SECOND WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME
SAINTS OF THE DAY: FEAST DAY ~ JANUARY 17, 2024
FEAST OF OUR LADY OF PONTMAIN (OUR LADY OF HOPE) 1871
WEEK OF PRAYER FOR CHRISTIAN UNITY 2024: In the Northern Hemisphere beginning tomorrow, Thursday, January 18, 2024 and ends Thursday, January 25, 2024
Greetings beloved family and Happy Wednesday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time!
Watch “Holy Mass and Holy Rosary on Wednesday, January 17, 2024 on EWTN” |
Watch “Holy Mass from the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy | Wednesday, January 17, 2024 |
Pray “Holy Rosary from the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy | Wednesday, January 17, 2024 |
Pray “Chaplet of the Divine Mercy from the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy | Wednesday, January 17, 2024 |
Pray “Holy Rosary Novena From Lourdes” | January 17, 2024 |
Pray “Holy Rosary ALL 20 Mysteries VIRTUAL🌹JOYFUL🌹LUMINOUS🌹SORROWFUL🌹GLORIOUS” on YouTube |
Today’s Bible Readings: Wednesday, January 17, 2024
Reading 1, First Samuel 17:32-33, 37, 40-51
Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 144:1, 2, 9-10
Gospel, Mark 3:1-6
WEEK OF PRAYER FOR CHRISTIAN UNITY 2024: In the Northern Hemisphere beginning tomorrow, Thursday, January 18, 2024 and ends Thursday, January 25, 2024
Theme: “You shall love the Lord your God… and your neighbor as yourself” ~ Luke 10:27
Link for prayers for the entire week: Week of Prayer for Christian Unity 2024 | USCCB | https://www.usccb.org/committees/ecumenical-interreligious-affairs/week-prayer-christian-unity-2024
DEVOTION OF THE MONTH OF JANUARY – MONTH OF THE HOLY NAME OF JESUS: The month of January is traditionally dedicated to the Holy Name of Jesus. After the Blessed Virgin Mary conceived by the Holy Spirit, the Angel Gabriel appeared to St. Joseph and told him that the Child’s name should be called Jesus, meaning “God Saves.” According to Jewish law, on the 8th day after his birth a male child was to be circumcised, receive his name, and become a full member of God’s covenant people. According to the old Roman liturgical calendar, the Feast of the Circumcision of Jesus was celebrated on January 1st, eight days after Christmas, the same day that He was given His sacred name. Currently we celebrate the Solemnity of the Mother of God on January 1st and honor the Holy Name of Jesus on January 3rd. For Catholics, Jesus’ sacred name is the object of a special devotion symbolized by the monogram “IHS,” (sometimes called a Christogram), which is the first three letters of the Greek spelling of His name.
On this feast day, with special intention through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary, and the Saints, we particularly pray for the sick and dying and we continue to remember our beloved late Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI on the first memorial anniversary of his death. We pray for the repose of his gentle soul and the souls of all the faithful departed, may the Lord receive them into the light of Eternal Kingdom. Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord. And let perpetual light shine upon them. May the gentle soul of Pope Benedict XVI and souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in perfect peace with our Lord Jesus Christ… Amen 🙏 ✝️🕯✝️🕯✝️🕯
Please let us continue to pray for peace all over the world, particularly in the Middle East, for an end to the current war in Israel-Palestine, and the Ukraine-Russia conflicts and for peace in our families and throughout our divided and conflicted World. Amen 🙏
PRAYER FOR THE DEAD: In your hands, O Lord, we humbly entrust our brothers and sisters. In this life, you embraced them with your tender love; deliver them now from every evil, and bid them eternal rest. The old order has passed away: welcome them into paradise, where there will be no sorrow, no weeping or pain, but fullness of peace and joy with your Son and the Holy Spirit forever and ever. Amen🙏
A PRAYER FOR PEACE: Lord Jesus Christ, You are the true King of peace. In You alone is found freedom. Please free our world from conflict. Bring unity to troubled nations. Let Your glorious peace reign in every heart. Dispel all darkness and evil. Protect the dignity of every human life. Replace hatred with Your love. Give wisdom to world leaders. Free them from selfish ambition. Eliminate all violence and war. Glorious Virgin Mary, Saint Michael the Archangel, Every Angel and Saint: Please pray for peace. Pray for unity amongst nations. Pray for unity amongst all people. Pray for the most vulnerable. Pray for those suffering. Pray for the fearful. Pray for those most in need. Pray for us all. Jesus, Son of the Living God, have mercy on us. Jesus, hear our prayers. Jesus, I trust in You! Amen 🙏
Prayers for Peace | https://mycatholic.life/catholic-prayers/prayers-for-peace/
Today, we celebrate the Feast of Our Lady of Pontmain (Our Lady of Hope) and the Memorial of Saint Anthony of Egypt, Abbot.
OUR LADY OF PONTMAIN (OUR LADY OF HOPE) 1871: In 1871, France was being devastated by the Franco-Prussian war. The Prussians were close to the town of Laval when on the evening of January 17, Eugene Barbedette and his brother Joseph saw an apparition of our Lady. A crowd gathered but only children could see the apparition, not adults. After the town gathered praying and singing, she told them that “God heard their prayers and fears and would answer their needs.” That same day, the Prussians halted their advances when their commander encountered an “invisible Madonna barring the way.” In May that same year, a peace treaty was signed. The local Bishop approved the apparition in 1872 and in 1908 the church was dedicated as a Basilica to Our Lady of Hope of Pontmain. Patron Saint of: Pontmain, France and Hope. Feast Day is January 17th
Our Lady of Hope of Pontmain ~ Pray for us 🙏
SAINT ANTHONY OF EGYPT, ABBOT: St. Anthony of Egypt (251–356 A.D.), founder of Monasticism, also known as St. Anthony the Great and St. Anthony of the Desert, was a leading figure among the Desert Fathers, the early Christian monks who lived in the Egyptian desert in the 3rd and 4th centuries. The story of his life was written by St. Athanasius of Alexandria. Saint Anthony was born in the year 251, in Upper Egypt to wealthy and virtuous Christian parents. After their death St. Anthony desired to conform himself to the manner of life of the Apostles and early Christians. On hearing these words from the Gospel of Matthew in church, “If you wish to be perfect, go, sell your possessions, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me,” St. Anthony gave away all his vast possessions — staying only to see that his sister’s education was completed — and retired into the desert. He left everything behind to live a life of prayer, fasting, self-denial, and labor. He then begged an aged hermit to teach him the spiritual life, and he also visited various solitaries, undertaking to copy the principal virtue of each. Whenever he heard of other holy people living in this manner, he would visit them to learn from their virtues in order to imitate them. To serve God more perfectly, He eventually removed himself from all society and became the first Christian to live a life of consecrated solitude. St. Anthony immured himself in a ruin, building up the door so that none could enter. Here the devils assaulted him furiously, appearing as various monsters, and even wounding him severely; but his courage never failed, and he overcame them all by confidence in God and by the sign of the cross. One night, while Anthony was in his solitude, many devils scourged him so terribly that he lay as if dead. A friend found him in this condition, and believing him dead carried him home. But when Anthony came to himself he persuaded his friend to take him back, in spite of his wounds, to his solitude. Here, prostrate from weakness, he defied the devils, saying, I fear you not; you cannot separate me from the love of Christ. After more vain assaults the devils fled, and Christ appeared to Anthony in His glory.
Saint Anthony’s only food was bread and water, which he never tasted before sunset, and sometimes only once in two, three, or four days. He wore sackcloth and sheepskin, and he often knelt in prayer from sunset to sunrise. His admirers became so many and so insistent that he was eventually persuaded to found two monasteries for them and to give them a rule of life. In 305, he founded a religious community of cenobites who lived in detached cells. These were the first monasteries ever to be founded, and Saint Anthony is, therefore, the father of cenobites of monks. He occasionally left his hermitage for pressing matters, once to encourage persecuted Christians, and another time to support Pope Athanasius against the heresy of Arius. In 311 he went to Alexandria to take part in the Arian controversy and to comfort those who were being persecuted by Maximinus. This visit lasted for a few days only, after which he retired into a solitude even more remote so that he might cut himself off completely from his admirers. When he was over ninety, he was commanded by God in a vision to search the desert for Saint Paul the Hermit. He is said to have survived until the age of a hundred and five, when he died peacefully in a cave on Mount Kolzim near the Red Sea. In keeping with his instructions, two of his disciples buried his body secretly in an unmarked grave. Saint Athanasius, his biographer, says that the mere knowledge of how Saint Anthony lived is a good guide to virtue. He’ s Patron Saint of Amputees; animals; basket makers/weavers; brushmakers; butchers; gravediggers; cemetery workers; domestic animals; eczema; epilepsy; epileptics; ergotism (Saint Anthony’s fire); erysipelas; gravediggers; hermits; hogs; monks; pigs; relief from pestilence; skin diseases; skin rashes; swine; swineherds. St. Anthony’s feast day is January 17th.
PRAYER: Lord God, You gave St. Anthony the Abbot the grace of serving in the desert in prayer with You. Aided by his intercession, may we practice self-denial and hence always love You above all things. Amen🙏
PRAYER INTENTIONS: We thank God for blessing us all with the gift of His precious son, may we be saved by the name of our Savior Jesus Christ! May the Lord grant us His grace as we continue to serve Him in spirit and in truth. Through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary and the Saints on this feast day, we continue to pray for all those who are sick and dying, especially sick children, those who are mentally and physically ill, strokes, heart diseases, and those suffering from cancers and other terminal diseases. May God restore them to good health and grant them His Divine healing and intervention. May our Mother Mary comfort them, may the Angels and Saints watch over them and may the Holy Spirit guide them in peace and comfort during this challenging time. We pray for an end to wars, political and religious unrest. We pray for God’s deliverance from impossible causes or situations. We pray for torture victims, the poor, the needy and the most vulnerable in our communities and around the world. We pray for the souls in Purgatory and the repose of the souls of the faithful departed and for all widows and widowers. And we continue to pray for our Holy Father, Pope Francis, the Bishops, the Clergy and all those who preach the Gospel. We pray for vocations to the priesthood and religious life, for the Church, for persecuted christians, for all the innocent who suffer violence due to political or religious unrest, for the conversion of sinners, and Christians all over the world… Amen🙏
SCRIPTURE REFLECTIONS:
Bible Readings for today, Memorial of Saint Anthony, Abbot | USCCB| https://bible.usccb.org/daily-bible-reading
Gospel Reading ~ Mark 3:1-6
“Is it lawful on the sabbath to save life rather than to destroy it?”
“Jesus entered the synagogue. There was a man there who had a withered hand. They watched Jesus closely to see if he would cure him on the sabbath so that they might accuse him. He said to the man with the withered hand, “Come up here before us.” Then he said to the Pharisees, “Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?” But they remained silent. Looking around at them with anger and grieved at their hardness of heart, Jesus said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately took counsel with the Herodians against him to put him to death.”
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus does good on the Sabbath; He does God’s work on the Sabbath by healing the withered hand of a man in the synagogue. Yet, because of the good that Jesus did, some religious and political leaders immediately began to plot together to destroy Jesus. It was because Jesus was faithful to doing God’s good work that He was crucified. Jesus’ life shows very clearly that the good that we do does not always bring a reward; sometimes it can bring the opposite of a reward. It is a strange paradox, but one that is often true to life, that good sometimes generates evil. The goodness of some brings out evil in others. Yet Jesus was faithful to the good work that God gave Him to do, regardless of how negatively it was received by some. Jesus teaches us that goodness is its own reward. We try to be faithful to what God wants of us, because it is what God wants of us and not because of any benefit it might bring us. We remain faithful to our calling to share in Jesus’ work of bringing healing and life to others, even though it may, at times, bring us suffering.
Our first reading today is about the famous story of how David, the one chosen by God to be king over all of His beloved people Israel, triumphed and won against the great and mighty champion of the Philistines, Israel’s bitter enemy, who was represented by the giant and powerful warrior Goliath. The story of David and Goliath had been well-known throughout time and history. David, who was much smaller than Goliath, managed to overcome the much larger and more powerful Goliath, through not the force and power of arms, but through God’s guidance, and through the wisdom and knowledge that He had given to him, in protecting him from harm and in providing everything for him and the Israelites to triumph against their adversities. David placed his faith and trust in God while Goliath the Philistine put his trust in his personal might and physical prowess, in his weapons and armour, and Goliath ridiculed David for his small stature, lack of armour and proper battle gear. David chose to put his trust in God rather than any worldly means and human power because in the end, even the greatest of human might and designs could fail in the midst of trials and dangers. And in his pride, arrogance and haughtiness, Goliath thought he could ridicule David and crush him, even to the point of toying around with him and blaspheming against God. This became his undoing as David, guided by God’s strength, wisdom and power, managed to defeat Goliath, silencing his arrogance and blasphemy once and for all. The Lord had indeed intervened and helped His servant David, as well as His beloved people Israel, in their hour of greatest need. He showed His love and faithfulness, His steadfast strength and guidance to those who have entrusted themselves to Him. By defeating Goliath, David showed us all that in God we can truly find true satisfaction and hope, strength and comfort, because through Him we shall gain greatly in the path towards eternal life and true glory, salvation and liberation from the forces of all those arrayed against us. Each and every one of us should also have faith and trust in the Lord, in following Him and the path that He has shown and revealed to us so that by our lives, lived in obedience to God’s guidance and ways, will come ever closer to His love and grace.
As we reflect on the words of the Sacred Scriptures today, we are reminded of the Lord’s love, guidance and providence for all of us, in how He cared for us all in our darkest and most difficult moments, and how through Him we shall truly be delivered from the challenges and trials facing us. Through what we have heard today, we are reminded to keep our focus on the Lord at all times, and to place our faith and trust in Him, just as David as in our first reading today had done, and just as how the man paralysed on his hand was healed by the Lord because of his faith and trust in Him. Each and every one of us as Christians are reminded of the great graces and love of God that we all have truly been so fortunate in receiving, and why we must really be thankful for all of that. Let us all therefore renew our faith in the Lord, and let us all turn towards Him with renewed heart and commitment, with the desire to follow and serve Him like what David, the king of Israel had done, and just as how St. Anthony the Abbot, who we celebrate today has shown us by his abandonment of worldly glory and ambitions. Let us always put our faith and trust in God, and not in any earthly means and ways, in any worldly glory and power, and we must not allow our ego, greed and desire from dragging us into the path towards of our downfall and destruction. Let us all do our best that we may be good and worthy examples of our Christian faith, and do our part in proclaiming the Good News and truth of Christ to the world, by our obedience to the Law of God, through proper and meaningful understanding, appreciation and internalisation of what we have been taught and shown to do by the Lord Himself. May God in His infinite grace and mercy, grant us the grace to walk in the way of Jesus so as to give greater priority to the total well being of people than to the laws of the institution. May the Lord be with us all in our efforts and journey, and may He bless us all in everything we say and do, now and always. Amen🙏
Let us pray:
My loving Lord and merciful Judge, give me a heart of compassion and mercy toward all. Remove from my heart all judgmentalness and criticalness. I leave all judgment to You, dear Lord, and seek only to be an instrument of Your love and mercy. This day I open myself to an examination of my own heart and pray that You will help me to always be open to change when necessary. Help me, especially, to see any hardness I may have within my heart. Help me to overcome any obstinacy, stubbornness and self-righteousness. Give me the gift of humility, dear Lord, so that my heart can become more like Yours. Jesus, I trust in You ~ Amen 🙏
Save Us, Savior of the World. Our Blessed Mother Mary, Saint Anthony of Egypt ~ Pray for us🙏
Thanking God for the gift of this new year and praying for justice, peace, love and unity in our families and our world and for God’s Divine Mercy and Grace upon us all as we begin this Ordinary Time. Wishing all of us a most blessed, safe, healthy, prosperous and grace-filled New Year and a blessed week! Amen🙏
Blessings and love always, Philomena💖
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