TWENTY-FOURTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

SAINTS OF THE DAY ~ FEAST DAY: SEPTEMBER 18, 2024

Greetings and blessings, beloved family and Happy Wednesday of the Twenty-Fourth Week in Ordinary Time!

Today, on this special feast day, through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary and Saint Joseph of Cupertino (Patron Saint of students, test takers, pilots and travelers), we humbly pray for our children, all students, especially those preparing for or taking exams, we pray for their success. We pray for astronauts, pilots and all air travellers, we also pray for all those who travel by other means, we pray for journey mercies and God’s guidance and protection. We pray for the poor and needy, for those seeking for the fruit of the womb, we pray for difficult marriages, for peace, love, and unity in our marriages, our families and our world.

We continue to pray for the sick and dying, especially those who are mentally and physically ill, and those suffering from cancers and other terminal diseases. We pray for those who mourn, for all widows and widowers. May the good Lord comfort them. We pray for the gentle repose of the souls of our loved ones who recently passed away, we particularly pray for the repose of the souls of all those who will die today, asking God to have mercy on their souls and to lead them into Eternal Life. We pray for the souls in Purgatory and we continue to pray for the repose of 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 and souls of all the faithful departed 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🙏

Watch “Holy Mass and Holy Rosary on EWTN on YouTube” | September 18, 2024 |

Watch “Holy Mass from the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy” | September 18, 2024 |

Pray “Holy Rosary from Lourdes France” | September 18, 2024 |

Pray “The Chaplet of Divine Mercy in song”| September 18, 2024 |

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

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

Today’s Bible Readings: Wednesday, September 18, 2024
Reading 1, First Corinthians 12:31-13:13
Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 33:2-3, 4-5, 12, 22
Gospel, Luke 7:31-35

SAINT OF THE DAY: MEMORIAL OF SAINT JOSEPH OF CUPERTINO, PRIEST ~ FEAST DAY: SEPTEMBER 18TH: Today, we celebrate the Memorial of Saint Joseph of Cupertino, Priest. Through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary and Saint Joseph of Cupertino on this feast day, we humbly pray for all students, especially those preparing for or taking exams, we pray for their success. We pray for astronauts, pilots and all air travellers, we also pray for all those who travel by other means, we pray for journey mercies and God’s guidance and protection. We pray for the sick and dying, especially those who are mentally and physically ill, and those suffering from cancers and other terminal diseases. We pray for the souls in Purgatory and the repose of the souls of the faithful departed. We pray for the poor and needy, for all widows and widowers, for peace, love, and unity in our marriages, our families and our world. And we continue to pray for our Holy Father, Pope Francis, the Bishops, the Clergy, for vocations to the priesthood and religious life, for the Church, for persecuted Christians, for the conversion of sinners, and Christians all over the world…. Amen🙏

SAINT JOSEPH OF CUPERTINO, PRIEST: St. Joseph of Cupertino (1603-1663) was born at Cupertino, Italy, and died in Osimo. He was a mystic who was perhaps most famous for his ability to fly. He was noted for his great austerities, his angelic purity, his great devotion to Our Lady and especially for his ardent love of God. His father, a poor carpenter, died before his birth and his mother became destitute, was unable to pay the debts, lost her home and gave birth to St. Joseph in a stable at Cupertino, Italy on June 17, 1603. St. Joseph began having mystical visions when he was seven for which he was ridiculed, and was often so lost to the world around him that the other children made fun of him giving him the nickname, “open-mouthed” for his gaping manner. He had an irascible temper, he was awkward, absent-minded, unintelligent, difficult to be around and read very poorly, giving others the impression that he was dumb and good for nothing. Aside from that, he was so continually drawn into ecstasy that it was impossible for him to be attentive to the tasks at hand. Thus, when he secured a job, he lost it very quickly. At the age of seventeen, St. Joseph finally managed to obtain a post taking care of a stable in a Franciscan convent near Cupertino. Upon realizing his holiness and aptitude for penance, humility, and obedience beneath his irritating demeanor, it was decided that he could begin studying for the priesthood. St. Joseph was a very poor student, however during his final examination, the examiner happened to ask him a question on the one topic he knew well. He passed and was admitted into the priesthood. It was also soon recognized that though he knew little by way of worldly knowledge and had little capacity to learn, St. Joseph was infused with a divine knowledge that made him capable of solving some of the most intricate theological quandaries. The people flocked to St. Joseph in droves seeking help and advice in the confessional, and he converted many to a truly Christian life. He was most devoted to the Blessed Virgin Mary and promoted devotion to her among all classes of people.

St. Joseph of Cupertino’s life was marked by ecstasies and levitations. The ecstasies became more pronounced, and he would often levitate or float as they happened. These ecstasies could be triggered easily through the mention of anything heavenly, or by any mortification. These occurrences became a spectacle and disturbance to others and caused St. Joseph much suffering; they were a cross he would bear his whole life. For example, as a priest he could not celebrate Mass publicly due to his distracting ecstasies. For the last 35 years of his life as a priest he was unable to celebrate Mass in public because he would often, without being able to help it, be lifted up into the air when he went into an ecstatic state, which happened at nearly every Mass. No meals could be taken in the monastery without some extraordinary interruption because of St. Joseph’s miraculous behaviour. It took only the slightest reference of anything having to do with God in order for this state to be induced in him. Once as Christmas carols were being sung he soared to the high altar and knelt in the air, rapt in prayer. He was even reported to the Inquisition for fear he was involved in witchcraft. Despite being moved from one friary to another, because of the disruption he caused by his ecstasies and the persecutions he endured from some of his brothers who were envious of his gifts, yet St. Joseph remained profoundly inundated by the joy of abandoning himself to Divine Providence. He lived a life of deep prayer and severe penance through continual fasting, subjecting himself every year to seven Lents of forty days each. St. Joseph of Cupertino, humbly endured many severe trials and terrible temptations throughout his life. He died on September 18, 1663 and was canonized in 1767 by Pope Clement XIII. Sometimes called “The Flying Saint,” fittingly the twentieth century has made St. Joseph of Cupertino patron of pilots and airline passengers. He’s also the Patron Saint of air travellers; astronauts; air crews; aviators; paratroopers; pilots; test takers and students preparing for exams. His feast day is September 18th.

QUOTES OF SAINT JOSEPH OF CUPERTINO: “Clearly, what God wants, above all, is our will, which we received as a free gift from God in creation and possess as though our own. When a man trains himself to acts of virtue, it is with the help of grace from God, from whom all good things come …The will is what man has, as his unique possession.”

PRAYER: God, You willed that Your only-begotten Son should draw all things to Himself when He was lifted up above the earth. May the merits and example of St. Joseph, Your Priest, help us to rise above all earthly desires so that we may come to Jesus. Amen 🙏

SCRIPTURE REFLECTIONS

Bible Readings for today, Wednesday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time | USCCB | https://bible.usccb.org/daily-bible-reading

Gospel Reading ~ Luke 7:31-35

“We played the flute for you, but you did not dance. We sang a dirge, but you did not weep”

“Jesus said to the crowds: “To what shall I compare the people of this generation? What are they like? They are like children who sit in the marketplace and call to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, but you did not dance. We sang a dirge, but you did not weep.’ For John the Baptist came neither eating food nor drinking wine, and you said, ‘He is possessed by a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking and you said, ‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is vindicated by all her children.”

In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus uses the language of music to speak of His own ministry and the ministry of John the Baptist. He compares the Baptist’s ministry to children in the market place singing dirges, playing at funerals, and He compares His own ministry to children in the market place playing pipes, as at a wedding or some other celebratory event. There was a sombre character to the ministry of John the Baptist which was absent from Jesus’ ministry and there was a joyful, celebratory character to Jesus’ ministry which was absent from the Baptist’s. Jesus declares that neither the sombre music of John’s ministry or the joyful music of His own ministry moved many of His contemporaries. They dismissed John as possessed and Jesus as a glutton and drunkard. Jesus played the music of God in a way no one else has ever done. The risen Lord continues to play the music of God through the Holy Spirit today. We try to become more and more attuned to that music of the Spirit, so that its melody feeds our spirit and its rhythm shapes how we live.  

According to the Gospel, Jesus is reminded of how unmoved the people of His generation have been by the somewhat sombre ministry of John the Baptist and His own much more joyful ministry. They labelled John as ‘possessed’ and Jesus as a ‘glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners’. In St. Paul’s wonderful portrait of love in the first reading, he declares that love ‘does not take offence, and is not resentful’. Many of Jesus’ contemporaries took offence at and resented the very different ministries of John the Baptist and Jesus. They lacked the quality of love towards John and Jesus that St. Paul describes in the first reading. This quality of love is a more than human love. It is what St. Paul calls elsewhere the fruit of the Spirit. It is the outward expression of God’s love that has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit. If we open our hearts to the Spirit, we will come to see others with the eyes of love, the eyes of the Lord. We will recognize the ways God is at work in people’s lives, rather than dismissing them with the kind of cheap labels that Jesus’ contemporaries used for Himself and John the Baptist.

In our first reading today from the Epistle of St. Paul to the Church and the faithful people of God in Corinth, the Apostle reminded all the faithful people of God that unless each and every one of them have love in them then all their gifts, blessings, abilities, specialties, talents and all sorts of other things they possess, all would come to nothing as these would not bring them to true righteousness and virtue in God, as God seeks the hearts and minds of those who love and showcase this same love in all opportunities, those who truly love Him and love one another in the same manner as how God Himself has loved each and every one of us, His beloved children and people. God wants each and every one of us to model ourselves based on His love, kindness and compassion, and to follow His path at all times. St. Paul the Apostle reminded the faithful in Corinth and elsewhere that their Christian faith must not be based on boasting of one’s own proud ambitions and power, and all the glory and fame of the world. Instead, the greater each of us are, the more loving and the more humble we should become, and the more we should show the generous love that God Himself, our Lord and Master has shown to each one of us. A lot of sufferings in this world came to be because of our failure to do so, and our inability to resist the temptations of worldly glory and pleasures, all of which led us down the ruinous path towards our doom and downfall. If we allow our pride, ego and ambition to lead us this path to ruin then there will be nothing for us but regret in the end, of having chosen the wrong path of rebellion and disobedience against God.

As we reflect on the words of the Sacred Scriptures today, each and every one of us are reminded that we are all called to be faithful and committed disciples and followers of the Lord in all things, to do His will and to obey His calling and commandments so that by each and every one of our actions, words and interactions with one another, we will always strive to do what is right and just in accordance with what the Lord has taught us to do, to be full of His love, kindness and mercy, and not to follow instead the path and corruptions of this world, or the distractions and temptations of worldliness around us which can keep us away from the path of God’s salvation and grace. Let us all therefore do our best so that in everything that we say and do, we will continue to embody our love for God and for our fellow brothers and sisters around us. We should always be the shining beacons of God’s Light and grace, proclaiming His Good News and love at all times, by our exemplary living and actions, loving those who have none to love them and showing care to everyone, to those who are in our families, our relatives and friends, but even also those who have hurt and persecuted us. Certainly this is much easier said than done, but that is exactly the challenge that each and every one of us as Christians have received from the Lord, for to be Christians is to be truly like the Lord Himself, Who has loved everyone including even those who persecuted and oppressed Him. May the Lord, our ever loving God and Father continue to strengthen us with His love and kindness, blessing us with His generous and ever abundant compassion and care, His patient and ever enduring generosity and passion in reaching out to us and in spending time and moments with us. We’re called to emulate the Holy men and women and Saints, particularly the Saint ww celebrate today, St. Joseph of Cupertino, who humbly endured many severe trials and terrible temptations throughout his life. May God in His infinite grace and mercy, grant us His grace to be Astute and may He continue to strengthen and empower us all with His love and teach us to continue to love in the same manner and to be always generous in giving from the depths of our hearts, to be fully attuned to God’s ways and love, to be ever worthy to be called His disciples, followers and children. Amen 🙏🏾

DEVOTION OF THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER:

MONTH OF OUR LADY OF SORROWS:
September is the Month of Our Lady of Sorrows, also known as our Mother of Sorrows (Mater Dolorosa)! Since the 16th century, Catholic piety has assigned entire months to special devotions. The Church dedicates the month of September to Our Lady of Sorrows, whose memorial the Church celebrates on September 15th.  Devotion to the sorrows of the Virgin Mary dates from the twelfth century, when it made its appearance in monastic circles under the influence of St. Anselm and St. Bernard.

This devotion recalls the Blessed Virgin Mary’s spiritual martyrdom in virtue of her perfect union with the Passion of Christ. This was her role in salvation history and what merited her place as the spiritual Mother of all Christians. This is symbolized by a single sword, or seven swords, piercing Mary’s suffering heart, as foretold in Simeon’s prophecy. Traditionally the Church meditates on the “Seven Sorrows” of our Blessed Mother: the prophecy of Simeon; the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt; the loss of the Child Jesus for three days; the meeting of Mary and Jesus as He carried His cross; Jesus’ crucifixion and death; Jesus’ sacred body taken down from the cross; and Jesus’ burial. All the sorrows of Mary (the prophecy of Simeon, the three days’ loss, etc.) are merged in the supreme suffering at the Passion. In the Passion, Mary suffered a martyrdom of the heart because of Our Lord’s torments and the greatness of her love for Him. “She it was,” says Pope Pius XII, “who immune from all sin, personal or inherited, and ever more closely united with her Son, offered Him on Golgotha to the Eternal Father together with the holocaust of her maternal rights and motherly love. As a new Eve, she made this offering for all the children of Adam contaminated through his unhappy fall. Thus, she, who was the mother of our Head according to the flesh, became by a new title of sorrow and glory the spiritual mother of all His members.” The feast of Our Lady of Sorrows (Mater Dolorosa) is September 15th.

INVOCATIONS: Mary most sorrowful, Mother of Christians, pray for us. Virgin most sorrowful, pray for us 🙏🏾

https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/prayers/view.cfm?id=762

THE POPE’S MONTHLY INTENTIONS FOR 2024: FOR THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER – FOR THE CRY OF THE EARTH: We pray that each one of us will hear and take to heart the cry of the Earth and of victims of natural disasters and climactic change, and that all will undertake to personally care for the world in which we live.

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 Ordinary Time, please let us all continue to pray for peace all over the world, particularly in Africa, Nigeria, 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 🙏🏾

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

PRAYER INTENTIONS: During this season of the Ordinary Time, through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary and all the Saints on this feast day, we humbly pray for our children and children all over the world, we pray for their health, safety and well-being, we particularly pray for those who have no one to care for them and those who are terminally ill, we pray for God’s Divine healing upon them. We pray for all mothers, wives, those going through challenges in their marriages, Victims of verbal and spousal abuse, and we pray for peace, love and unity in our families and our world. 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 soul 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. We pray for Vocation to the Priesthood and Religious life. We particularly pray for all Youths and all Seminarians, with special intention for those Seminarians who will be ordained into Priesthood. 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 🙏

Let us pray:

Lord, Your soul was perfectly ordered, always responding to the will of the Father with perfection. You were firm when love demanded it, courageous in the face of hardship, merciful to the repentant sinner, and joyful at the conversion of all. Please help me to always be attentive to the promptings of Your grace and to always respond to You in the way I am called. Jesus, I trust in You ~ Amen 🙏

Save Us, Savior of the World. Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and Most Precious Blood of Jesus, have mercy on us. Our Blessed Mother Mary; Saint Joseph of Cupertino ~ Pray for us 🙏

Thanking God for the gift of this day 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. Have a blessed, safe, grace-filled and fruitful week and month of September!🙏

Blessings and Love always, Philomena💖