for Jesus. The Word of God says clearly that only those who lose themselves, who give themselves entirely to God, truly find Him and enjoy Him here on earth: “ If, however, from there you start searching once more for Yahweh your God, and if you search for him honestly and sincerely, you will find him.” (Deut 4, 29). The Lenten journey is therefore a path of self-giving and trusting in God which culminates at Easter with new birth in Jesus. The Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, describes this dynamics with the following illuminating words: “ Jesus’ invitation to take up one’s cross and follow him may at first sight seem harsh and contrary to what we hope for, mortifying our desire for personal fulfilment. At a closer look, however, we discover that it is not like this: the witness of the saints shows that in the Cross of Christ, in the love that is given, in renouncing the possession of oneself, one finds that deep serenity which is the source of generous dedication to our brethren, especially to the poor and the needy, and this also gives us joy. The Lenten journey of conversion on which we are setting out today together with the entire Church thus becomes a favourable opportunity, “the acceptable time” (II Cor 6: 2) for renewing our filial abandonment in the hands of God and for putting into practice what Jesus continues to repeat to us: “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Mk 8: 34) and this is how one ventures forth on the path of love and true happiness. (…)let us ask Our
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Lady, Mother of God and of the Church, to accompany us on our way through Lent, so that it may be a journey of true conversion. May we let ourselves be led by her, and inwardly renewed we will arrive at the celebration of the great mystery of Christ’s Pasch, the supreme revelation of God’s merciful love.” (Benedict XVI, General Audience 6 February 2008). Msgr. Luciano Alimandi (Agenzia Fides 20/2/2008; righe 54, parole 792)
The Station today is at St. Lawrence’s in Lucina. Near the church was a well which was very dear to the Romans and which probably suggested the Epistle and Gospel of today’s Mass. The church also contains a part of the gridiron on which St. Laurence was burned. The Introit and Gradual refer to the prayers of the Saint while he was being tortured.
Daily Readings for: March 29, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Pour your grace into our hearts, we pray, O Lord, that we may be constantly drawn away from unruly desires and obey by your own gift the heavenly teaching you give us. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Mostaccioli
ACTIVITIES
Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart!
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The Kaleidoscope of Lent
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 4 Prayer Before a Crucifix
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: March 30th
Saturday of the Third Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Climacus, abbot (Hist); St. Quirinus martyr (Hist); Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Historically today is the feast of St. John Climacus, a learned abbot and great spiritual director. He was a monk of Mount Sinai and wrote The Ladder to Paradise which described the thirty degrees to religious perfection. It is also the feast of St. Quirinus of Neuss, Roman tribune and martyr.
St. John Climacus Saint John, whose national origin remains unknown, was called Climacus because of a treatise he wrote called The Ladder (Climax) of Paradise. He made such progress in learning as a disciple of Saint Gregory Nazianzen that while still young, he was called the Scholastic. At the age of sixteen he turned from the brilliant future which lay before him, and retired to Mount Sinai, where he was placed under the direction of a holy monk named Martyrius. Once that religious journeyed to Antioch and took the young John with him; they visited Saint Anastasius, a future Patriarch of Antioch, and the Saint asked Martyrius who it was who had given the habit to this novice? Hearing that it was Martyrius himself, he replied, “And who would have said that you gave the habit to an Abbot of Mount Sinai?” Another religious, a solitary, made the same prediction on a similar visit, and washed the feet of the one who would some day be Abbot of Mount Sinai. Never was there a novice more fervent, more unrelenting in his efforts for self-mastery. On the death of his director, when John was about thirty-five years old, he
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 134 withdrew into a deeper solitude, where he studied the lives and writings of the Saints and was raised to an unusual height of contemplation. There he remained for forty years, making, however, a visit to the solitaries of Egypt for his instruction and inspiration. The fame of his holiness and practical wisdom drew crowds around him for advice and consolation. In the year 600, when he had reached the age of seventy-five, he was chosen as Abbot of Mount Sinai by a unanimous vote of the Sinai religious, who said they had placed the light upon its lampstand. On the day of his installation, six hundred pilgrims came to Saint Catherine’s Monastery, and he performed all the offices of an excellent hotel-master; but at the hour of dinner, he could not be found to share the meal with them. For four years, said his biographer, a monk of the monastery of Raithe, “he dwelt on the mountain of God, and drew from the splendid treasure of his heart priceless riches of doctrine which he poured forth with wondrous abundance and benediction.” He was induced by a brother abbot to write the rules by which he had guided his life; and the book which he had already begun, The Ladder, detailing thirty degrees of advancement in the pursuit of perfection, has been prized in all ages for its wisdom, clearness, and unction. At the end of that time, he retired again to his solitude, where he died the following year, as he had foretold.
Excerpted from Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul Guérin (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 4.
Things to Do:
Read St. John Climacus, Abbot.
St. Quirinus of Neuss Little is known about St. Quirinus of Neuss, but legend relates that he was a Roman tribune as well as Pope Alexander I’s jailer. He converted to Christianity along with his daughter, St. Balbina. He is credited with translating St. Peter’s chains to Rome from Jerusalem. St. Quirinus was martyred during the persecution of Emperor Hadrian shortly before the martyrdom of Pope
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Alexander (who is mentioned in the Roman Canon and who is credited with instituting the blessing of holy water and the mixing of water and wine at Mass). Quirinus was buried on the Via Appia in the Praetextatus Catacomb. In 1050, Pope Leo IX gave St. Quirinus’ relics to his sister, Gepa, who was the abbess of Neuss, on the Rhine River, where there is a Romanesque church bearing his name. St. Quirinus is the patron of Neuss and a minor patron of Orte, in the Italian province of Umbria.
Excerpted from 2009 Saints Calendar and Daily Planner published by Tan Books.
The Station is in the church of St. Susanna, virgin and martyr of Rome. The first Christian place of worship was built here in the 4th century. It was probably the titulus of Pope Caius (283-296). Caius was St. Susanna’s uncle, and tradition claims that the church stands on the site of her martyrdom.
Daily Readings for: March 30, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Rejoicing in this annual celebration of our Lenten observance, we pray, O Lord, that, with our hearts set on the Paschal mysteries, we may be gladdened by their full effects. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
None
ACTIVITIES
Lenten Scrapbook
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PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent To Keep A True Lent Lent Table Blessing 4
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: March 31st
Fourth Sunday of Lent Old Calendar: Fourth Sunday of Lent; Laetare Sunday
“Rejoice, Jerusalem! Be glad for her, you who love her; rejoice with her, you who mourned for her, and you will find contentment at her consoling breasts.” This Sunday is known as Laetare Sunday and is a Sunday of joy. Lent is half over, and Easter is enticingly near. This Sunday was formerly called “Laetare Sunday” since its mood and theme was one of hope and rejoicing that Easter was near. In the reformed calendar this Sunday is not different from the other Sundays of Lent even though the entrance antiphon for the day still begins with the Latin word “laetare” and the vestments worn by the celebrant are rose-colored, not violet. The day is important because it is the day of the second scrutiny in preparation for the baptism of adults at the Easter Vigil.
Sunday Readings The first reading is taken from the book of Joshua, 5:9, 10-12. Today’s reading recounts the celebration of the Passover in the Promised Land by Joshua and those who had sojourned with him in the desert for 40 years. The second reading is from the second letter of Paul to the Corinthians, 5: 17-21. The reconciliation of mankind with God has been brought about by Christ’s death on the cross. Jesus, who is like men in all things “yet without sinning” bore the sins of men and offered himself on the cross as an atoning sacrifice for all those sins, thereby reconciling men to God; through this sacrifice we became the righteousness of God. The Gospel is from St. Luke 15:1-3, 11-32. This reading recounts the parable of the Prodigal Son, one of Jesus’ most beautiful parables. It teaches us once more that God is a
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 138 kind and understanding Father. The son who asks for his part of the inheritance is a symbol of the person who cuts himself off from God through sin. “Although the word ‘mercy’ does not appear, [this parable] nevertheless expresses the essence of the divine mercy in a particularly clear way” (John Paul II, Dives in misericordia, 5). Mercy — as Christ has presented it in the parable of the prodigal son — has the interior form of the love that in the New Testament is called agape. This love is able to reach down to every prodigal son, to every human misery, and above all to every form of moral misery, to sin. When this happens, the person who is the object of mercy does not feel humiliated, but rather found again and ‘restored to value’. The father first and foremost expresses to him his joy, that he has been ‘found again’ and that he has ‘returned to life’. This joy indicates a good that has remained intact: even if he is a prodigal, a son does not cease to be truly his father’s son; it also indicates a good that has been found again, which in the case of the prodigal son was his return to the truth about himself" (Dives in misericordia, 6).
This church is one of the seven pilgrim churches in Rome. St. Helen, mother of the emperor Constantine, had a church built in Rome to house the relics of the Passion of Our Lord which she had obtained during her pilgrimage to the Holy Land. St. Helen discovered the true Cross of Our Savior with its title and the instruments of His Death like the nails and the crown of thorns. She had the top layer from Mount Calvary removed and placed in barges which carried this material to Rome. She then had the builders use this soil as the ground on which she had the basilica built for the sacred relics. The true Cross and other holy items have been kept in this basilica since its consecration in the fourth century and can be visited to this day. Because of the great relic enshrined there the basilica is called the Holy Cross and because it is built on the soil from Mount Calvary it is said to be in Jerusalem.
Commentary for the Readings in the Extraordinary Form: Fourth Sunday of Lent “Jesus then took the loaves and …distributed them to those reclining, …
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as much as they wished” (Gospel). We all “wish” to be fed with joy, now and forever. The discipline of Lent may sadden our poor frail nature, so the Church analyzes the causes of true joy on this Rejoice or Laetare Sunday (Introit). The first source of genuine joy is a sincere Easter Confession; it emancipates us from the slavery of sin. We now enjoy the freedom of Christ’s Gospel of love, because we have been freed from the bondage of that fear which prevailed in the days before Christ (Epistle). The second source of genuine joy is a fruitful Easter Communion, for which proper preparation and thanksgiving have been made. The soul’s instinctive hunger is satisfied by the personal com-muning with God. In the picture, the Host and Chalice are seen descending upon men of all races (symbolized by the awaiting crowd). Humanity thus fed with Divinity, is joyously united in a real social and mystical union. Men will then work for one another in “a city which is compact together” (Communion Verse).
Excerpted from My Sunday Missal, Confraternity of the Precious Blood
Daily Readings for: March 31, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who through your Word reconcile the human race to yourself in a wonderful way, grant, we pray, that with prompt devotion and eager faith the Christian people may hasten toward the solemn celebrations to come. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Bury Simnel Cake Chocolate Pecan Pie
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Easy Simnel Cake Never Out of Season Sunday Dinner (Sample Menu) Shrewsbury Simnel Cake Simnel Cake I Simnel Cake II Simnel Cake IV Simnel Cake V
ACTIVITIES
How to be a Good Father Mothering Sunday Mother’s Day Story-Telling
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Novena to St. Joseph Lent Table Blessing 4 Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Ordinary Time (2nd Plan) Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (1st Plan) Novena to St. Joseph II Traditional Novena Prayer to St. Joseph
LIBRARY
Conquering by the Cross: Jesus’ Love Wins All | Pope Benedict XVI God So Loved the World That He Gave His Only Son | Pope John Paul II
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Lent: April 1st
Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Hugh of Grenoble, bishop (Hist)
“One of the scribes came to Jesus and asked him, “Which is the first of all the commandments?” Jesus replied, “The first is this: Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. (Mk 12:28).” Historically today is the feast of St. Hugh of Grenoble, who was elected bishop at the age of twenty-eight to purge the diocese of its disorders, and he occupied the see until his death fifty-two years later.
Meditation - The Tree of Knowledge and the Cross The sin that was wrought through the tree was undone by the obedience of the tree, obedience to God whereby the Son of man was nailed to the tree, destroying the knowledge of evil, and bringing in and conferring the knowledge of good; and evil is disobedience to God, as obedience to God is good. And therefore the Word says through Isaiah the prophet, foretelling what was to come to pass in the future—for it was because they told the future that they were “prophets”—the Word says through him as follows: I refuse not, and do not gainsay, my back have I delivered to blows and my cheeks to buffets, and I have not turned away my face from the contumely of them that spat. [Is. 50, 6] So by obedience, whereby He obeyed unto death, hanging on the tree, He undid the old disobedience wrought in the tree. And because He is Himself the Word of God Almighty, who in His invisible form pervades us universally in the whole world, and encompasses both its length and breadth and height and depth—for by God’s Word everything is disposed and administered—the Son of God was also crucified in these, imprinted in the form of a cross on the universe; for He had necessarily, in becoming
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 143 visible, to bring to light the universality of His cross, in order to show openly through His visible form that activity of His: that it is He who makes bright the height, that is, what is in heaven, and holds the deep, which is in the bowels of the earth, and stretches forth and extends the length from East to West, navigating also the Northern parts and the breadth of the South, and calling in all the dispersed from all sides to the knowledge of the Father. — St. Irenaeus
Things to Do:
The fasting desired by the Lord is not so much denying oneself food (although this is important) but rather, consists in “Sharing your bread with the hungry, sheltering the oppressed and the homeless; / Clothing the naked when you see them, and not turning your back on your own.” Many families take these words to heart by having an inexpensive, penitential dinner on Fridays in Lent (such as beans and rice) and then giving the extra money to the poor. Many families give each child one pretzel during Friday dinners in Lent. Remind your children of the spiritual significance of the pretzel. Pray the Stations of the Cross today with your family. An excellent version with beautiful meditations composed by our Holy Father is his Stations of the Cross at the Colosseum. Some other recommended versions are: Eucharistic Stations of the Cross, and the more traditional Stations of the Cross written by Saint Alphonsus Liguori can be found in most Catholic bookstores. Here are some guidelines for praying the Stations of the Cross in your home. Any of the linked activities (Fun Pretzel Project, Lenten Scrapbook, Candelabrum for Stations of the Cross) are a perfect way for your children to spend their Friday afternoons throughout this season of Lent.
St. Hugh of Grenoble It was the good fortune of Saint Hugh to receive, from his cradle, strong impressions of piety through the example and solicitude of his illustrious and holy parents. He was born at Chateauneuf in Dauphiné, France, in 1053. His father, Odilo, who served his country in an honorable post in the army, labored by all means in his power to make his soldiers faithful servants of their Creator, and by severe punishments, to restrain vice. By the
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 144 advice of his son, Saint Hugh, in his later years he became a Carthusian monk, and died at the age of one hundred, having received Extreme Unction and Viaticum from the hands of his son. Under his direction, his mother had served God in her own house for many years by prayer, fasting, and abundant almsgiving; and Saint Hugh also assisted her in her last hours. Hugh, from the cradle, appeared to be a child of benediction; in his youth he was recognized as such through his exceptional success in his studies. Having chosen to serve God in the ecclesiastical state, he accepted a canonry in the cathedral of Valence. His great sanctity and learning rendered him an ornament of that church, and at the age of twenty-seven he was chosen Bishop of Grenoble. Pope Gregory VII consecrated him in Rome, and inspired in him an ardent zeal for the Church’s liberty and the sanctification of the clergy. He at once undertook to reprove vice and reform abuses, at that time rampant in his diocese, but found his efforts without fruit. He resolved therefore, after two years, to resign his charge, and retired to the austere abbey of Casa Dei, or Chaise-Dieu, in Auvergne. There Saint Hugh lived for a year, a perfect model of all virtues in a monastery filled with saints, until Pope Gregory commanded him, in the name of holy obedience, to resume his pastoral charge, saying: “Go to your flock; they need you.” This time his sanctity effected great good in souls. His forceful preaching moved crowds and touched hearts; in the confessional he wept with his penitents, and aroused in them a deeper contrition. After a few years the face of his diocese had changed. His charity for the poor led him to sell even his episcopal ring and his chalice to assist them. During his episcopate the young Saint Bruno came to him for counsel, and it was Saint Hugh who assisted him in the foundation of the Carthusian Monastery in the mountains of the diocese of Grenoble, whose renown after a thousand years has not diminished. Always filled with a profound sense of his own unworthiness, he earnestly solicited three Popes for leave to resign his bishopric, that he might die in solitude, but was never able to obtain his request. God was pleased to purify his soul by a lingering illness before He called him to Himself. He closed his penitential course on the 1st of April in 1132, two months before completing his eightieth year. Miracles attested the sanctity of his death, and he was canonized only two years afterwards, by Pope Innocent II.
Things to Do:
Try making Mock Turtle Soup. St. Hugh for a time lived in a Carthusian monastery as a simple monk. Legend has it that once, on arriving, he found the
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monks assembled in the refectory but with nothing to eat. He was told that some benefactor had indeed given them fowl but their rule forbade the eating of meat. When Saint Hugh saw their predicament, he promptly made the sign of the cross and changed the fowl into turtles.
Excerpted from Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints
Today’s Station is at St. Nicholas in Prison. It was constructed in the ruins of two temples and the ancient Forum Olitorium, and you can see fragments from them reused in the church. The most important of the temples was the Temple og Piety, built by Acilius Glabrius, consul in 191 B.C. The dedication to St. Nicholas was made by the Greek population in the area.
Daily Readings for: April 01, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who renew the world through mysteries beyond all telling, grant, we pray, that your Church may be guided by your eternal design. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Mock Turtle Soup Mock Turtle Soup - 2
ACTIVITIES
Motivating Children to Perform Good Deeds
PRAYERS
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PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 4 Prayer Before a Crucifix
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 2nd
Optional Memorial of St. Francis of Paola, hermit Old Calendar: St. Francis of Paola, confessor
St. Francis was born at Paula in Calabria; after living as a hermit for five years (from the age of fourteen to nineteen) he gathered around him some companions with whom he led the religious life. This was the origin of a new order, to which he gave the name of Minims, that is “the least” in the house of God. Pope Sixtus IV sent him to France to help Louis XI on his deathbed. He remained there and founded a house of his Minims at Tours.
St. Francis of Paola Francis of Paola founded the Minim Order, a branch of the Franciscans (1454). These “Hermits of St. Francis of Assisi” dwelt in small houses, and as “least” brethren, endeavored to live a more austere and humble life than the “Fratres Minores.” The saint worked numerous miracles. He had a favorite ejaculation, one that welled up from the depths of his physical and spiritual being: “Out of love.” This was an all-powerful ejaculation for him and for his companions. “Out of love” the heaviest stone was light; “Out of love” he admonished and punished; “Out of love” he once crossed the sea without a boat. For on a certain occasion the saint wanted to go from the Italian mainland to Sicily.
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A boat was lying in the harbor. Francis asked the owner if he would take him and his companion along on the boat. “If you pay, monk,” the sailor answered sulkily, “I will take you along.” “Out of love,” the saint humbly pleaded; “for I have no money with me.” “Then I have no ship for you,” came the mocking reply. “Out of love,” was Francis’ answer, “forgive me if I go away.” He walked about a stone’s throw to the shore, knelt down, and blessed the sea. Then, to the sailor’s great surprise, the saint suddenly stood up, stepped out on the tossing waves, and with firm foot trod over the surging sea. St. Francis of Paola stood high in the esteem of the French king, Louis XI, whom he helped prepare for death.
— The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch
Patron: Against fire; boatmen; Calabria, Italy (named by Pope John XXIII in 1963); mariners; naval officers; plague epidemics; sailors; sterility; travellers; watermen.
Symbols: Man with the word “charitas” levitated above a crowd; man holding a skull and scourge; man sailing on his cloak.
Daily Readings for: April 02, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, exaltation of the lowly, who raised Saint Francis of Paola to the glory of your Saints, grant, we pray, that by his merits and example we may happily attain the rewards promised to the humble. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Pasta with Sardines & Fennel
ACTIVITIES
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Turn to the Lord with a Pure Heart
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fourth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 4 April Devotion: The Blessed Sacrament Prayer to St. Francis of Paola
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 3rd
Wednesday of the Fourth Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Richard of Chichester, bishop (Hist)
“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life (Jn 8:12).” Like the forty days’ fast of the Ninevites, our Lent continues in complete confidence in divine mercy; but our hope is founded not so much on our poor efforts at penance but on the passion of our Savior. No one is excluded from the redemption effected by the Blood of Christ; His grace is promised to all who believe in Him. Historically today is the feast of St. Richard of Chichester also known as Richard de Wych, a saint canonized 1262 who was Bishop of Chichester.
Meditation What do we do for the salvation of souls? It is true that we pray for one another, offer a few words of comfort, and do each other slight favors; but we do little more. Christ was more generous. He endured the crowning of thorns and dragged the heavy cross to Calvary. We pamper our bodies as if they were our last end. We prefer to have our heads crowned with laurels and roses. We are impatient and consider ourselves unfortunate whenever we are called on to carry a mere splinter of the cross of Christ. Are we one in spirit with Him? Now, during Passiontide, we must begin to love and treasure pain and suffering. In the cross, in suffering, in our crucifixion with Christ, we shall find salvation. For Him and with Him we should bear all the slight injustices committed against us. For Him we should suffer freely and willingly the unpleasant and disagreeable things that occur to us. But our faith is weak. We flee from the cross instead of holding it dear, instead of loving it and welcoming it as our Savior did.
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What St. Paul says of many Christians of his day is equally true of many in our time: “For many walk, of whom I have told you often (and now tell you weeping) that they are enemies of the cross of Christ. Whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things” (Phil. 3:18 f.).
Excerpted from The Light of the World by Benedict Baur, O.S.B.
St. Richard of Chichester St Richard was born at the manor of Wiche, famous for its salt wells, four miles from Worcester, being second son to Richard and Alice de Wiche. In order to keep faithfully his baptismal vows, he from his infancy always manifested the utmost dislike to frivalous diversions, and ever held in the highest contempt all worldly pomp: instead of which his attention was wholly employed in establishing for himself a solid foundation of virtue and learning. Every opportunity of serving others he regarded as his happiness and gain. The unfortunate situation of his eldest brother’s affairs gave him an occasion of exercising his benevolent disposition. Richard condescended to become his brother’s servant, undertook the management of his farms, and by his industry and generosity effectually retrieved his brother’s previously distressed circumstances. Having completed this good work, he resumed at Paris those studies he had begun at Oxford, leading with two select companions a life of piety and mortification, generally contenting himself with coarse bread and simple water for his diet; except that on Sundays and on particular festivals he would, in condescendence to some visitors, allow himself a little meat or fish. Upon his return to England, he proceeded master of arts at Oxford, from whence he went to Bologna, in Italy, where he applied himself to the study of canon law, and was appointed public professor of that science. After having taught there a short time, he returned to Oxford, and, on account of his merit, was soon promoted to the dignity of chancellor in that university. St. Edmund, archbishop of Canterbury, having the happiness of gaining him for his diocese, appointed him his chancellor, and intrusted him with the chief direction of his archbishopric; and Richard was the faithful imitator of his patron’s piety and devotions. The principal use he made of his revenues was to employ them to charitable purposes, nor would he on any terms be prevailed on to accept the least present in the execution of his office as ecclesiastical judge.
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He accompanied his holy prelate in his banishment into France, and after his blessed death at Pontigni, retired into a convent of Dominican friars in Orleans. Having in that solitude employed his time in improving himself in theological studies, and received the order of priesthood, he returned to England to serve a private curacy, in the diocess of Canterbury. Boniface, who had succeeded St. Edmund in that metropolitan see, compelled him to resume his office of chancellor with the care of his whole diocese. Ralph Nevil, bishop of Chichester, dying in 1244, King Henry III recommended to that see an unworthy court favourite, called Robert Passelew: the archbishop and other prelates declared the person not qualified, and the presentation void, and preferred Richard de Wiche to that dignity. He was consecrated in 1245. But the king seized his temporalities, and the saint suffered many hardships and persecutions from him and his officers, during two years, till his majesty granted him a repreieve upon which he recovered his revenues, but much impaired. Afterwards having pleaded his cause at Rome before Pope Innocent IV against the king’s deputies, and obtained a sentence confirming his election, he had permitted no persecution, fatigue, or difficulty to excuse him to himself for the omission of any part of his duty to his flock: so now, the chief obstacles being removed, he redoubled his fervour and attention. He in person visited the sick, buried the dead, and sought out and relieved the poor. When his steward complained that his alms exceeded his income: “then,” said he, “sell my plate and my horse.” Having suffered a great loss by fire, instead of being more sparing in his charities, he said, “Perhaps God sent us this loss to punish our covetousness;” and ordered upon the spot more abundant alms to be given than usual. Such was the ardour of his devotion, that he lived as it were in the perpetual contemplation of heavenly things. He preached the word of God to his flock with that unction and success, which only an eminent spirit of prayer could produce. The affronts which he received, he always repaid with favours, and enmity with singular marks of charity. In maintaining discipline he was inflexible, especially in chastising crimes in the clergy: no intercession of the king, archbishop, and several other prelates could prevail with him to mitigate the punishment of a priest who had sinned against chastity. Yet
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 153 penitent sinners he received with inexpressible tenderness and charity. Whilst he was employed in preaching a holy war against the Saracens, being commissioned thereto by the pope, he fell sick of a fever, foretold his own death, and prepared himself for it by the most melting ejaculations of divine love and thanksgiving. He died in an hospital at Dover, called God’s House, on the 3rd of April, in the year of our Lord 1253, of his episcopal dignity the ninth, of his age the fifty-sixth. His body was conveyed to Chichester, and interred before the altar which he himself had consecrated in his cathedral to the memory of St. Edmund. It was removed to a more honourable place in 1276, on the 16th of June, on which day our ancestors commemorated his translation. The fame of miraculous cures of paralytic and other distempers, and of three persons raised to life at his tomb, moved the pope to appoint commissaries to inquire into the truth of these reports, before whom many of these miracles were authentically proved upon the spot; and the saint was solemnly canonized by Urban IV. in 1262.
Excerpted from The Lives of the Saints by Alban Butler (1866)
The Station, at Rome, is in the church of St. Chrysogonus, one of the most celebrated martyrs of the Church of Rome. His name is inserted in the Canon of the Mass. The church was probably built in the 4th century under Pope Sylvester I.
Daily Readings for: April 03, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who reward the merits of the just and offer pardon to sinners who do penance, have mercy, we pray, on those who call upon you, that the admission of our guilt may serve to obtain your pardon for our sins. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
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Minestrone
ACTIVITIES
The Kaleidoscope of Lent
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 1 April Devotion: The Blessed Sacrament St. Richard of Chichester Deathbed Prayer
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 4th
Optional Memorial of St. Isidore, bishop and doctor Old Calendar: St. Isidore
St. Isidore, who succeeded his brother St. Leander as Archbishop of Seville, was one of the great bishops of the seventh century. He was proficient in all brances of knowledge and was regarded as one of the most learned men of his time; with Cassiodorus and Boethius he was one of the thinkers whose writings were most studied in the Middle Ages, St. Isidore died in 636. Pope Innocent XIII canonized him in 1722 and proclaimed him a Doctor of the Church.
St. Isidore of Seville Isidore, archbishop of Seville and brother of the saintly Bishop Leander, ranks as the most outstanding person in the Church of Spain during the seventh century. Because of the singular holiness of his life, he was idolized by the people. Wherever he appeared, throngs gathered about him. “Some came to see the miracles that he performed in the name of the Lord. The sick came to be freed from their sufferings, for the power of God emanated from him and he would heal them all” (Bollandists: April 1, 340). He is regarded as the great restorer of the Spanish Church after the Visigoths returned to the Catholic faith. He also contributed greatly to the development of Spain’s liturgy. He presided over the fourth provincial council of Toledo (633), the most important in Spanish history. Rich in merit, he died in 636 after ruling his see 40 years. St. Gregory the Great was one of his personal friends.
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Excerpted from The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch.
Patron: Computer technicians; computer users; computers; the Internet; schoolchildren; students.
Symbols: Bees; bishop holding a pen while surrounded by a swarm of bees; bishop standing near a beehive; old bishop with a prince at his feet; pen; priest or bishop with pen and book; with Saint Leander, Saint Fulgentius, and Saint Florentina; with his Etymologia.
Things to Do:
Read more about St. Isidore in the Catholic Encyclopedia For those who speak or read Latin and are fascinated by words you might take a look at The Etymologies From the Catholic Culture library you may also want to read what Pope Benedict XVI has to say about St. Isidore.
Daily Readings for: April 04, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Graciously hear the prayers, O Lord, which we make in commemoration of Saint Isidore, that your Church may be aided by his intercession, just as she has been instructed by his heavenly teaching. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Paella I Paella II
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ACTIVITIES
How Sanctity Does Not Come Easily
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 1 April Devotion: The Blessed Sacrament
LIBRARY
Church and Internet | Pontifical Council for Social Communications Deus ex Machina: How to Think About Technology | Archbishop Charles J. Chaput O.F.M. Cap. Ethics in Internet | Pontifical Council for Social Communications Spread Christian Values Through the Media | Pope John Paul II Statement on the Information Highway by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops | Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops Using the Internet in Religious Instruction | Ronald M. Vierling
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Lent: April 5th
Optional Memorial of St. Vincent Ferrer, priest Old Calendar: St. Vincent Ferrer, confessor
St. Vincent Ferrer (1350-1419) was born in Valencia, Spain, and died in Vannes, Britany. He was a great scholar and became Master of Theology — he knew the entire Bible by heart. He was also a great preacher, preaching throughout Europe. Jews, infidels and heretics were converted by his sermons on the true faith. The most obdurate sinners embraced a life of holiness. The favorite topic of his sermons was the final judgment. He repeated over and over the words of the prophet, “Arise, ye dead, and come to the judgment.” He is often called the “Angel of the Judgment.” A renowned wonder-worker, St. Vincent cured the sick, the blind and the lame.
Vincent Ferrer St. Vincent Ferrer’s father was an Englishman, who had been knighted at the siege of the city. On February 5th, 1367, having completed his studies in philosophy, he became a Dominican. He was moved to Barcelona in the next year, and in 1370 became lecturer in philosophy at the Dominican house in Lerida. In 1373, when he returned to Barcelona to the ‘Studium Arabicum et Hebraicum’, he was already a famous public preacher. In 1377 he was sent to Toulouse for further study; there he attracted the attention of the Legate of the future Avignon antipope, Cardinal Pedro de Luna, whose suite he joined, being himself a strong advocate of the claims of the Avignon popes as against those of Rome. He preached a great deal, particularly to Jews and Moors, and converted a rabbi of Valladolid, who, later became Bishop Paul of Burgos, and associated with St. Vincent in his strenuous and successful attempts to convert the Jews of Spain. Disillusioned in his attempts to heal the schism
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 159 between Rome and Avignon, St. Vincent saw a vision of our Lord standing between St. Dominic and St. Francis, commissioning him directly to go about preaching penance. He was released by Benedict XIII in November 1399 to do this, and continued his preaching and wandering throughout western Europe until his death, being followed by a crowd of penitents and flagellants which varied from 300 to 10,000. He was in Aragon when the throne became vacant and with his brother, Boniface, a Carthusian, was instrumental in choosing Ferdinand of Castille as prince. In 1416 he withdrew his own allegiance and that of the kingdom of Aragon from Benedict XIII, because the Avignon antipope had made no serious attempt to heal the schism and had refused the request made by the council of Constance that he should resign in order to make possible a new and undisputed election to the papacy. St. Vincent’s decision had the effect of deposing Benedict and of making possible an end to the schism. St. Vincent died on April 5th, 1419, at Vannes in Brittany, where his relics are venerated. He was canonized by Pope Calixtus II in 1455.
Excerpted from The Saints edited by John Coulson
Patron: Brick makers, builders construction workers, pavement workers, plumbers, tile makers.
Symbols: Dominican holding an open book while preaching; Dominican with a cardinal’s hat; Dominican with wings; cardinal’s hat; pulpit; trumpet; Dominican with a crucifix; Dominican preacher with a flame on his head; flame; Dominican preacher with a flame on his hand.
Things to Do:
St. Vincent reduces the rules of perfection to avoiding three things: first, the exterior distraction of superfluous activities; secondly, all interior secret elation of heart; and thirdly, all immoderate attachment to created things. Also to the practicing of three things: first, the sincere desire of contempt and abjection; secondly, the most affective devotion to Christ crucified; and thirdly, patience in
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bearing all things for the love of Christ. Examine your own life and consider how well you embrace the desire for perfection. Read St. Vincent’s Treatise on the Spiritual Life.
Daily Readings for: April 05, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who raised up the Priest Saint Vincent Ferrer to minister by the preaching of the Gospel, grant, we pray, that, when the Judge comes, whom Saint Vincent proclaimed on earth, we may be among those blessed to behold him reigning in heaven. Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Jiffy On-Fire Dessert Snowballs on Fire
ACTIVITIES
Lenten Prayer Pot
PRAYERS
Litany of Dominican Saints and Blesseds Novena to St. Vincent Ferrer
LIBRARY
St. Vincent Ferrer and the Divided Papacy | Fr. Michael Keating
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Lent: April 6th
Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Juliana of Cornillon
Historically today is the feast of Saint Juliana of Cornillon, also known as Juliana of Liege, who was a medieval Norbertine canoness regular and mystic in what is now Belgium. She has long been recognized as the promoter of the Feast of Corpus Christi.
St. Juliana of Cornillon St. Juliana is little known but the Church is deeply indebted to her, not only because of the holiness of her life but also because, with her great fervour, she contributed to the institution of one of the most important solemn Liturgies of the year: Corpus Christi. She is St Juliana de Cornillon, also known as St Juliana of Liège. We know several facts about her life, mainly from a Biography that was probably written by a contemporary cleric; it is a collection of various testimonies of people who were directly acquainted with the Saint. Juliana was born near Liège, Belgium between 1191 and 1192. It is important to emphasize this place because at that time the Diocese of Liège was, so to speak, a true “Eucharistic Upper Room”. Before Juliana, eminent theologians had illustrated the supreme value of the Sacrament of the Eucharist and, again in Liège, there were groups of women generously dedicated to Eucharistic worship and to fervent communion.
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Guided by exemplary priests, they lived together, devoting themselves to prayer and to charitable works. Orphaned at the age of five, Juliana, together with her sister Agnes, was entrusted to the care of the Augustinian nuns at the convent and leprosarium of Mont-Cornillon. She was taught mainly by a sister called “Sapienza” [wisdom], who was in charge of her spiritual development to the time Juliana received the religious habit and thus became an Augustinian nun. She became so learned that she could read the words of the Church Fathers, of St Augustine and St Bernard in particular, in Latin. In addition to a keen intelligence, Juliana showed a special propensity for contemplation from the outset. She had a profound sense of Christ’s presence, which she experienced by living the Sacrament of the Eucharist especially intensely and by pausing frequently to meditate upon Jesus’ words: “And lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age” (Mt 28:20). When Juliana was 16 she had her first vision which recurred subsequently several times during her Eucharistic adoration. Her vision presented the moon in its full splendour, crossed diametrically by a dark stripe. The Lord made her understand the meaning of what had appeared to her. The moon symbolized the life of the Church on earth, the opaque line, on the other hand, represented the absence of a liturgical feast for whose institution Juliana was asked to plead effectively: namely, a feast in which believers would be able to adore the Eucharist so as to increase in faith, to advance in the practice of the virtues and to make reparation for offences to the Most Holy Sacrament. Juliana, who in the meantime had become Prioress of the convent, kept this revelation that had filled her heart with joy a secret for about 20 years. She then confided it to two other fervent adorers of the Eucharist, Blessed Eva, who lived as a hermit, and Isabella, who had joined her at the Monastery of Mont-Cornillon. The three women established a sort of “spiritual alliance” for the purpose of glorifying the Most Holy Sacrament. They also chose to involve a highly regarded Priest, John of Lausanne, who was a
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 164 canon of the Church of St Martin in Liège. They asked him to consult theologians and clerics on what was important to them. Their affirmative response was encouraging. What happened to Juliana of Cornillon occurs frequently in the lives of Saints. To have confirmation that an inspiration comes from God it is always necessary to be immersed in prayer to wait patiently, to seek friendship and exchanges with other good souls and to submit all things to the judgement of the Pastors of the Church. It was in fact Bishop Robert Torote, Liège who, after initial hesitation, accepted the proposal of Juliana and her companions and first introduced the Solemnity of Corpus Christi in his diocese. Later other Bishops following his example instituted this Feast in the territories entrusted to their pastoral care. However, to increase their faith the Lord often asks Saints to sustain trials. This also happened to Juliana who had to bear the harsh opposition of certain members of the clergy and even of the superior on whom her monastery depended. Of her own free will, therefore, Juliana left the Convent of Mont-Cornillon with several companions. For 10 years — from 1248 to 1258 — she stayed as a guest at various monasteries of Cistercian sisters. She edified all with her humility, she had no words of criticism or reproach for her adversaries and continued zealously to spread Eucharistic worship. She died at Fosses-La-Ville, Belgium, in 1258. In the cell where she lay the Blessed Sacrament was exposed and, according to her biographer’s account, Juliana died contemplating with a last effusion to love Jesus in the Eucharist whom she had always loved, honoured and adored. Jacques Pantaléon of Troyes was also won over to the good cause of the Feast of Corpus Christi during his ministry as Archdeacon in Lièges. It was he who, having become Pope with the name of Urban iv in 1264, instituted the Solemnity of Corpus Christi on the Thursday after Pentecost as a feast of precept for the universal Church.
Excerpted from Pope Benedict XVI BENEDICT XVI General Audience of November 17, 2010
The Station at Rome is in the church of St. Apollinaris, who was a disciple of St. Peter, and afterwards bishop of Ravenna. He was martyred. The church was founded in the early Middle Ages, probably in the 7th century.
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Daily Readings for: April 06, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: May the working of your mercy, O Lord, we pray, direct our hearts aright, for without your grace we cannot find favor in your sight. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Bohemian Rye Bread Leek Soup
ACTIVITIES
None
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 1 April Devotion: The Blessed Sacrament Novena to St. Bernadette
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org:
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Lent: April 7th
Fifth Sunday of Lent Old Calendar: Passion Sunday
“Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Jesus did not deny the Scribes and Pharisees the right to carry out this prescription of the Law, but he insisted on one condition, namely, that they have no sin on their consciences. When Jesus and the woman were left alone, he looked up and said, “Woman, where are they?” Ironically, the self-righteous observers of the Law, so eager to throw stones, could not measure up to the requirement that Jesus had laid down. Previously called “Passion Sunday”, this Sunday marks the beginning of Passiontide, a deeper time of Lent. This is the third Sunday of the scrutinies for the preparation of adult converts, and the final Sunday of Lent before the beginning of Holy Week. The Liturgy of the Word of this day speaks of re-creation, resurrection, and new life. The feast of St. John the Baptist de la Salle, which is ordinarily celebrated today, is superseded by the Sunday liturgy.
Sunday Readings The first reading is taken from the Book of the Prophet Isaiah, 43:16-21. Last week we heard of the conclusion of the exodus from Egypt; the first Passover celebration in the land of Canaan. This week we look forward to a new exodus that God promises through the prophet Isaiah. The new exodus promises to be far more wonderful than the first. God promises to restore His people after they have suffered in exile. The second reading is from the Letter of St. Paul to the Philippians, 3:8-14, and is a warning to the Philippians about false teachers; Judaizers who would try to hang on to
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 168 the old ways while at the same time claiming to be Christians. The Judaizers taught that in order to be a Christian, you first had to be a Jew: to be circumcised and to obey all 613 Old Covenant commandments. This question, whether or not Gentile converts to Christianity must first become full and legal Jews, prompted the Council of Jerusalem. The Gospel is from St. John, 8:1-11 and is about the woman caught in adultery. "The two of them were left on their own, the wretched woman and Mercy. But the Lord, having smitten them with the dart of injustice, does not even deign to watch them go but turns his gaze away from them and once more writes on the ground with his finger. But when the woman was left alone and they had all gone, he lifted up his eyes to the woman. We have already heard the voice of justice; let us now hear the voice of gentleness. I think that woman was the more terrified when she heard the Lord say, ‘Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her,’ … fearing now that she would be punished by him, in whom no sin could be found. But he, who had driven away her adversaries with the tongue of justice, now looking at her with the eyes of gentleness, asks her, ‘Has no one condemned you?’ She replies, ‘No one, Lord.’ And he says, ‘Neither do I condemn you; I who perhaps you feared would punish you, because in me you have found no sin.’ Lord, can it be that you favour sinners? Assuredly not. See what follows: ‘Go and sin no more.’ Therefore, the Lord also condemned sin, but not the woman’ (St Augustine, In Ioann. Evang., 33, 5-6). Jesus, who is the just One, does not condemn the woman; whereas these people are sinners, yet they pass sentence of death. God’s infinite mercy should move us always to have compassion on those who commit sins, because we ourselves are sinners and in need of God’s forgiveness. — The Navarre Bible - St. John
At Rome, the Station is in the basilica of St. Peter. The importance of this Sunday, which never yields to any feast no matter what its solemnity may be, requires that the place for the assembly of the faithful should be in one of the chief sanctuaries of the holy city.
Commentary for the Readings in the Extraordinary Form: Passion Sunday "They therefore took up stones to cast at
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"They therefore took up stones to cast at Him; but Jesus hid Himself and went out from the temple" (Gospel). The poor forlorn beggar (to the right in the picture), looking at the departing Christ, Whose shadow may still be seen, is a symbol of us beholding the veiled crucifix on the altar today. Christ voices His terrifying analysis of those who ignore His miracles, His sinlessness: “The reason why you do not hear is that you are not of God.” Aware how much He will endure from an unholy nation on the hill of Calvary (Introit), Jesus appeals to His Eternal Father, recalling how “they have fought against me from my youth” (Gradual). Yet for them, for us, He will shed His Precious Blood to cleanse (our) conscience from dead works to serve the living God" (Epistle). Excerpted from My Sunday Missal, Confraternity of the Precious Blood
Daily Readings for: April 07, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: By your help, we beseech you, Lord our God, may we walk eagerly in that same charity with which, out of love for the world, you Son handed himself over to death. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Classic Beans and Rice
ACTIVITIES
Carling or Passion Sunday Purple Shrouds
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PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (2nd Plan) Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (1st Plan)
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 8th
Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Julie Billiart, religious (Trad./ some places)
According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, in some places today is the feast of St. Julie Billiart, a French religious who founded, and was the first Superior General of, the Congregation of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur.
St. Julie Billiart Saint Julie was a woman completely immersed in God’s love and goodness, even in the midst of great suffering. She was a woman of vision who responded to the needs of the suffering world around her. Born in Cuvilly, France, on July 12, 1751, Julie lived a humble life in a loving family. She was a woman of serenity, despite the great personal suffering she endured. The Billiart family survived many hardships, including the deaths of several children. When Julie was 16, she went to work to help support her family. At the age of 23 she became paralyzed by the trauma of a shooting that was aimed at her father. She spent more than 20 years confined to her bed, unable to care for even her most basic needs. Besides her physical pain, Julie suffered religious persecution, lived in hiding as a refugee. Throughout her suffering, she steadfastly trusted in God’s goodness. At the age
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 172 refugee. Throughout her suffering, she steadfastly trusted in God’s goodness. At the age of 53, Julie and her very good friend, Françoise Blin de Bourdon, along with two other women, made their vows as Sisters of Notre Dame in Amiens, France. A variety of difficult circumstances caused her to move her congregation to Namur, Belgium, several years later. Today these sisters are known as the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur. Julie’s spirit and charism also influenced the Sisters of Notre Dame of Amersfoort, The Netherlands, as well as our own congregation of the Sisters of Notre Dame, which began in Coesfeld, Germany. Julie reached out to the poor and forgotten, she brought comfort and hope to those around her, she encouraged faith in the seeking and the lost. More than anything else, she was a witness to the deep, loving goodness of God. Her motto and mantra was: “Oh, how good God is!” In 1969 Julie was named a saint by the Catholic Church. The impact that Saint Julie had on the world continues through the life and ministry of the sisters who share in her heritage.
Excerpted from The Sisters of Notre Dame
Today’s Station takes place in the Church of St. John before the Latin Gate. This ancient basilica is built near the spot where the beloved disciple was, by Domitian’s order, plunged into the cauldron of boiling oil.
Daily Readings for: April 08, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, by whose wondrous grace we are enriched with every blessing, grant us so to pass from former ways to newness of life, that we may be made ready for the glory of the heavenly Kingdom. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
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Lenten Eggs Benedict
ACTIVITIES
Elementary Parent Pedagogy: Teaching by Example Preschool Parent Pedagogy: Teaching Obedience in Preschool Children
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent Lent Table Blessing 1 Novena to St. Bernadette
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 9th
Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent Old Calendar: St. Mary of Cleophas (Hist); St. Gaucherius (Hist)
Historically today is the feast of St. Mary of Clophas, Mother of St. James the Less and Joseph, wife of Cleophas (or Clopas or Alpheus). She was one of the “Three Marys” who served Jesus and was present at the Crucifixion , and accompanied Mary Magdalen to the tomb of Christ. Tradition reports that she went to Spain as a missionary. Mary reportedly died at Ciudad Rodrigo. Another tradition states that she went to France with St. Lazarus and his sisters. Also St. Gaucherius’ feast is historically celebrated today. He was also know as Walter, abbot-founder and friend of St. Stephen of Grandmont. He founded St. John’s Monastery at Aureilfor and a convent for women.
St. Mary of Clophas “And there were standing by the cross of Jesus His mother and His mother’s sister, Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalen.” How should we understand “His mother’s sister,” literally, as in having the same parents, or in the same sense that Jesus’s “brothers” are to be understood as close relatives? The short answer is that Mary of Cleophas is probably the Blessed Virgin’s sister-in-law. Mary of Cleophas may have had a previous husband named Alpheus, or this Alpheus may have been Cleophas. The Blessed Virgin Mary, of course, only had one husband (Joseph) and remained a virgin. The long answer may be found here.
St. Gaucherius Born in Meulan-sur-Seine to the northwest of Paris, he
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Born in Meulan-sur-Seine to the northwest of Paris, he received a classical education and became a priest. However he felt a deep longing for solitude and a life more radically centered on God. He thereupon devoted his life God as a hermit and began with his friend, Germond, to reside in the area of Limoges. Alone and forgotten by the world, Gaucherius and Germond grew in holiness. Their example attracted others who built hermitages near to theirs. Finally Gaucherius decided to build a monastery at Aureil and to establish two communities, one for men, the other for women, both under the rule of St. Augustine. The passage of an eremitical settlement into the canonical life was one of the principal ways through which the canons regular grew in the 11th and 12th Century. The community of Aureil is typical of these kinds of Ordo Novus canons regular. Thereafter he lived with his companions, being for all a model of sanctity. His companions and disciples include St. Lambert of Angouleme and St. Faucherus as well as the founder of Grandmont monastery, St. Stephen Muret. He died 80 years old in 1140 and was canonized in 1194. Excerted from the Canons Regular of St. Augustine
Daily Readings for: April 09, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Grant us, we pray, O Lord, perseverance in obeying your will, that in our days the people dedicated to your service may grow in both merit and number. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Basic French Bread French Pea Soup
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ACTIVITIES
Elementary Parent Pedagogy: ‘Copy Jesus’ for Love Preschool Parent Pedagogy: Lessons from Books
PRAYERS
Blessing of the Home with Easter Water Easter Season II Table Blessing 1 April Devotion: The Blessed Sacrament Easter Prayers Novena to St. Bernadette
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 10th
Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent Old Calendar: St Fulbert (Hist)
Historically today is the feast of St. Fulbert, Bisbop of Chartres, France, and a poet and scholar who aided the Cluniac Reform. Born in Italy circa 952 or 960, Fulbert studied at Rheims, France, under future Pope Sylvester II. In 1003 he returned to France, becoming the bishop of Chartres in 1007. Fulbert rebuilt the cathedral there when it burned down and defended monasticism and orthodoxy. His hymns, treatises, and letter have survived.
St. Fulbert Bishop, b. between 952 and 962; d. 10 April, 1028 or 1029. Mabillon and others think that he was born in Italy, probably at Rome; but Pfister, his latest biographer, designates as his birthplace the Diocese of Laudun in the present department of Gard in France. He was of humble parentage and received his education at the school of Reims, where he had as teacher the famous Gerbert who in 999 ascended the papal throne as Sylvester II. In 990 Fulbert opened a school at Chartres which soon became the most famous seat of learning in France and drew scholars not only from the remotest parts of France, but also from Italy, Germany, and England. Fulbert was also chancellor of the church of Chartres and treasurer of St. Hilary’s at Poitiers. So highly was he esteemed as a teacher that his pupils were wont to style him “venerable Socrates”. He was a strong opponent of the rationalistic tendencies which had infected some dialecticians of his times, and often warned his pupils against such as extol their dialectics above the teachings of the Church and the testimony of the Bible. Still it was one of Fulbert’s pupils, Berengarius of Tours, who went farthest in subjecting faith to reason. In 1007 Fulbert succeeded the deceased
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 178 who went farthest in subjecting faith to reason. In 1007 Fulbert succeeded the deceased Rudolph as Bishop of Chartres and was consecrated by his metropolitan, Archbishop Leutheric of Sens. He owed the episcopal dignity chiefly to the influence of King Robert of France, who had been his fellow student at Reims. As bishop he continued to teach in his school and also retained the treasurership of St. Hilary. When, about 1020, the cathedral of Chartres burned down, Fulbert at once began to rebuild it in greater splendour. In this undertaking he was financially assisted by King Canute of England, Duke William of Aquitaine, and other European sovereigns. Though Fulbert was neither abbot nor monk, as has been wrongly asserted by some historians, still he stood in friendly relation with Odilo of Cluny, Richard of St. Vannes, Abbo of Fleury, and other monastic celebrities of his times. He advocated a reform of the clergy, severely rebuked those bishops who spent much of their time in warlike expeditions, and inveighed against the practice of granting ecclesiastical benefices to laymen. Fulbert’s literary productions include 140 epistles, 2 treatises, 27 hymns, and parts of the ecclesiastical Office. His epistles are of great historical value, especially on account of the light they throw on the liturgy and discipline of the Church in the eleventh century. His two treatises are in the form of homilies. The first has as its subject: Misit Herodes rex manus, ut affligeret quosdam de ecclesia, etc. (Acts 12:50); the second is entitled “Tractatus contra Judaeos” and proves that the prophecy of Jacob, “Non auferetur sceptrumde Juda”, etc. (Genesis 49:10), had been fulfilled in Christ. Five of his nine extant sermons are on the blessed Virgin Mary towards whom he had a great devotion. The life of St. Aubert, bishop of Cambrai (d. 667), which is sometimes ascribed to Fulbert, was probably not written by him. Fulbert’s epistles were first edited by Papire le Masson (Paris, 1585). His complete works were edited by Charles de Villiers (Paris, 1608), then inserted in “Bibl. magna Patrum” (Cologne, 1618) XI, in “Bibl. maxima Patri.” (Lyons, 1677), XVIII, and with additions, in Migne, P.L., CXLI, 189-368.
Excerpted from The Catholic Encyclopedia
Daily Readings for: April 10, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Enlighten, O God of compassion, the hearts of your children, sanctified
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by penance, and in your kindness grant those you stir to a sense of devotion a gracious hearing when they cry out to you. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Chocolate Eclairs
ACTIVITIES
Homemade Prayer Book for Preschool Children
PRAYERS
Prayer for the Fifth Week of Lent April Devotion: The Blessed Sacrament Novena to St. Bernadette
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 11th
Memorial of St. Stanislaus, bishop & martyr Old Calendar: St. Leo I, pope and doctor
St. Stanislaus was the Bishop of Cracow, Poland. A champion of the liberty of the Church and of the dignity of man, he defended the lonely and the poor. When he reproached King Boleslaus II for his immoral life, the king himself killed him during Mass. He is the patron saint of Poland. According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, May 7, is the feast of St. Stanislaus. In Poland his feast is celebrated on May 8, which is the day he died. Also the feast of St. Leo the Great is today and in the Ordinary Form his memorial is celebrated on November 10.
St. Stanislaus of Cracow Stanislaus was born in 1030 and was educated at Gnesen and at Paris. After his ordination to the priesthood he was made a canon of the cathedral at Cracow as well as archdeacon and preacher. Upon the death of the bishop of Cracow, he was nominated bishop of the diocese by Pope Alexander II. The king at the time, Boleslaus II, trying to strengthen his own power, led an expedition against the grand duchy of Kiev, making himself very unpopular with the nobles of the country, who opposed his policies. St. Stanislaus of Cracow sided with the nobles, led by the king’s brother, Ladislaus, and this brought him into conflict with the king. Stanislaus had opposed the king before for his tyrannical ways and once confronted him boldly for
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 181 tyrannical ways and once confronted him boldly for his immoral behavior when Boleslaus had abducted the wife of a Polish nobleman and carried her off to his castle. No one seemed willing to face the king from a fear of his rage, but Stanislaus boldly went to the king and threatened excommunication if he did not change his ways. Furious, the king promised revenge on the bishop. Later, Stanislaus sided with the nobles in their opposition to the king’s political policies, and the king accused him of being a traitor and condemned him to death. At first the king commanded his soldiers to kill the bishop when he was celebrating Mass at St. Michael’s chapel in Cracow, but the soldiers refused, fearing to bring down upon themselves the wrath of God. Undeterred, the king himself entered the church, drew his sword, and killed the bishop, ordering his soldiers to dismember the body. Pope Gregory VII placed the country under interdict and Boleslaus fell from power, fleeing to Hungary, where he entered the monastery of Osiak to do penance for his crime. Stanislaus, canonized by Pope Innocent IV in 1253, is one of the patron saints of Poland. — The One Year Book of Saints by Rev. Clifford Stevens
Patron: Archdiocese of Cracow, Poland; Poland.
Symbols: Bishop being hacked to pieces at the foot of an altar.
Things to Do:
Sometimes evil has to be confronted boldly, whatever the consequences. Brave men like St. Stanislaus of Cracow risked death in facing evil. There is little chance today that we will ever be in that danger, but we must always be willing to defend the truth, and it should be very clear, in the face of genuine evil, where we stand. Christ our Lord can expect no less from us. Say an extra prayer today for the gift of fortitude. Learn a little more about the city of Kracow where both St. Stanislaus and Pope John Paul II came from. For those who are extremely interested in knowing more about Polish history this online book, Polish Americans and Their Communities of Cleveland may prove to be a good source of information. The final work of Franz Liszt is the unfinished oratorio St. Stanislaus, for which
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he left two scenes (one and four) and two polonaises. Learn more about this oratorio here and if you are able find a copy and listen.
Daily Readings for: April 11, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, for whose honor the Bishop Saint Stanislaus fell beneath the swords of his persecutors, grant we pray, that we may persevere strong in faith even until death. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Pierogi Polish Potato Pancakes IV
ACTIVITIES
Namedays What is a Nameday?
PRAYERS
Regina Coeli (Queen of Heaven) Easter Season II Table Blessing 3 Easter Prayers Novena to St. Bernadette
LIBRARY
Now Is the Time to Remember All These Martyrs and to Pay Them Due
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Now Is the Time to Remember All These Martyrs and to Pay Them Due Honour | Pope John Paul II Rutilans Agmen | Pope John Paul II We Give Praise and Thanks to God That the Gospel Seed Has Borne Abundant Fruit | Pope John Paul II
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Lent: April 12th
Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent Old Calendar: Julius I, pope (Hist)
Historically today is the feast of St. Julius, a Roman who was chosen Pope on the 6th of February in 337. He ruled the Church until 352 and received the appeal from St. Athanasius, whom he defended against his Arian accusers. The letter he wrote to the East on this occasion is one of the most momentous pronouncements of the Roman See. He built several churches in Rome and ranks as one of the most distinguished occupants of the Holy See.
St. Julius I With Pope St. Julius the Papacy finds at its doorstep the vexing problem of the Eastern Arians. It is true that the Council of Nicaea had condemned Arianism, but in spite of that Arians had been growing in strength and had even gained the ear of Constantine, and what was more crucial, that of his son Constantius who succeeded him in the East. The man who was compelled to face the problem was Julius, a Roman who had been chosen to succeed Mark after an unexplained interval of four months. He soon received delegates from Alexandria asking him to acknowledge a certain Pistus as bishop of Alexandria in place of Athanasius, the mighty fighter for orthodoxy. The delegates tried to prove that Athanasius, who actually had been the victim of Arian intrigue, had been validly deposed. Athanasius on his part also sent envoys and later
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 185 came to Rome in person to plead his case before the Pope. The Arians asked Julius to hold a synod to decide the case, but when in 341 Julius actually did convene it, they refused to attend. The Pope held it without them and over fifty bishops decreed that Athanasius had been unjustly condemned. Julius informed the Arians at Alexandria of this decision and let them know that he was displeased at their uncooperative attitude. The Emperor Constans, who ruled in the West, was favorable to the orthodox Christians while his brother Constantius, who ruled the East, was pro Arian. At this time both Emperors agreed to hold a big general council to see if religious unity could be achieved. Pope Julius approved of the plan and sent legates to Sardica, the modern Sofia, where the council gathered. The council did not achieve religious unity because the Arians, when they found themselves outnumbered, walked out. The council once again vindicated Athanasius and once more repeated the solemn Nicene Creed. It also left an interesting set of regulations on the manner in which appeals to the pope should be made. In spite of the repeated vindications of Athanasius, that good man was unable to return to his see. Emperor Constans supported the Arian George until the usurper died. Then and only then was the long-suffering Athanasius allowed to go home. Pope Julius, delighted, wrote a letter to the people of Alexandria, congratulating them on the return of their true bishop. At Rome the number of Christians continued to grow during the pontificate of Julius. He built two new basilicas and three cemetery churches. The stay of St. Athanasius at Rome helped to popularize Egyptian monasticism and gave an impetus to religious life there. Pope St. Julius died April 12, 352. He was buried in the Cemetery of Calepodius. His feast is kept on April 12.
Excerpted from Popes Through the Ages by Joseph Brusher
Daily Readings for: April 12, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Pardon the offenses of your peoples, we pray, O Lord, and in your goodness set us free from the bonds of the sins we have committed in our weakness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
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RECIPES
Pea Soup
ACTIVITIES
Miniature Mystical Body—Raising Children to Be Adults
PRAYERS
Regina Coeli (Queen of Heaven) Easter Season II Table Blessing 4 Easter Prayers Novena to St. Bernadette Easter Hymns and Music
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 13th
Optional Memorial of St. Martin I Old Calendar: St. Hermenegild, martyr
St. Martin was born in Todi, Italy. He was elected pope in 649 during the period of the last christological controversy. For his defense of Christ as true God and true man, he was exiled by the Byzantine emperor Constans II to Crimea where he died, broken by his sufferings. According to the 1962 Missal of St. John XXIII the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, today is the feast of St. Hermenegild, son of the king of the Visigoths in Spain, who married the daughter of the king of the Franks. Despite the opposition of his father, who was an Arian, he was converted to Catholicism. He was imprisoned and then was put to death. The feast of St. Martin I is celebrated on November 12.
St. Martin I The unfortunate victim of Constans’ wrath was the virtuous Martin. Born in Todi of noble birth, he had served as nuncio to Constantinople under Pope Theodore, gaining experience in dealing with the Byzantine court and familiarizing himself with the Monothelite teachings so prevalent in the East. Without waiting for the necessary imperial mandate, Martin proceeded with his consecration on July 5, 649. This independent act so enraged the emperor that he refused to acknowledge Martin as the legitimate pope. A staunch defender of the orthodox, Martin immediately convened a synod in the Lateran. Attended by 105 Western bishops, the synod studied all aspects of
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Lateran. Attended by 105 Western bishops, the synod studied all aspects of Monothelitism and the emperor’s Type. After nearly a month, the synod reached a conclusion. They determined that there were two wills in Christ, condemned the One Will heresy, and further condemned Constans’ Type for boldly prohibiting the truthful teachings of the apostles. In an effort to pacify the emperor, Martin acknowledged Constans’ good intentions in trying to unify the Church and placed the burden of responsibility on the poor advice of Constantinople’s patriarchs. Constans, far from appeased, was determined that his religious policies would not be ignored. Appointing his chamberlain Olympius as exarch to Italy, he dispatched him with the order to obtain the signatures of acceptance from all Italians without exception. Olympius proved to be a dismal failure, both in his mission and in an attempted assassination of the popular pope. The exarch prudently abandoned his post and fled to Sicily to fight the invading Muslims. In the summer of 653, the furious emperor appointed yet another exarch, Theodore Calliopas, with orders to escort the inflexible pontiff to Constantinople. Calliopas and his officers boldly entered the Lateran, arrested the bedridden Martin, and presented the clergy with Constans’ edict deposing the pope who had been consecrated illegally. The voyage, which took nearly three months, subjected the sickly pope to humiliation and abuse. Arriving in Constantinople, racked with dysentery and disabled by gout, Martin was placed in solitary confinement. On December 19, 653, Martin was brought to trial on trumped-up charges of treason and sacrilege. The pope, near death and realizing his position futile, could only laugh at the ridiculous accusations and beg the emperor to excuse the fumbling witnesses before they added perjury to false witness! Constans pronounced the predetermined verdict of guilty on the pontiff and sentenced him to public flogging and death. The disapproving crowd watched, horrified; and it was only by the dying Patriarch Paul’s intercession that Martin’s sentence of public execution was commuted to banishment. For nearly three months, the pope suffered under the worst conditions in a Byzantine prison before he was exiled to the Crimea. There, on September 16, 655, suffering from cold and starvation, Pope Martin gratefully met his God. Pious Martin had been disgraced in life but later became honored as a martyr. Today he is venerated as a saint; his feast is celebrated by both the Roman and Greek Churches on April 13. — The Popes: A Papal History, J.V. Bartlett
Symbols: Pope holding money; Pope with geese around him (possible confusion by artist with Martin of Tours); Pope in a prison cell.
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Things to Do:
Read another biography of St. Martin I. As head of the Church, St. Martin condemned false doctrine and thereby brought upon himself the wrath of the Emperor. He would not yield a hairbreadth from the way of truth, even when such a stand entailed suffering, imprisonment, exile, death. Here is a model for fidelity to one’s vocation. In every state of life there are opportunities for martyrdom. Spend some time considering your own life and examine whether or not you take the opportunities presented to witness to the truth. Pope Martin, fearing that the truth about Christ would not be taught, called a council at the Lateran. Learn more about monothelitism and monothelites.
St. Hermenegild Leovigild, Arian King of the Visigoths, had two sons, Hermenegild and Recared, who were reigning conjointly with him. All were Arians, but Hermenegild married a zealous Catholic, the daughter of Sigebert, King of France, and by her holy example was converted to the faith. His father, on hearing the news, denounced him as a traitor, and marched to seize his person. Hermenegild tried to rally the Catholics of Spain in his defense, but they were too weak to make any stand; and after a two years’ fruitless struggle, Hermenegild surrendered on the assurance of a free pardon. Once he was safely in the royal camp, the king had him loaded with fetters and cast into a foul dungeon at Seville. Tortures and bribes were in turn employed to shake his faith, but Hermenegild wrote to his father that he regarded the crown as nothing, and preferred to lose scepter and life rather than betray the truth of God. At length, on Easter night, an Arian bishop entered his cell, and promised him his father’s pardon if he would receive Communion from his hands. Hermenegild indignantly rejected the offer, and knelt with joy for his death-stroke, praying for his persecutors. The same night a light streaming from his cell
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 190 told the Christians keeping vigil nearby that the martyr had won his crown and was celebrating the Resurrection of the Lord with the Saints in glory. King Leovigild, on his death-bed, was changed interiorly. He had been witness to the miracles that had occurred after his son’s cruel death, and he told his son and successor Recared to seek out Saint Leander, whom he himself had persecuted. Recared should follow Hermenegild’s example, said the king, and be received by the bishop into the Church. Recared did so; and although his father himself had not had the courage to renounce the false faith publicly, after his father’s death the new king labored so earnestly for the extirpation of Arianism that he brought over the whole nation of the Visigoths to the Church. “Nor is it to be wondered,” says Saint Gregory, “that he came thus to be a preacher of the true faith, since he was the brother of a martyr, whose merits helped him to bring so many into the haven of God’s Church.” — Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints
Patron: Converts.
Symbols: Young prince in armour being borne to heaven while contemplating the crucifix while around him angels carry an axe; chains; royal regalia; a palm; and a rose wreath and heretical bishops and king stand below him; prince with an axe.
Things to Do:
Learn more about Spain under the Visigoths.
Daily Readings for: April 13, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Grant, almighty God that we may withstand the trials of this world with invincible firmness of purpose, just as you did not allow your Martyr Pope Saint Martin the First to be daunted by threats or broken by suffering. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
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RECIPES
Spanish Casserole
ACTIVITIES
Namedays What is a Nameday?
PRAYERS
Regina Coeli (Queen of Heaven) Easter Season II Table Blessing 2 Easter Prayers Novena to St. Bernadette Collect for Feast of St. Hermenegild
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 14th
Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion Old Calendar: Palm Sunday
So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!” And Jesus found a young ass and sat upon it; as it is written, “Fear not, daughter of Zion; behold, your king is coming, sitting on an ass’s colt (Jn 12:13-15)!” Today we commemorate Christ’s entry into Jerusalem for the completion of the Paschal Mystery. In the old calendar before Vatican II, the Church celebrated Passion Sunday two Sundays before Easter, and then Palm Sunday was the beginning of Holy Week. The Church has combined the two to reinforce the solemnity of Holy Week. The Palm Sunday procession is formed of Christians who, in the “fullness of faith,” make their own the gesture of the Jews and endow it with its full significance. Following the Jews’ example we proclaim Christ as a Victor… Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord. But by our faith we know, as they did not, all that His triumph stands for. He is the Messiah, the Son of David and the Son of God. He is the sign of contradiction, acclaimed by some and reviled by others. Sent into this world to wrest us from sin and the power of Satan, He underwent His Passion, the punishment for our sins, but issues forth triumphant from the tomb, the victor over death, making our peace with God and taking us with Him into the kingdom of His Father in heaven.
Liturgy for Palm Sunday The priests and deacons wear red vestments for Mass. There is a special entrance at the beginning of each
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Mass, either simple or solemn. This includes a blessing of the palms and the gospel reading of the entrance into Jerusalem (Matt 21:1-11; Mark 11:1-10; John 12:12-16; Luke 19:28-40). The introduction by the priest explains the solemnity of Holy Week, and invites the faithful to take full part in the celebration:
Dear friends in Christ, for five weeks of Lent we have been preparing, by works of charity and self-sacrifice, for the celebration of our Lord’s paschal mystery. Today we come together to begin this solemn celebration in union with the whole Church throughout the world. Christ entered in triumph into his own city, to complete his work as our Messiah: to suffer, to die, and to rise again. Let us remember with devotion this entry which began his saving work and follow him with a lively faith. United with him in his suffering on the cross, may we share his resurrection and new life.
The palms are blessed with the following prayer:
Almighty God, we pray you bless these branches and make them holy. Today we joyfully acclaim Jesus our Messiah and King. May we reach one day the happiness of the new and everlasting Jerusalem by faithfully following him who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.
As the faithful, we remember and dramatize Christ’s triumphal entrance into Jerusalem on a donkey. In Jesus’ time, a huge crowd assembled, put their cloaks or branches on the ground, and waved palm branches, acclaiming Christ as the King of Israel, the Son of David. We now wave our palm branches and sing as the priest enters the church:
Hosanna to the Son of David, the King of Israel. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.
These words of praise are echoed every day at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass at the Sanctus (Holy, Holy). Our joy is quickly subdued. We are jolted to reality and see the purpose of Christ coming to Jerusalem by the reading of the Passion at the Gospel. (Written by Jennifer Gregory Miller)
Things to Do:
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Things to Do:
The palms distributed at Mass are blessed, so are sacramentals. Read Blessed Palms in the Home. Read Pope Francis’ Homily for Palm Sunday 2014. Also read the History of Palm Sunday by Fr. Francis X. Weiser This is also known as “Carling Sunday” after carling peas. Peas porridge would be an appropriate dish for today. See recipes for suggestions and history behind this tradition. This is also known as “Fig Sunday” due to the tradition that Christ ate figs after his entry into Jerusalem. Adding some type of figs to your meal would be a nice touch. Read the short passages from Directory on Popular Piety concerning Holy Week and Palm Sunday.
The Station at Rome is in the church of St. John Lateran which represents the Holy City Jerusalem which Christ and we, His disciples, have just entered. It is the first cathedral of Rome, where Emperor Constantine allowed the Pope to set up the episcopal chair after 312.
Commentary for the Readings in the Extraordinary Form: Palm Sunday We carry palm branches as a tribute of waving joy, before Christ, victorious over death; also as a symbol of our wavering fickleness, betraying Christ unto His Death. Jesus is our “example;” let us never lose sight of the eternal joy of “sharing in His Resurrection,” when with Him we now “suffer on a cross” (Prayer).
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In glorious language we read how the Son of God became the “slave” of man; how “He humbled Himself” and is now our pledge “in the glory of God the Father” (Epistle). Even as Christ adhered to the Father, so must we, despite the seeming “prosperity of the sinner” (Gradual). The “long Gospel”enables us, as it were, to be eyewitnesses of Christ’s Passion and Death, revealing His love “unto the end” (indicated by Calvary in background).
Excerpted from My Sunday Missal, Confraternity of the Precious Blood
Daily Readings for: April 14, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Almighty ever-living God, who as an example of humility for the human race to follow caused our Savior to take flesh and submit to the Cross, graciously grant that we may heed his lesson of patient suffering and so merit a share in his Resurrection. Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Almond Milk Almond Milk Frumenty Fig Pudding Fig Swirl Frumenty Pea Soup Pease Porridge Yellow Split Pea Soup
ACTIVITIES
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A Jonas (Jonah) Project Blessed Palms in the Home Carling or Passion Sunday Fun Pretzel Project Holy Week in the Catholic Tradition Hymn: Gloria Laus et Honor (All Glory, Laud and Honor) Jonas and Holy Week Lent Hymn: O Head All Scarred and Bleeding Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart! Lenten Customs of the Russian Germans Music for Lent and Easter: St. Matthew Passion by Bach Palm Sunday and Holy Week in the Home Palm Sunday Festivities Palm Sunday Procession in the Home Palm Sunday Procession with the Family Palms and Ashes Purple Shrouds Reflections on Palm Sunday Shrouding of Statues and Crucifixes Traditions related to Palm Sunday
PRAYERS
Prayer Before a Crucifix Prayer for Palm Sunday and Holy Week Sacrifice Beads Way of the Cross To Keep A True Lent
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Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Lent (1st Plan)
LIBRARY
From Palm Branches to the Wood of the Cross | Fr. Roger J. Landry Hymn for Palm Sunday | Bishop Theodulf Palm Sundays | Dom H. Philibert Feasey O.S.B. We hail you, O Cross of Christ! | Pope John Paul II
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Lent: April 15th
Monday of Holy Week Old Calendar: Monday of Holy Week
“Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom my soul delights. I have endowed him with my spirit that he may bring true justice to the nations. He does not cry out or shout aloud, or make his voice heard in the streets. He does not break the crushed reed, nor quench the wavering flame (Is 42:1-2).”
Meditation - Mary and Judas Today the liturgy presents two noteworthy characters who play dissimilar roles in the Lord’s passion. One fills us with solace and comfort; the other with uneasiness and wholesome fear. Their juxtaposition produces a powerful effect by way of contrast. The two characters are Mary of Bethany and Judas. Jesus is in the house of Lazarus, at dinner. Mary approaches, anoints the feet of her Savior for His burial and dries them with her hair. Judas resents her action and resolves upon his evil course. These two persons typify man’s relation to Christ. He gives His Body to two types of individuals: to Magdalenes to be anointed, to Judases to be kissed; to good persons who repay Him with love and service, to foes who crucify Him. How movingly this is expressed in the Lesson: “I gave My body to those who beat Me, and My cheeks to those who plucked them. I did not turn away My face from those who cursed and spit upon Me.” The same must hold true of His mystical Body. Down through the ages Christ is
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 199 enduring an endless round of suffering, giving His body to other Marys for anointing and to other Judases to be kissed, beaten, and mistreated. Augustine explains how we can anoint Christ’s body:
Anoint Jesus’ feet by a life pleasing to God. Follow in His footsteps; if you have an abundance, give it to the poor. In this way you can wipe the feet of the Lord.
The poor are, as it were, the feet of the mystical Christ. By aiding them we can comfort our Lord in His mystical life, where He receives Judas’ kisses on all sides-the sins of Christians. The Gospel account may be understood in a very personal way. In everyone’s heart, in my own too, there dwell two souls: a Judas-soul and a Mary-soul. The former is the cause of Jesus’ suffering, it is always ready to apostatize, always ready to give the traitor’s kiss. Are you full master over this Judas-soul within you? Your Magdalen-soul is a source of comfort to Christ in His sufferings. May the holy season of Lent, which with God’s help we are about to bring to a successful conclusion, bring victory over the Judas-soul and strengthen the Magdalen-soul within our breasts.
Excerpted from The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch
The Station today is at the church of St. Praxedes which was built over St. Praxedes’ house. It was one of the twenty-five original parishes in Rome. It is easily one of the most beautiful churches in the Eternal City and is bedecked with incredibly beautiful mosaics. The present church is the one built by Pope Adrian I c. 780, completed and altered by Pope St. Paschal I c. 822. It was enlarged at that time mainly to serve as a repository for relics from the catacombs.
Daily Readings for: April 15, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Grant, we pray, almighty God, that, though in our weakness we fail, we
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may be revived through the Passion of your Only Begotten Son. Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Holy Thursday Meal Menu
ACTIVITIES
A Jonas (Jonah) Project Holy Week in the Catholic Tradition Housecleaning for Holy Week I Housecleaning for Holy Week II Jonas and Holy Week Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart! Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of Holy Week in the Home Music for Lent and Easter: St. Matthew Passion by Bach Spring Cleaning The Passover Meal: 1. Introduction
PRAYERS
Prayer for Monday of Holy Week Prayer Before a Crucifix Prayer for Palm Sunday and Holy Week Way of the Cross To Keep A True Lent Family Evening Prayer for Holy Week
LIBRARY
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None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-04-15
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Lent: April 16th
Tuesday of Holy Week Old Calendar: Tuesday of Holy Week
Like the Pharisees we are quick to condemn the faults of others, often as a means of justifying ourselves. We cannot expect Christ to approve self-righteous indignation at our neighbor’s weakness. He gives us the example of prudent silence and the incontrovertible principle: “He that is without sin … let him first cast a stone.” In the face of these words and the consciousness of our own sinfulness, do we dare to condemn another? We have need to remember that only God can read the heart of man and that He alone can judge the guilt or merit of an action.
Meditation Today, again, our Savior sets out in the morning for Jerusalem. His intention is to repair to the temple, and continue His yesterday’s teachings. It is evident that His mission on earth is fast drawing to its close. He says to His disciples: “You know that after two days shall be the Pasch, and the Son of Man shall be delivered up to be crucified.” On the road from Bethania to Jerusalem, the disciples are surprised at seeing the fig-tree, which their divine Master had yesterday cursed, now dead. Addressing himself to Jesus, Peter says: “Rabbi, behold, the fig-tree, which Thou didst curse, is withered away.” In order to teach us that the whole of material nature is subservient to the will of God, Jesus replies: “Have the faith of God. Amen I say to you, that whosoever shall say to this mountain: Be thou removed and cast into the sea! and shall not stagger in his heart, but believe that whatsoever he saith shall be done, it shall be done unto him.” Having entered the city, Jesus directs His steps towards the temple. No sooner has He entered, than the chief priests, the scribes, and the ancients of the people, accost Him
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 203 with these words: “By what authority dost Thou do these things and who has given Thee this authority, that Thou shouldst do these things?” We shall find our Lord’s answer given in the Gospel. Our object is to mention the leading events of the last days of our Redeemer on earth; the holy volume will supply the details. As on the two preceding days, Jesus leaves the city towards evening: He passes over Mount Olivet, and returns to Bethania, where He finds His blessed Mother and His devoted friends.
— The Liturgical Year, Abbot Gueranger O.S.B.
The Station today is at the church of St. Prisca. Saint Prisca was baptized by Saint Peter when she was thirteen. She was thrown to the lions by Claudius (41-54), but the lion only licked her feet. She was then beheaded. Her home was made into a church by Pope Saint Eutychianus (275-283), who placed her remains under the high altar. It was probably one of the first gathering places for Christians in Rome.
Daily Readings for: April 16, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Almighty ever-living God, grant us so to celebrate the mysteries of the Lord’s Passion that we may merit to receive your pardon. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Holy Thursday Meal Menu
ACTIVITIES
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A Jonas (Jonah) Project Holy Week in the Catholic Tradition Housecleaning for Holy Week I Housecleaning for Holy Week II Jonas and Holy Week Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart! Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of Holy Week in the Home Music for Lent and Easter: St. Matthew Passion by Bach Spring Cleaning The Passover Meal: 1. Introduction
PRAYERS
Prayer for Tuesday of Holy Week Prayer Before a Crucifix Prayer for Palm Sunday and Holy Week Way of the Cross To Keep A True Lent Family Evening Prayer for Holy Week
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-04-16
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Lent: April 17th
Wednesday of Holy Week Old Calendar: Wednesday of Holy Week
Wednesday is known as Spy Wednesday because on this day Judas made a bargain with the high priest to betray Jesus for 30 silver pieces (Matt 26:14-16; Mark 14:10-11; Luke 22:1-6). In Poland, the young people throw an effigy of Judas from the top of a church steeple. Then it is dragged through the village amidst hurling sticks and stones. What remains of the effigy is drowned in a nearby stream or pond. This is also the day that Jesus was anointed with an expensive jar of alabaster by the woman at Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper (Matt 26:6-13; Mark 14:3-9; John 12:1-19).
The Sacrament of Penance and the Easter Duty One of the duties of a Catholic is to fulfill the six Precepts of the Church, the positive laws which are “meant to guarantee to the faithful the indispensable minimum in the spirit of prayer and moral effort, in the growth in love of God and neighbor” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2041). Two of these precepts directly relate to the upcoming Easter season. The third precept is “You shall humbly receive your Creator in Holy Communion at least during the Easter season.” This is tied in with the second precept to “confess your sins at least once a year.” If we want to receive Jesus worthily in Holy Communion during Easter, we need to cleanse our souls, especially of any mortal sin through the Sacrament of Penance. Most parishes offer extra confession times for Holy Week, but usually any priest is available on request to hear confession by appointment.
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Meditation We are healed by His bruises! O heavenly Physician, who takes upon Himself the sufferings of those He comes to cure! But not only was He bruised for our sins, He was also slaughtered as a lamb; and this not merely as a Victim submitting to the inflexible will of His Father who hath laid upon Him the iniquity of us all, but (as the prophet here assures us) because it was His own will. His love for us, as well as His submission to His Father, led Him to the great Sacrifice. Observe, too, how He refuses to defend Himself before Pilate, who could so easily deliver Him from His enemies: He shall be dumb as a lamb before his shearers, and He shall not open His mouth. Let us love and adore this divine silence, which works our salvation. Let us not pass over an iota of the devotedness which Jesus shows us—a devotedness which never could have existed save in the heart of a God. Oh! how much He has loved us, His children, the purchase of His Blood, His seed, as the prophet here calls us. O holy Church! thou long-lived seed of Jesus, who laid down His life, thou art dear to Him, for He bought thee at a great price. Faithful souls! give Him love for love. Sinners! be converted to this your Savior; His Blood will restore you to life, for if we have all gone astray like sheep, remember what is added: The Lord hath laid upon Him the iniquity of us all. There is no sinner, however great may be his crimes, there is no heretic, or infidel, who has not his share in this precious Blood, whose infinite merit is such, that it could redeem a million worlds more guilty even than our own. — The Liturgical Year, Abbot Gueranger O.S.B.
The Station today is at St. Mary Major for the second time during Lent. As we set our eyes on the Sacred Triduum, it is good to stand in solidarity with our Mother of Sorrows as we contemplate our Redemption.
Daily Readings for: April 17, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
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Collect: O God, who willed your Son to submit for our sake to the yoke of the Cross, so that you might drive from us the power of the enemy, grant us, your servants, to attain the grace of the resurrection. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Holy Thursday Meal Menu Judases
ACTIVITIES
A Jonas (Jonah) Project Holy Week in the Catholic Tradition Housecleaning for Holy Week I Housecleaning for Holy Week II Jonas and Holy Week Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart! Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of Holy Week in the Home Music for Lent and Easter: St. Matthew Passion by Bach Spring Cleaning Tenebræ The Passover Meal: 1. Introduction
PRAYERS
Prayer for Wednesday of Holy Week Prayer Before a Crucifix Prayer for Palm Sunday and Holy Week
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Way of the Cross To Keep A True Lent Family Evening Prayer for Holy Week
LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-04-17
www.catholicculture.org The Sacred Triduum
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Lent: April 18th
Holy Thursday Old Calendar: Holy Thursday (Maundy Thursday)
The last three days of Holy Week are referred to as the Easter or Sacred Triduum (Triduum Sacrum), the three-part drama of Christ’s redemption: Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday. Holy Thursday is also known as “Maundy Thursday.” The word maundy comes from the Latin word mandatum (commandment) which is the first word of the Gospel acclamation:
Mandátum novum do vobis dicit Dóminus, ut diligátis Ãnvicem, sicut diléxi vos. “I give you a new commandment: Love one another as I have loved you.” (John 13:34)
These are the words spoken by our Lord to His apostles at the Last Supper, after he completed the washing of the feet. We should imitate Christ’s humility in the washing of the feet. By meditating on the Gospels (cf. Matt 26:1 ff.; Mark 14:1 ff.; Luke 22:1 ff.; John 13:1 ff.), we can recall to mind Jesus’ actions of that day. Father Bernard Strasser summarizes all the events of that first Holy Thursday:
…They included: (1) the eating of the Easter lamb or the paschal meal; (2) the washing of the disciple’s feet; (3) the institution of the Most Holy Eucharist (the first Mass at which Jesus Christ, the eternal high priest, is the celebrant; the first Communion of the apostles; the first conferring of Holy Orders); (4) the foretelling of Judas’ betrayal and Peter’s denials; (5) the farewell discourse and priestly prayer of Jesus; (6) the agony and capture of Jesus in the Garden of Olives. — ©1947, With Christ Through the Year
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In all the German speaking countries, Slavic nations and in Hungary this day is also known as “Green Thursday.” The word is a corruption of the German word grunen (to mourn) to the German word for green (grün). Many people believe they must eat green at today’s meal, which is probably derived from from the Jewish Passover meal that included bitter herbs.
Chrism Mass There are only two Masses allowed on Holy Thursday—the Chrism Mass and the evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper. In each diocese there is a Chrism Mass or Mass of the Holy Oils, usually said in the morning at the cathedral of the diocese. Catholics should make an effort to participate at the Mass at least once in their lives, to experience the communion of priests with their bishop. All the priests of the diocese are invited to concelebrate with the bishop. The holy oils to be used throughout the diocese for the following year in the sacraments of Baptism, Confirmation, Holy Orders and the Sacrament of the Sick are blessed by the bishop at this Mass. This Mass also celebrates the institution of the priesthood.
Mass of the Lord’s Supper During the evening of Holy Thursday, the Mass of the Lord’s Supper is celebrated. It is celebrated in the evening because the Passover began at sundown. There is only one Mass, at which the whole community and priests of the parish participate. This is a very joyful Mass, as we recall the institution of the Holy Eucharist and the priesthood. The priests wear white vestments, the altar is filled with flowers, the Gloria is sung and the bells are rung. After the Gloria, we shall not hear organ music and the bells until the Easter Vigil. The Liturgy of the Mass recalls the Passover, the Last Supper, which includes the Washing of the Feet. The hymn Ubi Caritas or Where Charity and Love Prevail is usually sung at this time. After the Communion Prayer, there is no final blessing. The Holy Eucharist is carried in procession through Church and then transferred into a place of reposition, usually a side chapel. The hymn Pange Lingua is also usually sung at this time.
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After the Mass, we recall the Agony in the Garden, and the arrest and imprisonment of Jesus. The altar is stripped bare, crosses are removed or covered. The Eucharist has been placed in an altar of repose, and most churches are open for silent adoration, to answer Christ’s invitation “Could you not, then, watch one hour with me?” (Matt 26:40)
The Altar of Repose When the Eucharist is processed to the altar of repose after the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, we should remain in quiet prayer and adoration, keeping Christ company. There is a tradition, particularly in big cities with many parishes, to try and visit seven churches and their altar of repose during this evening. Popular piety is particularly sensitive to the adoration of the Most Blessed Sacrament in the wake of the Mass of the Lord’s supper. Because of a long historical process, whose origins are not entirely clear, the place of repose has traditionally been referred to as “a holy sepulchre”. The faithful go there to venerate Jesus who was placed in a tomb following the crucifixion and in which he remained for some forty hours. It is necessary to instruct the faithful on the meaning of the reposition: it is an austere solemn conservation of the Body of Christ for the community of the faithful which takes part in the liturgy of Good Friday and for the viaticum of the infirmed. It is an invitation to silent and prolonged adoration of the wondrous sacrament instituted by Jesus on this day. In reference to the altar of repose, therefore, the term “sepulchre” should be avoided, and its decoration should not have any suggestion of a tomb. The tabernacle on this altar should not be in the form of a tomb or funerary urn. The Blessed Sacrament should be conserved in a closed tabernacle and should not be exposed in a monstrance. After midnight on Holy Thursday, the adoration should conclude without solemnity, since the day of the Lord’s Passion has already begun.
— Directory on Popular Piety
Washing of Feet and a “Last Supper” Meal
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In imitation of Christ’s last supper, many Christians prepare a meal reminiscent of how Christ celebrated the Last Supper. We see the lamb, cooked whole, with no bones broken, foreshadowing the death of Christ, the Lamb of God. We eat the unleavened bread and recall to mind the Eucharist. We eat the whole meal in prayerful reminder of that Last Supper that Jesus spent with His apostles, His friends, instituting Holy Orders and leaving His greatest gift, the Holy Eucharist. A representative paschal meal can include roast lamb, bitter herbs, green herbs, haroset, matzoh and wine and perhaps include readings from the Mass of the Lord’s Supper. Our Passover Feast is the Mass, in particular the whole Triduum. The US Bishops have discouraged Catholics to “baptizing” a Jewish Seder meal, and the Vatican has issued recent documents on Catholic relations with Jews. For more information see USCCB: God’s Mercy Endures Forever: Guidelines on the Presentation of Jews and Judaism in Catholic Preaching and Commission of the Holy See for Religious Relations with the Jews.
The Station today is at St. John Lateran. Maundy Thursday is devoted to the institution of the Eucharist and the priesthood. On this day the bishop blesses the Holy Oils; thus is made clear that the sacraments have their source in Christ and derive their fruitfulness from the paschal mystery of salvation.
Daily Readings for: April 18, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who have called us to participate in this most sacred Supper, in which your Only Begotten Son, when about to hand himself over to death, entrusted to the Church a sacrifice new for all eternity, the banquet of his love, grant, we pray, that we may draw from so great a mystery, the fullness of charity and of life. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
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RECIPES
Arnaki Gemisto (Stuffed Easter Lamb) Beranek Charoses Easter Lamb Greek Easter Lamb Haroset Holy Thursday Meal Menu Holy Thursday Spinach Horoseth Judases Leg of Lamb Matzah Matzo Bread Roast Leg of Spring Lamb Seven-Herb Vichyssoise Spinach Fondue au Gratin Spinach Soup Spring Herb Soup Unleavened Bread Whole Baby Lamb
ACTIVITIES
A Jonas (Jonah) Project Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament Easter Garden I
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Eucharist Hymn: Pange Lingua Holy Thursday Activities in the Home Holy Thursday in the Home with the Trapp Family Holy Thursday Meal in the Home—Remembering the Last Supper Holy Week in the Catholic Tradition Hymn: Ubi Caritas Jonas and Holy Week Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart! Lenten Customs of the Russian Germans Maundy Thursday and the Passover Meal Maundy Thursday: Do Unto Others Music for Lent and Easter: St. Matthew Passion by Bach Popular Customs and Traditions of Maundy Thursday Sacred Triduum in the Home Tenebræ A Passover Supper On Holy Thursday
PRAYERS
Prayer Before a Crucifix Holy Thursday in the Home Way of the Cross Holy Thursday Table Blessing Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Sacred Triduum (2nd Plan) Table Blessing for Holy Thursday Family Evening Prayer for Holy Week Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Sacred Triduum (1st Plan)
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LIBRARY
None
View this item on CatholicCulture.org: http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/calendar/day.cfm?date=2019-04-18
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Lent: April 19th
Good Friday Old Calendar: Good Friday
“It is accomplished; and bowing his head he gave up his spirit.” We adore Thee, O Christ, and we praise Thee. Because by Thy Holy Cross Thou hast redeemed the world. Today the whole Church mourns the death of our Savior. This is traditionally a day of sadness, spent in fasting and prayer. The title for this day varies in different parts of the world: “Holy Friday” for Latin nations, Slavs and Hungarians call it “Great Friday,” in Germany it is “Friday of Mourning,” and in Norway, it is “Long Friday.” Some view the term “Good Friday” (used in English and Dutch) as a corruption of the term “God’s Friday.” This is another obligatory day of fasting and abstinence. In Ireland, they practice the “black fast,” which is to consume nothing but black tea and water. March 25 is usually the Solemnity of the Annunciation, but when it falls during Holy Week, the feast is transferred to the first day after the Octave of Easter. This year the Solemnity is celebrated on April 4th.
Liturgy According to the Church’s ancient tradition, the sacraments are not celebrated on Good Friday nor Holy Saturday. “Celebration of the Lord’s Passion,” traditionally known as the “Mass of the Presanctified,” (although it is not a mass) is usually celebrated around three o’clock in the afternoon, or later, depending on the needs of the parish. The altar is completely bare, with no cloths, candles nor cross. The service is divided into three parts: Liturgy of the Word,
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Veneration of the Cross and Holy Communion. The priest and deacons wear red or black vestments. The liturgy starts with the priests and deacons going to the altar in silence and prostrating themselves for a few moments in silent prayer, then an introductory prayer is prayed. In part one, the Liturgy of the Word, we hear the most famous of the Suffering Servant passages from Isaiah (52:13-53:12), a pre-figurement of Christ on Good Friday. Psalm 30 is the Responsorial Psalm “Father, I put my life in your hands.” The Second Reading, or Epistle, is from the letter to the Hebrews, 4:14-16; 5:7-9. The Gospel Reading is the Passion of St. John. The General Intercessions conclude the Liturgy of the Word. The ten intercessions cover these areas:
For the Church For the Pope For the clergy and laity of the Church For those preparing for baptism For the unity of Christians For the Jewish people For those who do not believe in Christ For those who do not believe in God For all in public office For those in special need
For more information about these intercessions please see Prayers for the Prisoners from the Catholic Culture Library. Part two is the Veneration of the Cross. A cross, either veiled or unveiled, is processed through the Church, and then venerated by the congregation. We joyfully venerate and kiss the wooden cross “on which hung the Savior of the world.” During this time the “Reproaches” are usually sung or recited. Part three, Holy Communion, concludes the Celebration of the Lord’s Passion. The altar is covered with a cloth and the ciboriums containing the Blessed Sacrament are brought to the altar from the place of reposition. The Our Father and the Ecce Agnus Dei (“This is the Lamb of God”) are recited. The congregation receives Holy Communion,
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 219 there is a “Prayer After Communion,” and then a “Prayer Over the People,” and everyone departs in silence.
Activities This is a day of mourning. We should try to take time off from work and school to participate in the devotions and liturgy of the day as much as possible. In addition, we should refrain from extraneous conversation. Some families leave the curtains drawn, and maintain silence during the 3 hours (noon — 3p.m.), and keep from loud conversation or activities throughout the remainder of the day. We should also restrict ourselves from any TV, music or computer—these are all types of technology that can distract us from the spirit of the day. If some members of the family cannot attend all the services, a little home altar can be set up, by draping a black or purple cloth over a small table or dresser and placing a crucifix and candles on it. The family then can gather during the three hours, praying different devotions like the rosary, Stations of the Cross, the Divine Mercy devotions, and meditative reading and prayers on the passion of Christ. Although throughout Lent we have tried to mortify ourselves, it is appropriate to try some practicing extra mortifications today. These can be very simple, such as eating less at the small meals of fasting, or eating standing up. Some people just eat bread and soup, or just bread and water while standing at the table. For a more complete understanding of what Our Lord suffered read this article On the Physical Death of Jesus Christ (JAMA article) taken from The Journal of the American Medical Association.
The Station today is at the church of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem which contains parts of the true Cross and one of the nails of the Crucifixion. The Church commemorates the redemption of the world with the reading of the Passion, the Collects in which the Church prays with confidence for the salvation of all men, the veneration of the Cross and the
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reception of Our Lord reserved in the Blessed Sacrament.
Daily Readings for: April 19, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: Remember your mercies, O Lord, and with your eternal protection sanctify your servants for whom Christ your Son, by the shedding of his Blood, established the Paschal Mystery. Who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen
RECIPES
Fritatta Sardegna (Omelet Sardinian) Oeufs à la Mistral (Baked Eggs) Pain Doré (Golden Toast) Vdolky (Bohemian Pan Cakes) Cold Apple Soup Cold Tomato Soup with Wine Confectioners’ Sugar Icing Dark Rye Bread Dried Cod Good Friday Bread Herb Omelet III Hot Cross Bread Hot Cross Buns I Hot Cross Buns II Hot Cross Buns III Hot Cross Buns IV Hot Cross Buns V Hot Cross Buns VI
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Hot Cross Buns VI Milk Rice Old-Fashioned Johnnycake Potted Cod with Sour Cream Quick Hot Cross Buns Ricotta Omelet Scrambled Eggs and Cheese Scrambled Eggs with Mushrooms Scrambled Eggs with Shrimps Sourdough Hot Cross Buns Spatzle
ACTIVITIES
A Jonas (Jonah) Project Devotions for Good Friday Easter Garden I Good Friday Activities in the Home Good Friday in the Home Good Friday in the Home Good Friday in the Home with the Trapp Family Good Friday Lamentations Good Friday Remembrance Good Friday Reproaches (Improperia) Holy Week in the Catholic Tradition Hymn: Vexilla Regis Prodeunt Jonas and Holy Week Lent Hymn: O Head All Scarred and Bleeding Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart!
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Lenten Customs of the Russian Germans Music for Lent and Easter: St. Matthew Passion by Bach Pretzels for God: Lent and the Pretzel Sacred Triduum in the Home Tenebræ The Three O’Clock Hour Good Friday Activities
PRAYERS
Prayer for Good Friday Stations of the Cross at Home Good Friday Table Blessing Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Sacred Triduum (2nd Plan) To Jesus Forsaken The Chaplet of the Divine Mercy Divine Mercy Novena Family Evening Prayer for Holy Week Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Sacred Triduum (1st Plan)
LIBRARY
None
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Lent: April 20th
Holy Saturday — Easter Vigil Old Calendar: Holy Saturday — Easter Vigil
On Holy Saturday the Church waits at the Lord’s tomb, meditating on his suffering and death. The altar is left bare, and the sacrifice of the Mass is not celebrated. Only after the solemn vigil during the night, held in anticipation of the resurrection, does the Easter celebration begin, with a spirit of joy that overflows into the following period of fifty days.
Holy Saturday Holy Saturday (from Sabbatum Sanctum, its official liturgical name) is sacred as the day of the Lord’s rest; it has been called the “Second Sabbath” after creation. The day is and should be the most calm and quiet day of the entire Church year, a day broken by no liturgical function. Christ lies in the grave, the Church sits near and mourns. After the great battle He is resting in peace, but upon Him we see the scars of intense suffering…The mortal wounds on His Body remain visible…Jesus’ enemies are still furious, attempting to obliterate the very memory of the Lord by lies and slander. Mary and the disciples are grief-stricken, while the Church must mournfully admit that too many of her children return home from Calvary cold and hard of heart. When
www.catholicculture.org LITURGICAL YEAR 2018-2019, VOL. 3 224 that too many of her children return home from Calvary cold and hard of heart. When Mother Church reflects upon all of this, it seems as if the wounds of her dearly Beloved were again beginning to bleed.
According to tradition, the entire body of the Church is represented in Mary: she is the “credentium collectio universa” (Congregation for Divine Worship, Lettera circolare sulla preparazione e celebrazione delle feste pasquali, 73). Thus, the Blessed Virgin Mary, as she waits near the Lord’s tomb, as she is represented in Christian tradition, is an icon of the Virgin Church keeping vigil at the tomb of her Spouse while awaiting the celebration of his resurrection.
The pious exercise of the Ora di Maria is inspired by this intuition of the relationship between the Virgin Mary and the Church: while the body of her Son lays in the tomb and his soul has descended to the dead to announce liberation from the shadow of darkness to his ancestors, the Blessed Virgin Mary, foreshadowing and representing the Church, awaits, in faith, the victorious triumph of her Son over death. — Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy
Although we are still in mourning, there is much preparation during this day to prepare for Easter. Out of the kitchen comes the smells of Easter pastries and bread, the lamb or hams and of course, the Easter eggs. There are no liturgies celebrated this day, unless the local parish priest blesses the food baskets. In Slavic countries there is a blessing of the traditional Easter foods, prepared in baskets: eggs, ham, lamb and sausages, butter and cheeses, horseradish and salt and the Easter breads. The Easter blessings of food owe their origin to the fact that these particular foods, namely, fleshmeat and milk products, including eggs, were forbidden in the Middle Ages during the Lenten fast and abstinence. When the feast of Easter brought the rigorous fast to an end, and these foods were again allowed at table, the people showed their joy and gratitude by first taking the food to church for a blessing. Moreover, they hoped that the Church’s blessing on such edibles would prove a remedy for whatever harmful effects the body might have suffered from the long period of self-denial. Today the Easter blessings of food are still held in many churches in the United States, especially in Slavic parishes. If there is no blessing for the Easter foods in the parish, the father of the family can pray the Blessing over the Easter foods. It is during the night between Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday that the Easter Vigil is celebrated. The service begins around ten o’clock, in order that the solemn vigil Mass
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Activities
Today we remember Christ in the tomb. It is not Easter yet, so it’s not time for celebration. The day is usually spent working on the final preparations for the biggest feast of the Church year. The list of suggested activities is long, but highlights are decorating Easter eggs and attending a special Easter food blessing. For families with smaller children, you could create a miniature Easter garden, with a tomb. The figure of the risen Christ will be placed in the garden on Easter morning. Another activity for families is creation of a paschal candle to use at home. The Directory on Popular Piety discusses some of the various devotions related to Easter, including the Blessing of the Family Table, Annual Blessing of Family Home, the Via Lucis and the Visit to the Mother of the Risen Christ.
The Station today is at St. John Lateran. During the afternoon of Holy Saturday the faithful were summoned here for the final scrutiny of the catechumens. Then, in the evening began the vigil or night of watching which concluded at dawn with the solemn baptisms — the neophytes, plunged into the baptismal waters and there buried with Christ, were born to the life of grace at the very time when our Savior came forth triumphant from the tomb at dawn on Easter morning.
Daily Readings for: April 20, 2019 (Readings on USCCB website)
Collect: O God, who make this most sacred night radiant with the glory of the Lord’s Resurrection, stir up in your Church a spirit of adoption, so that, renewed in
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body and mind, we amy render you undivided service. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
RECIPES
Casatiella (Egg Pizza) Babka I (Polish Easter Bread) Babka II (Polish Easter Bread) Paskha (Ukrainian Easter Bread) Beranek Easter Eggs Hard-Cooked Egg Cookies Italian Easter Baskets Moravian Love Cakes Babka (Polish Easter Bread) Koulich (Russian Sweet Easter Bread) Easter Baba (Polish Easter Coffee Cake) Easter Story Cookies Italian Easter Bread Eggs
ACTIVITIES
A Jonas (Jonah) Project Alleluia Egg Baptismal Candles Blessing of the Easter Foods Creating a Lumen Christi (Light of Christ) Paschal Candle Cross of Victory Easter Eggs Decorations
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Easter Eggs I Easter Eggs II Easter Eggs III Easter Eggs! song Easter Garden I Easter Garden II Easter Hymn Easter Lamb Easter Marian Hymn: Rejoice, O Rejoice, Heavenly Queen Easter or Paschal Candle Easter Song: Three Women at Break of Day Easter Standard Easter Vigil Holy Saturday Activities in the Home Holy Saturday and Easter in the Home Holy Saturday Festivities Holy Saturday with the Slovaks Holy Week in the Catholic Tradition Home Altar Hangings Home Easter Vigil Jonas and Holy Week Lent Hymn: Open, O Hard and Sinful Heart! Lenten Customs of the Russian Germans Music for Lent and Easter: St. Matthew Passion by Bach New Fire of Easter Paschal Candle as a Centerpiece Paschal Candle for Home Sacred Triduum in the Home
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Symbolism of the Easter Eggs Tenebræ Traditional Easter Hymns Triptych Window Transparencies Wreath of Victory Decorating Easter Eggs
PRAYERS
Prayer Before a Crucifix Prayer for Palm Sunday and Holy Week Prayer for Holy Saturday Polish Easter Blessing Blessing of the Home with Easter Water Way of the Cross To Keep A True Lent Holy Saturday Table Blessing Book of Blessings: Blessing of Food for the First Meal of Easter Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Sacred Triduum (2nd Plan) Easter Blessing of Food Divine Mercy Novena Family Evening Prayer for Holy Week Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Sacred Triduum (1st Plan) Renewal of Baptismal Promises Exsultet (Easter Proclamation)
LIBRARY
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LIBRARY
None
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