Wednesday of the 19th Week in Ordinary Time
Optional Memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal, religious (†1641 Moulins – France). Spiritual disciple of St. Francis de Sales, under whose direction she co-founded the Visitation Sisters.
See also:
Mass Readings
First Reading – Ezekiel 9:1-7; 10:18-22
The LORD cried loud for me to hear: Come, you scourges of the city! With that I saw six men coming from the direction of the upper gate which faces the north, each with a destroying weapon in his hand. In their midst was a man dressed in linen, with a writer’s case at his waist. They entered and stood beside the bronze altar. Then he called to the man dressed in linen with the writer’s case at his waist, saying to him: Pass through the city, through Jerusalem, and mark a “Thau” on the foreheads of those who moan and groan over all the abominations that are practiced within it. To the others I heard the LORD say: Pass through the city after him and strike! Do not look on them with pity nor show any mercy! Old men, youths and maidens, women and children–wipe them out! But do not touch any marked with the “Thau”; begin at my sanctuary. So they began with the men, the elders, who were in front of the temple. Defile the temple, he said to them, and fill the courts with the slain; then go out and strike in the city.
Responsorial Psalm – Ps 113:1-2, 3-4, 5-6(R. 4b)
R. The glory of the Lord is higher than the skies.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Praise, you servants of the LORD,
praise the name of the LORD.
Blessed be the name of the LORD
both now and forever. R.
From the rising to the setting of the sun
is the name of the LORD to be praised.
High above all nations is the LORD;
above the heavens is his glory. R.
Who is like the LORD, our God, who is enthroned on high,
and looks upon the heavens and the earth below? R.
Gospel – Mt 18:15-20
Jesus said to his disciples: “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that every fact may be established on the testimony of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell the Church. If he refuses to listen even to the Church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector. Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again, amen, I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything for which they are to pray, it shall be granted to them by my heavenly Father. For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”
Featured Saints
Blessed Innocent XI, Pope (†1689). He undertook an extensive work of moralizing customs. He imposed strict norms on bishops while he himself set an example of austerity.
Blessed Karl Leisner, priest and martyr (†1945). Member of the Apostolic Movement of Schönstatt; he died as a result of abuse suffered while imprisoned in Dachau concentration camp, in Germany.
Blessed Florian Stepniak, priest and martyr (†1942). Franciscan Capuchin who died in a gas chamber in the concentration camp of Dachau, Germany.
Blessed Victoria Díez y Bustos de Molina, virgin and martyr (†1936). Killed by firing squad during the religious persecutions of the Spanish Civil War; she died exhorting other Catholics to martyrdom.
Sts. James Do Mai Nam, priest, Anthony Dich Nguyen and Michael Nguyen, martyrs (†1838). Priest, farmer and doctor respectively, beheaded in Nam Ðinh, Vietnam, after suffering terrible tortures.
Blessed Peter Jarrige de Puyredon, priest and martyr (†1794). Canon of Saint-Yrieix, left to die in a crowded prison-ship for refusing to take the oath of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy.
Photo gallery
