Happy Feast of St. Anthony! Pray for Vocation!
Happy Feast of St. Anthony! Pray for Vocation!
First of all, I wish you all a happy Feast of St. Anthony! St. Anthony celebrates the patron saint day. June 13 is the actual Feast Day of St. Anthony, and this year it falls on Saturday.
I don't know if you paid attention to the statue of St. Anthony. The statue of St. Anthony in Park Falls has lilies, Child Jesus, and a book. The lily is meant to remind us of St. Anthony’s purity and our own need to pray for the grace of purity in times of temptation. There is a book in his hand. According to the story, he had a hand-printed book of Psalms, which was very important to him. He had notes and components to teach the students. He lost this book, and St. Anthony prayed, and the person who stole the book brought it back. That is where the tradition of praying to St. Anthony for the stolen items began. There are many versions of St. Anthony cradling the Christ child. The popular one is that St. Anthony had traveled to a local hermitage to spend time in prayer. One night, while deep in prayer, Jesus appeared to him as a child. The room was filled with light and laughter as St. Anthony held the Christ child in his arms. The owner of the hermitage was curious to see the light and came to investigate, but was surprised to find St. Anthony and the Christ child. When the vision ended, St. Anthony found the honor of the house on his knees at the door. St. Anthony begged him not to share the story until after Anthony’s death. Let us ask the intercession of St. Anthony for each one of us, our families, and the cluster Community.
Friday, June 12, was the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. It was the day of prayer for the sanctification of priests. Let us pray for the vocation. The eleventh Sunday Gospel reading is the commissioning of the twelve and sending them out for the mission. The Gospel, paired with the first reading from the book of Exodus (19:2-6), recounts God entering into the covenant with his people at Mount Sinai. God reminded Moses of what God had done for his people and instructed that he wants all His chosen people to be a kingdom of holy priests to offer prayer and sacrifice, and to keep his covenant. God says that all His people are special, set apart, and holy, and that they should pay attention to their exalted position.
The Israelites at the foot of Mount Sinai is a type of the foundation of the Catholic Church. Catechism of the Catholic Church 751 says, “The word 'Church' (Latin ecclesia, from the Greek ek-ka-lein, to 'call out of') means a convocation or an assembly. It designates the assemblies of the people, usually for a religious purpose. Ekklesia is used frequently in the Greek Old Testament for the assembly of the Chosen People before God, above all for their assembly on Mount Sinai, where Israel received the Law and was established by God as his holy people. By calling itself "Church," the first community of Christian believers recognized itself as heir to that assembly. In the Church, God is "calling together" his people from all the ends of the earth. The equivalent Greek term Kyriake, from which the English word Church and the German Kirche are derived, means "what belongs to the Lord."
In the Gospel of Matthew 9:36-10:8, the first part of the Gospel, Jesus feels compassion towards the people. In most of chapter 9, Matthew talks about Jesus' healing ministry. Those in need of spiritual and physical healing are close to Jesus’ heart. Jesus chose the twelve as laborers to shepherd the lost sheep, and he instructed them to pray fervently for the laborers: vocation.
In the second part of the Gospel, Jesus prepared them for mission by giving them authority, commissioning the twelve, and delivering the missionary sermon before sending them to the surrounding Galilean villages. The Kingdom of God is to be announced first to the Jewish people: the chosen people. CCC 543 says, “Everyone is called to enter the kingdom. First announced to the children of Israel, this messianic kingdom is intended to accept men of all nations. To enter it, one must first accept Jesus' word: The word of the Lord is compared to a seed which is sown in a field; those who hear it with faith and are numbered among the little flock of Christ have truly received the kingdom. Then, by its own power, the seed sprouts and grows until the harvest.”
We read the final commissioning before the ascension in the Gospel of Matthew 28:19&20, “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Through Baptism, the faithful are incorporated into a body, the Church, which the risen Lord builds up and sustains through the Eucharist. The Eucharist is the root and center of the community, and is the source of communion among the members of the Church. By giving us his Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, the Lord transforms us into one Body, the church, and sends us out to share the faith with others in our daily lives.