TWENTY-SEVENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME (YEAR B)
SAINTS OF THE DAY: FEAST DAY ~ OCTOBER 6, 2024
Greetings and blessings, beloved family. Happy Sunday of the Twenty-Seventh Week in Ordinary Time!
On this special day, please keep me and my family in your thoughts and prayers as I celebrate my birthday today, thank you and God bless!
Today, on this feast day, we continue to pray for the sick and dying, especially those who are mentally, physically and critically ill and those suffering from cancers and other terminal diseases. We pray for our children and children all over the world, for students, for those seeking for the fruit of the womb, for the poor and needy, we pray for difficult marriages, for peace, love, and unity in our marriages, our families and our world. Amen 🙏
We continue to pray for the gentle repose of the soul of our loved ones who recently passed away, we 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. 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” | October 6, 2024 |
Watch “Holy Mass from the National Shrine of the Divine Mercy” | October 6, 2024 |
Pray “Holy Rosary for Peace with Pope Francis” | LIVE Basilica of St. Mary Major | October 6, 2024 |
Pray “Holy Rosary from Lourdes France” | October 6, 2024 |
Pray “The Chaplet of Divine Mercy in song”| October 6, 2024 |
Pray “Holy Rosary ALL 20 Mysteries VIRTUAL🌹JOYFUL🌹LUMINOUS🌹SORROWFUL🌹GLORIOUS” oùn YouTube |
Memorare Chaplet | Prayer in Difficult Times (Powerful Prayer) |
Today’s Bible Readings: Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B) | October 6, 2024
Reading 1, Genesis 2:18-24
Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 128:1-2, 3, 4-5, 6
Reading 2, Hebrews 2:9-11
Gospel, Mark 10:2-16
SCRIPTURE REFLECTIONS
Bible Readings for today, Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B) | USCCB | https://bible.usccb.org/daily-bible-reading
Gospel Reading ~ Mark 10:2–16
“Therefore what God has joined together, let no human being separate”
“The Pharisees approached Jesus and asked, “Is it lawful for a husband to divorce his wife?” They were testing him. He said to them in reply, “What did Moses command you?” They replied, “Moses permitted a husband to write a bill of divorce and dismiss her.” But Jesus told them, “Because of the hardness of your hearts he wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, no human being must separate.” In the house the disciples again questioned Jesus about this. He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.” And people were bringing children to him that he might touch them, but the disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw this he became indignant and said to them, “Let the children come to me; do not prevent them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Amen, I say to you, whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it.” Then he embraced them and blessed them, placing his hands on them.”
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus presents his ideal, God’s ideal, for marriage. His teaching went against the grain in the Jewish world of His time. The Jewish law made provision for divorce. The only issue of debate among the religious leaders was the grounds for divorce. One school of rabbis favoured very lenient grounds; another school insisted on much stricter grounds. According to the Jewish law it was only the man who could initiate divorce proceedings, whatever the grounds. The woman was not free to do the same. The divorce laws gave a freedom to men that it did not give to women, and it left women very vulnerable to being cut adrift by their husbands. The writ of divorce that the husband had to put into his wife’s hand gave her only limited protection, enabling her to marry again. In that context, Jesus’ teaching was intended to protect women. It reminded men in particular of their obligation to love their wives, to honour their wives as they would their own body, rather than seeing her almost as a piece of property that they could dispose of when it suited them. Jesus went back beyond what the Jewish law had come to allow to God’s original intention as expressed in the Book of Genesis, according to which husband and wife are to become one body, one loving union.
There is a wonderful vision of marriage developed St Paul he developed it when he stated that the union between a husband and wife is a reflection of the union between Christ and his church and that husbands are to love their wives, and wives their husbands, as Christ loves the church. Those who come to the church to be married are drawn by this vision of Jesus for marriage. It is not by accident that one of the most frequently chosen readings for the wedding liturgy is that of Paul’s great hymn to love in 1 Corinthians 13: ‘Love is patient, love is kind…’ Here indeed is Jesus’ ideal for married love, the spelling out of what it means to live as one body. Yet, we are all aware that the gap between that ideal and the real can be very great, in marriage as much as in other areas of life. Marriages do break down, sometimes irretrievably so. Jesus must have been very aware of this. His attitude towards those who were not living according to his ideal for marriage was always characterized by sensitivity and respect. The way the gospels show him relating to the Samaritan woman and to the women caught in the act of adultery shows this.Jesus it seems could present the ideal clearly and at the same time make allowances for the reality of people’s lives which often fell far short of the ideal. There is a message here for all of us, not just in relation to marriage but in relation to other areas of life. We need ideals and values that will stretch us, that will put before us a way that does justice to what is best in us, to what we are capable of, with God’s help. We will find such ideals and values in the message and life of Jesus. However, we also need an assurance that when we fail to live out these values, for whatever reason, we remain graced people who are loved by God and continue to be called into communion with God’s Son. We will find such an assurance too in the message and life of Jesus.
We know from our own experience that that not all marriages reflect the ideal that Jesus places before us in today’s Gospel reading. Many of us will have relatives whose marriages have not lasted. The Gospels are clear that although Jesus presented a certain vision for human relationships, including within marriage, he did not condemn those who feel short of that vision. All of us, married or single, are called to love one another as the Lord has loved us, and we all fail in our response to that call. It is in those moments of weakness and failure that the second part of today’s Gospel reading has most to say to us, ‘anyone who does not welcome the kingdom of God like a little child will not enter it’. We stand before the Lord with a child-like heart, in our weakness and vulnerability, open and receptive to the great gift of the Lord’s love that is given to us unconditionally. It is that gift which empowers us to keep reaching towards the goal, the ideal, the Jesus puts before us all.
In our first reading this Sunday from the Book of Genesis, we heard of the account of the moment after the time when God created the first Man, Adam, in His own image, and saw that it is not good for man to be alone, just as the Lord Himself was not alone, but existing as always in the perfect unity of Three Divine Persons of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, the belief that we have in the Holy Trinity, of the Oneness of God Who exists in the Three Divine Persons, sharing perfectly the indivisible unity of love because God is indeed Love, with the love that is shared by the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit overflows to all of us mankind and to all of His Creation. He has no need for any one of us or for Creation, and yet, He created us all because He desired to share this love with us all. That was why He created us in the first place, and in order to share in this unity, He also therefore created us man and woman, so that we may have one another and may share in the union between us, a union of love through which we may procreate and form new life, through the sacred union between man and woman that God had decreed, and He had also made woman from the parts of man, in order to show that through the union of man and woman, therefore we are made whole by this sacred union, which we describe as marriage, or holy matrimony. This sacred union is one that is blessed by God and mandated by Him for all of us to procreate and to inherit the whole world, all that God had created for each and every one of us. And ideally, through this loving union with one another, and with God Himself, all of us should have existed in harmony and peace. But, because we disobeyed God, we fell into sin and were removed from the state of grace, hence, suffering in this world.
In our second reading this Sunday from the Epistle to the Hebrews, the author of this Epistle shared with all of us that despite this fate we are facing, our sufferings due to our rebellions and sins, God still loved us all nonetheless, and from the very beginning, He had wanted to redeem us all and bring us to His loving Presence once again, and He did all these by sending unto us His messengers and prophets, proclaiming His salvation which He would indeed fulfil through His Son, Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Through Christ, all of us have seen the Lord’s love manifested in the flesh, as He assumed our own human existence, our flesh and human nature, becoming tangible, real and approachable for us to come towards and touch, and through His loving Presence, all of us are reminded of how beloved we all have been by God, at all times. As the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews shared with us that the Lord Jesus came to us to share with us His love, the love of God that is ever generous and compassionate, reaching out to us all, even to the most marginalised and to everyone who had been separated from Him and kept apart from His love by our sins. By His most loving and selfless sacrifice on the Cross, Our Lord Himself has opened for us the gates of Heaven and showed us the path to eternal life, true happiness and fullness of glory with Him, to regain for ourselves what we have always been intended to experience, that is not the sufferings due to our sins, but the pure bliss and happiness, the sharing in the fullness of God’s love and grace as He has always intended for us before we fell into sin and darkness.
As we reflect on the words of the Sacred Scriptures this Sunday, we are all reminded of everything that God had done for us, in His creation of us mankind, whom He has created lovingly in His own image, meant to share the fullness of His glory and majesty, His joy and happiness through all that He had made in this world. He has always desired that we live together in harmony and happiness, joy and satisfaction, to enjoy forever the fullness of His love and grace, and to be truly blessed and wonderful in all things. However, our disobedience against Him and our surrender to the many temptations and allures of worldly pleasures all around us had led us down into this path of darkness and downfall, which led us to wander in this world and suffer the consequences of our disobedience and lack of faith. Through what we have heard in this Sunday’s Scripture passages, let us all therefore remind ourselves first of all of God’s most generous love and kindness, His compassionate love and mercy, and all that He has reassured and promised us all. And as part of God’s One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church, as His beloved and holy people, let us always uphold the sacred institution of marriage, the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony, the foundation of our holy and devout families, which themselves are the foundations and pillars of support for the Church of God. As long as our families are united in God and blessed by Him, and as long as each one of us as members of God’s holy and devout families continue to worship the Lord together and put Him as the centre and focus of our families, the Church will always be strong against all the attacks from the evil ones. May the Lord, our ever loving God, Father and Creator continue to be with us all and bless each and every one of us in our journey of faith. May He continue to strengthen us all in faith, and allow us all to follow Him ever more faithfully and worthily in each and every moments of our lives, now and forevermore. May God in His infinite grace and mercy, grant us the grace as we grow ever more faithful and courageous in proclaiming the Good News of God in all of every moments of our lives, now and always. Amen🙏🏽
SAINTS OF THE DAY: MEMORIAL OF SAINT BRUNO, PRIEST AND BLESSED MARIE ROSE DUROCHER, VIRGIN ~ FEAST DAY ~ OCTOBER 6, 2024: Today, we celebrate the Memorial of Saint Bruno, Priest and Blessed Marie Rose Durocher, Virgin. Through the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary and the Saints on this feast day, we humbly pray for God’s Divine Grace and Mercy upon us all. We pray for the poor, the needy and the most vulnerable. 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 all widows and widowers. We pray 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 BRUNO, PRIEST: St. Bruno of Cologne (1030-1101) was born to a noble and prominent family in Cologne, Germany in about 1030. He was the founder of the Carthusian order of monks who remain notable for their strictly traditional and austere rule of contemplative life. His mother was St. Matilda, patroness of Maude, widow of King Henry I. Excepting St. Norbert, he is the only German having that honor. His contemporaries called him the light of the Church, the flower of the clergy, the glory of Germany and France.
Early in life he was a canon at Cologne and Rheims. He was well educated and excelled in his studies, and became a priest around the year 1055. Returning to Reims the following year, he soon became head of the school he had attended there, after its director Heriman left to enter consecrated religious life in 1057. He directed and taught at the episcopal school at Reims for many years, nearly two decades earning a reputation as a learned scholar and acquiring an excellent reputation as a philosopher and theologian, until he was named chancellor of the local diocese in 1075. After also serving as the chancellor of his archdiocese, he and a few companions left their positions in the diocese in order to follow a path of greater religious observance. He decided to leave the world and pursue a life of complete solitude and prayer. The persecution by the simoniacal archbishop of Rheims, Manasses, hastened his resolve to enter a life of solitude (1084). He settled in the Chartreuse Mountains in France with a small group of scholars who, like himself, desired to become contemplative monks. This was the beginning of the Carthusian order founded by St. Bruno, combining the solitary life of hermits with the conventual life of religious observance. Legend puts it this way. A famous professor had died. While the Office of the Dead was being chanted at his funeral, he suddenly raised himself up from the coffin and said: “By the just judgment of God have I been accused, judged, damned.” Thereupon Bruno renounced the world. He received from Hugo, bishop of Grenoble, a site called Chartreuse (from the color of the surrounding hills) as a place of residence.
In 1088, one of Bruno’s former students was elected as Pope Urban II. Six years into his life as an alpine monk, Bruno was called to leave his remote monastery to assist the Pope in his struggle against a rival papal claimant as well as the hostile Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV. St. Bruno served as a close adviser to the Pope during a critical period of reform. Around this time, he also rejected another chance to become a bishop, this time in the Italian region of Calabria. While he obtained the Pope’s permission to return to monastic life, Bruno was required to remain in Italy to help the Pope periodically, rather than returning to his monastery in France. During the 1090s Bruno befriended Count Roger of Sicily and Calabria, who granted land to his group of monks and enabled the founding of a major monastery in 1095. The monks were known, then as now, for their strict practice of asceticism, poverty, and prayer; and for their unique organizational form, combining the solitary life of hermits with the collective life of more conventional monks. The Order founded by Bruno is one of the strictest in the Church. These alpine monks embraced a strictly disciplined life of poverty, labor, prayer, and fasting. Carthusians follow the Rule of St. Benedict, but accord it a most austere interpretation; there is perpetual silence and complete abstinence from flesh meat (only bread, legumes, and water are taken for nourishment). Bruno sought to revive the ancient eremitical way of life. His Order enjoys the distinction of never becoming unfaithful to the spirit of its founder, never needing a reform. Six years after initiating the foundation, Bruno was called to Rome by Pope Urban II as personal counselor to assist with the troubles and controversies rocking the Church. He complied with a heavy heart. St. Bruno became a close advisor to the Pope and was allowed to return to monastic life only if he remained nearby within Italy. However, when the Pope was forced to flee to Campania because of Emperor Henry IV, St. Bruno found a wilderness similar to that of Chartreuse at La Torre; there he made a second foundation in 1095, which blossomed into a flourishing community. Here in September, 1101, he became severely ill. Having called together his followers, St. Bruno made a public confession and died on October 6, 1101, at the age of seventy-one. He’s the Patron Saint of diabolic possession; Ruthenia. Veneration of St. Bruno was given formal approval in 1514, and extended throughout the Latin Rite in 1623. More recently, his Carthusian Order was the subject of the 2006 documentary film “Into Great Silence,” chronicling the life of monks in the Grand Chartreuse monastery. His feast day is celebrated on October 6th.
QUOTES OF SAINT BRUNO
☆”By your work you show what you love and what you know.”
☆”The cross is steady while the world is turning.” “While the world changes, the cross stands firm.”
☆”For when the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through places without water, seeking rest; and not finding. . .”
☆”For the devil may tempt the good, but he cannot find rest in them; for he is shaken violently, and upset, and driven out, now by their prayers, now by their tears of repentance, and now by their almsgiving and similar good works.”
PRAYER: God, You called St. Bruno to serve You in solitude. Through his intercession, grant that amidst the many affairs of this world we may always have time for You. Amen 🙏
BLESSED MARIE ROSE DUROCHER, VIRGIN: Bl. Marie Rose (1811-1849) was born Eulalie Durocher on October 6, 1811 at St. Antoine in Quebec, Canada. She was the tenth of eleven children. She was drawn to the religious life, but turned away because of her frail health. After her education at the hands of the Sisters of Notre Dame, for 12 years she assisted her brother, a parish priest, as a housekeeper and in the process established the first Canadian parish Sodality for young women. She lived a life of great poverty and remained unswerving in her concern for the poor.
In 1843, the she was invited and encouraged by Bishop Bourget to found a new congregation of women dedicated to Christian education. Accordingly she founded the Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary and took the religious name Marie Rose. Her religious order was dedicated to Christian education, especially for the poor. Under her saintly and wise leadership, her community flourished in spite of all kinds of obstacles, including great poverty and unavoidable misunderstandings. She remained unswerving in her concern for the poor. Worn out by her many labors, Marie Rose was called to her heavenly reward on October 6, 1849, at the age of 38, died of natural causes. This Order first came to the U.S. in 1859. Bl. Marie-Rose was beatified and declared Blessed on May 23, 1982 by Pope John Paul II. She’s the Patron Saint of bodily ills; loss of parents; illness; frail health.
QUOTES OF BLESSED MARIE ROSE DUROCHER
☆”Let us pray, let us suffer and let us trust”
☆”To a novice leaving religious life, Marie-Rose said: “Do not imitate those persons who, after having spent a few months as postulant or novice in a community, dress differently, even ludicrously. You are returning to the secular state. My advice is, follow the styles of the day, but from afar, as it were.”
PRAYER: O Lord, You enkindled in the heart of Blessed Marie Rose Durocher the flame of an ardent charity and a burning desire to collaborate, as a teacher, in the mission of the Church. Inspire our hearts with that same charity so that we may lead our brothers and sisters to the bliss of eternal life. Amen 🙏
DEVOTION OF THE MONTH OF OCTOBER:
MONTH OF THE HOLY ROSARY: The Catholic Church designates and dedicate October as the Month of the Holy Rosary. During this month the faithful venerate the Blessed Virgin Mary especially under her title of Our Lady of the Rosary, and make special effort to honor the Holy Rosary with group recitations and rosary processions. The Lady of the Rosary honors a large battle between the Catholic Church and the Muslim caliphate of the Ottoman Empire. This battle, in the Gulf of Patras, near Greece, took place in the 16th century, on October 7, 1571. St. Dominic de Guzman, the founder of the Order of Preachers, is the Saint to whom Our Lady famously appeared and gave the prayers of the Holy Rosary to assist him as a spiritual weapon in combating heresy and leading souls back to the one, true Catholic faith. Our Blessed Mother Mary ~ Pray for us 🙏
THE MYSTERIES OF THE ROSARY: Until about the 15th century hundreds of mysteries were part of the Rosary devotion then the 15 mysteries that we know today were definitively fixed as “the Mysteries of the Rosary.” Pope John Paul II, in his encyclical, Rosarium Virginis Mariae, in 2002 added the five Luminous Mysteries.
Through the meditations of the complete Rosary one recalls and has impressed on his mind, the Popes tell us, “the chief mysteries of the Christian religion,” “the mysteries of our Redemption,” “the great mysteries of Jesus and His Mother united in joys, sorrows, and triumphs.” The twenty mysteries are divided into four equal groups, known as “The Joyful,” “The Sorrowful,” “The Glorious,” and “The Luminous Mysteries.”
PRAYER OF ST. LOUISE DE MONTFORT: O Jesus living in Mary, come and live in Your servants, in the spirit of Your holiness, in the fullness of Your might, in the perfection of Your ways, in the truth of Your virtues, in the communion of Your mysteries. Subdue every hostile power, the devil, the world and the flesh, in the strength of Your Spirit, for the glory of Your Father, Amen 🙏🏽
https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/overviews/months/10_1.cfm
THE POPE’S MONTHLY INTENTIONS FOR 2024: FOR THE MONTH OF OCTOBER – FOR A SHARED MISSION: We pray that the Church continue to sustain in all ways a Synodal lifestyle, as a sign of co-responsibility, promoting the participation, the communion and the mission shared among priests, religious and lay people.
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 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 of the Covenant, Your love is perfect. It is pure, it is selfless, self-giving, total and irrevocable. Please help me to love You with this same love so that I can share in the divine marriage covenant to which I am called. May this holy love also overflow into every relationship so that You will be the foundation of those holy bonds. 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 Bruno and Blessed Marie Rose Durocher ~ 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, and grace-filled Sunday and month of October 🙏🏽
Blessings and Love always, Philomena💖