Third Sunday in Lent: The Shame that Leads to Sorrow
by VP
Posted on Sunday March 23, 2025 at 12:00AM in Sunday Sermons
Gerard Seghers: Repentance of St Peter
"Yea, rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it."—LUKE xi. 28.
I. The noble calling to hear and keep the word of God.
2. To our shame, we have often neglected both hearing and keeping it.
3. The shame of having preferred sin and the friendship of the devil to keeping the word of God.
WE cannot help but be amazed when we hear these words of our Blessed Lord. Can anyone be more blessed than His own Immaculate Mother? No; but her greater blessedness was not simply in being His Mother, but being His worthy Mother. "Yea, rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it."
This leads us to think, what a noble calling is ours to hear the word of God and keep it. What blessedness should be ours if we had done so; but if we have not done so, what shame and confusion. Where is the blessedness in our careless, negligent, and sinful lives?
Let us look into our souls, and shame will force us to be humble and obtain forgiveness. Hear the word of God! How many a time has the hearing of the word of God been distasteful to us, and we have shirked the opportunity of listening to it. A short, early Mass to avoid a sermon; no prayer-book with us to whisper a word of God, rather distractions rioting in our minds, our thoughts engrossed with all manner of memories and desires, but with no remembrance of any word of God. Spiritual reading! oh, that is left for nuns and priests! Newspapers, novels, ah! yes; our minds are enticed by something else than the word of God. Even if time hangs heavy on our hands, there is no desire to listen to that. That word which should steady our minds, give us pause to think whither all this foolish dissipation of mind will lead us. That word that should nerve us to resolve to do better and give ourselves to obeying God. That word which should give us courage, based on the promises of God, to do our best. With what shame do we find our souls overwhelmed by our sinful neglect in hearing the word of God.
But looking back, perhaps there was a time when we heard the word of God and loved to hear it. Words that lived in our souls when we were young, and which conscience will not let die, and makes them re-echo in times of temptation and sinfulness. Certain it is that we have all heard more than we have kept. That, indeed, is the important, the all-important, part. To have heard and not to have kept! "O Lord, Thou knowest my reproach, my confusion, and my shame (Ps. lxix. 10).
It is when we examine why we have not kept the word of God that we realize our shame. Why did we not? Because we loved and preferred to be careless and negligent, and even sinful. Yes, we have not kept the word of God because of our sins. When we look back and see the worthlessness of our sins, it is then that we are covered with shame and confusion. What good have they ever done for us, or will do for us? And yet we have preferred them to keeping the word of God. That would have made us blessed; our sins have brought nothing on us but shame; even in remembering them we are ashamed, but how much more, terribly more, when we shall stand in judgment for those sins; when the words of the prophet come true, and the Judge shall say: "I will bring an everlasting reproach upon you, and a perpetual shame, that will never be forgotten" (Jer. xxxiii. 40).
And instead of keeping the word of God, we find, on reflecting, that we have given ear to the whispers of the devil. Though we knew in our hearts that he was the father of lies, yet we listened to his seducing temptations, we gave half credence to his boasts of making us free and letting us do what we liked. Yes, in actual fact, we have preferred the mock friendship of the devil to being the faithful ones and blessed ones for keeping the word of God.
The shame of it! for we have despised and rejected the friendship and the love of God. We are the children of God - the good God, our Creator, our Father, Who has endowed us with immortal souls, Who has at Baptism enrolled our names in the Book of Life, Who has given us Himself in the Blessed Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, Who Himself wishes to be our eternal reward in the Kingdom of His glory. We have despised this good God in not keeping His blessed word, but preferring to sin and live in sin. We are those of whom it is said, "Whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things" (Phil. iii. 19).
Let us change our hearts and be ashamed of what we have done preferring sinfulness, the friendship of the devil, to the blessedness of keeping the word of God. To be thus ashamed is a grace from God. It is the beginning of humility, of sorrow, of true repentance. This shame for the wasted past will nerve us to begin now to be in earnest, not to allow Lent to pass by carelessly. This holy shame will make us banish dissipation of mind, the love of vain and earthly pleasures, and turn our hearts all to God. This shame will fill our hearts with holy resolve and courage. We are poor indeed in God's sight, for there is nothing but shame to clothe our souls as we kneel before Him. But God is not only good, not only powerful, but God is merciful. And when He beholds our hearts grieving in shame over our wasted life, His mercy will bless that shame into repentance, and a contrite and humble heart God will not despise." Short Sermons on the Epistles & Gospels of the Sundays of the Year By Rev. Fr. Francis Paulinus Hickey, O.S.B. 1922
Day 19. Lent with the Cure d'Ars: On Prayer
by VP
Posted on Sunday March 23, 2025 at 12:00AM in Lenten Sermons
"Our catechism teaches us, my children, that prayer is an elevation, an application of our mind and heart to God, to make known to Him our wants and to ask for His assistance.
We do not see the good God, my children; but He sees us, He hears us, He wills that we should raise towards Him what is most noble in us - our mind and our heart. When we pray with attention, with humility of mind and of heart, we quit the earth, we rise to heaven, we penetrate into the Bosom of God, we go and converse with the angels and the saints.
It was by prayer that the saints reached heaven; and by prayer we too shall reach it. Yes, my children, prayer is the source of all graces, the mother of all virtues, the efficacious and universal way by which God wills that we should come to Him.
He says to us: "Ask, and you shall receive." No one but God could make such promises and keep them. See, the good God does not say to us, "Ask such and such a thing, and I will grant it;" but He says in general: "If you ask the Father anything in My name, He will give it to you."
O my children! Ought not this promise to fill us with confidence, and to make us pray fervently all the days of our poor life? Ought we not to be ashamed of our idleness, of our indifference to prayer, when our Divine Savior, the Dispenser of all graces, has given us such touching examples of it? for you know that the Gospel tells us He prayed often, and even passed the night in prayer? Are we as just, as holy, as this Divine Savior? Have we no graces to ask for? Let us enter into ourselves; let us consider. Do not the continual needs of our soul and of our body warn us to have recourse to Him who alone can supply them? How many enemies to vanquish! the devil, the world, and ourselves.
How many bad habits to overcome, how many passions to subdue, how many sins to efface! In so frightful and painful a situation, what remains to us, my children? The armor of the saints: prayer, that necessary virtue, indispensable to good as well as to bad Christians. Within the reach of the ignorant as well as the learned, enjoined to the simple and to the enlightened, it is the virtue of all mankind; it is the science of all the faithful! Everyone on the earth who has a heart, everyone who has the use of reason, ought to love and pray to God; to have recourse to Him when He is irritated; to thank Him when He confers favors; to humble themselves when He strikes.
See, my children, we are poor people, who have been taught to beg spiritually, and we do not know how to beg. We are sick people, to whom a cure has been promised, and we do not know how to ask for it. The good God does not require of us fine prayers, but prayers which come from the bottom of our heart.
St. Ignatius was once traveling with several of his companions; they each carried on their shoulders a little bag, containing what was most necessary for them on the journey. A good Christian, seeing that they were fatigued, was interiorly excited to relieve them; he asked them as a favor to let him help them to carry their burdens. They yielded to his entreaties. When they had arrived at the inn, this man who had followed them, seeing that the Fathers knelt down at a little distance from each other to pray, knelt down also. When the Fathers rose again, they were astonished to see that this man had remained prostrate all the time they were praying; they expressed to him their surprise, and asked him what he had being doing. His answer edified them very much, for he said: "I did nothing but say, Those who pray so devoutly are saints; I am their beast of burden; O Lord! I have the intention of doing what they do; I say to Thee whatever they say." These were afterwards his ordinary words, and he arrived by means of this at a sublime degree of prayer.
Thus, my children, you see that there is no one who cannot pray, and pray at all times, and in all places; by night or by day; amid the most severe labors, or in repose; in the country, at home, in traveling. The good God is everywhere ready to hear your prayers, provided you address them to Him with faith and humility."
Source: The Spirit of the Cure d'Ars by Abbe Monnin, p.259, 1865
Prayer for Lent: O Lord who, for our sake, didst fast forty days and forty nights; give us grace to use such abstinence that, our flesh being subdued to the spirit, we may worthily lament and acknowledge our wretchedness, and may obtain perfect remission and forgiveness of Thee, the God of all mercy, who livest and reignest with the Father and Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen
Source: Lent with the Cure d'Ars Compiled by the CAPGSt. Victorian and others, Martyrs, A.D. 484
by VP
Posted on Sunday March 23, 2025 at 12:00AM in Saints
" Victorian had been made proconsul of Carthage by Huneric the Arian king of the Vandals, in the fifth century. The king, after he had published his cruel edicts against the Catholics, sent a message to him, promising the most obliging terms, to heap on him the greatest wealth and the highest honours, if he would renounce his faith. The proconsul generously answered: "Tell the king that I trust in Christ. If his majesty pleases, he may condemn me to the flames, or to wild beasts, or to any torments: but I shall never consent to renounce the Catholic Church." The tyrant became furious at this answer: nor can the tortures be imagined, which he caused the saint to endure. Victorian suffered them with joy, and amidst them finished his glorious martyrdom.
Two brothers at the same time being seized, promised to be companions in the same torments and death. This favour being desired of the executioners, they were hung up in the air with heavy weights at their feet; which one of them not supporting, desired to be released. But being called upon by his brother, and put in mind of his promise, he took fresh courage, and offered himself to still greater torments. Upon which, they were burnt with plates of iron, and torn with hooks; and thus finished their glorious martyrdom.
What can we do when we see this courage and patience of the martyrs, but be confounded within ourselves, and blush at the repeated experience of our
own weakness; there being scarce any difficulty so inconsiderable, but
what is above our courage and patience? As often as any provocation is
given us, we immediately take fire, and make passionate returns. As
often as we imagine ourselves injured, affronted, or neglected, we open our breasts to the disquiets of anger
and pride, and in our hearts despise those who have inflicted injuries
upon us. O God, when wilt thou give us a better spirit, such as may
carry us through the ordinary trials of life; that we may not be thus daily overcome by trifles, whilst others triumph over the most severe torments. O God, we bow down and acknowledge our misery, but hope that thy goodness which strengthened the martyrs, will likewise be our support." The Catholic Year by Rev. Fr. John Gother
