St. Jerome Emiliani Bible Study Group

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How to Make Your St. Louis de Montfort's Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary
The Annunciation February 21-March 25 (Leap Year)
Day 1: Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary


Purpose: Emptying Yourself of the Spirit of the World


Examine your conscience, pray, practice renouncement of your own will; mortification, purity of heart. This purity is the indispensable condition for contemplating God in heaven, to see Him on earth and to know Him by the light of faith. The first part of the preparation should be employed in casting off the spirit of the world which is contrary to that of Jesus Christ. The spirit of the world consists essentially in the denial of the supreme dominion of God; a denial which is manifested in practice by sin and disobedience; thus it is principally opposed to the spirit of Christ, which is also that of Mary.

It manifests itself by the concupiscence of the flesh, by the concupiscence of the eyes and by the pride of life. By disobedience to God's laws and the abuse of created things. Its works are: sin in all forms, then all else by which the devil leads to sin; works which bring error and darkness to the mind, and seduction and corruption to the will. Its pomps are the splendor and the charms employed by the devil to render sin alluring in persons, places and things.

READING
Matthew 5:1—19


The Beatitudes

When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you."



Salt of the earth and light of the world

"You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven."



The fulfillment of the Law

Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven."



PRAYERS
Veni Creator Spiritus
Come, Holy Spirit, Creator blest,
and in our souls take up Thy rest;
come with Thy grace and heavenly aid
to fill the hearts which Thou hast made.

O comforter, to Thee we cry,
O heavenly gift of God Most High,
O fount of life and fire of love,
and sweet anointing from above.

Thou in Thy sevenfold gifts are known;
Thou, finger of God's hand we own;
Thou, promise of the Father,
Thou Who dost the tongue with power imbue.

Kindle our sense from above,
and make our hearts o'erflow with love;
with patience firm and virtue high
the weakness of our flesh supply.

Far from us drive the foe we dread,
and grant us Thy peace instead;
so shall we not, with Thee for guide,
turn from the path of life aside.

Oh, may Thy grace on us bestow
the Father and the Son to know;
and Thee, through endless times confessed,
of both the eternal Spirit blest.

Now to the Father and the Son,
Who rose from death, be glory given,
with Thou, O Holy Comforter,
henceforth by all in earth and heaven. Amen.

Ave Maris Stella
Hail, O Star of the ocean,
God's own Mother blest,
ever sinless Virgin,
gate of heav'nly rest.

Taking that sweet Ave,
which from Gabriel came,
peace confirm within us,
changing Eve's name.

Break the sinners' fetters,
make our blindness day,
Chase all evils from us,
for all blessings pray.

Show thyself a Mother,
may the Word divine
born for us thine Infant
hear our prayers through thine.

Virgin all excelling,
mildest of the mild,
free from guilt preserve us
meek and undefiled.

Keep our life all spotless,
make our way secure
till we find in Jesus,
joy for evermore.

Praise to God the Father,
honor to the Son,
in the Holy Spirit,
be the glory one. Amen.

Magnificat
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,
my spirit rejoices in God my Savior
for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.

From this day all generations will call me blessed:
the Almighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his Name.

He has mercy on those who fear him
in every generation.

He has shown the strength of his arm,
he has scattered the proud in their conceit.

He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
and has lifted up the lowly.

He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.

He has come to the help of his servant Israel
for he has remembered his promise of mercy,
the promise he made to our fathers,
to Abraham and his children forever.



Glory Be
Glory to the Father, and to the Son,
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning, is now,
and will be forever. Amen.
https://www.catholiccompany.com/content/total-consecration-day-one

Wednesday of the First Week of Lent: Look kindly, Lord, we pray, on the devotion of your people, that those who by their 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, God, for ever and ever.

Optional Memorial of St. Peter Damian: Grant, we pray, almighty God, that we may so follow the teaching and example of the Bishop Saint Peter Damian, that, putting nothing before Christ and always ardent in the service of your Church, we may be led to the joys of eternal light. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever.

The Church celebrates the Optional Memorial of St. Peter Damian, a man of vehemence in all his actions who was brought up in the hard school of poverty, found that he had the vocation of a reformer. He exercised it in the first place against himself as one of the hermits of Fontavellana in about 1035, but he did not remain for long hidden in his cell: his colleagues soon made him their abbot (1043). In 1057, Stephen IX made him Cardinal Bishop of Ostia. By his preaching and writings he was one of the valuable collaborators of the eleventh century popes in their great work of reform. Pope Leo XII declared him a Doctor of the Church in 1823.

Today is Ember Wednesday, the beginning of the Spring or Lent Embertide. There are two principal objects for the Ember Days of this period of the year: the first is to offer to God the season of Spring, and, by fasting and prayer, to draw down His blessing upon it; the second is to ask Him to enrich with His choicest graces the priests and sacred ministers who are to receive their Ordination on Saturday. See also Contemporary Observation of Ember Days and Lenten Ember Days for more information.

Today's Station Church >>>

Meditation on the Liturgy
The people of Nineveh are also our model for Lent. They did penance at the preaching of Jonah the prophet and obtained divine mercy and pardon. Christ is preaching penance to use today through his Church. Should we not also put on the sackcloth of self-denial and take on the fast to remedy our self-indulgence that we also may obtain forgiveness for ourselves? Nor should we forget to pray for a world which is drowning in the sin and vice of its own creation.

Before we arrive at the joy and glory of Easter we have first to go through forty days of Lenten journey. This period of preparation is designed by God. It is not merely a time of self-denial, of death to self, and of carrying the cross; it is a time of recovery of our real self, of a more real life, and of sharing in Christ's glory. God intends that we should accustom ourselves to live the Paschal rhythm of "death and life" to reclaim one's real self and to become ready to share in Christ's glory.
—St. Andrew Bible Missal

Lent Ember Days or Lent Embertide, Ember Wednesday of Lent
The Church has traditionally designated Wednesday, Friday and Saturday of the First Week in Lent during which to consecrate the season of spring to God and to obtain graces, through prayer, fasting and the offering of the holy Sacrifice. These days, however, unlike those of the other seasons, do not refer to the fruits of the earth, but are rather expiatory in character.

The Lenten Ember days are the most recent of the four sets of Ember Days and do not have the same importance as the other three, since the whole of Lent is devoted to spiritual renewal. Doubtlessly the three days, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, formed part of the Lenten liturgy from its very beginning. Wednesday, devoted to our Lady, is a day of reflection and spiritual orientation; Friday emphasizes conversion and penance; Saturday, a preview of Easter, marked the renewal of our baptismal covenant.

On all four Ember Wednesdays the stational service was observed in the largest church of our Lady in Rome, St. Mary Major. This basilica, which dates from the fourth century, was rebuilt by Pope Sixtus III (431-440), and dedicated to our Blessed Mother as a result of the Council of Ephesus' definition of the divine motherhood of the Virgin Mary.

It is probable that in the second half of the fourth century the Ember day observance was rearranged and the three great churches (St. Mary Major, Holy Apostles, St. Peter) were selected as stations.

Today, then, we pilgrimage to the largest and most venerable shrine of Our Lady in the world and honor the Mother of God as our patron. The humble guise in which we meet her in the Gospel serves as a model for Lenten humility. Nevertheless, we are promised a participation in her dignity, i.e., we are destined to become "mothers and brothers to Jesus," if we do "the will of His Father." Thus Mary is our companion during Lent. Devoutly and suppliantly we enter the stational church, reminding God of His never failing mercy and begging for liberation from oppression. The kingdom of God never lacks enemies.

"The men of Nineveh [the pagans] shall rise in judgment with this generation [the chosen people of Israel] and shall condemn it; because they did penance at the preaching of Jonah; and behold a greater than Jonah here. The queen of the South [of Saba] shall rise in judgement with this generation and shall condemn it; because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and behold a great then Solomon here." The chosen people would have nothing to do with their Savior when He came to them. They rejected Him, and therefore they themselves were rejected. We who are of the Gentiles have been chosen in their place. Mary and our Holy Mother the Church lead us to Him. In baptism we were made His brothers and sisters and were joined to Him in a union of prayer, in a union of life and spirit. From that moment we are bound to do the will of the Father.

We can prove unfaithful to our vocation, lose our faith, and fall away. For this reason the Church presses upon us the urgency of self-examination, penance, and meditation during the holy season of Lent, for the "men of Nineveh did penance at the preaching of Jonah" and thus found favor with God.

Our hearts are filled with gratitude for the great grace that has been given to us in baptism. We should renew our desire and our resolution to accomplish the will of the Father. "I will meditate on Thy commandments which I have loved exceedingly; and I will lift up my hands to Thy commandments which I have loved."
—adapted from Dom Rembert Bularzik, O.S.B, Orate Fratres, Pius Parsch, OSB, The Church's Year of Grace and Benedict Baur, The Light of the World

St. Peter Damian
St. Peter Damian must be numbered among the greatest of the Church's reformers in the Middle Ages, yes, even among the truly extraordinary persons of all times. In Damian the scholar, men admire wealth of wisdom: in Damian the preacher of God's word, apostolic zeal; in Damian the monk, austerity and self-denial; in Damian the priest, piety and zeal for souls; in Damian the cardinal, loyalty and submission to the Holy See together with generous enthusiasm and devotion for the good of Mother Church. He was a personal friend of Pope Gregory VII. He died in 1072 at the age of 65.

On one occasion he wrote to a young nephew, "If I may speak figuratively, drive out the roaring beasts from your domain; do not cease from protecting yourself daily by receiving the Flesh and Blood of the Lord. Let your secret foe see your lips reddened with the Blood of Christ. He will shudder, cower back, and flee to his dark, dank retreat."

In his poem, the Divine Comedy, Dante places Damian in the "seventh heaven." That was his place for holy people who loved to think about or contemplate God.
—Excerpted from The Church's Year of Grace, Pius Parsch

Patronage: Faenza, Italy

Symbols: Cardinal bearing a discipline in his hand; pilgrim holding a papal Bull, to signify his many legations.

Highlights and Things to Do:

St. Peter Damian was a great reformer, often prescribing penances and fasting to lax religious. Choose a day every week, most appropriately Friday, on which you will fast and offer penances for specific intentions. Pray especially that our nation and the world will recognize the evil of homosexuality. Pray for those who are guilty of this sin.
Read Pope Benedict XVI's Message for the 100th Anniversary of St. Peter Damian.
Read more about St. Peter Damian:
Catholic Encyclopedia
Catholic Ireland
CatholicSaints.info
EWTN
Saints Stories for All Ages
Pray the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, St. Peter Damian revised and recommended it. Go to The Mary Page for a copy.
St. Peter's relics are located in the Cathedral of Faenza, Italy.

Wednesday of the First Week of Lent (Ember Wednesday)
Station with Santa Maria Maggiore (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.

For more on Santa Maria Maggiore, see:

Churches of Rome
Rome Art Lover
Roman Churches
PNAC
Aleteia

Wednesday of the First Week of Lent; Opt. Mem. of St. Peter Damian, Bishop & Doctor; Ember Wednesday - February 21, 2024 - Liturgical Calendar The Church celebrates the Optional Memorial of St. Peter Damian, a man of vehemence in all his actions who was brought up in the hard school of poverty, found that he had the vocation of a reformer. He exercised it in the first place against himself as one of the hermits of Fontavellana in about

https://www.catholiccompany.com/how-to-make-your-st-louis-de-montforts-total-consecration-to-jesus-through-mary/

How to Make Your St. Louis de Montfort's Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary

The Annunciation February 21-March 25 (Leap Year)

DAY 1
Feb 21

DAY 2
Feb 22

DAY 3
Feb 23

DAY 4
Feb 24

DAY 5
Feb 25

DAY 6
Feb 26

DAY 7
Feb 27

DAY 8
Feb 28

DAY 9
Feb 29

DAY 10
Mar 1

DAY 11
Mar 2

DAY 12
Mar 3

DAY 13
Mar 4

DAY 14
Mar 5

DAY 15
Mar 6

DAY 16
Mar 7

DAY 17
Mar 8

DAY 18
Mar 9

DAY 19
Mar 10

DAY 20
Mar 11

DAY 21
Mar 12

DAY 22
Mar 13

DAY 23
Mar 14

DAY 24
Mar 15

DAY 25
Mar 16

DAY 26
Mar 17

DAY 27
Mar 18

DAY 28
Mar 19

DAY 29
Mar 20

DAY 30
Mar 21

DAY 31
Mar 22

DAY 32
Mar 23

DAY 33
Mar 24

DAY 34
Mar 25
CONSECRATION
The Annunciation

Tuesday of the First Week of Lent: 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, God, for ever and ever.

Franciso and Jacinta Marto were officially declared saints of the Catholic Church by Pope Francis on May 13, 2017, in Fatima, Portugal. Today the Roman Martyrology commemorates St. Jacinta (1910-1920), the youngest visionary of Our Lady of Fatima. The brother and sister who tended to their families’ sheep with their cousin Lucia Santo in the fields of Fatima, witnessed the apparitions of Mary, now commonly known as Our Lady of Fatima. Pope John Paul II beatified Francisco and Jacinta May 13, 2000, on the 83rd anniversary of the first apparition of Our Lady at Fatima. Both under 12 years old, they were the youngest non-martyrs to be beatified in the history of the Church. St. Francisco's feast is April 4.

The readings and propers of the Mass shows the Church's constant effort to acquaint us with the teaching of her Founder, and to strengthen us to follow and live his teachings. Mere formalism and externalism are of no value in the religion of Christ. God demands of his people a worship in spirit and in truth, and a conversion which comes from the heart.

Lent is a time set apart to seek the Lord. It is a special time of divine mercy and grace. The Church, acting as God's prophet, calls us to return to the Lord by true penance. The word of God which is sown so abundantly during Lent should grow and bear fruit in us if we have really prepared ourselves by fasting and discipline of the flesh. —St. Andrew Bible Missal

Today's Station Church >>>

Meditation—Tuesday of the First Week of Lent:
In the liturgical texts for today is hidden the mystery of the Mother of God, intimately connected with that of the incarnation of the Son of God. Let us look at the texts, and begin with the reading from the prophet Isaiah.

So shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth: it shall not return to me empty (55, 11)

When the prophet Isaiah made this affirmation, it was not at all to bring out something merely trivial, but rather a contradiction of what might be expected. For this passage belongs certainly to the story of the passion of Israel, where we read that God’s appeals to his people were continually defeated and that his word invariably remained fruitless, while God appears seated astride history, but not as a conqueror. For everything happened as a sign: the crossing of the Red Sea, the blossoming of the period of the Kings, the return of Israel to their country out of exile, all this now fades away. God’s seed in the world seems to give no results. The prophecy, therefore, however wrapped in obscurity, is an encouragement to all those who, in spite of everything continue to believe in the power of God, convince that the world is not just rocky soil in which the seed cannot find room to grow, but certain that the soil will not always be only a thin layer on the surface from which the birds day by day peck out suddenly what seed has there fallen upon it. (cf. Mk 4,1-9).

For us Christians an affirmation of this kind has the ring of the promised coming of Jesus Christ, thanks to which the word of God has now truly penetrated into the earth and has become bread for us all: seed which bears fruit through the ages, a fruitful response in which God’s discourse has taken root in this world in vital fashion. It is difficult to find elsewhere the mystery of Christ allied to that of Mary in a form as clear and condensed as in the perspective of this promise: for when it affirms that the word, or better the seed, bears fruit, it means to say that it does not fall on the ground to rebound like a ball, but that instead it penetrates deeply into the soil to absorb the moisture there and transform it into itself, truly producing something new, transubstantiating that same earth into fruit. The grain does not remain alone: this is part of the fertility mystery of the earth—Mary, the holy soil of the Church, as the Fathers fittingly call her, belongs to Christ. The mystery of Mary signifies in this connection that the word does not remain alone; rather it assumes the other, the earth, into itself; in the earth of the Mother the word becomes man, and now, mingled with the soil of the whole of humanity, it can return again to God.

The Gospel on the other hand seems to be speaking of something quite different. Here it is a question of our mode of prayer, its correct form, its proper content, the way to comport ourselves, and genuine recollection: not so much therefore of what it is for God to do, but of how we ought to act before him. In reality the two readings are interdependent; we might say that in the Gospel we come now to see how it is possible for human beings to become a fertile field for the word of God. This they can become by preparing those elements by which a life can grow and mature. They attain this end by themselves living from these elements, thus transforming themselves, being impregnated with the word, in the word, immersing their life in prayer and therefore in God.

So this Gospel, then, accords with the introduction to the Marian mystery given by Luke, when in more than one place he says of Mary that she ‘kept’ the word in her heart (2,19; 2,51). Mary united in herself the various currents in Israel; in her prayer she bore within herself the suffering and the greatness of that history, to convert it into a fertile land for the living God. To pray undoubtedly means much more, as the Gospel tells us, than speaking without reflection, merely mouthing words. To be a field for the word means to be earth which allows itself to be absorbed by the seed, which assimilates itself to the see, renouncing itself so as to make the seed germinate. With her motherhood Mary transfused into it her very substance, body and soul, so that a new life might come forth. The saying about the sword which would pierce her soul (Lk 2,35) has a much greater and more profound meaning: Mary makes herself completely available as the soil, she allows herself to be used and consumed so as to be transformed into him, who has need of us in order to become the fruit of the earth.

In the Collect for today we are called upon to have a longing desire for God. The Fathers of the Church maintain that to pray is nothing else than to turn into a longing desire for the Lord. In Mary this petition is heard: she is, may I say, a vessel of desire in whom life becomes prayer, and prayer life. St. John has wonderfully alluded to such a process of transformation while not calling Mary by name in his Gospel. He refers to her solely as the mother of Jesus. She in a certain sense set aside whatever in her life was personal, so as to be uniquely at the disposal of the Son; and it is precisely in this that Mary realised her personality.

I think that such links between the mystery of Christ and that of Mary put before us by today’s Readings are of great importance for the Western activistic mentality, which has reached its peak in our age. For to our way of thinking the principle of domination alone still has value.: action, production, planning the world and, along with that, reconstructing it by ourselves, without owing anything to anybody but confidently relying on our own resources. With such a mentality, then, it is not by chance that we have more and more separated Christ from his mother, without taking account of how Mary as his mother, could signify something indispensable for theology and for faith. The whole of this way of considering the Church thus starts out from an erroneous way of thinking. We may even ourselves consider it as a technical product which we intend to programme cleverly and bring to realization with a tremendous expenditure of energy. We wonder whether that can happen which St. Louis-Marie Grignon de Montfort appended to a passage from the prophet Haggai “You have done much but nothing has come of it” (1,6). “If doing takes the upper hand, becoming autonomous, then those things which are not manufactured, but are living and need to mature, will no longer be able to exist.”

We want to get out of this one-sided outlook belonging to Western activism in order not to degrade the Church to a product of our doing and planning. The Church is not a finished artefact but always living from God, needing to develop and achieve maturity. For this she requires the Marian mystery, just as she herself is the mystery of Mary. She can train herself to that fecundity only if she submits to that sign; only then does she become holy soil for the word. We should adopt the symbol of the fertile soil, we should become people who hope, harvesting their own inner lives, persons who, deep within their prayer, their longing and their faith, make room for growth.
—Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI), Journey Towards Easter

St. Jacinta Marto
Between May 13 and October 13, 1917, three children, Portuguese shepherds from Aljustrel, received apparitions of Our Lady at Cova da Iria, near Fatima, a city 110 miles north of Lisbon. At that time, Europe was involved in an extremely bloody war. Portugal itself was in political turmoil, having overthrown its monarchy in 1910; the government disbanded religious organizations soon after.

At the first appearance, Mary asked the children to return to that spot on the thirteenth of each month for the next six months. She also asked them to learn to read and write and to pray the rosary “to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war.” They were to pray for sinners and for the conversion of Russia, which had recently overthrown Czar Nicholas II and was soon to fall under communism. Up to 90,000 people gathered for Mary’s final apparition on October 13, 1917.

Less than two years later, Francisco died of influenza in his family home. He was buried in the parish cemetery and then re-buried in the Fatima basilica in 1952. Jacinta died of influenza in Lisbon, offering her suffering for the conversion of sinners, peace in the world and the Holy Father. She was re-buried in the Fatima basilica in 1951. Their cousin, Lucia dos Santos, became a Carmelite nun and was still living when Jacinta and Francisco were beatified in 2000. Sister Lucia died five years later. The shrine of Our Lady of Fatima is visited by up to 20 million people a year.
—Excerpted from Saint of the Day: Lives, Lessons and Feast by Leonard Foley, O.F.M.; revised by Pat McCloskey, O.F.M.

Patronage: against bodily ills; captives; people ridiculed for their piety; prisoners; sick people; against sickness

Highlights and Things to Do:

Learn more about St. Jacinta:
L’Osservatore Romano Biography of the newly beatified
Find-a-Grave
Saints Stories for All Ages
EWTN
Denver Catholic
CatholicCompany
Visit virtually the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima in Fatima, Portugal.
Read online Fatima in Lucia's Own Words.
Catholic Cuisine for some food ideas for St. Jacinta.

Tuesday of the First Week of Lent
Station with Sant'Anastasia al Palatino (St. Anastasia in the Palatine):
Today's stational church is St. Anastasia in Rome, where, 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 the early 4th century martyr St. Anastasia of Sirmium, who is included in the Roman Canon. Pope Francis granted the church to the Syro Malabar Church in July 2020.

Tuesday of the First Week of Lent - February 20, 2024 - Liturgical Calendar Franciso and Jacinta Marto were officially declared saints of the Catholic Church by Pope Francis on May 13, 2017, in Fatima, Portugal. Today the Roman Martyrology commemorates St. Jacinta (1910-1920), the youngest visionary of Our Lady of Fatima. The brother and sister who tended to their

Talk 5: Saints During Times of Crisis (Part 1) Fr Jojo Zerrudo
The children of Fatima Fracinsco,Jacinta from the book of Sr. Lucia Fatima in Lucia's Own Words: Sister Lucia's Memoirs.

Talk 5: Saints During Times of Crisis (Part 1) Fr Jojo Zerrudo

Talk 5: Saints During Times of Crisis (Part 2) Fr Jojo Zerrudo

The children of Fatima Fracinsco,Jacinta from the book of Sr. Lucia Fatima in Lucia's Own Words: Sister Lucia's Memoirs.

Talk 5: Saints During Times of Crisis (Part 2) Fr Jojo Zerrudo

Monday of the First Week of Lent: 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, God, for ever and ever.

Today The Roman Martyrology commemorates St. Conrad of Piacenza (1290-1351), a Franciscan tertiary hermit celebrated for piety and miraculous cures at Noto in Sicily and St. Barbatus (610-682), Bishop of Benevento, who converted the Lombards.

The great themes—the annual catechumenate by which all the people of the Church are renewed in the baptismal promises they repeat at the Easter Vigil; the adventure of God in salvation history and in the coming of the Kingdom in the person of Jesus; and the invitation to deeper friendship with Christ through a more intimate embrace of His Passion and Death—shape the liturgical rhythm of Lent.

Ash Wednesday, the days immediately following, and the first two weeks of Lent are penitential in character. The prayers and readings of daily Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours calls us to an extended examination of conscience: How am I living as a witness to the Kingdom? Have I been the missionary of the Gospel I am called to be? What is there in me that needs purification, if I am to deepen my friendship with Jesus? —George Weigel, Roman Pilgrimage: Station Churches

Today's Station Church >>>

Meditation on the Liturgy
This is also the Ember week of Lent: the spring Embertide. The first week of Lent continues the subject introduced on Sunday: temptation. The lessons of the principal and most ancient Masses this week show that every Lenten effort brings results from the Lord: healing, strengthening, conversion. But the effort itself is not the most important thing; it is God's reaction and acceptance. We are like the grain of wheat which must die to become productive. We must die before we grow into glory.

The Mass of today is filled with thought of the last Messianic times, when Christ will gather all those he has redeemed and lead them into his eternal Kingdom. What a wonderful encouragement to those who, with Christ and the Church, have truly entered into the Lenten effort.

Today's Gospel tells us that we must practice charity and do works of mercy to all without distinction and in the name of Christ. When our Blessed Lord comes to us in the Eucharist today he will give us the joy of hearing his invitation to possess the kingdom prepared for us by his Father form the foundation of the world.—St. Andrew Bible Missal

Bl. Conrad of Piacenza
Blessed Conrad was a Franciscan tertiary and hermit. He was a noble, born at Piacenza, Italy. While hunting, Conrad made a fire that quickly engulfed a neighboring cornfield. A poor man was arrested as an arsonist and condemned to death, but Conrad stepped forward to admit his guilt in the matter. As a result, he had to sell his possessions to pay for the damages. Conrad and his wife decided to enter the religious life. She became a Poor Clare, and he entered the Franciscan Third Order as a hermit. Conrad went to Noto, on Sicily, where he lived the next three decades at St. Martin's Hospital and in a hermitage built by a wealthy friend. During his last years, he lived and prayed in the grotto of Pizzone outside of Noto.
—Excerpted from Our Sunday Visitor's Encyclopedia of Saints

Patronage: against hernias; hunters; Cacciatori, Italy; Calendasco, Italy; city of Noto, Sicily; diocese of Noto, Sicily

Symbols and Representation: Franciscan hermit with a cross upon which birds perch; bearded, old man with a tau staff, bare feet, Franciscan cincture, and small birds fluttering around him; old man with stags and other animals around him

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St. Conrad's relics are held in the Cathedral of St. Nicholas in Noto, Italy, also called "Noto Cathedral."
St. Barbatus
St. Barbatus was born in the territory of Benevento in Italy, toward the end of the pontificate of St. Gregory the Great, in the beginning of the seventh century. His parents gave him a Christian education, and Barbatus in his youth laid the foundation of that eminent sanctity which recommends him to our veneration.

The innocence, simplicity, and purity of his manners, and his extraordinary progress in all virtues, qualified him for the service of the altar, to which he was assumed by taking Holy Orders as soon as the canons of the Church would allow it. He was immediately employed by his bishop in preaching, for which he had an extraordinary talent, and, after some time, made curate of St. Basil's in Morcona, a town near Benevento. His parishioners were steeled in their irregularities, and they treated him as a disturber of their peace, and persecuted him with the utmost violence. Finding their malice conquered by his patience and humility, and his character shining still more bright, they had recourse to slanders, in which their virulence and success were such that he was obliged to withdraw his charitable endeavors among them.

Barbatus returned to Benevento, where he was received with joy. When St. Barbatus entered upon his ministry in that city, the Christians themselves retained many idolatrous superstitions, which even their duke, Prince Romuald, authorized by his example, though son of Grimoald, King of the Lombards, who had edified all Italy by his conversion. They expressed a religious veneration for a golden viper, and prostrated themselves before it; they also paid superstitious honor to a tree, on which they hung the skin of a wild beast; and those ceremonies were closed by public games, in which the skin served for a mark at which bowmen shot arrows over their shoulders. St. Barbatus preached zealously against these abuses, and at length he roused the attention of the people by foretelling the distress of their city, and the calamities which it was to suffer from the army of the Emperor Constans, who, landing soon after in Italy, laid siege to Benevento.

Ildebrand, Bishop of Benevento, dying during the siege, after the public tranquillity was restored St. Barbatus was consecrated bishop on the 10th of March, 663. Barbatus, being invested with the episcopal character, pursued and completed the good work which he had so happily begun, and destroyed every trace of superstition in the whole state. In the year 680 he assisted in a council held by Pope Agatho at Rome, and the year following in the Sixth General Council held at Constantinople against the Monothelites.

He did not long survive this great assembly, for he died on the 29th of February, 682, being about seventy years old, almost nineteen of which he had spent in the episcopal chair.
—-Excerpted from Butler's Lives of the Saints, Benziger Bros. ed. [1894]

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Monday of the First Week of Lent
Station with San Pietro in Vincoli (St. Peter in Chains):
This 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.

Monday of the First Week of Lent - February 19, 2024 - Liturgical Calendar Today The Roman Martyrology commemorates St. Conrad of Piacenza (1290-1351), a Franciscan tertiary hermit celebrated for piety and miraculous cures at Noto in Sicily and St. Barbatus (610-682), Bishop of Benevento, who converted the Lombards. The great themes—the annual catechumenate by which