MASS READINGS
March 21, 2007 (Readings on USCCB website)
COLLECT PRAYER
Lord, you reward virtue and forgive the repentant sinner. Grant us your forgiveness as we come before you confessing our guilt. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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"Do not be amazed at this, because the hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and will come out, those who have done good deeds to the resurrection of life, but those who have done wicked deeds to the resurrection of condemnation (Jn. 5:28-29)."
This day was called the 'Feria of the great scrutiny,' because in the Church of Rome, after the necessary inquiries and examinations, the list of the catechumens, who were to receive Baptism, was closed. The Station is held in the basilica of St. Paul outside the walls, both because of the size of the building, and also in order to honor the apostle of the Gentiles by offering him these new recruits, which the Church was about to make from paganism. The reader will be interested and edified by a description of this ceremony.
The Station today is at St. Paul outside-the-walls. On this day the catechumens were subjected to a new examination and, if approved, were registered for Baptism. The beginning of the four Gospels was read to them, and the Creed and the Our Father was "given," or explained to them. Today's Mass has a decided Baptismal character. The joys of this day were anticipated on Laetare Sunday.
Meditation - Submission and Christian Obedience
Continual submission to the holy will of God is the most universal of all virtues and its practice should be most familiar to you, since at every moment there arise opportunities of renouncing your own will and submitting to the will of God. His will is always easy to recognize. God has willed that all things that are extremely necessary should also be very easy to obtain. The sun, for instance, and air and water, and the other elements are most necessary for man's natural life; so, also, these things are common and freely available to everyone.
In the same way, since God has placed you in this world only to do His holy will, and your salvation depends upon this, it is, therefore, extremely necessary that you should easily know God's will in all that must be done. So, He has made it easily recognizable, manifesting His holy will in five chief ways which are very certain and evident:
- by His commandments;
- by His counsels;
- by the laws, rules and obligations of our state in life;
- by the authority of those placed over you or directing you;
- by events, since every happening in an infallible sign that God so wills, either by absolute or by permissive will.
Excerpted from The Life and Kingdom of Jesus in Christian Souls, St. John Eudes
Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Station with Sant'Apollinare in Campo Marzio or Sant'Apollinare alle Terme (St. Apollinaris at the Baths):
The Station in Rome is in the church of St. Apollinaris, who was a disciple of St. Peter, and afterwards bishop of Ravenna. He was martyred. The church was founded in the early Middle Ages, probably in the 7th century. Since 1990, the basilica has been the chapel of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, entrusted to Opus Dei.
For more on Sant'Apollinare in Campo Marzio, see:
For further information on the Station Churches, see The Stational Church.
