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Thứ Năm, 3 tháng 10, 2019

OCTOBER 04, 2019 : MEMORIAL OF SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI


Memorial of Saint Francis of Assisi
Lectionary: 459

Reading 1BAR 1:15-22
During the Babylonian captivity, the exiles prayed:
"Justice is with the Lord, our God;
and we today are flushed with shame,
we men of Judah and citizens of Jerusalem,
that we, with our kings and rulers
and priests and prophets, and with our ancestors,
have sinned in the Lord's sight and disobeyed him.
We have neither heeded the voice of the Lord, our God,
nor followed the precepts which the Lord set before us.
From the time the Lord led our ancestors out of the land of Egypt
until the present day,
we have been disobedient to the Lord, our God,
and only too ready to disregard his voice.
And the evils and the curse that the Lord enjoined upon Moses, his servant,
at the time he led our ancestors forth from the land of Egypt
to give us the land flowing with milk and honey,
cling to us even today.
For we did not heed the voice of the Lord, our God,
in all the words of the prophets whom he sent us,
but each one of us went off
after the devices of his own wicked heart,
served other gods,
and did evil in the sight of the Lord, our God."
Responsorial PsalmPS 79:1B-2, 3-5, 8, 9
R.(9) For the glory of your name, O Lord, deliver us.
O God, the nations have come into your inheritance;
they have defiled your holy temple,
they have laid Jerusalem in ruins.
They have given the corpses of your servants
as food to the birds of heaven,
the flesh of your faithful ones to the beasts of the earth.
R. For the glory of your name, O Lord, deliver us.
They have poured out their blood like water
round about Jerusalem,
and there is no one to bury them.
We have become the reproach of our neighbors,
the scorn and derision of those around us.
O LORD, how long? Will you be angry forever?
Will your jealousy burn like fire?
R. For the glory of your name, O Lord, deliver us.
Remember not against us the iniquities of the past;
may your compassion quickly come to us,
for we are brought very low.
R. For the glory of your name, O Lord, deliver us.
Help us, O God our savior,
because of the glory of your name;
Deliver us and pardon our sins
for your name's sake.
R. For the glory of your name, O Lord, deliver us.
AlleluiaPS 95:8
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
If today you hear his voice,
harden not your hearts.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Jesus said to them,
"Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida!
For if the mighty deeds done in your midst
had been done in Tyre and Sidon,
they would long ago have repented,
sitting in sackcloth and ashes.
But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon
at the judgment than for you.
And as for you, Capernaum, 'Will you be exalted to heaven?
You will go down to the netherworld.'
Whoever listens to you listens to me.
Whoever rejects you rejects me.
And whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me."

For the readings of the Memorial of Saint Francis of Assisi, please go here.


Meditation: "He who hears you hears me"
If Jesus were to visit your community today, what would he say? Would he issue a warning like the one he gave to Chorazin and Bethsaida? And how would you respond? Wherever Jesus went he did mighty works to show the people how much God had for them. Chorazin and Bethsaida had been blessed with the visitation of God. They heard the good news and experienced the wonderful works which Jesus did for them. Why was Jesus upset with these communities? The word woe is also translated as alas. It is as much an expression of sorrowful pity as it is of anger.
Jesus calls us to walk in the way of truth and freedom - justice and holiness
Why does Jesus lament and issue a stern warning? The people who heard the Gospel here very likely responded with indifference. Jesus upbraids them for doing nothing! Repentance demands change - a change of heart and way of life. God's word is life-giving and it saves us from destruction - the destruction of soul as well as body. Jesus' anger is directed toward sin and everything which hinders us from doing the will of God and receiving his blessing. In love he calls us to walk in his way of truth and freedom, grace and mercy, justice and holiness. Do you receive his word with faith and submission or with doubt and indifference?
"Lord Jesus, give me the child-like simplicity and purity of faith to gaze upon your face with joy and confidence in your all-merciful love. Remove every doubt, fear, and proud thought which would hinder me from receiving your word with trust and humble submission."

Daily Quote from the early church fathersChrist speaks through the disciples, by Cyril of Alexandria (376-444 AD)
"Christ gives those who love instruction the assurance that whatever is said concerning him by the holy apostles or evangelists is to be received necessarily without any doubt and to be crowned with the words of truth. He who hears them, hears Christ. For the blessed Paul also said, 'You desire proof that Christ is speaking in me' (2 Corinthians 13:3). Christ himself somewhere also said to the holy disciples, 'For it is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaks in you' (Matthew 10:20). Christ speaks in them by the consubstantial Spirit. If it is true, and plainly it is, that they speak by Christ, how can they err? He affirms that he who does not hear them, does not hear Christ, and that he who rejects them rejects Christ, and with him the Father." (excerpt from COMMENTARY ON LUKE, HOMILY 63)

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 4, LUKE 10:13-16
(Baruch 1:15-22; Psalm 79)

KEY VERSE: "Whoever listens to you listens to me. Whoever rejects you rejects me" (v. 16).
TO KNOW: Jesus centered much of his ministry in the cities near the Sea of Galilee. Like the ancient prophets, Jesus expressed profound displeasure with those who rejected God's truth. He gave the obstinate cities of Chorazin and Bethsaida a warning, saying that the Gentiles living in Tyre and Sidon never saw such mighty deeds. If they had, they would have repented in sackcloth and ashes as did the Ninevites in Jonah's day (Jon 3:1-10). Capernaum, Jesus’ “headquarters” in Galilee, fared no better. There would be harsh consequences for those who closed their ears and hearts to the message Jesus preached. The mission of his disciples was Jesus’ mission: to bring forth God’s reign on earth. Because the gospel was the word of God, it was not to be treated lightly. Whoever heard the words of his disciples also heard Jesus. Whoever rejected them rejected Jesus and the one who sent him.
TO LOVE: In what ways am a messenger of good news to others?
TO SERVE: Lord Jesus, help me to hear your voice spoken by the servants of your Church.

Memorial of Saint Francis of Assisi, religious 

Francis, the son of a rich cloth merchant, led a misspent youth. His search for conversion led him to the ancient church at San Damiano. While praying there, he heard Christ speak to him from the crucifix, "Francis, repair my church." Francis assumed this meant the crumbling building. Acting in his impetuous way, he took fabric from his father's shop and sold it to get money to repair the church. His father dragged Francis before the bishop and in front of the whole town demanding that he return the money and renounce all rights as his heir. Francis not only gave back the money but stripped off the clothes his father had given him, and declared that from then on his true Father was God in heaven. Francis took the Gospels as the rule of his life, and Jesus Christ as his example. He dressed in rough clothes and begged for his sustenance. He visited hospitals, served the sick, cared for lepers, preached purity and peace, composed songs and hymns to God and nature, and regarded all people as his brothers and sisters. He began to attract followers, and in 1209, with papal blessing, founded the Franciscans. In 1212 Clare of Assisi became his spiritual student, which led to the founding of the Poor Clares. While in meditation on Mount Alvernia in the Apennines in September 1224, Francis received the stigmata, which periodically bled during the remaining two years of his life.


Friday 4 October 2019

St Francis of Assisi
Bar 1:15-22. Psalm 78 (79):1-5,8-9. Lk 10:13-16.
For the glory of your name, O Lord, deliver us – Psalm 78 (79):1-5,8-9
‘Anyone who listens to you listens to me’
Early clear mornings give me the morning star and then the sun rises through clouds of blue, gold and peach, my gum trees glistening with pure light. Darkness is packed away and once again I am filled with wonder. With the little birds I exult in the majesty and gifts of God. I breathe into a new day.
The sublime beauty surrounding us remind our spirits of the bounty of God. Saint Francis of Assisi and now Pope Francis advise on living a simple life as a pathway to genuine creativity. Countless souls have been fired by their examples.
Be aware of the insidious intrusion of technology on your day. Empty promises of more and improved noise and knowledge may detract from your own creative self. Daily chats with Jesus will nullify the strident calls for success, power and wealth. Normally busy people can still have a stillpoint within, because of a strong friendship with Jesus.


Saint Francis of Assisi
Saint of the Day for October 4
(September 26, 1182 – October 3, 1226)
 
Scenes from the Life of Saint Francis (Scene 7) | Benozzo Gozzoli
Saint Francis of Assisi’s Story
The patron saint of Italy, Francis of Assisi, was a poor little man who astounded and inspired the Church by taking the gospel literally—not in a narrow fundamentalist sense, but by actually following all that Jesus said and did, joyfully, without limit, and without a sense of self-importance.
Serious illness brought the young Francis to see the emptiness of his frolicking life as leader of Assisi’s youth. Prayer—lengthy and difficult—led him to a self-emptying like that of Christ, climaxed by embracing a leper he met on the road. It symbolized his complete obedience to what he had heard in prayer: “Francis! Everything you have loved and desired in the flesh it is your duty to despise and hate, if you wish to know my will. And when you have begun this, all that now seems sweet and lovely to you will become intolerable and bitter, but all that you used to avoid will turn itself to great sweetness and exceeding joy.”
From the cross in the neglected field-chapel of San Damiano, Christ told him, “Francis, go out and build up my house, for it is nearly falling down.” Francis became the totally poor and humble workman.
He must have suspected a deeper meaning to “build up my house.” But he would have been content to be for the rest of his life the poor “nothing” man actually putting brick on brick in abandoned chapels. He gave up all his possessions, piling even his clothes before his earthly father—who was demanding restitution for Francis’ “gifts” to the poor—so that he would be totally free to say, “Our Father in heaven.” He was, for a time, considered to be a religious fanatic, begging from door to door when he could not get money for his work, evoking sadness or disgust to the hearts of his former friends, ridicule from the unthinking.
But genuineness will tell. A few people began to realize that this man was actually trying to be Christian. He really believed what Jesus said: “Announce the kingdom! Possess no gold or silver or copper in your purses, no traveling bag, no sandals, no staff” (Luke 9:1-3).
Francis’ first rule for his followers was a collection of texts from the Gospels. He had no intention of founding an order, but once it began he protected it and accepted all the legal structures needed to support it. His devotion and loyalty to the Church were absolute and highly exemplary at a time when various movements of reform tended to break the Church’s unity.
Francis was torn between a life devoted entirely to prayer and a life of active preaching of the Good News. He decided in favor of the latter, but always returned to solitude when he could. He wanted to be a missionary in Syria or in Africa, but was prevented by shipwreck and illness in both cases. He did try to convert the sultan of Egypt during the Fifth Crusade.
During the last years of his relatively short life, he died at 44, Francis was half blind and seriously ill. Two years before his death he received the stigmata, the real and painful wounds of Christ in his hands, feet and side.
On his deathbed, Francis said over and over again the last addition to his Canticle of the Sun, “Be praised, O Lord, for our Sister Death.” He sang Psalm 141, and at the end asked his superior’s permission to have his clothes removed when the last hour came in order that he could expire lying naked on the earth, in imitation of his Lord.

Reflection
Francis of Assisi was poor only that he might be Christ-like. He recognized creation as another manifestation of the beauty of God. In 1979, he was named patron of ecology. He did great penance—apologizing to “Brother Body” later in life—that he might be totally disciplined for the will of God. Francis’ poverty had a sister, Humility, by which he meant total dependence on the good God. But all this was, as it were, preliminary to the heart of his spirituality: living the gospel life, summed up in the charity of Jesus and perfectly expressed in the Eucharist.

Saint Francis of Assisi is the Patron Saint of:
Animals
Archaeologists
Ecology
Italy
Merchants
Messengers
Metal Workers


Lectio: Luke 10:13-16
Lectio Divina
Friday, October 4, 2019

Ordinary Time
1) Opening prayer
Father,
You show Your almighty power
in Your mercy and forgiveness.
Continue to fill us with Your gifts of love.
Help us to hurry towards the eternal life You promise
and come to share in the joys of Your kingdom.
We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
2) Gospel Reading - Luke 10:13-16
Jesus said to them, "Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have repented, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you. And as for you, Capernaum, 'Will you be exalted to heaven? You will go down to the netherworld.' Whoever listens to you listens to me. Whoever rejects you rejects me. And whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me."
3) Reflection
● The Gospel today continues speaking about the sending out of the seventy-two disciples (Lk 10:1-12). At the end, after sending them out, Jesus speaks about shaking off the dust from their shoes if the missionaries are not welcomed or accepted (Lk 10:10-12). Today's Gospel stressed and extends the threats upon those who refuse to receive the Good News.
● Luke 10:13-14: “Alas for you, Corazin! Alas for you, Bethsaida!” The space which Jesus traveled or covered in the three years of His missionary life was small. It measured only a few square kilometers along the Sea of Galilee around the cities of Capernaum, Bethsaida, and Corazin. Precisely in this very small space Jesus works the majority of His miracles and presents His discourses. He has come to save the whole of humanity, and He hardly went out of the limited space of His land. Tragically, Jesus had to see that the people of those cities do not want to accept the message of the Kingdom and are not converted. The cities fixed themselves in the rigidity of their beliefs, traditions and customs and they do not accept the invitation of Jesus to change life. Alas for you, Corazin; Alas for you Bethsaida! For if the miracle done among you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes". Jesus compares the two cities with Tyre and Sidon which in the past were unyielding enemies of Israel, ill-treating the people of God. For this reason they were cursed by the prophets: (Isa 23:1; Jer 25:22; 47:4; Ezek 26:3; 27:2; 28:2;  Am 1:10). And now Jesus says that these same cities, symbols of all the evil done to the people in the past, would have already converted if so many miracles had been worked in them as in Corazin and in Bethsaida.
● Luke 10:15: “And you Capernaum. Did you want to be raised high as Heaven? You shall be flung down to hell.”Jesus recalls the condemnation which Isaiah, the prophet launched against Babylon. Proud and arrogant, Babylon thought, "I shall scale the heavens; higher than the stars of God I shall set my throne. I shall sit on the Mount of the Assembly far away to the north. I shall climb high above the clouds, I shall rival the Most High" (Isa 14:13-14). That is what it thought! But it completely deceived itself! The contrary happened. The prophet says, "Now you have been flung down to Sheol, into the depths of the abyss!" (Isa 14:15). Jesus compares Capernaum with that terrible Babylon which destroyed the monarchy and the temple and took the people as slaves, from which it never succeeded in recovering. Like Babylon, Capernaum thought it was something important, but it fell into the most profound hell. The Gospel of Matthew compares Capernaum with the city of Sodom, the symbol of the worst perversion, which was destroyed by God's anger (Gen 18:16 to 19: 29). Sodom would have converted if it had seen the miracles which Jesus worked in Capernaum (Mt 11: 23-24). Today, the same paradox continues to exist. Many of us, Catholics since we were children, have such consolidated convictions that nobody is capable of converting us. And in some places, Christianity, instead of being a source of change and of conversion, has become the refuge of the most reactionary forces of politics of the country.
● Luke 10:16: "Anyone who listens to you listens to Me; anyone who rejects you rejects Me. And those who reject Me reject the One who has sent Me". This statement places the accent on the identification of the disciples with Jesus, in so far as He is despised by the authority. In Matthew the same saying of Jesus, placed in another context, underlines the identification of the disciples with Jesus accepted by the people (Mt 10:40). In both cases, the disciples identify themselves with Jesus in the total gift and in this gift is realized their encounter with God, and God allows Himself to be found by those who seek Him.
4) Personal questions
● Do my city and my country deserve the warning of Jesus against Capernaum, Corazin and Bethsaida?
● How do I identify myself with Jesus?
● What does it mean to “listen to Jesus” or to “reject Jesus”? Is listening just a passive activity? By using this term in opposition to the term “reject”, it has meaning as “accept”. To accept something is active, a conversion. Do I merely listen, or do I act?
● What does it mean to “listen to Jesus” or to “reject Jesus”? Do I act on what I hear? Do I hear all of what is said, or just the parts that suit me, as many do? To say “I believe!” is a start. Do I treat it as the end of my part?
● What does it mean to “listen to Jesus” or to “reject Jesus”? One cannot see the whole person, much less the deeper meanings driving a person, by just looking at a moment here and there, or a quote here and there. There has to be effort in getting to know the whole person, and the motivations and drives beneath what one sees. It has to form a coherent picture and not a collection of disjointed fragments. Do I listen to all of Jesus, His life, His meaning, His story, His intent, His mission, His intersection with my life, and search for the cohesive picture that puts all of His parables and quotes and actions into what I should “listen” to? Or do I pick those things that suit me and aren't too challenging and convince myself I don't need to listen further?
5) Concluding prayer
Protect me, O God, in You is my refuge.
To Yahweh I say,
'You are my Lord, my happiness is in none.'
My birthright, my cup is Yahweh;
You, You alone, hold my lot secure. (Ps 16:1-2, 5)

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