Greetings on this the Memorial of Saint Aloysius Gonzaga, Religious
Readings: 2 Cor 9:6-11; Ps 112:1bc-2, 3-4, 9; Mt 6:1-6, 16-18
Notes: Summertime!
The longest day of the year.
How shall we spend the day? That is the parts of our day we can control (daily optional time not obligation time).
Does the gospel reading look familiar?
Of course it does but there is another connection I want you to consider.
The gospel reading today is the gospel reading for Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. We just celebrated our first Sunday in Ordinary Time (the 11th Sunday) since Ash Wednesday. Our Sunday celebrations until now were either Sundays of Lent, Easter Sunday, Sundays of Easter, or the several Solemnities of the Lord.
I think we are challenged today to remember that in Lent we are encouraged to accentuate our Almsgiving, Prayer and Fasting. During Ordinary Time we are reminded that we are to maintain a certain purposefulness of these same practices.
Freely.
Bountifully.
If you will, ASH WEDNESDAY brackets EASTER with ORDINARY WEDNESDAY.
Today happens to be a memorial but it is also Wednesday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time.
Interesting reflection by the Franciscans:
Reflection
As a saint who fasted, scourged himself, sought solitude and prayer, and did not look on the faces of women, Aloysius seems an unlikely patron of youth in a society where asceticism is confined to training camps of football teams and boxers, and sexual permissiveness has little left to permit. Can an overweight and air-conditioned society deprive itself of anything? It will when it discovers a reason, as Aloysius did. The motivation for letting God purify us is the experience of God loving us in prayer.
Here: https://www.franciscanmedia.org/saint-of-the-day/saint-aloysius-gonzaga/
First Reading
Brothers and sisters, consider this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
Responsorial
Blessed the man who fears the Lord.
Gospel Acclamation
Whoever loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him and we will come to him.
Gospel
But when you give alms.
But when you pray.
But when you fast.
Peace be with you,
Deacon Gerry