Saturday 16 October 2021
Saturday of week 28 in Ordinary Time
or Saint Hedwig, Religious
or Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, Virgin
Spiritual Reading
Your Second Reading from the Office of Readings:
Saturday of week 28 in Ordinary Time
From the Second Vatican Council's pastoral constitution "Gaudium et spes" on the Church in the modern world
I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last
Only by faith can it be seen how the earthly and heavenly city exist together and interpenetrate each other. This is a mystery at the heart of human history – a history that will continue to be disturbed by sin until the splendour of the children of God is fully revealed.
The Church pursues her own purpose, which is salvation, and communicates the divine life to mankind. In a sense, she also takes the light that comes from that life and reflects and refracts it so that it shines onto every part of the earth. Most of all, she does this by healing and uplifting the dignity of the human person, by strengthening the bonds that hold human society together and by imbuing daily human activity with a deeper meaning and importance. Thus the Church believes that through her individual members and by her community as a whole she can give great gifts to the family of man and make its history more human.
While the Church gives help to the world and receives much from the world, she has only one end in view: that the kingdom of God may come and that the salvation of all mankind may be accomplished. Whatever good the pilgrim people of God has been able to give to the human race during its sojourn on earth, that good comes from the fact that the Church herself is the universal sacrament of salvation; she both manifests the mystery of God’s love for man and puts it into action.
For the word of God, through whom all things were made, became flesh himself so that, being a perfect man, he could save mankind and sum up all things in himself. The Lord is the end towards which human history is heading, a single point at which the yearnings of history and civilisation converge, a single point that is the centre of the human race, the fulfilment of all joys and all desires. He is the one whom the Father has raised from the dead, lifted up and seated at his right hand, making him the judge of the living and the dead. United and given life in his Spirit we journey on our pilgrimage towards the consummation of human history and fulfilment of the plan of God’s love, to bring everything together under Christ, as head, everything in the heavens and everything on earth.
The Lord himself has said: Very soon now, I shall be with you again, bringing the reward to be given to every man according to what he deserves. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.
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Other choices for today:
Saint Hedwig, Religious
The wedding of Henry the Bearded with Hedwig of of Andechs (14th century).
A contemporary life of St Hedwig
She was always directed toward God
Hedwig knew that those living stones that were to be placed in the building of the heavenly Jerusalem had to be smoothed out by buffetings and pressures in this world, and that many tribulations would be needed before she could cross over into the glory of her heavenly homeland. And so she exposed herself completely to the waters of suffering and continually exhausted her body with rigorous chastisement. Because of such great daily fasts and abstinences she grew so thin that many wondered how such a feeble and delicate woman could endure these torments.
She afflicted herself with continual mortification of the flesh, but she did so with prudent discretion. The more attentively she kept watch, the more she grew in the strength of the spirit and in grace, and the more the fire of devotion and divine love blazed within her. She was often borne aloft with such ardent desire and impelled towards God that she would no longer be aware of the things that were around her.
Just as her devotion made her always seek after God, so her generous piety turned her towards her neighbour, and she bountifully bestowed alms on the needy. She gave aid to colleges and to religious persons dwelling within or outside monasteries, to widows and orphans, to the weak and the feeble, to lepers and those bound in chains or imprisoned, to travellers and needy women nursing infants. She allowed no one who came to her for help to go away uncomforted.
And because this servant of God never neglected the practice of all good works, God also conferred on her such grace that when she lacked human means to do good, and her own powers failed, the divine power of the sufferings of Christ strengthened her to respond to the needs of her neighbours. And so through divine favour she had the power to relieve the bodily and spiritual troubles of all who sought her help.
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Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, Virgin
"St Margaret Mary Alacoque Contemplating the Sacred Heart" (c.1765) by Corrado Giaquinto (1703-1766).
A letter by St Margaret Mary Alacoque
We must know the love of Christ which surpasses all knowledge
It seems to me that our Lord’s earnest desire to have his sacred heart honoured in a special way is directed towards renewing the effects of redemption in our souls. For the sacred heart is an inexhaustible fountain and its sole desire is to pour itself out into the hearts of the humble so as to free them and prepare them to lead lives according to his good pleasure.
From this divine heart three streams flow endlessly. The first is the stream of mercy for sinners; it pours into their hearts sentiments of contrition and repentance. The second is the stream of charity which helps all in need and especially aids those seeking perfection to find the means of surmounting their difficulties. From the third stream flow love and light for the benefit of his friends who have attained perfection; these he wishes to unite to himself so that they may share his knowledge and commandments and, in their individual ways, devote themselves wholly to advancing his glory.
This divine heart is an abyss of all blessings, and into it the poor should submerge all their needs. It is an abyss of joy in which all of us can immerse our sorrows. It is an abyss of lowliness to counteract our foolishness, an abyss of mercy for the wretched, an abyss of love to meet our every need.
Therefore, you must unite yourselves to the heart of our Lord Jesus Christ, both at the beginning of your conversion in order to obtain proper dispositions, and at its end in order to make reparation. Are you making no progress in prayer? Then you need only offer God the prayers which the Saviour has poured out for us in the sacrament of the altar. Offer God his fervent love in reparation for your sluggishness. In the course of every activity pray as follows: “My God, I do this or I endure that in the heart of your Son and according to his holy counsels. I offer it to you in reparation for anything blameworthy or imperfect in my actions.” Continue to do this in every circumstance of life. And every time that some punishment, affliction or injustice comes your way, say to yourself: “Accept this as sent to you by the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ in order to unite yourself to him.”
But above all preserve peace of heart. This is more valuable than any treasure. In order to preserve it there is nothing more useful than renouncing your own will and substituting for it the will of the divine heart. In this way his will can carry out for us whatever contributes to his glory, and we will be happy to be his subjects and to trust entirely in him.
Copyright © 1996-2021 Universalis Publishing Limited: see www.universalis.com. Scripture readings from the Jerusalem Bible are published and copyright © 1966, 1967 and 1968 by Darton, Longman & Todd, Ltd and Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc, and used by permission of the publishers. Text of the Psalms: Copyright © 1963, The Grail (England). Used with permission of A.P. Watt Ltd. All rights reserved.