SAINT QUOTE OF THE DAY : Saturday - July 24, 2021

 Saturday - July 24, 2021

While you are proclaiming peace with your lips, 

be careful to have it even more fully in your heart.

 

-- St. Francis of Assisi

July 24, 2021

Saturday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 400

 

Reading 1                                                     Ex 24:3-8

When Moses came to the people

and related all the words and ordinances of the LORD, 

they all answered with one voice,

“We will do everything that the LORD has told us.”

Moses then wrote down all the words of the LORD and,

rising early the next day,

he erected at the foot of the mountain an altar

and twelve pillars for the twelve tribes of Israel.

Then, having sent certain young men of the children of Israel

to offer burnt offerings and sacrifice young bulls

as peace offerings to the LORD,

Moses took half of the blood and put it in large bowls;

the other half he splashed on the altar.

Taking the book of the covenant, he read it aloud to the people,

who answered, “All that the LORD has said, we will heed and do.”

Then he took the blood and sprinkled it on the people, saying,

“This is the blood of the covenant

that the LORD has made with you

in accordance with all these words of his.”

 

Responsorial Psalm                                              50:1b-2, 5-6, 14-15

 

R.     (14a)  Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.

 

God the LORD has spoken and summoned the earth,

    from the rising of the sun to its setting.

From Zion, perfect in beauty,

    God shines forth.

R.    Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.

“Gather my faithful ones before me,

    those who have made a covenant with me by sacrifice.”

And the heavens proclaim his justice;

    for God himself is the judge.

R.    Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.

“Offer to God praise as your sacrifice

     and fulfill your vows to the Most High;

Then call upon me in time of distress;

     I will rescue you, and you shall glorify me.”

R.    Offer to God a sacrifice of praise.

 

Alleluia                                                                      Jas 1:21bcJn 14:23

R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you

and is able to save your souls.

R. Alleluia, alleluia.

 

Gospel                                                                       Mt 13:24-30

Jesus proposed a parable to the crowds.

“The Kingdom of heaven may be likened to a man

who sowed good seed in his field.

While everyone was asleep his enemy came

and sowed weeds all through the wheat, and then went off.

When the crop grew and bore fruit, the weeds appeared as well.

The slaves of the householder came to him and said,

‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field?

Where have the weeds come from?’

He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’

His slaves said to him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’

He replied, ‘No, if you pull up the weeds

you might uproot the wheat along with them.

Let them grow together until harvest;

then at harvest time I will say to the harvesters,

“First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles for burning;

but gather the wheat into my barn.”’”

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WHAT TO DO ABOUT THE WEEDS GROWING IN OUR CHURCH

We all have the incredibly important responsibility of teaching the truth. To do this, we need to study Church documents and the Catechism -- the orthodoxy provided to us by the traditional Church Magisterium. We have to make sure we understand the truth as accurately as possible.

 

And we have the responsibility of standing firm, unwilling to compromise the truth. And many times we personally would be rejected by friends and family. It's the nature of this time that we're living through.

 

We all have this responsibility. And when we're rejected, our consolation is that we're living through a very interesting time, a period of purification in the Church and in the world. God is exposing evil in his holy light. It's difficult to watch, but it's good! The followers of Christ who have been sitting on the proverbial fence, with one foot in the Church and one foot in the world, are finding the fence to be more and more painful. They're getting an important opportunity to see what they've been ignoring and to repent and wholeheartedly jump fully into God's kingdom.

 

In this Saturday's Gospel reading, Jesus talks about the weeds sown by the enemy. His picture of a field of wheat infected with weeds is what our Church has been looking like for a long time. The weeds are the people who've been choosing moral relativism instead of the commandments of God. They've chosen "political correctness" instead of the counter-cultural ways of Christ. They've been protecting their image instead of humbly laying down their lives for sake of protecting the sheep of Christ. They've closed their minds to the uncomfortable truths that challenge the worldview they've adopted.

 

Notice how Jesus handles the problem. In loving compassion, he holds off the uprooting of the weeds, lest good people get pulled away with them. But this can't last forever because the weeds are spreading.

 

Jesus is teaching us an important lesson in this parable. How are you and I handling the weeds? Do we care enough to speak the truth in the hope that weedy bishops, priests and laity will listen and repent? Do we lovingly pray for public figures who claim to be Catholic yet promote abortion, discriminate against truth-tellers, or encourage other immoral activities? Do we care about the eternal souls of "Christians" who are in mortal sin -- enough to speak up before it's too late?

 

Jesus warned that the time of merciful waiting for repentance will come to an end: "At harvest time I will say to the harvesters, 'First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles for burning; but gather the wheat into my barn.'"

 

What weedy people do you know personally? Pray that God will not let them die before they are ready and willing to spend eternity with Jesus. I've found this prayer to be very effective. This is God's desire for them, and your prayer will unite with God's power as he holds off their weed-pulling time.

 

Today's Prayer

 

Beloved Jesus, Give me the grace of not falling into those temptations that block Your Word from producing abundant fruit in me and in those people You send to me. Amen.

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God Bless You.....

The Rosary Family

The mother of Jesus promised St. Dominic that, “one day through the rosary & the scapular I shall save the world!”