Let us rejoice in the Lord, with songs let us praise him.
Year: B(II). Psalm week: 2. Liturgical Colour: Green.
Other saints: Saint Ita (c.475 - 570)
Ireland
She was born in County Waterford and founded a community of women in County Limerick, at a place now called Killeedy after her. She was known for her sanctity and for her gift of prophecy and was held in veneration by a large number of saints, both men and women. See the article in
Wikipedia.
Other saints: St Remigius, Remy or Remi (437 - 533)
France
He was the son of an aristocratic family in Laon in Picardy. He studied at Rheims and soon became so noted for his learning and sanctity, and his high status, that he was elected Bishop of Rheims in his 22nd year, though still a layman. He also held high office in the kingdom of France. He was a friend of Clovis I, the pagan King of the Franks, and baptized him on Christmas Day of a year which historians have variously estimated as being between 496 and 499, not long after Clovis’s victory over the Alamanni at the battle of Tolbiac. According to St Gregory of Tours some three thousand Franks were baptized at the same time. This was the beginning of the Catholic history of France, and ever since the 11th century every French king has been crowned at Rheims.
About the author of the Second Reading in today's Office of Readings:
Second Reading: St Ignatius of Antioch (- 107)
He was the second bishop of Antioch after St Peter (the first being Evodius). He was arrested (some writers believe that he must have been denounced by a fellow-Christian), condemned to death, and transported to Rome to be thrown to the wild beasts in the arena. In one of his letters he describes the soldiers who were escorting him as being like “ten leopards, who when they are kindly treated only behave worse.”
In the course of his journey he wrote seven letters to various churches, in which he dealt wisely and deeply with Christ, the organisation of the Church, and the Christian life. They are important documents for the early history of the Church, and they also reveal a deeply holy man who accepts his fate and begs the Christians in Rome not to try to deprive him of the crown of martyrdom.
He was martyred in 107.
Liturgical colour: green
The theological virtue of hope is symbolized by the colour green, just as the burning fire of love is symbolized by red. Green is the colour of growing things, and hope, like them, is always new and always fresh. Liturgically, green is the colour of Ordinary Time, the orderly sequence of weeks through the year, a season in which we are being neither single-mindedly penitent (in purple) nor overwhelmingly joyful (in white).
| Mid-morning reading (Terce) | Jeremiah 31:33 |
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This is the covenant I will make with the House of Israel when those days arrive – it is the Lord who speaks. Deep within them I will plant my Law, writing it on their hearts. Then I will be their God and they shall be my people.
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| Noon reading (Sext) | Jeremiah 32:40 |
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I will make an everlasting covenant with them. I will not cease in my efforts for their good, and I will put respect for me into their hearts, so that they turn from me no more.
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| Afternoon reading (None) | Ezekiel 34:31 |
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You, my sheep, are the flock I shall pasture, and I am your God – it is the Lord who speaks.
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