Friday, November 4 : Saint Peter Chrysologus

John the Baptist is teaching in both word and deed. A true teacher, he shows by example what he describes in speech. Knowledge makes the teacher but action bestows authority… To teach by doing is the only rule followed by one who wants to give instruction, for instructing by words is knowledge but, when it passes on into deeds, then it is virtue. Therefore that knowledge is genuine that is combined with virtue: this, and this alone, is divine rather than human… «In those days John the Baptist appeared, preaching in the desert of Judea and saying: ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!’» «Repent». Why did he not rather say: «Rejoice»? «Rejoice, rather, because what is human gives way to what is divine, what is earthly to what is heavenly, what is temporal to what is eternal, what is evil to what is good, what is unsure to what is certain, sadness to happiness, what is perishable to those things that endure for ever. The Kingdom of heaven is close at hand. Repent!» Let your behavior as one who has converted be manifest. You who preferred what is human to what is divine, who desired to be the world’s slave rather than to conquer the world along with the world’s Lord: repent. You who fled the freedom that virtue would have won for you because you wished to take on the yoke of sin: repent. Repent in earnest, you who, for fear of possessing Life, have given yourself up to death.

maronite readings – rosary,team