Sunday, October 10 : Blessed Columba Marmion

Let us contemplate our Lord who is our model in all things, whom we wish to follow for love’s sake. What does his life teach us? He, so to speak, espoused poverty. He was God. (…) And behold this God becomes incarnate to bring us to himself. What way does he choose? That of poverty. When the Word came into this world, He, the King of heaven and earth, willed in his divine wisdom, to dispose the details of his birth, life, and death in such a manner that what most transpired was poverty, contempt for the things of this world. The poorest are born at least under a roof; he first sees the day as he lies upon straw, for “there was no room” for his mother in the inn (Lk 2:7). At Nazareth he leads the obscure life of a poor artisan (cf. Mt 13:55). (…). Later on, in his public life, he has nowhere to lay his head although “foxes have holes” (Lk 9:58). At the hour of his death, he is stripped of his garments and fastened naked to the Cross. He leaves his executioners to take possession of that tunic woven by his mother; his friends have forsaken him; of his apostles, he sees only Saint John near him. At least his mother remains to him: but no, he gives her to his disciple (cf. Jn 19:27). Is not this absolute renunciation? Yet he finds a means of going beyond this extreme degree of utter destitution. There are still the heavenly joys with which his Father inundates his humanity. He renounces them for now his Father abandons him, (cf. Mt 22:46) (…). He remains alone, hanging between heaven and earth. (…) When we contemplate Jesus poor in the manger, poor at Nazareth, poor upon the Cross, holding out his hands to us and saying: “It is for you,” we understand the follies of the lovers of poverty. Let us then keep our eyes fixed on this divine Poor One of Bethlehem, of Nazareth, and of Golgotha.

Roman Catholic Ordinary Calendar – rosary,team