Friday, 20 November 2009

Friday of the Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time

Today the Church celebrates : St. Edmund the Martyr (841-870)

See commentary below or click here
Saint Augustine : “All the people were hanging on his words”

2nd book of Maccabees 4:36-37.52-59.

Then Judas and his brothers said, “Now that our enemies have been crushed, let us go up to purify the sanctuary and rededicate it.” So the whole army assembled, and went up to Mount Zion. Early in the morning on the twenty-fifth day of the ninth month, that is, the month of Chislev, in the year one hundred and forty-eight, they arose and offered sacrifice according to the law on the new altar of holocausts that they had made. On the anniversary of the day on which the Gentiles had defiled it, on that very day it was reconsecrated with songs, harps, flutes, and cymbals. All the people prostrated themselves and adored and praised Heaven, who had given them success. For eight days they celebrated the dedication of the altar and joyfully offered holocausts and sacrifices of deliverance and praise. They ornamented the facade of the temple with gold crowns and shields; they repaired the gates and the priests’ chambers and furnished them with doors. There was great joy among the people now that the disgrace of the Gentiles was removed. Then Judas and his brothers and the entire congregation of Israel decreed that the days of the dedication of the altar should be observed with joy and gladness on the anniversary every year for eight days, from the twenty-fifth day of the month Chislev.

1 Chron. 29:10.11-12.

Then David blessed the LORD in the presence of the whole assembly, praying in these words: “Blessed may you be, O LORD, God of Israel our father, from eternity to eternity.
“Yours, O LORD, are grandeur and power, majesty, splendor, and glory. For all in heaven and on earth is yours; yours, O LORD, is the sovereignty; you are exalted as head over all.
“Riches and honor are from you, and you have dominion over all. In your hand are power and might; it is yours to give grandeur and strength to all.

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 19:45-48.

Then Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.'” And every day he was teaching in the temple area. The chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people, meanwhile, were seeking to put him to death, but they could find no way to accomplish their purpose because all the people were hanging on his words.

Copyright © Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, USCCB

Commentary of the day :

Saint Augustine (354-430), Bishop of Hippo (North Africa) and Doctor of the Church
Sermon on  Psalm 131[130], § 3

“All the people were hanging on his words”

We pray in God’s temple when we pray in the peace of the Church, in the unity of Christ’s body, because the Body of Christ is made up of the great mass of believers scattered throughout the world… It is in this temple, and not in the material Temple at Jerusalem, that we must pray «in spirit and truth» (Jn 4,23) if we are to be answered. The latter was «a shadow of things to come» (Col 2,17), which is why it fell to ruin… The temple that fell could not be the house of prayer of which it was said that: «My house will be called a house of prayer for all peoples» (Mc 11,17; Is 56,7; Jer 7,11).

Was it indeed the case that those who wanted to make of it «a den of thieves» were the cause of its fall? In the same way, neither do those leading a disordered life in the Church and seeking, so far as they might, to make the house of God a den of thieves, neither do those overthrow this temple. The time will come when they will be cast out beneath the blows of their sins. This gathering of the faithful, the temple of God and Body of Christ, has but one voice and sings as one person… If we want, this voice is ours; if we want, when we hear them singing we, too, will sing in our hearts.