Thursday 23 December 2021
23 December
(optional commemoration of Saint John of Kęty, Priest)
Spiritual Reading
Your Second Reading from the Office of Readings:
23 December
From a treatise by St Hippolytus against the Noetic heresy
The hidden sacrament is revealed
There is, brethren, one God, the knowledge of whom we gain from the Holy Scriptures and from no other source. Whatever things the Holy Scriptures declare, at these let us look; and whatever they teach, let us learn it; and as the Father wills our belief to be, let us believe; and as he wills the Son to be glorified, let us glorify him; and as he wills the Holy Spirit to be bestowed, let us receive him. Not according to our own will, nor according to our own mind, nor yet storming by force the things which are given by God, but even as he has chosen to teach them by the Holy Scriptures, so let us discern them.
God, subsisting alone, and having nothing coeval with himself, chose to create the world. And conceiving the world in mind, and willing and uttering the Word, he made it; and at once it appeared, formed it in the way he desired. For us it is sufficient simply to know that nothing was coeval with God. Outside him there was nothing; but he, while existing alone, yet existed in plurality. For he did not lack reason, or wisdom, or power, or counsel. All things were in him, and he was the All. At a time and in a manner chosen by him he made his Word manifest, and through his Word he made all things.
He bears this Word in himself, as yet invisible to the created world. He makes him visible, uttering the voice first, and begetting him as Light of Light. He presents him to the world as its Lord; and whereas the Word was visible formerly to God alone, and invisible to the world which is made, God makes the Word visible in order that the world might see him and be able to be saved.
This is the mind which came forth into the world and was manifested as the Son of God. All things came into being through him, and he alone comes from the Father.
He gave us the Law and the prophets; and in giving them, he made them speak by the Holy Ghost, in order that, receiving the inspiration of the Father’s power, they might declare the Father’s counsel and will.
Thus, then, was the Word made manifest, even as the blessed John says. For he sums up the things that were said by the prophets, and shows that this is the Word, by whom all things were made. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him, and without him nothing was made. And later, The world was made by him, and the world did not know him; he came to his own, and his own did not receive him.
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Other choices for today:
Saint John of Kęty, Priest
A statue in the market square at Kęty.
A letter of Pope Clement XIII
In heart and in speech he was at one with God
Saint John of Kęty deserves a high place among the great saints and scholars who practise what they preach and defend the true faith against those who attack it. When heresy and schism were gaining ground in neighbouring territories, his teaching at the University of Kraków was untainted by any error. At the pulpit he fought to raise the standard of holiness among the faithful, and his preaching was reinforced by his humility, his chastity, his compassion, his bodily penance and the other qualities of a dedicated priest and apostle.
He was a unique contribution to the reputation and credit of the professors of the university; he also bequeathed a wonderful example to those of his profession, an inspiration of complete dedication to duty and to their teaching – in theology and other sciences – for the honour and glory of the one God.
With the sense of worship that he brought to his teaching of the sacred sciences he combined humility. He never put himself above another, but treated himself as of no account, even though he was acknowledged by all as their master. So far was he from pretences that he even wished to be an object of contempt in the eyes of all who underestimated his worth. He could take their insults and cutting remarks in stride.
With his humility went a rare and childlike simplicity: the thoughts of his heart were revealed in his words and actions. If he suspected that someone had taken offence at speaking the truth, before going to the altar he would ask forgiveness for what was not so much his own sin as the other person’s misunderstanding. Every day after his round of duties he would go straight from the lecture room to church. There he would spend long hours in contemplation and prayer before the hidden Christ of the Eucharist. The God in his heart and the God on his lips were one and the same God.
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.