MEMORIAL OF SAINT ATHANASIUS OF ALEXANDRIA, BISHOP AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH AND SAINT ANTONINUS, BISHOP

FIFTH WEEK OF EASTER

SAINTS OF THE DAY ~ FEAST DAY: MAY 2, 2024

Greetings beloved family and Happy Thursday of the Fifth Week of Easter!

We thank God for the gift of life and for the gift of the new month of May. The entire month of May is dedicated to our beloved Mother Mary, the Mother of God. May she continue to intercede for us and may God’s grace and mercy be with us all during this season of Easter🙏

Watch “Holy Mass from the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy” | May 2, 2024 |

Watch “Holy Mass and Holy Rosary on EWTN | May 2, 2024” |

Pray “Holy Rosary from Lourdes, France” | May 2, 2024 |

Pray “Holy Rosary from the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy” | May 2, 2024 |

Pray “The Chaplet of Divine Mercy | from the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy” | May 2, 2024 |

Pray “Holy Rosary ALL 20 Mysteriels VIRTUAL🌹JOYFUL🌹LUMINOUS🌹SORROWFUL🌹GLORIOUS” on YouTube |

Memorare Chaplet | Prayer in Difficult Times (Powerful Prayer) |

Today’s Readings: Thursday, May 2, 2024
Reading 1, Acts 15:7-21
Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 96:1-2, 2-3, 10
Gospel, John 15:9-11

DEVOTION OF THE MONTH OF MAY: MONTH OF OUR LADY: In addition to the myriad feast days honoring Our Lady under her many titles and virtues, the entire month of May is especially given to her praise. In the words of Pope Paul VI, May is “a month which the piety of the faithful has long dedicated to Mary, the Mother of God … For this is the month during which Christians, in their churches and their homes, offer the Virgin Mother more fervent and loving acts of homage and veneration; and it is the month in which a greater abundance of God’s merciful gifts comes down to us from our Mother’s throne.”

THE POPE’S MONTHLY INTENTIONS FOR 2024: FOR THE MONTH OF MAY – FOR THE FORMATION OF RELIGIOUS AND SEMINARIANS: We pray that religious women and men, and seminarians, grow in their own vocations through their human, pastoral, spiritual and community formation, leading them to be credible witnesses to the Gospel.🙏

https://www.usccb.org/prayers/popes-monthly-intentions-2024

PRAYER FOR PEACE ~ POPE FRANCIS:

Lord God of peace, hear our prayer!

We have tried so many times and over so many years to resolve our conflicts by our own powers and by the force of our arms. How many moments of hostility and darkness have we experienced; how much blood has been shed; how many lives have been shattered; how many hopes have been buried… But our efforts have been in vain. Now, Lord, come to our aid! Grant us peace, teach us peace; guide our steps in the way of peace. Open our eyes and our hearts, and give us the courage to say: “Never again war!”; “With war everything is lost”. Instill in our hearts the courage to take concrete steps to achieve peace. Lord, God of Abraham, God of the Prophets, God of Love, you created us and you call us to live as brothers and sisters. Give us the strength daily to be instruments of peace; enable us to see everyone who crosses our path as our brother or sister. Make us sensitive to the plea of our citizens who entreat us to turn our weapons of war into implements of peace, our trepidation into confident trust, and our quarreling into forgiveness. Keep alive within us the flame of hope, so that with patience and perseverance we may opt for dialogue and reconciliation. In this way may peace triumph at last, and may the words “division”, “hatred” and “war” be banished from the heart of every man and woman. Lord, defuse the violence of our tongues and our hands. Renew our hearts and minds, so that the word which always brings us together will be “brother”, and our way of life will always be that of: Shalom, Peace, Salaam! Amen🙏

During this Easter season, please let us all continue to pray for peace all over the world, particularly in Africa, 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 🙏

On this special feast day, as we continue to celebrate our risen Lord, with special intention through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary, and the Saints, we pray for the Clergy and religious as they serve in the Lord’s Vineyard. We also pray for the sick and dying. We especially pray for our loved ones who have recently died and we continue to remember our beloved, we pray for the repose of their gentle souls 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 their gentle souls through the mercy of God rest in perfect peace with our Lord Jesus Christ… 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🙏

Prayers for Peace | https://mycatholic.life/catholic-prayers/prayers-for-peace/

SAINTS OF THE DAY: MEMORIAL OF SAINT ATHANASIUS OF ALEXANDRIA, BISHOP AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH AND SAINT ANTONINUS, BISHOP ~ FEAST DAY: MAY 2ND: Today, we celebrate the Memorial of Saint Athanasius of Alexandria, Bishop and Saint Antoninus, Bishop. Through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary and the Saints on this feast day, we humbly pray for the Church, the Clergy, for persecuted christians, for the conversion of sinners, for all Christians, the poor and needy and for justice, peace, love and unity in our families and all over the world. We also pray for the sick and dying, we particularly pray for those who are suffering from cancer and other terminal diseases, we hope the prayers of the Saints can bring them divine healing, comfort and strength from our Lord. Every life is a gift. We pray for God’s deliverance from impossible causes or situations. We pray for the souls in Purgatory and the repose of the gentle souls of our beloved family members who recently passed away and the souls of all the faithful departed, may the Lord receive them into the light of Eternal Kingdom. 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. 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🙏

SAINT ATHANASIUS OF ALEXANDRIA, BISHOP AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH: St. Athanasius (296-373 A.D.), also called Athanasius the Great, Athanasius the Confessor or Athanasius the Apostolic. A Christian theologian, a Church Father and the great champion of the Faith against Arianism in the Council of Nicaea. He suffered persecution and was exiled for seventeen years for resisting compromise in essentials of the faith. He wrote many works on apologetics. The fourth century bishop is known as “the father of orthodoxy” for his absolute dedication to the doctrine of Christ’s divinity. St. Athanasius was born in Alexandria, Egypt, to noble Christian parents, about the year 296. His parents took great care to have their son educated, and his talents came to the attention of a local priest who was later Bishop of his native city and later canonized as St. Alexander of Alexandria. The priest and future saint tutored St. Athanasius in theology, and eventually appointed him as an assistant. Around the age of 19, St. Athanasius spent a formative period in the Egyptian desert as a disciple of St. Anthony in his monastic community. Returning to Alexandria, he was ordained a deacon in 319, and resumed his assistance to Alexander who had become a bishop. Even in this capacity he was called upon to take an active part against the rising heresy of Arius, an ambitious priest of the Alexandrian Church who denied the Divinity of Christ. This was to be the life struggle of St. Athanasius. The Catholic Church, newly recognized by the Roman Empire, was already encountering a new series of dangers from within.

In 325, St Athanasius assisted his Bishop as participant at the Council of Nicaea, and did much of the theological work which supported the condemnation of the Arian heresy and the formulation of the Nicene Creed. His influence began to be felt. Five months later Alexander died; on his deathbed he recommended St. Athanasius as his successor. In consequence of this Athanasius was unanimously elected Patriarch in 326. St. Athanasius became the Bishop of Alexandria and served in that role for 46 years. He tirelessly and courageously devoted most of his life to defeating the Arian heresy, which denied the divinity of Christ. When the majority of his fellow bishops were Arian heretics, which threatened the integrity of the whole Church, St. Athansius stood firmly and almost single-handedly against their error using his philosophical knowledge, theological wisdom, rhetorical skill, and strength of spirit. Despite having the support of several popes, refusal to tolerate the Arian heresy was the cause of many trials and persecutions for St. Athanasius. He suffered great trials, scandals, and persecutions at the hands of his doctrinal enemies, and he spent seventeen of forty-six years of his episcopate in exile. After a life of virtue and suffering, this intrepid champion of the Catholic Faith, the greatest man of his time, died in peace on May 2, 373. St. Athanasius is known as one of the greatest champions of Catholic doctrine to have ever lived, earning the title, “Father of Orthodoxy.” St. Athanasius was later declared a Doctor of the Church.

“You will not see anyone who is really striving after his advancement who is not given to spiritual reading. And as to him who neglects it, the fact will soon be observed by his progress.” ~ St. Athanasius of Alexandra

PRAYER: Almighty ever-living God, who raised up the Bishop Saint Athanasius as an outstanding champion of your Son’s divinity, mercifully grant, that rejoicing in his teaching and his protection, we may never cease to grow in knowledge and love of you. Through our Lord… Amen. St. Athanasius of Alexandria ~ Pray for us🙏

SAINT ANTONINUS, BISHOP: St. Antoninus was born in Florence on March 1, 1389, the only child of Niccolo Pierozzi, a lawyer, and his wife Thomassina. He was baptized Antonius or Antonio, but because of his small size and gentle nature he was called by the diminutive “Antoninus” or “Antonino” all his life. Supposedly a pious child, at age 15 Antoninus applied to Blessed John Dominic for admission to the Dominican Order. In 1404 Bl. John was at the Convent of Santa Maria Novella in Florence, but he was reforming the Dominican priories in the area and organizing a new house at Fiesole. Afraid that the frail Antoninus could not tolerate the vigorous austerities of the new monastery, Bl. John did not turn the boy down directly but told him to go home and memorize the Decretum Gratiani, or Decrees of Gratian, an enormous compilation of Church law. Determined, St. Antoninus returned in a year, the book entirely committed to memory, and was accepted. Along with Fra Angelico and Fra Benedetto (natural brothers: one the famous painter, the other a miniaturist), Antoninus spent his novitiate in Cortona, then returned to Fiesole, where he stayed until 1409. A zealous reformer like Bl. John, St. Antoninus was named vicar of the convent at Foligno in 1414, then subprior and prior of the convent at Cortona. From 1418 to 1428 he served as prior of convents in Naples, Gaeta, Siena and Fiesole, and then was named prior of the convent at Minerva in Rome in 1430. From 1433 to 1446 he was superior of the reformed Tuscan and Neapolitan congregations, in which post he restored the primitive rules of the Dominican order.

St. Antoninus was summoned by Pope Eugene IV to take part in the Council of Florence in 1438, and as prior of San Marco, welcomed many of the prelates and scholars to Florence for the sessions of the council that took place there. It was at this time also that the great library of San Marco was opened to the public. In 1446, much against his will, he was appointed archbishop of Florence but continued to live as a simple Dominican friar. Then, he became a veritable dynamo of activity: he rebuilt churches, visited parishes, preached incessantly, and brought about peace between political factions and religious orders. He was in Rome at the deathbed of Pope Eugene IV and was consulted by succeeding pontiffs in the reform of the papal curia. He was a superb theologian, his writings on moral theology and economics are considered pioneer works in the changing society of his times. Shortly before the death of Antoninus, a plague hit Florence, decimating the city, with many of his friars dying, and the people starving from famine. He sold everything to help the hungry and destitute. When a violent earthquake hit Florence, he helped to rebuild the city, housing some of the victims in his own home. He died on May 2, 1459, and Pope Pius II himself came to attend his funeral. The people of Florence, who loved Antoninus, placed his statue in the Uffizi Palace, the city’s hall of fame. St. Antoninus’s incorrupt body was moved to a new chapel at San Marco in 1559. He’s the Patron Saint of with a fever.

St. Antoninus, Bishop ~ Pray for us🙏

PRAYER FOR PEACE ~ POPE FRANCIS:

Lord God of peace, hear our prayer!

SCRIPTURE REFLECTIONS

Bible Readings for today, Memorial of Saint Athanasius, Bishop and Doctor of the Church | USCCB | https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/050224.cfm

Gospel Reading ~ John 15:9-11

Remain in my love, that your joy might be complete

“Jesus said to his disciples: “As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. “I have told you this so that my joy might be in you and your joy might be complete.”

In today’s Gospel reading, there is a strong emphasis on love, God the Father’s love for Jesus, Jesus’ love for all of us, and His call on us to remain in His love. The call to remain in Jesus’ love suggests that we already find ourselves within His love and our task is to remain there. In other words, the Lord’s love for us is a given; we don’t have to look for it or work for it. We are born into the Lord’s love; we are baptized into His love. We only have to remain there. The call to remain in the Lord’s love suggests that we can remove ourselves from His love. The Lord does not remove His love from us, but we can fall out of His love, as it were. In the Gospel reading Jesus indicates that the way to stay, to remain, in His love is by keeping His commandments. According to John’s Gospel, Jesus reduces His commandments to one commandment, the commandment to love one another as He has loved us. It is by striving to love one another in the same selfless and generous way that the Lord loves us that we remain in His love. We remain in the love of Jesus by sharing the love we have received from Him with others. This is our calling. According to the gospel reading, it is the path that leads to true happiness, a sharing in Jesus’ own joy. ‘I have told you this so that my joy may be in you’.

Our first reading today is a continuation of the story from Acts of the Apostles when the Church was being divided on the issue of whether the Christian faithful ought to obey and follow the whole suit of the entire Jewish laws, customs, rituals and practices which was the favoured position of those who converted to the Christian faith from among the Pharisees and the more hardline ones among the Jewish people, demanding the Gentiles or the non-Jewish people to adopt wholesale the entire rules and laws concerning the Jewish customs and practices. This would have made it very difficult for the non-Jewish Christian converts to live their lives and consequently would have placed great burden on all those who seek to live their lives faithfully in God’s path. That was why St. Paul and St. Barnabas adamantly insisted that this should not be the way how the Church should proceed forward. They brought the discussion to the table to the Apostles in Jerusalem, highlighting before the whole assembly of the faithful how God has done His great works, signs and miracles among the non-Jewish people as well, showing that He has truly called on everyone to follow Him regardless of their cultural, racial and original background, and He loved everyone regardless of their differences, and thus the Church should also act in the same manner by not making it difficult for those who did not come from Jewish background or origin to follow the Lord and His path, as the way how the Pharisees practiced the Law and the commandments of God was rather excessive and unnecessary.

Therefore in this first Council of the Church, historically known as the First Council of Jerusalem, the Apostles led by St. Peter, the first Pope and Vicar of Christ decided that all the faithful people of God are not bound to the extensive and rigid application of the Jewish laws, rules, customs and rituals, and they also set the standard of what the faithful ought to believe in, a standard which continued to evolve and became more standardised later on, and yet, in its basic form and core tenet remains what we also believe today in our Christian faith. We are all reminded through these that what truly matters in our faith as Christians is for us to follow the Lord faithfully and focus ourselves thoroughly in Him, making God as the centre and focus of our lives, and not like how those Pharisees and teachers of the Law who had become so obsessed in the laws and customs they preserved, that they ended up idolising those laws and customs while forgetting the very purpose why those laws and customs were given to us in the first place. As Christians, all of us are reminded this day that we must truly have that strong and genuine love for the Lord our God and then also have the same love for our fellow brothers and sisters, our fellow men and women. All of us must always live our lives in a manner that is worthy of the Lord so that by our every actions, words and deeds, we will always continue to proclaim the glory of God and show His love and truth to everyone whom we encounter in life. Through our faithful and worthy lives therefore we may inspire countless others who have experienced us in their lives, either through their friendship or relationship with us, or through our simple actions and words, even for those whom we do not know at all, like strangers and others in our midst.

As we reflect on the words of the Sacred Scriptures today, we are all reminded of the need for us to follow and obey the commandments of God wholeheartedly and to understand what He has taught and entrusted to us so that in all the things we say and do, we shall always be focused and centred on the Lord, full of love and commitment for Him and then at the same time, also filled with genuine love for our fellow brothers and sisters all around us. We must not allow the temptations of worldly glory and desires from misleading us down the wrong path in life, as it is by following the Lord wholeheartedly and obeying Him that we shall find the path towards God’s grace and assured of His salvation. Let us all therefore continue to proclaim the Lord’s truth and reach out to our fellow brothers and sisters, to all those who have not yet known or experienced the Lord in their lives. Let our own lives and examples, like that of St. Athanasius and the Holy Apostles, the many other saints and holy men and women of God, be the source of light and hope, inspiration and strength for others. May God in His infinite grace and mercy, be with us always, and may He grant us His grace and may the Risen Lord continue to bless our every good efforts and endeavours, and may He empower us all to live ever more worthily in His Presence, now and always. Amen 🙏

Let us pray:

My obedient Lord, You obeyed the will of Your Father in Heaven to perfection. Through this obedience, You not only experienced the full love and joy of the Father in Your human nature, You also set for us a perfect example and model for holiness. Help me to see the areas of my life in which I need to be more obedient, so that I, too, will share in Your holy life and that of the Father’s. Jesus, I trust in You ~ Amen🙏

Save Us, Savior of the World. Our Blessed Mother Mary, Saint Athanasius of Alexandria and Saint Antoninus ~ Pray for us🙏

Thanking God for the gift of this day and praying for His Divine Mercy and Grace upon us all and for vocations to priesthood and consecrated life. Have a blessed, safe, grace-filled and fruitful Fifth Week of Easter 🙏

Blessings and Love always, Philomena💖

MEMORIAL OF SAINT ATHANASIUS OF ALEXANDRIA, BISHOP AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH AND SAINT ANTONINUS, BISHOP

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