Saturday, April 26 : Saint Peter Damian

It is right and just that someone who was loved by Christ more than any other should be the object of a very special love by Christ’s friends, all the more so since John has shown such love for us that… he has shared with us the riches of eternal life that he himself received. Indeed, God gave him the keys to wisdom and knowledge (cf Lk 11:52)… John’s God-illumined mind conceived the incomparable height of divine wisdom when he reclined on the Redeemer’s breast during the holy Last Supper meal (Jn 13:25). And because “all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col 2:3) are within the heart of Jesus, it is from there that he drew and from there that he greatly enriched our wretchedness as people who are poor and generously distributed these goods taken from their source for the salvation of the whole world. And because this blessed John speaks about God in a marvelous way that cannot be compared to that of anyone else, it is only right that the Greeks as well as the Latins have given him the name of “Theologian”. Mary is “Theotokos” because she has truly given birth to God; John is “Theologos” because he saw in an indescribable way that the Word of God was with the Father before the beginning of time and was God (Jn 1:1) and because, too, he spoke about this with extraordinary depth.

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team