Roman Catholic Ordinary Calendar

“God put Abraham to the test and said to him: ‘Take your son Isaac, your only one, whom you love, and offer him up as a sacrifice on a height that I will show to you’ ” (Gn 22,2). Notice how that same son on whom great and wonderful promises rested… Abraham received the command to offer in holocaust on a mountain to the Lord! What do you feel about this command, Abraham?… The apostle Paul to whom, I think, the Spirit had revealed Abraham’s thoughts and feelings, said: “Abraham did not doubt God’s promises in unbelief when he offered up his only son Isaac on whom rested the promises for he reasoned that God was able to raise even from the dead” (Rm 4,20; Heb 11,17.19)… This, then, was the first time when faith in the resurrection was shown. Yes, Abraham hoped Isaac would rise again and believed in the realization of something that had never happened before… Abraham knew that in him the prefiguration of a coming reality was already taking shape; he knew the Messiah, the true victim offered on behalf of the whole world, who was to triumph over death through his resurrection, would be born from his descendants. “So early the next morning Abraham rose and… on the third day… came to the place of which God had told him.” The third day is always associated with mystery and… the Lord’s resurrection in particular took place on the third day… “Abraham got sight of the place from afar. Then he said to his servants: ‘Both of you stay here with the donkey, while the boy and I go over yonder. We will worship and then come back to you.’”… Now tell me, Abraham, were you speaking the truth to your servants when you stated you were going to worship and then return with the boy; or did you want to deceive them?… “I am telling the truth,” Abraham answers. “I am offering the boy in sacrifice , which is why I am bringing the wood with me. Then I am coming back to you with the boy. Truly, I believe with all my heart that ‘God is sufficiently powerful to raise the dead.’”

Roman Catholic Ordinary Calendar – rosary,team

” Trouble shall make him afraid, straits shall besiege him, as a king ready to the battle.” In all that the wicked man does, he is hedged in with anguish, and tribulation, and straits; in that his soul is confounded with anxiety and misgiving. One man secretly longs to seize another’s goods by force, and he toils and strains in the thoughts of his heart, that he may not be found out. Another man, forsaking truth, makes up his mind to tell a lie, that he may deceive the mind of those that hear him; but what great labour it is to guard with sufficient heed, that his deceit itself may not be found out! For he sets before his eyes what answer may be made to him by those that know the truth, and with great effort of thought he makes out how by the appliances of falsehood he may surpass the evidences of truth. He cloaks himself about on this side and on that, and against that wherein he might have been found out, he looks about for an answer resembling truth, whereas if he had been minded to tell the truth, assuredly he might have done it without pains. For the path of truth is smooth, and the road of falsehood grievous. And hence it is said by the Prophet, They have taught their tongue to speak lies, and wearied themselves to commit iniquity. [Jer. 9, 5] Therefore it is well said, Trouble shall make him afraid, and straits besiege him; in that in himself he is undone in the toilsomeness of fear, who forsakes the way of truth.

Roman Catholic Ordinary Calendar – rosary,team

Christ our Lord was nailed to the cross to set humankind free from the shipwreck of the world. Moses, in the Old Testament, set up a bronze serpent on a pole in the midst of those who were dying. He had enjoined the people, when they saw this sign, to look at it in order to be healed (Num 21,6f.). So powerful a remedy issued from it against the bite of the serpents that the wounded, looking towards the serpent on the cross, began to hope and at once regained their health. Our Lord did not fail to call this episode to mind in the Gospel when he said: «As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of man be lifted up» (Jn 3,14)… The serpent, then, is the first to be crucified, by Moses. This is only right as the devil was the first to sin in the sight of the Lord (Gn 3)… It was placed, very rightly, crosswise on a pole since man had been deceived by the subterfuge of the tree of desire and, from henceforth, is saved by a pole cut from another tree… After the serpent, it is man who is crucified in the Savior, not just to punish the guilty party, to be sure, but also to punish the crime. The first cross takes revenge on the serpent, the second on its venom…: the venom that its persuasion had insinuated into man is expelled and healed… This is what our Lord did through his human nature: he, the innocent one, suffers; in him, the disobedience initiated by the devil’s notorious deceit, is put to rights and, set free from his sin, man is set free from death. Since we have as our Lord, Jesus, who has freed us by his Passion, let us keep our eyes constantly fixed on him, let us always hope to find in this sign the remedy for our wounds. If the poison of avarice should spread within us, let us look at the cross and it will deliver us; if that scorpion, desire, should gnaw at us, let us pray earnestly to it and it will heal us; if the bites of our earthly thoughts should tear us, let us pray once more and we shall live. These are our souls’ spiritual serpents: it was to tread them underfoot that our Savior was crucified. He himself says to us: «Behold, I have given you the power to tread on serpents and scorpions… and nothing will harm you» (Lk 10,19).

Roman Catholic Ordinary Calendar – rosary,team